Chapter 70
Nia locked the door behind her, then turned toward the group. “Cat thinks we should do a lock-in at Heathrow Hall like Columbia’s Hamilton. Thoughts? We need to decide what we’re going to do, if we’re going to do anything, by this evening.”
Someone said, “Who the fuck is Cat?”
“To be clear,” Baggy cargo pants said, “this would be an escalation from our other protests this year.”
“But what did they do when we peacefully protested?” Nia snapped. “They put us on probation. Escalation is the answer.”
Those last words made my heart thump, like a slogan you’d hear decades later in a documentary, when victory felt inevitable in the sheen of hindsight. I held on to that feeling.
There was a knock on the door, three quick taps, some sort of code.
Nia unlocked it. Tristan walked in. They kissed quickly.
He sat across the table from me, averting his eyes.
My heart raced faster like it was trying to make it across a finish line.
The last message I sent to him, less than an hour ago, was me ending things: The timing couldn’t have been worse.
He didn’t appear to be thinking about that though. He said, “Georgetown is game to join you guys. But we need to let them know what we’re doing soon. Either way we should probably prepare for the worst.”
“Like expulsion?” I said.
He briefly met my eyes, then looked down at his phone. “Yeah. Or worse.”
Nia searched the room, an alertness about her gaze. “So, do we want to do the lock-in or the encampment or nothing?”
“I think we could pull together the lock-in quicker,” Tristan said, “but it’s a bigger risk. It’s breaking and entering. And we’d need all the supplies because we’d basically be barricaded inside. We could probably last only three days, tops.”
I said, “But all we really need to do is make it through commencement weekend, right?”
“Or until they meet our demands, which could take weeks. Let’s vote on it,” Baggy cargo pants said. “We don’t have a quorum here but it is what it is. All in favor of an encampment?”
She raised her hand along with the actress.
“All in favor of doing nothing?”
No one raised their hand. That left seven of us in favor of the building takeover.
Nia said, “Looks like we’re breaking and entering. Everyone keep your phones close. We’ll blast the plans early Friday morning. Don’t let it leak before then or we’re done. We’ll meet on campus after midnight the night before. Once we get our messaging together, tell every soul you know.”
I gripped my thighs to stop myself from shaking. I understood something big was happening, and I was responsible for it.