Once Upon A High School |A Short Story Collection|

goldilocks (part one)

Cheap silverware.

Fake porcelain dishes.

Rings and earrings that looked like they came from one of those child jewelry stores.

Raven groaned at the amount of time she had wasted. She didn't know why she even came to raid Ms. Wolfe's house again. Last time she only found items that wouldn't sell well in a pawn shop. Sure the silverware looked shiny, but it was obviously from the dollar store. The porcelain dishes on display in the china cabinet? She'd seen a dog-bowl worth more money than those plates. She did, however, pocket a pair of silver bird earrings to keep for herself.

Her nerves had shot through the roof when she slid through the window of the house ten minutes ago. The initial moment of the whole breaking-and-entering thing always sent her on high alert. Her eyes would trace over every nook and crevice, searching for any sign of life as she tiptoed through the first room.

She despised the anxiety she felt for the first few minutes of the break-in. It made her careless and weak, two things she didn't need getting in her way. Once she could control her breathing, calm her racing heart, and wipe her brow, she was golden.

Raven tiptoed through the dark house even though Ms. Wolfe wasn't home. A thief's habits were the hardest to break. She crept into the kitchen, her stomach growling with anticipation. Wolfe always kept her fridge stocked with the best deli meats in the city. Raven swore her mouth watered as she gripped the handle and pulled the fridge door open.

She was greeted instead with rows, rows and some more rows of bottled drinks ranging from red to blue. There wasn't a single sliver of meat anywhere in the fridge. Did Wolfe acquire a new obsession with Powerade?

Raven darted to the cabinets, desperate to find something that would fill the gaping hole in her stomach. But when she opened each door, all she could find were canisters upon canisters of protein shakes. She dropped her arms to her sides in defeat. What the hell? Not even a package of crackers?

Wolfe was on a liquid diet at the worst possible time. Perhaps she felt guilty of all the animals she'd eaten, or maybe she realized that her heavy weight left her huffing and puffing from just trying to find the remote control. Whatever the reason, Raven didn't really care. She shrugged her shoulders and left the kitchen, placing herself in front of the window that looked out onto Fable Street, her favorite neighborhood to sack.

Fable Street was a quaint little neighborhood, set apart from the city that never seemed to sleep. She hated pick-pocketing the tourist crowds there. She always felt like eyes were on her, watching her every move. It was like they all saw through her and the wig she wore as a disguise. A street camera had caught her on video once and she never went back there to steal again. She snickered when she thought of the name that the news crew of Channel 5 had deemed her with after they witnessed her leaving the jewelry store on the corner of Eighth and Sycamore.