This ballroom was specifically built for this event and has been used for the Snowflake Ball for decades. They keep these doors locked throughout the year, except for today. I’ve dreamed of this since I joined Niveus.
I thought that when I finally got here, it would be a happy moment. Another marker of success.
I thought I’d be crowned Snowflake Queen. It’s what I wanted the most after valedictorian and Head Prefect.
But as I look at the crowns sitting on deep red cushions at the front of the ballroom, I realize how stupid this all is. The prefect badge, the crown. Lumps of metal I’d tied so much of my self-worth to.
I take a breath and I step forward, through the curtain. Voices get lower, whispers louder, as faces turn to stare at us.
I’m at the front now and I take in the room, trying not to shake. There are tables filled with familiar strangers, their faces covered by sparkly masks.
They hate me. Every person in this room hates me… and knowing that gives me the confidence to abandon any pride I have left, and march over to the cushions and grab one of the crowns. Devon gives me a weird look as I place the meaningless metal on my head.
People look surprised, amused, ready to see what I do next.
I see a figure slip in through one of the doors at the back.Terrell?Did Devon invite him after all?
It’s good, he gets to see us take Niveus down. He was there helping us with the details, it seems right that he’s here now. Plus, now I know that there is one person in the audience besides Devon who probably doesn’t hate me.
I scan the hall for Ms. Donovan, and her camera operator. They’re both dressed as waiters, blending in with the rest of the servers at the back. I don’t see the security, but I assume they are hidden somewhere in the room, waiting to jump in if necessary. Donovan starts counting down from five with her hands, the camera operator points the camera in our direction, then Donovan gives me a thumbs-up, and I begin, speaking clearly into the little microphone Donovan gave me to pin to my dress.
“My name is Chiamaka Adebayo and this is my friend Devon Richards. And by design, we are the only Black students at Niveus Private Academy. Every ten years, Niveus accepts two Black students. Niveus waits until their senior year to really strike, to enhance its campaign of psychological and physical abuse. The aim? To force thesestudents to drop out, ruining every hope they had for a future. It’s a game Niveus calls social eugenics.”
I open up the yearbook from 1965.
“Here is a picture of Camp Aces, a camp set up for legacy students at the school and their families to plot how they were going to destroy the lives of the Black students at Niveus. And, since this project was started, every single Black student has dropped out before graduation. There is no explanation for where they went. They just vanish. And they vanish because Niveus made them. But that’s why we are here. We are going to break that cycle by telling everyone what is really going on at this school. We are here to expose Niveus, its students, teachers, and donors for what they are.”
I unfold the posters from my clutch, passing the one with our yearbook photo scratched out to Devon and holding up one of the less-incriminating photos that Aces had taken and shoved through my mail slot. I look away from the camera and stare them all down.
“We have had physical threats, we have been followed, we have been set up. We have had our privacy invaded and personal photos and information leaked across the school. And now we say NO MORE,” I finish.
I’m standing here, like I always dreamed I would be. At the front, the queen to them all. It’s nothing like how I envisioned it. Not in the slightest. Yet I still feel powerful.
I turn to find the journalist again. But I furrow my eyebrows in confusion as I search the crowd. Where did she go? The camera operator is missing too.
There is movement across the crowd as people begin shufflingaround in their seats. I soon realize what they are doing. They are swapping out their masks. Exchanging them for identical ones. The mask from the hallway. The mask that chased me home.
Everyone in the hall has one on.
They sit there.
I know it’s silent, but all I can hear is the blood rushing in my ears.
This isAces. Every person I have spent the past four years with. Every person who I have looked in the eye. Sat next to in class. Passed in the hallway. Every person who, all along, wanted to humiliate me, see me work to get to the top, only to tear me down. Every person who knew they could hide behind thesemasks—online or here, now; a cult, that wants nothing more than to see me and Devon fail.
“Is your performance over?” a deep, dark voice says from behind me. I turn sharply and I am met by familiar jet-black hair; a wrinkled, expressionless face; and eyes devoid of light, staring down at me.
“We gave you the chance to leave with some of your dignity intact, but instead you two clearly want the Dianna Walker treatment,” Headmaster Ward says.
“What did you do to Dianna?” Devon says, sounding terrified.
I feel like I’m in a nightmare.
“You don’t scare us; we’ve recorded it all, and it’s being broadcast across America,” I say.
“Is that so…? Where are the cameras?” Headmaster Ward asks.
I glance back out into the sea of Aces. There’s still no sign of Ms. Donovan or her camera operator. What is going on?
