Dispatches from a Lock-In

Friday. 11:00 PM: A blazing alarm goes off. All of us congregate at Kathy Finkle’s desk. Watching the alarm.

“I think it is actually calling the police this time,” I say.

Robbie Carver comes out of a classroom.

I can tell by his tone, he is not happy about this.

“Again!” he yells.

I can’t say I was expecting the alarm to go off during this senior-junior lock-in, least of all for a second time.

Friday. 7:00 PM: I’m sitting in the Safeway cafe. It is hardly a cafe. When I imagine a cafe it looks nothing like this; a dirty, dark and uncomfortable collection of furniture all painted tan, which just happens to be the color of the floor tiles. I’m waiting in anticipation for the junior-senior lock-in later that night. It starts at 7:30 and I have been sitting here for 45 minutes. I know very little about the lock-in, only that it should be fun. Most people would not consider spending more than 12 hours locked in with 15 other teenagers to be fun, but I might as well give it a chance. Resting next to me is my backpack filled with school books and papers, a toothbrush, toothpaste, a change of clothes and a board game. I didn’t think anyone would play, but I might as well bring just in case.

Friday. 7:15 PM: I walk to a nearby pizza place to get a final bite to eat before the lock-in. It is raining cats and dogs, if cats and dogs bred like rabbits. I look like a street urchin who fell into one too many swimming pools. I order a slice of pepperoni, and wait in the cold under the awning. While I wait, I hear the people inside talking about the order that went out to Northwest Academy. I have a Disney-like flashback to sitting in English class hearing that pizza will be provided at the lock-in. Well… no turning back now. Full speed ahead.

Friday. 7:20 PM: I turn the corner and head for the Plaza Building; holding my pizza.

Ben Sherman opens the door and asks, “Why do you have pizza?”

Time to own it.

“Why not,” I say.

I notice Robbie.

“Where do we go?” I ask.

Robbie answers with a quick, “Wherever.”

Friday. 7:21 PM: I walk up the stairs. “Wherever?” I head into the iJournalism classroom mostly because it was close and my backpack was getting heavy.

Friday. 7:22 PM: Jack Brebner appears on a scooter. After a short talk, Jacob Alberts comes in.

Friday. 7:25 PM: “Here, help me get my Xbox set up,” Jacob tells us. He gets a TV from Robbie and we set up in the, now slightly less comfortable, iJournalism room.

Friday. 7:28 PM: Jacob is not getting any internet, so he asks where the server room is.
“The server is in there,” I tell him pointing towards Erin Calkins’ classroom.

“Where?” Jacob says.

“Behind those doors.” I immediately regret saying this. I know that Jacob is a determined person and I can’t easily persuade him not to screw something up.

Friday. 7:29 PM: We open up the closet and it reveals a large black box and with many wires coming out of it. If this is a spy movie we just found the explosives.

“Wait, what are you going to do?”

I’m becoming more and more worried about Jacob’s intentions.

“I’m just resetting it.” Jacob is not worried at all.

“Are you sure this is a good idea,” because I’m not.

“Yeah.”

“That thing is connected to the whole building, resetting it might screw something up.”

“It’s not going to set off the fire alarm.” (In hindsight this is a very ironic comment).

“No, but we are going to come in on Monday and find that all the printers don’t work.”

I stand there as he presses a small button on the side of the box. We wait a few moments and turn it back on. Calm resumes for about 10 seconds.

Friday. 7:30 PM: Then we hear a loud beeping from overhead. “Oh god,” I say.

Robbie comes from downstairs, “What did you do?!”

Friday. 7:31 PM: Jacob tries to explain his reasoning while Jack and I try to distance ourselves from the situation.

Friday. 7:55 PM: More people show up, along with Georgia Bonds Abele. She is on crutches and walks slowly so as the alarm goes off in the background I grab a rolling chair, create a makeshift wheelchair. She takes a seat and I roll her down the hallways.

Friday. 8:00 PM: I discover the pizza that I heard about almost an hour ago. I have my second slice of pizza of the night.

Friday. 8:05 PM: I have my third slice of pizza.

Friday. 8:10 PM: I discover the sparkling cider mentioned back in the English classroom two days ago. I talk in the company of the other students while the newly arrived teachers, Erin Calkins and Doug Cornett, join Robbie in dealing with the alarm.

Friday. 8:15 PM: With some investigating we discover the motion sensor section of the alarm menu and propose that maybe if we don’t set off the motion sensor the alarm will stop, so we all cram into the classroom and wait a few minutes. Walker Guinee, Isabel Downes-Le Guin and Elayna Caron walk in halfway through the experiment. We abandon the plan.

Friday. 8:20 PM: Shortly after the final chaperone, Paul Martone, shows up, we have found the solution to the alarm. Robbie talks with a man from the alarm company, and with some magic numbers the alarm shuts off.

Friday. 8:30 PM: Some of us settle into the iJournalism room where Jacob now has his Xbox connected to the internet. (He only had to connect through a browser). I notice that we are both bored with watching Jacob and the others messing around in Call of Duty and Grand Theft Auto V.

Friday. 8:32 PM: I pull the board game out of my backpack and offer to play with Walker.

“I don’t know how to play,” she says.

“You can learn, can’t you?” I reply.

Friday. 8:35 PM: We set up Citadels. It is a city building board game where you acquire money and spend that money on cards from your hand that represent different parts of a medieval city.

Friday. 8:50 PM: We finish the first game. I lost. Walker won. We start up another round, this time Erin and Elayna join us. Elayna is king first.

Friday. 9:10 PM: Walker becomes restless; leaves the game, and I take over her part. No one objects.

Friday. 9:30 PM: I win.

Friday. 9:32 PM: All three of us join the rest of the kids that have holed up in a classroom playing Cards Against Humanity.

Friday. 9:33 PM: I help Elayna serve the cake for Ilana Newman’s birthday. The game of Cards Against Humanity ends as everyone leaves to get cake in the kitchen.

Friday. 10:30 PM: Elayna leaves.

Friday. 10:35 PM: We get together to play some sardines, which is just reverse hide and seek.

Friday. 11:05 PM: Robbie calls the man from the alarm company for a second time tonight. He sounds even less excited to learn we set off the alarm again. It turns out Ilana accidentally went through an “emergency exit only” door.

Friday. 11:10 PM: It takes us way too long to find the first hider, Leah Carnahan-McGinley. Braam Beresford is assigned to be the new hider.

Friday. 11:15 PM: I check the curtains in the fitness room. Bingo.

Friday. 11:18 PM: We choose Annabel Cantor to be the next hider.

Friday. 11:20 PM: Everybody gives up looking. We fail to tell Annabel to stop hiding.

Friday. 11:25 PM: I have to ask Braam where Annabel is in order to tell her she can stop. She is not pleased that we stopped looking.

Friday. 11:30 PM: I watch some “Wings.” It’s an old sitcom, outdated but good, about a group of people working at a small airport. I join about halfway through the episode but it is still funny. Most the kids are mysteriously absent.

Friday. 11:50 PM: The teachers go to sleep and I find the rest of the kids holed up in the iJournalism classroom watching “New Girl.” I’m dealing with opposites. “New Girl” is uncomfortably “new,” as the title explains, and not funny at all.

Saturday. 12:00 AM: I crawl over everybody to get to my backpack. I grab my headphones and crawl my way out.

Saturday. 12:01 AM: I pull out a computer and watch some YouTube videos in an attempt replicate my normal Friday night.

Saturday. 12:30 AM: I give up my attempt. Isabel, Walker, Jack, McKensi Payne, Annabel and I find ourselves in the resource room tiredly gossiping. Every few minutes someone mentions when they want to go to sleep. The times they mention keep sliding sooner and sooner.

Saturday. 2:00 AM: If I had not known these people for the past three years I would have no idea what they are saying.

Saturday. 3:00 AM: The rest go to sleep. The list of the awake slims down to Jacob, Jack, Ilana and myself.

Saturday. 3:10 AM: We sit in the iJournalism classroom, where it all started. Jacob exhaustingly plays Grand Theft Auto. Jack lays on the floor drifting in and out of sleep. We think he is asleep, but every once in a while he will laugh at something we say.

Saturday. 4:00 AM: The rest say goodnight. Jack falls asleep (for sure this time) in front of the door so as we all exit we have to step over him. Ilana and Jacob go into the classroom where everybody else is already sleeping. I figure I have to stay up as long as possible; I’m writing a feature on this.

Saturday. 4:05 AM: I go back into the resource room, pull out the computer and continue my attempt at normality. I’m very tired, but I won’t let that stop me. Full speed ahead.

Saturday. 4:15 AM: I fail again. Instead I go and clean the kitchen. Then I come back and start another attempt to sleep.

Saturday. 4:30 AM: I decide I should get my pillow. Consciously, I know that this will not help me stay awake. I step over Jack and grab my pillow anyway.

Saturday. 5:00 AM: I can feel myself drifting off to sleep, but I won’t let that me hold me back. Full speed ahead.

Saturday. 5:20 AM: I know now that I will fall asleep. I’m tired enough. I just need to get my sleeping bag and crawl into bed, but maybe I can last a few more minutes. Full speed….

Saturday. 7:30 AM: I wake up. I wander around the premises. Most people are still asleep, but Robbie and the other teachers, who got a reasonable amount of sleep (not two hours) are awake and moving.

Saturday. 7:45 AM: The electric grill we have to make pancakes with looks like the floor of a movie theatre. It’s covered in grime, crumbs and grease. I accidentally volunteer to clean it.

Saturday. 8:30 AM: I’m finally done cleaning. The grill is not perfect, but it looks more like a grill and not a sticky floor tile.

Saturday. 9:00 AM: Breakfast is served. We all cram ourselves into the tiny kitchen and eat breakfast together. We are all laughing and talking. It feels like we are connected. Unlike when we were eating cake the night before, we are now enjoying each other’s presence instead of accepting it.

Saturday. 9:45 AM: I go and change into clean clothes, brush my teeth and put on deodorant.

Saturday. 10:10 AM: I return to the breakfast room. The atmosphere is still the same only with even more people. There are close to 20 of us all in the tiny kitchen. “Remember 12 hours ago when we were worried about Jacob setting off the alarm,” I say. “And again when Ilana set it off,” Robbie replies.

Saturday. 10:29 AM: I leave “early.”

Saturday. 10:40 AM: At my bus stop, I reflect on the night. Lots of people from both classes did not show up because they did not want to get up early. I only got two hours of sleep and it is all worth it. It is hard to sum up what bonding with people is like. When Elayna left the night before, she said it best.

“That was fun,” she said.

“What?” I told her.

“The board game. All of this.”