“Hurry hurry,” Chloe chanted almost like a prayer as they raced towards the band room.
It wasn’t what either of them wanted, but for some reason they were both running towards the band room at 5:00 PM. According to Chloe the band teacher might still be there, if she stayed a bit later to grade after marching band finished.
They raced around the corridor and were met with a closed wooden door. Chloe began to knock on the door aggressively. If anyone was in the building, they would hear the frantic rattling of the door. She waited a few seconds and then slumped to the door sighing. Chloe let out a string of curses and then went silent.
The whole reason they were there was because Chloe had forgotten her trumpet. She realized it about two hours after school let out, when she was hanging out with Kevin, and they rushed back to the classroom to see if the classroom was unlocked. As obvious by their current predicament, it was not. It might have seemed like a silly thing to worry about, but for Chloe this trumpet was her life. Tomorrow afternoon she had an audition for a music college, and she was desperate to practice tonight.
Kevin had agreed to help her, as they had been best friends since childhood, living in the same neighborhood only a couple houses away. Kevin knew few things, but even he knew that this was one of the most important moments of Chloe’s life. This was her dream, to perform in a professional orchestra and be first chair of course. But none of that would happen if she didn’t make the audition and to make the audition all she really needed was one final practice. One final practice to make sure it was good, to make sure she had it memorized, and so it was still fresh in her mind the next morning. It would also soothe about 20% of her anxiety. That wasn’t much but anything would help. All they needed was to get into that room. They needed to get into the room. Chloe needed to get into the-
“What if we pick the lock?” Kevin asked.
Chloe stared at him, dumbfounded. “Pick the lock to the band room?”
He shrugged. “Yeah”
“Why?”
“Why not?”
“It’s probably illegal?”
“And?”
“What do you mean and?”
He shrugged. “It’ll be quick, it always looked so easy in the movies.”
Chloe didn’t say anything.
“Do you have a bobby-pin?”
~~~
Thirty minutes later, and they had made no progress, aside from breaking four bobby-pins. Kevin worked on the lock while Chloe tapped her foot impatiently.
“This is not working,” she said, mildly annoyed.
“I’m pretty close to getting it,” Kevin said confidently, not looking up from the lock.
“You said that five minutes ago,”
Kevin didn’t respond.
“Kevin!” Chloe exclaimed exasperated.
Kevin made a sound that was somewhere between a hmm and a what. He turned to look up at Chloe.
She sighed. “It’s no use, the door isn’t going to open. We failed.”
Kevin stared at her. “I’m almost there,”
“We’ve made no progress!” She practically yelled. “You have no idea how to pick a lock.”
After her declaration a head peered out from around the corner, looking directly at the two of them.
“Are you trying to pick a lock?” The girl, Danielle, asked with an impish grin on her face.
“Yes,” Kevin said, without much hesitation or thought that telling other people what they were doing could get them in trouble.
Danielle joined the pair over by the door. “You’re doing it wrong,” she said, watching what Kevin did.
“You know how to pick locks?” Chloe looked at Danielle.
“I know how to do lots of things. If you ever do a heist episode I’m your girl.”
That surprised no one. Danielle knew a whole bunch of random things, most of which related to what you’d want to know in a fantasy novel. She knew about toxic plants, self defense, and even how to sword fight. The three knew each other from being in the same chemistry class. They all passed the class, Kevin more suspicious than the others, and went their separate ways after that. None of them had seen the other in more than a year and they certainly weren’t expecting this to be the situation for their reunion.
“Kevin stop,” Danielle ordered. “You fold the pin like this.” She separated one of the hairpins in and then twisted the end of another together. She then straightened out the other pin. “You want to push up all the keys by applying tension and…” she trailed off, looking at Chloe. “What?”
“We shouldn’t be doing this,”
“So?”
Chloe sighed.
Danielle rolled her eyes. “Look, this is the most exciting thing to happen all day. I don’t know why you need to break into the orchestra room-”
“Band,” Chloe interrupted.
Danielle stared at her for a second before continuing. “Whatever, all I know is that we’re breaking into this room. No matter how long it takes.”
Kevin nodded in agreement.
Chloe sighed. “I’m just worried we’ll get in trouble.”
“Why don’t you stand and look out. Far enough away to deny everything, but you’ll still be able to warn us if something happens,”
The two girls stood at a standstill, staring at each other, until Kevin intervened. “You’ll get your trumpet back.”
“Fine,” Chloe scoffed and she walked off.
After she left Danielle turned back to Kevin. “Do you even know what you’re doing?”
Kevin shrugged but didn’t say anything. Danielle watched Kevin fiddle around, another bobby-pin breaking in the lock.
“Ugh,” Danielle dropped down to her knees beside Kevin, so close they were shoulder to shoulder. She grabbed the bobby pin from him and handed him her cellphone. “Turn the flashlight on and I’ll show you how to pick the lock.
Kevin did as she said and Danielle got to work on the lock. She pushed one of the on the top of the masterlock, the other started to work on the pins inside the lock. The first bobby-pin turned while the other gently pushed up all of the pins into the upright position, each fitting with a click.
Kevin inhaled sharply as Danielle pulled on the lock. The shank separated from the body of the lock with a satisfying pop.
“We got it open!” Danielle exclaimed, her words echoing down the hallway.
Chloe came rushing back from where she stood at the end of the hallway. “Actually?”
“Yes,” Kevin said breathlessly. “She did it, Danielle did it.”
Small tears pricked up in Chloe’s eyes. “Thank you Danielle!”
Danielle’s cheeks flushed. “Yeah, no problem I guess.”
Kevin stared at the two. “Your trumpet?”
“Oh yeah,” Chloe exclaimed. She grabbed the handle to the room and threw the door open. Leading them into the empty band room.
To be continued…