The Kids Aren't Alright

Chapter 56: Jasper

"You know, when I told you that I would hack a computer for you, I didn't expect you to take that literally."

Finn jerks an accusing finger at his roommate. "This was his idea, not mine. I think the plan is doomed to fail. We're basically dead men walking."

"Glass half full," Ronan reminds him. There are two pink spots on the skin beneath his jutting cheekbones, and his voice is buoyed by a reckless excitement. Concocting evil plans might not be my idea of a fun night out, but it's certainly his. "It doesn't hurt to be optimistic, Fish."

"Screw optimism. The Director is about to kill us with her bare hands."

"Nah, she'd probably just shoot us dead. I heard she keeps a revolver under her pillow."

"How is that reassuring?"

"Matt said he saw her polishing it one night. Said it's custom-made."

"Once again, not reassuring. People who love their guns usually also love shooting things with their guns."

Ronan waves him off. "You're overthinking this. All we have to do is stick to the plan, and nobody will get shot."

But overthinking things is my personal specialty. I've been obsessing over this very moment all day, playing over and over in my head all the ways things could go wrong. Some of my favorite outcomes include: kitchen duty for the rest of the summer, expulsion from Lightlake, a fist to the face from the Director herself, an early and bloody death. Ronan's plan is so outrageously daring that all my waking hours have felt more like troubled nightmares. It doesn't help that it's the dead of the night, either— almost two in the morning, one of the only hours when it's actually night outside.

Curtains of shadows and mist hang heavy over the forest. The trees look like cloaked giants, towering over us with beady, watchful eyes. As I creep along the winding trail, my eyes fixed on Ronan's Metallica t-shirt, Finn's sneakers kicking against my heels, I try not to acknowledge the prickling hairs on the back of my neck, and the relentless, itching feeling that we're being observed. Then Ronan shines his flashlight (stolen from one of the counselors, I bet) and I can see the yellow eyes of half a dozen animals shining back at us. Thinking that you're being watched is bad enough, but knowing that you're being watched— it's enough to make my skin crawl.

"I can't believe I agreed to this," I mutter under my breath. When Ronan approached me at dinner to explain his plan, the word no was on the tip of the tongue. Breaking into the Director's cabin? No sane person would ever attempt it. But Ronan said that they needed someone who knows computers, and it doesn't take a genius to know that person is me. Hacking into my school's computer was the reason I got sent to this camp. It's ironic that hacking into a different computer is what's going to get me expelled.

Still, a small part of me agrees it's worth the risk. I haven't touched a computer in almost two months, and the opportunity to have a keyboard under my hands and a glowing screen in front of my face is too enticing to ignore. Before I came to Lightlake, code was my lifeblood. I spent days piecing parts together, only to take them apart again. My brain practically ran on Perl. Computers were the only reason I got through my first three years of high school: they were my pillars of order and logic, while the rest of my world was tumbling into chaos around me. So yeah, I miss them. More than I'd like to admit.

Finn sucks loudly on his front teeth, making Ronan turn and scowl at him. "Just to be perfectly clear, I'm only doing this for Clancey," Finn says, for maybe the tenth time tonight. He's been so dead-set on avenging Clancey's mysterious accident that I keep forgetting the two used to be arch-enemies. I can't imagine anyone caring about Clancey on more than a superficial level, but Finn really took his accident to heart. "After this is all over, I'm done with the crazy plotting and scheming. Done."