Chapter 3. Lorena
lorena
“I’m not going.”
“Yes, you are,” says Salma.
We’re back in our room, where we found three sets of an all-black version of the school uniform waiting for Salma in a package outside the door. She’s swiveling in her desk chair, waiting for her purplish black nail polish to dry. Tiffany is in the bathroom, retouching her makeup.
“Have you forgotten that anyone caught in a blocked-off area will be expelled?” I ask, lying back on my bed.
Salma raises her hands in exasperation, fingers widely extended. “I thought you said part of the appeal of this place was getting away from Tía Viv’s rules. Seriously, if you want to keep being lame, you’re going to have to do it on your own. I want to have fun—”
“Have you forgotten what happened the last time you had fun?” I blurt out.
Hurt flashes across Salma’s features, like a shock of lightning, and I know I screwed up.
“Sal, I didn’t mean—”
“You’re right. You should stay.” She swivels around, giving her back to me.
Just then, the door opens, and our roommate strides in. “Some of the girls are gathering in the common room to hang out before curfew. Should we join?”
Salma shrugs, and I don’t answer.
“What’s going on?” asks Tiffany, eyeing us curiously.
“Lorena’s not coming tonight,” says Salma, swiveling from side to side in her chair.
“Makes sense,” says Tiffany. “Mommy wouldn’t approve.”
She must know who I am.
“What’s your problem with me?” I ask, and Salma stops moving.
“I don’t like hypocrites,” Tiffany shoots back, as if she already had the answer locked and loaded. Then she grabs her phone and shows me the screen, like a lawyer presenting an exhibit in court.
Salma leans in as a two-second video begins to play, probably a live photo that’s been looped. I’ve only seen it once, back in February, and I’ve avoided it ever since.
I’m sitting on a couch in a packed living room, still wearing my winter coat.
Music blasts in the background, while a group of people plays beer pong, and a couple makes out against the far wall.
I’m holding a Rick and Morty bong in one hand and a beer can in the other, and I’m staring at the camera like a deer in headlights.
This is the video that wrecked Ma’s parenting credibility.
It wouldn’t have been such a big deal for anyone else, but Ma had just led a huge campaign against recreational cannabis when it was on the ballot. It felt like her detractors were waiting for me to mess up so they could rip her apart.
But why would Tiffany save it to her phone?
“Put that shit away,” says Salma, and Tiffany lowers the screen, releasing me from its hold. “If you bring up Lorena’s mom again, you’re going to need to find a new room.”
Salma’s voice is ice, same as her eyes.
“Whatever,” says Tiffany. “I’m going downstairs.”
Once she leaves, Salma checks her nails again, and I say a soft “Thanks.”
“You don’t have to come tonight if you don’t want to,” says Salma, and there’s still a chill in her demeanor.
“But if you’re just scared of what Tía Viv might say, then really think about this.
We both turned eighteen last week, which makes us grown-ass women.
It’s time you stand up for yourself and make your own fucking choices. ”
AT 10:30 PM, Salma, Tiffany, and I slip out of our room and tiptoe downstairs. Part of Trevor’s plan was for us to bring our phones so we can scout any pockets of cell service.
“I think I hear someone!” I whisper, and the three of us duck behind a couch in the common room.
Only two lights are still on—those closest to the bathroom—and the rest have been shut off, drowning most of the space in darkness. All I can see of Tiffany and Salma are the whites of their eyes.
“I don’t hear anything,” Tiffany whispers.
“Let’s go,” says Salma.
We stick close to the walls as we pad carefully down the dim passage. The illumination throughout the manor has been set so low that it’s hard to make out much of our surroundings until we reach the room with the billiards tables. This is where we said we’d meet the guys.
We huddle by the table farthest from the room’s two entrances, and I spy a shadow moving in the opposite corner.
I grab Salma’s arm, pulling her under the table with me. She yanks down on Tiffany’s arm, too.
I don’t even dare to breathe as we wait.
“It’s us.”
At the sound of Trevor’s voice, the three of us straighten.
“Did you guys run into anyone?” whispers Salma.
“No,” says Zach, who brought his camera with him.
“Where do we start?” whispers Tiffany.
“Anyone seen one of those roped-off areas Minaro was talking about?” asks Trevor.
When no one else answers, I say, “I have.”
“Good eye.” Trevor’s teeth sparkle in the darkness, and even in the poor lighting, I see his twin dimples. “Lead the way,” he says, and I march us in the direction of the dining hall.
When we get to the room with the green walls and velvet couches, the air is just one shade above pitch-black. “Back there,” I say, pointing.
“I see it,” says Trevor, edging ahead of me and making it to the velvet rope first. He pulls out his phone and touches the screen, which lights up the sign:
UNDER CONSTRUCTION. KINDLY DO NOT PASS.
He holds up his phone to look beyond the warning. “I can’t see much,” he says. “Just a long hallway, I think.”
“What are we waiting for?” Salma steps over the rope and plunges into the blackness without waiting for any of us.
Typical.
Trevor chases after my friend, and I climb over the rope next. The passage smells musty, and within a few steps, I can’t see anything.
A handheld light pops on ahead of me, then another. Salma and Trevor are using their phones to see, and I tap on my flashlight app, too.
The walls fall open around us, and we’re in a wider space blanketed in so much dust that it feels like we’re walking on freshly fallen snow. As our five light beams cast around the space, they reveal grimy white tarps covering pieces of furniture and tangles of spiderwebs clouding the ceiling.
“Anyone have service?” asks Zach. “Or see any Wi-Fi networks?”
After clicking through our phones, one by one we all report no.
“All this dust is getting in my eyes,” says Tiffany. “Have we considered this might be off-limits because it’s full of asbestos?”
Just the suggestion makes my lungs feel coated with dirty air.
“I thought you wanted to be an investigative reporter,” says Salma, illuminating the stained and bruised walls. “Don’t you want to know why the passage here was so much narrower than the others? It’s like this room is being deliberately kept out of the way.”
“I like the way you think, Hayek,” says Trevor.
“Thanks, Dimples. But why hide a whole room?”
Trevor looks like he’s stifling a grin as he says, “Let’s find out.” Then he sets down his phone so that the flashlight is aimed at a large piece of furniture and starts to pull on the tarp. Zach helps him remove it, exposing an empty bookshelf.
We uncover a few sofas next, as well as accent tables, a wardrobe, and a grand piano. Our phone lights bounce around in every direction as we keep unveiling more and more items, displacing enough dust that we sound like a chorus of sneezers.
“I found something.”
Trevor’s whisper carries through the space, even though it seems low enough that he could have been talking to himself.
He’s standing in front of the wooden wardrobe as the four of us approach.
It appears to have been custom-built into the wall because even though Trevor is shoving his body weight against it, the furniture doesn’t budge.
“What is it?” asks Zach.
Trevor opens the wardrobe’s doors and casts his flashlight across the inside. “See that?”
All I make out is blackness.
“No,” says Salma. “I don’t see anything.”
“Exactly.” Trevor reaches his hand inside, as if to prove it’s empty. “Nothing.” He leans farther in, until his arm disappears completely. “Get it yet?”
“Can you just tell us what—?”
But the rest of Tiffany’s question falls away as we watch Trevor climb inside the wardrobe and vanish from view.
“Trevor?” Salma calls out, but there’s no response.
“Did he just go to Narnia?” is all I can think to say.
“What are you, twelve?” Tiffany asks me.
“I’m going in,” says Salma, climbing after Trevor.
“Me, too,” says Tiffany, and she goes next.
Zach raises the camera to capture the wardrobe with its open doors, and the flash turns night to day.
“Come on,” he says to me as he climbs inside.
I hesitate, remembering the way Minaro looked at me like I could be a troublemaker. Then I think of what Salma, Zach, Tiffany, and those girls in the bathroom said about this school calling to them. And I wonder—what if the secret this room is hiding is one best kept buried?
But I can’t abandon Salma, so I shake off my worries and follow the others into the wardrobe. I use my phone for light, but I can’t see anyone ahead of me.
“Hello?” I ask, my voice small in the darkness. By now, I’ve taken too many steps to still be inside a piece of furniture. This passage must cut through the insides of the manor.
It’s so narrow in here that I can reach my arms out and touch both walls, which are smooth and lacking in texture. My calves start to tighten like I’m descending, and then a light appears in the distance. Once I’m closer, I shut off my phone.
The tunnel spills into a basement that’s windowless yet illuminated by a web of glowing white wires strung across the ceiling.
“What is this?” I ask in awe.
“It looks like a library,” says Zach, holding his camera like he’s recording.
Rows of bookshelves fill the space, brimming with spotless spines that match in height and style, differing only in color and thickness. It’s as if they’re all fresh off the same press.
There are a couple of pieces of furniture covered with white tarps. They look smaller than the ones in the dusty room, and I think they might be an armchair and a bench. Hanging on the wall are three small portraits, the artwork as detailed as photographs.