The Great Greene Heist

by Varian Johnson

  “It’s not a problem,” Jackson said. “It’s more of a snag.” And she’s not some girl.

  “Not even a snag. A speed bump, really,” Charlie added. And she’s not some girl.

  “Not even that,” Jackson said. “Just a rock in the road. A speck of sand in the ocean. A —”

  “Can’t we just have the rigged machine delivered?” Hashemi asked. “That way, we don’t have to break into the room. We can have someone do it for us.”

  Charlie and Jackson looked at each other. They weren’t used to being surprised. “Good idea,” Jackson said, “but we’d still have to get into the room to figure out what type of machine the school uses. You can’t rig it if you don’t know the type, right? But don’t worry. I have a plan.” He brushed a speck of dried paint from Bradley’s shoulder. “Just being curious, Bradley — can you read upside down?”

  The next day during fourth period, Bradley stood a few feet away from the copy room, trying to blend into the shadows. He wiped his hands on his jeans for the third time in as many minutes and whispered Jackson’s instructions to himself.

  Be calm and be cool.

  Bradley thought calm, cool thoughts as he listened to the copy machine roar behind the heavy wooden door. Mrs. Goldman had entered the room moments ago, carrying a small stack of papers.

  Bradley pulled out the metallic, bricklike purple cell phone that Hashemi had slipped to him before school. While pretending to text (pretending because that function didn’t currently work), Bradley took pictures of the copy room door, zooming in on the handle and the lock. Jackson had asked him to take as many photos as possible, just in case they needed more information.

  He took a few more photos as the copy machine died down. Then, gripping the phone tightly in his hand, he positioned himself in front of the door and took a deep breath.

  The lock jingled, then the door flew open. Bradley caught it inches before it slammed into his face. He blinked, amazed that he hadn’t ended up with a broken nose. Then he remembered the plan.

  “Ouch,” he moaned, covering his nose and bending over.

  “Who’s that — Bradley? Are you okay? What are you doing back here?” He heard Mrs. Goldman speaking over him, but his gaze remained glued to the plate on the skinny edge of the door. It took a second, but his eyes found the words that Jackson said would be there.

  “Bradley,” Mrs. Goldman said again, her hand on his back. “Are you hurt?”

  Bradley stood back up. “No, I’m okay,” he said, his hand still covering his nose. “I was just trying to text my mom before —”

  “Let me see.”

  For a second, Bradley thought she was talking about the phone. “No, it’s —”

  “Let me see,” she repeated, prying Bradley’s hands away from his face. “Hm … Your nose isn’t red, but it does look a bit swollen.”

  Swollen? Bradley thought. But the door didn’t hit it!

  “Come on,” she said. “Let’s put a cold compress on it.”

  “I’m okay.” He backed away. “It doesn’t even hurt.”

  “Are you sure?” she asked, her eyes widening. “It’s getting bigger as we speak.”

  Bradley reached for his nose again. “Really, I’m fine. I’ll put some ice on it as soon as I get home.”

  “No,” she said, taking him by the arm. “I insist.”

  As Bradley allowed himself to be dragged to the nurse’s office, he repeated the name of the lock over and over in his head so he wouldn’t forget it.

  A Guttenbabel 4200.

  Jackson would be so happy with him.

  Jackson had always believed that Dr. Kelsey’s office was the only room in the school secured with the Guttenbabel 4200. It was a double-barrel deadbolt, meaning it could be locked from either side of the door, and it employed a faint electrical current that made picking it virtually impossible. The lock was extremely expensive, and the majority of rooms at Maplewood didn’t need that level of security. However, after an unnamed person plastered his “Seymour Butts for Homecoming King” posters around school, the district apparently felt it was in their best interest to update some of the locks.

  Good-bye, crappy Ultra Lock. Hello, Guttenbabel 4200.

  After learning the news, Jackson spent an hour or so feeling sorry for himself. Then he got to work. By that afternoon, he’d figured out a new plan.

  “Just talk normal,” Jackson said. He picked up the phone and offered it to Victor, but the other boy refused to take it. They sat alone in Hashemi’s shed — Jackson had asked everyone else to wait outside. Jackson hoped that Victor would feel more comfortable with fewer people around.

  “Do I really have to do this?” Victor asked, staring at the cordless phone in Jackson’s hand.

  “Do you want to stop Keith or not?” Jackson leaned against the table. “How many times did he flush your homework down the toilet in elementary school?”

  “Fourteen times. Sixteen if you count the extra credit.”

  “If he wins, the next thing he’ll flush is the Chess Team,” Jackson said. “Think about it this way — compared to what you have to do tomorrow, this is a walk in the park.”

  “Tomorrow? What happens tomorrow?”

  Jackson quickly explained his plan. “I’d love to get one of the other guys to do it, but we have to do it during seventh period, when the main office will be its emptiest. That rules out Hash, because it’s impossible to get him out of Mrs. Berry’s class. And for obvious reasons, it can’t be me or Charlie.”

  “But can’t Bradley —”

  “With all the paint he gets in his hair? They’d recognize him in an instant.”

  “I have money.” Victor tried to stand. “Can’t we just hire someone —”

  Jackson pushed him back into his seat. “Focus, Victor. You can do this.”

  “But —”

  “I’m dialing.” Jackson punched the keypad with his index finger. “It’s ringing.”

  Victor took the phone and pressed it against his ear.

  “Hello. Hello?”

  After a few seconds, Jackson nudged Victor.

  “Hello … Mrs. Alicia Goldman?” he croaked. “This is Carson Baxter from WJXI. Congratulations — you’ve just won a pair of tickets to see the Sk8tr Boiz!”

  Caroline Appleton couldn’t believe that Mrs. Goldman had called in sick. Ms. Appleton had been an administrative assistant at Maplewood for nearly thirty years, since Senator Maplewood himself was principal, and she had never missed a day of school. Not even when she had a fever of 102 degrees. Not even when she broke three fingers on her left hand. Not even when her dog died.

  Mrs. Goldman blamed her sudden sickness on allergies, but Ms. Appleton figured it was somehow related to the Sk8tr Boiz concert taking place that evening in Cincinnati. While Ms. Appleton would never skip work to attend some teenybopper concert, she had to admit, those Sk8tr Boiz could belt out some catchy tunes.

  She glanced at her watch as the seventh period bell rang. Like most of the students, she was more than ready for the day to be over. She started cleaning her desk in anticipation of leaving as soon as school ended.

  She looked up as the office door swung open, and frowned at the sight of Jackson Greene. “What are you doing here? Didn’t you already have your weekly meeting with Dr. Kelsey?”

  Jackson nodded. “I know … but there’s something I need to tell him.”

  “He’s tied up on a conference call with the district superintendent.”

  Out of the corner of his eye, Jackson watched as Megan Feldman, the seventh period office helper, typed at a computer. The football team had an away game; she was already dressed in her cheerleader uniform. She glanced up, tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, and smiled. “Hi, Jackson.”

  Jackson stared back without blinking. Her smile faltered.

  “Hello,” he finally said. Then he turned toward Ms. Appleton. “I know Dr. Kelsey’s busy, but it’s important.”

  Ms. Appleton grunted as she picked up
her phone and dialed. “Dr. Kelsey … Yes, I know who you’re on the phone with…. Jackson Greene is in the office. He says it’s important.” She nodded, then hung up the phone. “He’ll be out in a —”

  Dr. Kelsey’s office door flew open. “Mr. Greene! Why are you here?”

  Jackson started to open his mouth, then paused. A nervous, worried, perplexed look washed over his face. “Maybe you should call Charlie in as well. I promise, it was all his idea.”

  Dr. Kelsey stepped forward. “What did you do?”

  Jackson nibbled on his bottom lip, glanced at the wall clock behind Ms. Appleton, then looked at the floor. “Again, I think you’d better get —”

  “Megan, run and get Charlie de la Cruz out of class,” Dr. Kelsey said. “Now, please.”

  “Sure,” she said, rising from her desk. “Let me look up —”

  “He’s in Mr. Woodson’s room.” Dr. Kelsey stepped back into his office. “Come in, Mr. Greene.”

  It was only a few seconds after Megan exited the office that another student entered. His black horn-rimmed glasses covered half his face, and his hair looked as stiff as a football helmet. Ms. Appleton took his hall pass. “George Rhee. You were in here last week, right? Dr. Kelsey was giving you some award.”

  That had been Danny Nguyen — who was Vietnamese, not Korean — but “George” didn’t correct her. “Mr. Jonas needs an extra pack of paper for art class,” he said.

  “Does this look like an art store?” Ms. Appleton grumbled. She wasn’t fond of Mr. Jonas and all his newfangled “group learning” activities. As far as Ms. Appleton was concerned, the old ways of teaching kids worked just fine.

  “I don’t even like art that much,” he said. “I’d rather take another math or science class, but the school board …”

  “Don’t get me started on the school board. How are we supposed to get our kids ready for the ‘global marketplace’ or whatever they call it if we’re not cramming their schedules with math and science? I bet those Asians aren’t wasting their time on art and music — no offense.”

  As she continued her rant, Victor — that is, “George” — glanced at the clock.

  Ten seconds.

  “Not to interrupt, but could I please get that paper?” he asked.

  “Well, I suppose. But I plan to give Mr. Jonas a stern tongue-lashing about class preparedness,” she said. “I need to —”

  She stopped as her desk phone rang. “They can leave a —”

  Then the phone on the office counter rang.

  Then the familiar ringtone of the Sk8tr Boiz’s “Eye M Sew N Luv” came from the bottom drawer of her desk.

  The main office hadn’t been this popular since the Mid-Day PDA.

  Ms. Appleton sighed, letting her eyes linger on the hall pass. “You’re a good kid,” she said. “I suppose I can trust you.” She pulled a set of keys from her pocket, pointed out a chipped bronze one, and handed him the key ring. “The supply closet is around the corner. The paper is on the third shelf.”

  Victor rounded the corner, holding every important key in Ms. Appleton’s life — including the key to her twenty-two-year-old Ford Taurus, twelve scuffed bronze keys, and an oddly shaped, specially cut, shiny silver one.

  When he returned with the ream of paper tucked underneath his arm, the phones in the office had stopped ringing. One call was a wrong number, the other was for Mrs. Goldman, and whoever called Ms. Appleton’s cell phone had neglected to leave a message.

  “Thank you,” Victor said, dropping the keys into her outstretched palm.

  Ms. Appleton quickly counted the keys. Satisfied, she said, “I see you found what you needed.”

  Instead of looking at the pack of pink paper, he glanced at the massive, bricklike cell phone in his hand. “Yes. I got exactly what I came for.”

  After Megan Feldman tracked down Charlie — it seemed that he had a bad stomachache and had spent the first few minutes of seventh period in the bathroom — he and Jackson Greene sat before Dr. Kelsey and told him the truth.

  They believed the Botany Club should be able to plant flowers along the football field.

  After Dr. Kelsey finally calmed down — he had hung up midsentence on the superintendent in order to talk to the boys — he spent the next hour grilling them, trying to coerce, trick, and manipulate them into confessing to at least some minor infraction. Jackson passed the time by counting the remaining hairs on Dr. Kelsey’s head. Charlie entertained himself by silently humming the entire Sk8tr Boiz debut album.

  By the time they were allowed to leave, the school was empty. They headed directly to the shed, where Hashemi was already at work transposing high-resolution photographs of a certain silver key into three-dimensional schematics.

  Schematics that could create a key for a Guttenbabel 4200.

  The Saturday afternoon air was warm and muggy as Jackson and Charlie stepped off the bus at North High and Price. Although the neighborhood of Short North was filled with legitimate art galleries, restaurants, and coffee shops, if one knew where to look, one could always find a business of questionable intent.

  Fighting the pull of fresh, hot doughnuts, Jackson and Charlie passed a bakery and entered Basilone’s Lock and Key. The sign said that they were open, but the shop was empty. A thin layer of dust covered the various shelves and countertops, and the smell of burnt metal hung in the air.

  “Hello?” Jackson called out. “Anyone here?”

  “Coming,” a voice said from behind a thick green curtain. “I’ll be there —”

  Jackson grinned as Ray Basilone appeared. Ray and Jackson’s brother had been best friends all through middle school and high school. But when it came time for college, Ray decided to attend Columbus State Community College while Samuel went off to the University of Pennsylvania. The way Samuel saw it, getting into and graduating from an Ivy League school was the ultimate con. Unfortunately, it was one con that Ray had to sit out.

  Ray wiped his hands on his shirt. “You fellas have grown a bit since the last time I saw you.” Jackson noticed the new gold caps he sported on his front teeth.

  “Your dad here?” Jackson asked.

  “He’s downtown. Some old lady locked herself out of her apartment.” He smiled, his gold caps sparkling. “It’s a total coincidence that she lives above a jewelry store.” Ray sat on a stool. “How’s your brother?”

  “He just got an A on his last exam.”

  “Whose paper did he cheat off?”

  Jackson laughed. “He says you should call him.”

  “He’s the busy one, not me. Every time I call he’s off to some toga party.”

  Jackson doubted his brother would attend any toga parties — not unless he was trying to steal a sorority girl or two — but he didn’t want to waste any more time talking about Samuel. “I need a favor.”

  Ray whistled as Jackson unfolded the schematic plans on the counter. “Is that a —”

  “Yep.”

  “Now this … this is a key,” Ray said. “Wait. Are you asking what I think you’re asking?”

  “According to our tech guy, the dimensions of the grooves are within 1/64 of an inch tolerance.”

  Ray tapped the plans. “I know I’m not a college boy like your brother, but unless I’m mistaken, Guttenbabel keys aren’t supposed to be duplicated.”

  Charlie pulled two fifty-dollar bills from his pocket and placed them on the counter. “Ulysses S. Grant says otherwise,” he said, sliding the money across the glass, leaving a trail in the dust. “Can you get us a copy by Wednesday afternoon?”

  Eyeing the money, Ray said, “While I enjoy General Grant’s company, there’s no way I can get this done by Wednesday. Guttenbabels have both mechanical and electrical components. It’s got to be the right blend of copper, silver, and aluminum alloy, or the key won’t carry the current necessary to trigger the lock. And because of the strength of the metal, the key can’t be cut like a regular key — it has to be punched.” He spun the bills. “It’ll tak
e five days to get the metal, and three days after that to finish the key.”

  “That’s an eight-day turnaround. Samuel said you could do it in five.” Jackson placed two additional bills on the counter. “My friend Ben Franklin says the same.”

  Although Keith Sinclair kept his gaze glued to his tuna sandwich, his abundant interest in his lunch had nothing to do with the quality of the meal. Rather, it was his futile attempt to ignore all the posters plastered around the cafeteria, half of which featured his face crossed out with a big, red X. The two sixth graders sitting at his table, usually eager to talk to Keith about basketball or video games or whatever else he wanted to discuss, ate their lunches and slinked off without saying a word.

  “About time they left,” Stewart Hogan said, dropping into the chair across from Keith. “We need to talk.”

  Keith sighed. He’d pick those sixth graders over Stewart any day. “I heard Megan broke things off with you.”

  Stewart nodded. “Tell me the truth. Did you tell her that you gave me the game? You know how she feels about you.”

  “Believe me, the feeling is mutual,” Keith said. “But I didn’t tell her. Maybe she just got tired of all your bragging.”

  “It wasn’t bragging. I just needed a little more time.” He banged the table. “She came over on Saturday. I almost kissed her. I was this close.”

  “Of course you were,” Keith said, his voice as dry as the tuna. “Now why are you sitting here again? Our agreement was never based on you actually taking her to the formal.”

  “I know. I just had to ask. I don’t know how else she could have found out about the game. Seriously, I didn’t tell anybody.”

  “Neither did I.”

  Stewart rose. “You’ll understand if I keep the game.”

  Keith had already gone back to his sandwich. “No problem. I own two copies.”

  “And don’t worry about me and the formal. I’ll find another girl to take. I mean, I’m Stewart Hogan.”