So we wait until it's lunch break. I tell my fake friends that I'm doing a statistics project for class and I need to spend the next few weeks surveying people. And then we start. 

First I go up to a boy with dark brown eyes and dark curling hair. 

"What do you think about the Wall?" I ask. His eyes go wide in shock and fear. 

"I try not to think about it." That gives me my answer. He's not someone who is on our side. That's okay though. There are plenty of other people around. 

Next I go up to a girl with strawberry blonde hair. She wears a white silk blouse. 

"What are your thoughts about the Wall?" She startles, and walks away quickly like a scared child. 

I go up to a boy with a leather jacket stitched with many colourful patches and studded with silver across the shoulders. He is getting a laptop from his locker. 

"What are your opinions on the Wall?" I ask him. His eyes darken, tinged with fear. 

"Fuck off," he answers. I sigh and turn away. I already knew that this was going to be long, frustrating, bitter work. I already knew that I would run into so many dead ends before finding someone who would be open to leaving. But actually having to confront the hatred and the fear and the horror that people have towards the outside is a new type of exhausting. Still, I tell myself to go forwards. For the first time in my life I'm doing something that's actually helping other people. 

I ask student after student after student after student the same question, walking all over the large school in resolute strides. They all give me similar responses. Which is to say, clipped, short responses or silent refusal. 

I try to keep my spirits up but with each and every set of scared eyes and tight mouths I feel a bit more hope drain away from me. Maybe no other people feel the same way we do. Maybe everyone is content to just live in the city. Maybe it's only the three of us, and maybe Elliot's sister, that want to see what else is out there. 

I feel so incredibly young, going from person to person like a bee buzzing after fake flowers. I feel so incredibly young and foolish. 

But I'm stronger than my mediocre feelings of hopelessness. I know that even if nobody comes with us, my boyfriends and I will still go past the Wall. And I know that I have to try. Trying is what matters. 

I go to a girl with many colourful ribbons in her hair. And she refuses me. I go to a girl with sparkling gem-studded ballet flats. And she refuses me. I go to a boy with dark purple eyeliner. And he refuses me. I go to a boy with a brand new backpack that is blacker than jet-black. And he walks away. I go to a boy with a silver chain around his throat. And he tells me to ask someone else. 

I go then to a girl with thick, dark hair woven into many intricate braids around her head. She looks about thirteen. She is sitting by herself in a corner by the window, writing something on the shimmering silver-white wall of the school with scarlet permanent marker. She has on blue jeans with many three-dimensional taffeta flowers blooming all over them and colourful floral sneakers. I sit beside her. 

"Hi," I whispher. 

"Hi," she says back to me, not making eye-contact. 

"I have a question. But I need you to look at me to answer it." She turns to look me in the eyes. Her eyes are so incredibly dark. They're beautiful. 

"What?"

"What are your opinions on the Wall?"

"THE Wall?"

"Yes. THE Wall." 

She doesn't say anything to me for a while. She just stares off into the distance. But her eyes are filled with soft hope. With searching wonder. Like a blackbird taking off into into the evening sky. 

"I ... I know I'm supposed to be afraid of it. But I'm not." Praise the sky.

"Meet me on the school roof after school," I tell her. "Climb the spruce tree to get there."

"Okay." 

I ask three more teenagers before the lunch bell rings and I have to go to class. I spend all of class time thinking about that young girl, about her story, and about her emancipation. 

———

On the school roof there are seven of us. More people than I thought imaginable. There are too many of us to hide in the sliver between the walls of the third floor and the raised up section. But we stay far away from the edges of the roof so that we are not seen. Marcus is smiling wider than I've ever seen him smile before. Elliot has a soft sort of vibrancy in his eyes. 

"What are your names?" I start with. 

"My name is Karla," the young girl I met earlier supplies. 

"My name is Rod," a tall, skinny boy with brown hair says. 

"My name is Garrett," a boy with thick curly hair and warm brown skin tells us. 

"And my name is Ali," a girl with dark green eyes says. 

"It's amazing to meet you all," I tell them. 

"Have you guys, have you guys ever felt like there was more to life than what you've been told all your lives to persue?" Elliot asks them. Everyone is quiet for a very long time. Finally, Garrett speaks. 

"Yes." His voice is quiet. The others nod in agreement, faces filled with cautious curiosity and hopeful longing. 

"Have you felt like the city is too much, too cluttered, too loud, too big, too blazing, too filled?" My voice shakes softly with emotion. 

"I have," Karla agrees. 

"Me too," Rod adds. The other two nod their heads again. I know that what we're doing is very dangerous. That all of our plans could be destroyed by the wrong people knowing. That a year's worth of work and millions of dollars could be wasted. But we don't care. If we don't share what we have then what point is there?

"Do you want something better. Something purer?" Marcus's voice is steady and slow. Eventually all of our new recruits voice their agreement. 

"Meet us here again tomorrow." Elliot says. And they agree to. 

That night we work more on the tunnel. And it makes me more excited than I've ever been before. It makes me so full of excitement that I feel like I'm going to explode like one of the firecrackers, and out of me will pour infinite light. 

The next day we tell Karla and Ali and Rod and Garrett of our plans. And they question us for hours about how we think this is safe, why we want to do it, why we think there's anything out there. And we answer that we don't know whether anything is out there. We are just following our hearts. That something inside us is telling us to get away, get away, get away from the city. And that we have faith. Even if we don't understand why we have faith, we do. After a long time they are convinced. 

———

We are sitting on the floor under Elliot's bed. Being dead-quiet. Speaking only in whispers. Elliot's sister's Leia is down here with us, sitting on Elliot's pillow. She's eight years older than Elliot. And working on her masters degree. That's more school than I can even imagine. I don't know how she does it. She's very smart. 

"What are you guys up to?" She whispers. 

"We're going to cross the Wall," I whispher back. She's quiet for a long time. 

"You guys are crazy." 

"Please don't tell anyone," Marcus begs.

"I'm not a snitch," she assured us, "but you need to let me come with you. There needs to be one responsible adult to keep you guys safe." I smile and hug her, and she hugs me back. 

———

There are twenty-two of us in total. Twenty one teenagers from the school. And Leia as our "supervisor." So twenty-two. 

The plan worked. We were able to, in a matter of weeks, ask every kid in the school to come with us. Most said no. But a few said yes. That was all that mattered. That a few said yes. That a few would be free. That we would be free together. 

We were stopped a few times by teachers, who asked us what we were doing. We told them that we were working on a statistics project for extra credit in psychology class. We told them that we wanted to ask a question that nobody had asked before. So we were asking people about the Wall. We showed them a fake questionnaire and fake pages of data that we had forged. And they bought it. They bought it wholeheartedly. They were exasperated but there was nothing they could do to stop us. 

And now we are all gathered in the abandoned part of town, beside the tunnel in the Wall, ready to explode the last firecrackers and blow through all the way to the other side. 

The anticipation is so thick that you could cut it with a knife. I feel sick to my stomach, but in a good and beautiful way. Everyone's eyes are shining. With hope. With wonder. With secrets. Everyone is tense. The air around us is tense. The sky above us is tense. 

We all count together. In whisphers that come together to make one single many-voiced voice. 

"Five. 

"Four. 

"Three. 

"Two. 

"One." 

Explosions burst across the sky and down under the ground and shake our souls to the very core. It feels like victory. Like sweet, saturated, sparking victory. I want to cheer. I can tell that everyone wants to cheer. But we don't. Because we can't attract attention. 

Rod goes down into the tunnel with a shovel and a string of people follow him, transferring the broken concrete out of the tunnel. A few of us keep a lookout. 

"Hi, sir!" One of the lookouts loudly calls out from down the street. The twelve of us that are outside the tunnel quickly move to cover it with our bodies, to that nobody can see the hole in the ground behind where we are standing. My heart thuds in my chest. 

An elderly man, dressed impeccably as all men are, walks up to us. We smile at him, and hope that it reaches our eyes. 

"Are you guys the kids that keep lighting fireworks every night?" He asks us jovially. 

"Yes we are." I smile at him, keeping my voice even and steady. 

"Well you kids have fun. You're only young once after all." 

"Thank you." I keep smiling. He turns to walk away. When he's gone we let out a collective sigh of relief. 

"There's only dirt now!" The people inside the tunnel call out. We switch shifts and quickly dig out the dirt that is all that remains between us and freedom. And then we take our backpacks filled with food and water and we all crawl through, one by one. 

The last person to go fills the hole with bits of concrete. 

We're finally doing it, my heart thrums. I think vaguely, that I should be more afraid than I am.