I turn the knob of the left door carefully, and it clicks open, sweeps outward. Very dim motion-sensor lights click on, and Jack stops inside the door.

“Oh, wow,” he says, and the surge of triumph is real.

The room is large, and the ceiling is unfinished, rough beams. Stacked along each wall are painted backdrops—the ones that get repainted over and over, every season or even between shows, by theater kids and dance kids and even the music kids when they’re feeling fancy. Some of them dingy, some of them bright strokes of color—fluffy white clouds in a blue sky, a sketchy forest, a graffitied subway station—padded around the edges and stacked several deep. There’s also a painted arch, with columns on either side, and I rush underneath it, spin to beam at Jack, and throw my arms wide.

“We’ve found it!”

“Do we have to whisper?” Jack asks in a normal voice.

“Fuck no,” I say, and turn to examine my find. String up a curtain between the columns, build a little space behind it, spread out cushions for the audience. Drape fairy lights and fabric garlands across the jungle of backdrops. Hang pretty paper lanterns overhead for light.

“So this is the place,” he says.

“This is definitely the place,” I say, and those words are my favorite words all day.

I snap photos of everything to show the rest of the group, and see that there’s no cell service down here, which I like, which makes us feel more separate and safe from the world, and also there will be no live tweeting.

When my phone alarm goes off, my curfew warning, I sigh, and we head through the dark to the back exit.

“It’s easy to get here from the dorms,” I tell him, lowering my voice automatically. The exit sign is flickering, making the shadows stutter strangely. We’re whispering about how people can reach the stage door by taking a path through the woods, when—

Boom!

The noise echoes from somewhere else in the building.

Jack and I freeze. Solid ice. Rigid, staring huge-eyed at each other, clutching our jackets to our chests. A heartbeat.

My tiny voice is frantic. “No one is supposed to be here. No one is supposed to be here!”

“The wind,” he suggests. His forehead is knotted up, and his eyes are wide and black in the light.

Another boom. And then a rattle. We both jump.

“Shit, shit, I think that’s the elevator,” I say.

We both look over to the closed elevator doors and up at the ceiling, like we’re going to see it moving down. I’m shaking. We’re going to get caught.

“Run,” he whispers. He hasn’t blinked. He doesn’t move. I push him. He fumbles at the exit door, but he can’t get the keys out.