Irma L.

“There was nothing I could do except homework. I cracked open Forsyth’s Basics of Cryptography, read until my eyes went bleary, then looked at my clock and saw it was only four thirty in the afternoon. Time really crawled when you were on lockdown. I struggled through another chapter, nodding off seventeen or eighteen times, then checked my clock again. It was still four thirty in the afternoon. Either time really crawled when you were on lockdown or my clock was broken. I checked my phone. In fact, it was eight thirty at night, which explained why I was so darn hungry. No one had come to get me for dinner. I wondered if this was part of my punishment or if the administration had simply forgotten about me. I’d now been at spy school long enough to guess it was the latter, which began to worry me. I could get through the night without food, but if someone didn’t remember I was in the Box by the next morning, things could get dicey. Still, it wasn’t worth panicking yet. Maybe this was merely a test to see how I handled pressure. If so, I’d show them I was a tough egg to crack. For the benefit of any cameras that might have been on me, I played it cool, as though I were really enjoying being on lockdown. I laid back on my cot and gave a contented sigh. “This is great,” I said to any concealed microphones. “All this time to myself. It’s like being on vacation.” Then I casually examined my clock to see if I could keep it from telling me that it was eternally four thirty in the afternoon.”
― Stuart Gibbs, Spy School