By the time we’re done, it’s dark outside. It’s too risky to write it down and leave it out so after we’re done decoding, Jace crumples the paper and eats it. It’s fairly disgusting, but effective.
“Okay, so we all know Carrie’s directions now,” Nico says calmly.
“Only one of us should get thrown into solitary—the others act as a distraction. Use kitchen job for access. Meet at the old delivery alley by the kitchen during blackout. Practice the route after dinner. Christmas kitchen shift is the best time to move tools,” I say by memory.
Nico frowns. “Wait, just one of us in the hole? Not all three? I swear I read?—”
Jace interrupts him. “Yeah. The guards never put more than one from a fight in solitary at the same time. If we all go, they’ll split us up all over the prison. But if it’s just me, and you two are causing trouble somewhere else, they’ll keep us apart like normal.”
I scan the note again. “Look—she wants me in the kitchen for the holiday shifts. Christmas week, the kitchen’s a mess, tons of inmates are rotating in. I’ll have a reason to be moving around, and I can hide a tool near the delivery alley. Nico, your job is to set off a small alarm or distraction on the admin side right before the blackout, so the guards are running in circles.”
Nico grins, rubbing his hands together. “Just my style.”
Jace keeps his eyes on the map. “I’ll pick a fight in laundry when the right guard’s on—guy with the limp, that’s the note here. He’s the one who always sends people to east wing solitary. I just have to make it obvious, but not bloody.”
We keep our distance from Carrie. It’s the hardest part. For the last two weeks, none of us have spoken to her directly.
If anyone’s watching, they’d think we don’t care about her at all. It feels wrong, but we know we have to play it safe. If the guards or the warden suspect anything, we’re done.
Instead, we use every spare moment to observe, plan, and test. Thanksgiving is coming, and the whole prison is on edge—extra food deliveries, more movement in the kitchen, shifts changing all the time. We use it to our advantage.
Jace keeps his head down in the laundry. He studies the guards’ schedules, memorizes when the officer with the limp is on east wing solitary rotation. He notes who watches the cameras, which guards are lax during meal delivery, and which days the laundry supervisor lets the jobbers roam without supervision. He times his path from the laundry room to the admin corridor, noting blind spots, fire doors, and which workers gossip instead of watching.
Nico volunteers for library detail. He wipes tables, restocks books, and fixes shelves, but really he’s checking the admin side exits and searching for weak points in the staff doors. He also hangs out near the rec room and admin hallway, learning how quickly guards respond to small disturbances—a cough, a dropped book, a loud laugh. Twice, he sets off the old alarm by the staff restroom just to watch how fast they scramble. He makes it look like an accident every time.
I join the kitchen crew, signing up for shifts all through Thanksgiving week. The place is chaos—big frozen turkeys everywhere, delivery drivers complaining about late paperwork, half the cooks high on pie fillings. I pay attention to the side doors, the service alley, and the rusted delivery elevator Carrie marked on the map. On my second day, I stash a screwdriver behind the potato bin just like her instructions said.
We practice our “routes” in pairs—never the same two people, never at the same time. Sometimes Jace follows the corridor from laundry, sometimes I make a big deal out of running to the kitchen freezer and then sneaking a peek out the alley door. Nico runs errands for a bored guard, asking if he can take books back to the admin office, just to get a look at the doors. We compare notes at night in whispers, always with one eye on the hallway and one ear on the guards’ boots.
A few times, we catch glimpses of Carrie. She never stops to talk, never even meets our eyes. She acts like we’re invisible.But we see her—always laughing at some joke with the warden, smiling for staff, passing out treats in the library, or walking with the volunteers who organize Thanksgiving bingo. It stings, watching her “flirt” with the warden and charm her way through the day, but we remind ourselves that it’s all for cover.
Once a week, she leaves something hidden for us in the library. Nico finds a scrap of map tucked inside a hollowed-out book, another time a list of new guard names inside the cover of a mystery novel. As the days crawl closer to Thanksgiving, the tension builds. The prison gets louder, tempers flare, and the guards grow sloppier with their routines. We watch, we wait, and we trust Carrie’s plan.
On the night before D-day, we run through everything again—timing, locations, which tools are where, and who’s on which shift. Nico checks the map one last time, Jace counts the seconds it takes to get from laundry to solitary, and I rehearse how to get from the kitchen to the service alley without raising suspicion.
And then,in the blink of an eye, Thanksgiving arrives.
I’ve never been so aware of every sound in my life. Even the clatter of forks at dinner makes me tense. The kitchen is a storm—bodies everywhere, trays banging, hot steam clouding the air, guards barking at each other and the inmates.
I keep my head down, cleaning a tray, clocking every movement in the kitchen. The plan runs through my mind on a loop. Nico is first. He’s supposed to start a distraction near admin, and I can feel time crawling as I wait for the signal. My hands are sweating so bad I almost drop the screwdriver I’ve hidden in my sleeve.
Suddenly, an alarm blares. The room explodes into shouting, kitchen workers yelling, guards shouting for order. Someone throws a pot, and a guard is nearly knocked over. That’s Nico. I slip through the door when everyone’s looking the other way, heart slamming in my chest.
I run. My legs feel like concrete but I force myself down the service hall, gripping the screwdriver so tight my hand aches. In the shadows, near the old elevator, I wait, counting my own breath and the seconds ticking away.
Jace’s part is next. I hear him before I see him—a roar from laundry, a crash, guards cursing. He’ll be dragged to solitary now.
Jace doesn’t look back, and I don’t dare let myself react.
For hours, Nico and I go through the motions. I scrub pans and peel potatoes on my shift, trying not to imagine what’s happening in solitary. Nico is sent back and forth from the kitchen to the library, nerves eating him alive. Every time I pass a guard, I look for some sign—anything to say Jace is still okay. Nothing.
After dinner, everything inside me feels frayed.
I find Nico mopping near the admin hall, his face tense. We don’t speak. We just wait, watching the clock, holding our breaths as Thanksgiving grows colder outside.
Finally, the next part of the plan: Nico knocks over a cleaning cart, setting off the small admin fire alarm. Guards scramble, shouting, running for the control panel. I slip out with the trash, as invisible as I can make myself, the screwdriver burning a hole in my pocket. The service alley is dark, colder than before, and empty except for the distant wail of an ambulance somewhere in the city.
The blackout hits right on time. The whole block plunges into darkness. This is it. My hands shake so badly I almost drop thescrewdriver as I find the panel on the service elevator. I work the switch, breath hissing between my teeth. The doors creak open.
