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“Opuntia Arison,” the voice echoed from down the long corridor through the air that felt as still as stone. It took every fibre of her being to move in the direction of the call and not to run away and cower. Every part of her was shaking, from her knees to her hands to her breathing. But there could be no escape. The sky would not open up and swallow her. Down that long corridor awaited her fear, and she was bound to follow it like a dog on a leash. She took agonizing steps towards the door and in the distance could hear the faintest of carols and the sound of church organs. The songs that usually made her feel warm inside were now leading her to her doom. ‘How did we get like this?’ Opuntia thought desperately. She never wanted this, but she was here. And it was all thanks to…him.
This was a crescendo to a symphony of events and emotions that had been building for the past weeks. As the weather grew colder, and the snow on the ground became a permanent sight around the school grounds, tensions between the six friends became more and more frigid. They had each divided into their smaller groups of two and three instead of talking to each other as a whole. This was typically a given since they had different classes together, but at meal times they would always reconvene and share their thoughts about what happened throughout the day. Now, it seemed there was less and less to say, with conversations often subsiding into heavy silences, unspoken words hanging in the air like toxic fumes. It was the most obvious between Sampson and Cas, where she would one moment find herself talking to Cas about calculus homework, and the next Sampson would be telling her a joke, and Cas was nowhere to be found. It was clear that everything going on at the school was taking a toll on them, and Opuntia herself could feel every day once again stretch into long voids, all blended together to form a colourless mass of fatigue and stress. With her friends seeming more absent than usual, there was barely anything to stop her from sinking wistfully back into the fog and succumbing to the will of the school and now, the ender. Could she just accept the fact that she would never know who they were? Could she really just let them continue to torture her, and put the people she cared about in danger? Was this the new normal?
Every history club meeting was becoming more or less of the same thing, each time growing shorter in length and full of less substance, and they were still being forced to talk in code. Questions were not being answered, and no new theories were being produced by the club’s members. But this was not the case on the fifteenth of December.
It was a typical winter afternoon, with the sun already sunken below the dense forest of trees surrounding the school, and the howling wind sending their branches askew. Within the poster-clad walls of the history classroom, she listened to Eng explain the current situation of the coven of Caliban. This time, the code names were updated to figures from the Revolutionary War.
“So, Thomas Jefferson and the rest of the revolutionaries are currently in a civil dispute after the cannon incident,” He explained, screwing his eyes up to try and remember everyone’s name. “There’s still a lot of disagreement towards what America’s motives are and a lot of them have now turned against it since they believe America…is now in support of…the British? Does that make sense?” Eng now seemed to be confused himself, unable to keep track of everything he said.
“Dorian and the rest of that cult are now scrambling because their beloved idol is a psycho who doesn’t actually care about them. Solid.” Sampson said lazily, his face squished against his palm.
“Dude, what is the point of having code names if we’re not even going to use them?” Teddy pointed out, gesturing to the door of Mr. Maguire’s office. “C’mon, we have to keep quiet or else we’ll get in trouble,”
“Oh, right, yeah,” Sampson replied, though he didn’t seem to be bothered by getting caught. “Ok, is it my turn yet? I have something important to say.”
Opuntia snapped back to reality after spending the last minute staring out the window. “Uh, let’s review with Cas and Wilfred and their progress on the reaction and then we can do ours.” She decided quickly. The six of them had been working in pairs regarding different topics of the conspiracy for the past few meetings. Eng and Teddy had been tasked with covering the coven of Caliban, which was relatively easy since Eng was still keeping minutes for the Debate team, and he added that most of the time they forgot he was friends with the five of them, or even was there in the first place, so the coven members had no problem speaking freely around him. Wilfred and Cas were in charge of the ender’s latest act, the chemistry explosion, and so far had no luck in figuring out what actually happened. Opuntia had also stared at that poem copied from under the desk over and over and still had barely a clue about what it meant. Yellow and green make red? Pink flesh still intact? But that was not her responsibility, since she and Sampson had taken on the ender’s identity, a seemingly pointless and never-ending task, and the worst part was that Sampson was barely even working with her, not having a chance to share their ideas since all of the others were roommates. So, whatever he had to say that was apparently important, she was left in the dark about.
Wilfred perked up at the mention of his name, brushing the hair from his face. But Cas remained distracted, picking intensely at a felt poppy on Mr. Maguire’s desk leftover from Memorial Day.
“Well, we really don’t have much to say, once again,” Wilfred shrugged, an apologetic frown etched on his thin mouth. “We have determined that the reaction had to have happened between a reactive white powder and reactive clear liquid that created a combustion reaction, so it has to have some oxygen getting displaced.”
“And you said that it smelled really bad, right O.P?” Teddy added helpfully.
“Right,” Wilfred continued. “It created oxygen and some other product that smelled bad. But if you know chemistry, these things don’t exactly narrow it down at all. It seems almost impossible to know for certain--”
“Wait, wait, wait, hold on,” Cas suddenly stood up from his perch, still clutching the flower in his hand. His brows were furrowed and his eyes were wide, appearing almost mad. This was the look of a Cas epiphany.
“What? What is it?” Opuntia asked but Cas shushed her. He walked up to her wordlessly as everyone else watched with curious expressions. He bent over her desk and grabbed the piece of paper on which she had copied the ender’s most recent poem. She watched as he mouthed the words on the page, dragging his pointer finger down each line as it read it.
“Chlorine gas, it was chlorine gas…” He said as he looked up, meeting Opuntia’s eyes.
“It is? Explain yourself, Cas,” Wilfred said, baffled. Cas began pacing around the classroom, taking off his glasses just to put them back on again.
“Well, clearly, Wilfred said everything we knew already, and I was looking at the poppy, from World War One, obviously. In World War I they used Chlorine gas as chemical warfare, and I thought, well, you can see what I thought.” He explained rapidly, all as Wilfred whipped open his chemistry book again. Opuntia looked at Teddy for better clarification, who looked impressed.
“It could work,” he said slowly. “But we still don’t know what reaction went down, we just know that it ended up producing chlorine gas.”
“The poem says yellow and green make red, and the word chlorine stems from the root word in Greek meaning yellow-green. And chlorine gas irritates your eyes and skin, naturally making it red,” Cas carried on, not paying attention to anything else.
“If this is true, it’s a major breakthrough,” Opuntia said, feeling something, anything, for the first time in a while. They were finally beginning to make progress. The first part was always the hardest, she thought. She was sure that with this piece of the puzzle found, the rest would come together, at least regarding the question of the last act.
“Chlorine and oxygen compounds are typically oxidizing agents. A fuel added to it would in theory create something like an explosion.” Wilfred said thoughtfully, now also wracking his brains to connect the lines.
“Chlorine and oxygen…that’s a white powder…” Teddy thought aloud, the three science-based people now brainstorming together. “That couldn’t be sodium hypochlorite, could it?”
“That’s a liquid,” Wilfred told him. “But calcium hypochlorite, that very well could be our contender.”
“I can’t believe you figured this out. Great job, Cas.” Teddy smiled, shaking his head in disbelief, and Opuntia was right there with him. At these words, Cas stopped pacing to look at them, taken aback by this sudden praise. He then turned away to sit back down.
“Well, what future doctor would I be if I couldn’t tell you the effects of chlorine gas?” He muttered though a very small smile was forming on his face.
“But we still have to figure out the identity of the other substance that caused the reaction,” Wilfred carried on, now standing up to write the chemical formula for calcium hypochlorite on the board. Opuntia felt almost helpless in this conversation, barely scraping a B+ in chemistry, and having no clue what it could be. She looked over towards Eng and Sampson, who had also not said anything this entire time, to find Sampson standing up abruptly, a determined glint in his eyes that could only mean one thing.
“Anyone have an idea?” Wilfred asked the room at large. “We know that the ‘fuel’ cannot be hazardous unless added to the calcium hypo--”
“I’m getting expelled,” Sampson blurted out.
Wilfred stood there, his arm still suspended in the air, holding the piece of white chalk to the blackboard. Opuntia could feel her breath catch in her throat. It was a sudden declaration that he had clearly been dying to spit out.
“Alright, now that I’ve gotten everyone to shut up, it’s time for me to explain what I had already said was important,” Sampson stated, smirking at seeing the dumbfounded looks on everyone’s faces.
“Sampson, what are you talking about? You haven’t been expelled,” Teddy said, an eyebrow raised.
“Right, not yet Dodgers, but I’m going to. I’ve decided.” He replied matter-of-factly, sitting down and leaning all the way back in his wooden chair.
Opuntia just stared, almost at a loss for words. She was unsure if he was actually serious.
“I’ve even decided on a date,” Sampson continued. “Mark your calendars, everyone, because this Friday, Sampson Laurier is splitting. For good.”
No one said a word. Everyone just kept staring at the boy with a wild grin on his face.
“Oh, you’re being serious,” Cas was the first to blurt out, echoing Opuntia’s thoughts with his hands firmly on his hips.
“Yes! Of course, I’m being serious,” Sampson retorted, glancing at them all to see their reactions. She wasn’t sure of what he wanted from them. “Why wouldn’t I be serious about this?”
“Because I always just assumed you were joking about wanting to leave Arison. I mean, after you said you would do it and you never did,” Opuntia finally spoke, making Sampson scowl playfully at her.
“Arison, every word that has ever exited my mouth has always been 100% true,” he said, making Cas and Opuntia roll their eyes.
“He really is leaving,” Teddy said to her, his face now looking unusually serious. “I tried to talk him out of it a hundred times but--”
“Yeah, nothing you ever said could convince me.” Sampson finished, stretching his arm and wrapping it around the back of Teddy’s chair. “I did want to do it, but you know, I’ll be honest, I was a bit of a chicken. But with everything that’s happened, I feel like it’s time for me to say goodbye to this place for good.”
This whole time, Opuntia had always brushed off his remarks about getting expelled, and now the truth was staring her right in the face. He didn’t want to stay. He was going to leave everyone behind with Redwood, the teachers and the ender for some reason she couldn’t even comprehend.
“I still don’t understand why you can’t just hold on for another few months.” Wilfred scrutinized, with a look similar to that of a dissatisfied parent. “You would get a high school diploma to secure your future,”
“My future is already secured!” Sampson explained exasperatedly. “I’m going to work at the old man’s company until he retires so I can take over as CEO. So who needs a diploma when you can instead have a legendary sendoff? I can’t just graduate normally, I have to be…”
“Special? Different? Better?” Opuntia suggested, feeling a sudden resentment rise in her that began to leak in her voice.
“Exactly,” Sampson replied, not catching on to her sarcasm. “Look, I was already too late to be the first in our year to do it. Stupid Michael beat me to that. So, now my job is to make it even more memorable. But it’s not just about that, because I also have a theory that can help us determine who the ender is.”
Everyone else seemed intrigued by this statement, but it only seemed to make Opuntia more irritated.
“You think you know?” Teddy asked with wide eyes. “Wow, two breakthroughs in one meeting.”
“It’s only a working theory, but me getting expelled could prove it true or false. Let me explain.”
Cas opened his mouth to say something but Sampson immediately stopped him.
“And no, Seki, I’m not going to make you help me or tell you what I’m even doing. It’s all figured out. No one’s dying on this hill but me.”
Cas then shut his mouth, his eyebrows raised in surprise.
“Ok, with the last act that happened, and how it basically targeted the students, it got me thinking. This whole situation with the ender has made the school rules and overall atmosphere the pits. The ender was able to gather a group of students and basically make them go feral, which only made Redwood double down. But what if this is what they wanted? What if they wanted to make us look worse so they could punish us even more?
“Are you implying that someone on the staff is behind this?” Wilfred asked in a low voice, leaning in towards Sampson so he would quiet down.
“Only a staff member could get access to a storage room. Only a staff member could get access to the chemical supply closet, and Opuntia heard someone in Redwood’s office the night of the second act.” Sampson explained even more.
“Mr. Wozniak is under investigation for what happened in the lab,” Eng said quietly, following Sampson's narrative.
“I’m not saying it has to be him, but no student could have this much power to be getting away with this. They practically caught Michael in a millisecond!”
“...my father is a staff member,” Opuntia said, her face as still as stone. “Are you saying he’s the ender?”
His cold demeanour and seeming dislike of the school’s rowdy students, along with his allowance of the torment that went on at Arison did seem like he could be capable of performing something like this. But when Opuntia considered how he dedicated his entire life to the school, she couldn’t imagine why he would be fine with ripping it apart and having to deal with the damages. Her father may be cold, but she knew he would never try to blow up students. And besides, she had seen how troubled he appeared lately. His jet black hair was beginning to grey, he appeared stiffer, and he would never meet her gaze when she walked by.
“C’mon, of course he’s not saying that. Right, Sampson?” Teddy assured her, looking at Sampson for a reply.
“No, no, not him,” he backtracked, his cocky smile faltering from her severe look.
“My main suspect is Redwood. He would be the only one sadistic enough to cook up a plan like this, and he has power over everyone else. So, who knows? Maybe he got Dr. Wozniak to switch the chemicals.”
This caused Wilfred to gasp and shake his head, firmly believing in Wozniak’s innocence after the whole debacle.
“That was just an example,” Sampson clarified quickly.
“But you still haven’t said how getting expelled is going to prove this,” Cas reminded him.
“I’m getting there! Okay, so my plan for getting expelled is not going to be anything like the Ender attacks. But if it really is Redwood, I have a feeling that he might try to pin the ender stuff on me. Even with no evidence, he’ll still try to frame me. Because who else would he despise more than me, right?”
Everyone just sat in silence for what felt like the tenth time that day. Opuntia still couldn’t believe what she was hearing, and she didn’t know how much longer she could take it.
“It had to be done, so you’re welcome for taking the stand,” Sampson added, giving a little bow.
“No it didn’t,” she said, finally snapping. All of her friends looked at her but the words continued spilling out of her. “It didn’t have to happen and you know it. You could’ve just stayed here with the rest of us.”
“Opuntia, I’ve wanted this since I was twelve, and you know I can’t survive any longer in this place. It’s just gotta be done.”
“You think any of us want to be here anymore?” She said waspishly, her voice growing higher with indignation. “And you’re just going to leave us for some pathetic reason?”
“Pathetic? Hey, I just said I could prove--”
“You know that’s not the reason. It’s you and your stupid need to always be the centre of everything, isn’t it? You couldn’t let Michael get a head up on you, could you?”
She could not just sit here and listen to one of her closest friends talk so freely about abandoning them in their darkest times. She could not just sit idly by as her world changed around her, as one of the only things that kept her sane was now slowly fading into the distance. And she didn’t understand why no one else seemed to care. She whipped around to look at her friends.
“You all are just perfectly fine with this?”
She watched as Cas simply shrugged his shoulders. “Well, if I had the money and the opportunities he did, I’d probably do the same.” He said honestly.
“I wouldn’t, but it’s still up to him. You can never convince a man who’s set on something to do otherwise.” He stated, looking over at Cas. Teddy seemed to agree, nodding his head slowly. “I’ve known for a while,” he professed. These responses only seemed to hurt Opuntia even more. This entire time, she thought that they cared about each other. She figured they would have each other’s backs no matter what, even if they did have petty bickering and threw around some meaningless insults sometimes. But to see all of them so apathetic, even Teddy? It stung her soul. She turned to look at Eng, who was the only one who had not spoken, but she knew he would not speak for her. She was alone, stretching herself thin trying to keep everyone together. A losing battle.
“You’re acting like I’m never going to see you guys again. Obviously, I’m going to keep in touch with you, maybe I’ll stop by at graduation!” Sampson finally spoke, trying to make the conversation lighter again.
“That will definitely kill Redwood,” Teddy chuckled.
“It’s not going to be the same…” Opuntia looked down, feeling so defeated, so helpless. In contrast, however, Sampson still had a smirk on his rosy face.
“Wow, Arison, I didn’t realize you cared so much, jeez,”
‘Didn’t realize you cared’ Those words cut her so deeply, she was surprised to not find blood soaking through her shirt. What person would not care about her friend of six years? Why did she feel insane for not wanting to lose someone she cared about? But she knew she couldn’t express just how much she cared. She didn’t have it in her to speak about everything she was feeling right now, the frustration, the sorrow, the desperation. But she wanted to scream. She could feel her face growing red as she shot back at him, wanting to wipe the stupid smile off his face, not understanding how he was enjoying this.
“You’re--infuriating, you know that?” She told him, immediately standing from her chair and grabbing her bag. “You all are.” She didn’t care if this revealed who the ender was. She would gladly let the ender roam free forever more, rather have her hand burnt off than lose her friends. But the problem was, she could never tell them that.
“O.P, don’t leave, I get you’re upset but--” Teddy began, but was interrupted by the opening of Mr. Maguire’s office door. Opuntia clapped a hand to her mouth, not realizing how loud she was being.
“Getting a bit enthusiastic, are we?” Mr. Maguire asked, apparently none the wiser, that they had not been talking about history for several minutes. “Are we still covering the Revolutionary War?”
“Yes sir,” they all answered quickly, Wilfred reaching to erase the chemical formula off the board.
“Hey, I saw that. Save the science stuff for the labs, I say,” Mr. Maguire said playfully. “We are here in the year 1776. We must keep the history alive.” he winked. “Well, don’t let me stop you.”
“We were just leaving, actually,” Opuntia blurted out, pulling her backpack over her arms and turning away from them, her cheeks still burning.
“Oh, well, I guess I’ll see you all after the break, then. Merry Christmas!” Mr. Maguire called as Opuntia left the room, with not a look back at her other friends.
When she got to her room, her face was already buried in her pillow before the door swung shut. Her head was once again pounding, a common occurrence these days. And as she lay there, the muscles in her face screwed up from the pain, she still couldn’t let it be true. She would make it end. She would strain every part of herself to keep everyone here, rooted to the spot. She would end their suffering. She would end her own suffering. She had to because she could not let this be the end.
But she was so tired. And now looking back at how everyone was so fine with Sampson leaving them in the dust, her anger was becoming shame. She shouldn’t have said anything. She alone was making a fool of herself and she must’ve misunderstood some things because clearly her friends didn’t care as much as she thought they did. She wished she could always remain as positive as Teddy, as level-headed as Wilfred or even as enigmatic as Engelbart. But things would always come out of her, albeit in the wrong way. Why did she have to be this exploding fury of disarray?
There was that nagging thought in the back of her mind that answered her question, and on most days Opuntia would never resort to it. But above all the other cries, this one seemed to pick at her most, and it was the very simple fact that separated her from the rest of her peers. The emotional, sappy, uncontrolled state of being a woman. Was this truly why only she seemed to live in this constant state of erupting, even after all this pain the year had dealt them? Thinking about this embarrassed her even more, and she could feel her face still glowing scarlet. It wasn’t fair. She was losing herself day by day, unravelling like a spool of thread until she feared there would be nothing left. And her friends were supposed to be there no matter what. She supposed there were other things more important to Sampson Laurier than her, and she wasn’t sure how to feel about that.
She knew she could not stay in this state forever, so though it took all the strength left in her, she climbed from her bed and to her writing desk, focusing solely on her work, which she knew would untangle the wires, attach circuits and smooth the knots of herself. She never knew why she worked this way, but now it was her only hope.
In the darkest depths of a garden
Where roses and alstroemerias bloomed the year before
The ground stood dead.
The trees were still.
But in the middle was a secret scene.
Statues perched hand in hand and circled a patch of grass.
Their faces blank as the slate they were created from.
Their marble fingertips slowly crumbling from age
And the weight of the scalding sun.
But one is tipping, lurching like a bobbing buoy
Towards the edge of the ragged cliff,
Swerving to the luscious meadow where flowers still bloomed
Tempted sweetly by the scent of daisies, and the hum of bees.
But the statues cannot grab hold.
They cannot reach out to grasp their part of the whole
Suspended like figurines in resin mold.
But it could.
There in the center was the mess of the light.
The consequence of the dog days roaring for too long.
She was on fire.
She was a melting puddle of singed sinew and sticky tissue.
Boiling blood killing the yellow grass.
But, tell me, was she a fool to snatch at the ankles of the stones, when she was sure she felt their warmth?
Perhaps it was just the heat of the sun, but how could they stand there, as if plunged into icy water?
They were not on fire.
They were falling, just out of sight, one after the other
The clock struck midnight.
And they fell like heavy drops of rain.
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But the rain never came for her in the center of the garden.
She will remain forever lasting.
So if you need her you can find her
Screaming at the ground
Because she’s still too afraid to turn her face to the sky
“I am not on fire”
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Once completed, Opuntia looked down at the pages now filled with her freshly written words and debated ripping them out. It was definitely different from what she usually wrote and she wasn’t sure if she liked that. She felt like her writing had changed so much from the past years and what was once a pastime was now her only means of escape. Reading it, she felt so immersed in metaphor that it was like cracking a code, but it was also so obvious it was painful. But she knew she had already wasted too much time by not studying for her upcoming biology test. So she set the leather book, and all of her feelings aside. She was fine. She was going to pretend like everything was fine, a skill she had become scarily good at.
Three days before Christmas break and two days before Sampson’s grand departure, the Caesar Six did not mention what had occurred at the meeting the day before. They once again barely talked, with Opuntia doing her best to keep her expression neutral and her thoughts clear. She didn’t want her friends to see her as the near-emotional wreck they had witnessed. She didn’t want them to treat her like everyone else did at school, like a Martian making a poor attempt to blend in. But she wondered if she was too late, since every now and again she would find Teddy looking at her before awkwardly smiling and turning away.
One day before Sampson’s expulsion plan, Opuntia was shown a completed theory of chemical reactions from Wilfred and Cas, on a crowded piece of paper full of crossings out and arrows pointing in every direction.
“Calcium hypochlorite mixed with polyethylene glycol would’ve made that exact reaction, and they look similar to what should’ve been in the lab,” Wilfred explained in a barely audible voice, hunched over their table to point out exactly what he was showing her.
“You’re sure this is what it is?” Opuntia asked them, handing the paper over to the rest of the group to look at.
“100%,” Cas said with some pride. “And we know how easily the ender could’ve gotten it, no matter who they are. It’s pretty much a mix of breaker fluid and a common cleaner like pool chlorine, so it’s not hard to come by.”
At these words, Opuntia noticed Eng take a sharp intake of breath and lean away from the rest of the group, appearing slightly dazed.
“Don’t say that name, we have to--” Opuntia started to remind Cas, but Sampson had just then joined their huddle, making her close her mouth and look away.
“Oh great nerd stuff, so glad I won’t be doing any of that anymore,” he chuckled as Wilfred quickly folded the paper and put it away. She could feel Teddy’s eyes on her again as she sat there in silence.
“Well, I’m sure everyone was wondering but it’s all sorted out. My plan is nearly in motion. I’m practically going, going, gone.” Sampson said to the six of them, finally bringing up the elephant in the room.
“Are you gonna say goodbye?” Teddy asked him since no one else wanted to talk.
“That’s what I was leading to, Dodgers.” Sampson continued. “Come down at breakfast tomorrow for my last words to each of you. Well, obviously not last words, I mean it’s not like I’m dying,” He laughed at these words in solace. “But it’s happening right after breakfast, so I’m guessing none of you guys want to be there. Unless you want to stick around for a show of a lifetime then…”
“We have a biology midterm,” Eng said awkwardly, making Sampson’s demeanour deflate the smallest bit.
“Right, well, then I want all of you there at breakfast. Even you, Arison.”
She looked up at the mention of her name and locked eyes with Sampson for the first time in days. She wondered if he could see her anguish behind them, or if he even cared. She just nodded, as did everyone else. But by the time it came, the morning Sampson was set to execute his foolish plan, she had completely forgotten her promise to him.
The combination of the biology test she had stayed up all night studying for, the partial elation of being free from school for two weeks, the dread of being back home around her father and sister, and on top of that, the utter despair she felt over losing one of her closest friends was swirling around inside of her like a cyclone. She studied the bags under her eyes as she stared into the foggy mirror, her palms slick with sweat and shower water. Her brain was like a TV set where channels were constantly being changed. One second she was recalling the functions of the hypothalamus, the next she was hoping beyond hope that Sampson would change his mind. But it was pointless to hope anymore. Any time Opuntia seemed to hope for something, things only got worse. By now, she had accepted the fact that he loved the thrill of fame and glory more than her, so why should she give him the satisfaction of her focus along with everyone else’s? He had already said goodbye to her, in her eyes, when he first smugly revealed his plot, so she didn’t need to see it once again. It would only make things worse. It would only make things more real, and she just couldn’t bear it.
She did feel a twinge of guilt as she pulled on her socks, as her mind was now traitorously playing a reel of all her favourite memories of him. His jokes, his wild imagination, his eagerness to stand up to even the scariest of teachers.
‘Stop it. Stop. He’s made his choice. He’s not coming back, and he doesn’t care, so why should you?’ She reminded herself. She had to stop thinking about it and focus only on her test. She couldn’t be that emotional little crybaby. So, she took a deep breath and left the room, walking in the opposite direction of where she knew he was waiting for her. ‘He won’t care. He’s leaving, he obviously doesn’t care. He doesn’t care about anything.’
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