The Girl Thief Page 2

  “You know who’s going to be upset? Gladys. That’s who.”

  Sammy glanced back at Mark, whose shoulder twitched.

  “That witch will have us locked up.”

  “We didn’t do nothing but defend ourselves.”

  “You think they’ll believe us?”

  “There’s the two of us, the twins.”

  “Are you going to leave out the part where Justin almost speared him with the scissors?”

  “Let’s keep that to ourselves.”

  Cindy held onto the dresser and wheezed. “Suppose he’s really bad. He could die for all we know.”

  “I’ll check on him, okay?” Sammy walked over and shook Mark.

  The smell of peppermint hung over him like a cloud. Mark’s eyelids flickered into slits. “What happened?” He sounded groggy as if he’d been woken from a deep sleep.

  “You fell and bumped your head.”

  “Fell?” He leaned on his side and pushed up, grimacing. He pulled a porcelain sliver from under his arm. “Lying bitch.”

  “He’s fine,” Sammy said, turning to Cindy who tottered to the doorway.

  Mark sat up against the banister rails.

  “See?” Sammy said. “Now get in bed, and I’ll clean this up. Mark can slither down to the basement.”

  Mark ran his hand along the back of his head. “I’m bleeding.”

  Sammy bent over but didn’t see anything. “I’ll get ice.”

  He kicked shards at them. “Think you can knock me around in my own house?”

  “You started it, Mark.”

  “Just because I live with the trash doesn’t mean I have to take this shit from it.”

  Sammy had seen that look a thousand times on the streets, but it was the first time someone put words to it.

  Cindy was back by the dresser, stuffing clothes into the bag.

  “I’ll make sure you’re locked up for this,” he said, plucking a shard from his hair.

  “And you'll get locked up for groping her.”

  He chuckled, but it sounded forced. “She was asking for it like she does with the other hundred guys she’s been screwing.”

  “You take that back, Mark!”

  “Got something else to crack over my head? I’ll add it to the other assault charges.”

  Sammy hurried to Cindy. “He’s just mad and blowing off steam.”

  “I’m not taking the chance.”

  “We’ll testify against you, Mark,” Sammy said. “You’re inviting your own troubles.”

  “You think anybody’s going to believe your lies?”

  Cindy wiped her eyes. “Nobody’s going to believe us.”

  “You’re sick, Cindy.”

  “I’ll take my chances.”

  Sammy sighed. “Where are we going to go?”

  “You said you knew some places.”

  Sammy ran her hand over her head. “That was years ago.”

  “How bad can they be now?”

  Sammy had scouted a few abandoned buildings when she first arrived at Gladys’s house just in case things didn’t work out. The best of them were structurally sound, but it’d take a lot to get them livable. “There’ll be no light or heat.”

  “I have enough clothes.” Cindy held the bag up as if it was the answer to all her troubles.

  Sammy didn’t want to squash her hopes with tales of hunger, marauding packs of thugs, and needle pushers. “Are you sure?”

  Cindy took in a deep breath and exhaled slowly. It seemed to calm her. “I have to leave in a few months, anyway. Why wait around and risk getting thrown in jail?”

  Sammy cupped Cindy’s hands, which felt like ice. She rubbed to warm them. “You wait here and rest, okay?”

  Cindy nodded.

  Mark didn’t move from the hallway, moaning as he shifted his weight. He looked like a hundred other guys down on their luck, but he was safe in his momma’s home.

  Sammy grabbed a black trash bag and stuffed the two trousers, three shirts, three bras, and a handful of panties. She was used to traveling light with all the moving she did with Uncle Danny. She’d been here for almost three years, never been at a place that long.

  Cindy sat hunched on the bed, trying to smile, but it never quite happened. She pushed up to stand, but the weight of the bag over her shoulder almost toppled her back.

  Sammy helped her out of the bedroom, stepping on Mark’s leg as she crossed over him to the stairs. “Sorry. Am I lying now, Mark?”

  “Lying bitch.”

  Sammy stopped by the twins’ room. The night-light gave the room a slightly reddish hue, shining through one of those superhero figures. She’d gotten it for them, telling them he’d protect them. Puffs of breaths and exhales cut through the silence of the room, rising and falling in a rhythmic wave.

  “Coming?” Cindy asked from the bottom of the stairs.

  Sammy nodded. “Bye, my angels,” she whispered.

  Mark shifted among the shards and chuckled. “It’s not every day that the trash takes itself out.”

  Sammy swung her bag at the banister rail on the way down, hitting him in the back of the head. “Sorry.”

  Chapter Three

  _____________________________

  Sammy had that gnawing fear about Cindy that she kept pushing down, hoping it was nothing. Cindy spewed a long, hacking cough, the kind that tore at your throat. She stumbled but held onto a lamppost. The air was thick with impending rain. She tugged at Cindy’s arm. “We have to keep going.”

  Cindy dropped her bag. “Seventeen years of living and this is all I have to show for it.”

  “Makes leaving easier.”

  “What are we going to do, Sam?”

  “Keep moving. The place isn’t much farther.”

  “I mean tomorrow and the next day.”

  Dark clouds rolled by the nearly full moon. “We’ll figure it out. Come on.”

  Cindy looked past her. “I should’ve let him grope me.”

  “Don’t talk that way.”

  Cindy’s eyes turned dull. “It wouldn’t be the first time.”

  Cindy had told her about her stepdad.

  “I still see his face like it’s right in front of me.”

  Was she talking about Mark?

  “Dumbfounded. He looked totally dumbfounded.”

  Cindy always described her stepdad that way when they took him away in an ambulance. “Come on. We have to go.”

  They headed to a building on the west-side flood zone. It was abandoned like all the other buildings in the zone, but this one was locked up solid and in good shape. All the first-floor windows had wire-mesh grates as if they planned on revitalizing it. It’d be a first if they did.

  Sammy and Cindy crossed over to one of the long avenue blocks. The closer to the zone, the darker and quieter the streets got. Sammy had her ball bearings and could run if trouble came, but Cindy wouldn’t be running anytime soon.

  Cindy staggered and grabbed hold of a fence to a dark alley. She wheezed a long string of coughs. “Where is this place?”

  It was at least two avenues over and ten blocks up. Might as well be a hundred miles the way Cindy was going. “Not much more.”

  “You keep saying that.”

  “It will be if we keep moving.” Sammy felt the first drops of rain. Shit! That was all they needed. She tied the two bags together and flung them over the fence.

  “Why’d you do that?”

  “It’s starting to rain,” Sammy said, slipping her arm under Cindy’s shoulder. “I’ll come back and pick them up later.”

  They plodded two blocks up and one avenue over, but Cindy was getting heavier. Sammy found some steps under a canopy. Cindy looked like a pale doll and just as lively, her breath wheezy.

  When Uncle Danny got that way, she’d roll him on his side so he wouldn’t choke on his own vomit, until the day she didn’t. Sammy wiped the rain from Cindy’s cheeks. Her skin was cold and clammy. Don’t die on me.

  The rain was stea
dy now and their clothes soaked through. The building was in sight maybe five blocks up. It was an old beige stone building a few stories high. It was slicked wet from the rain and glistened from a lone working streetlamp.

  Cindy’s legs folded under her. Sammy slipped behind her and dragged her to a pile of bricks. She held her up and pointed to the beige building. “It’s right there, Cindy. It’s right there.”

  Cindy closed her eyes.

  “You can’t give up.”

  Cindy opened her eyes to a squint.

  “We’re all we got, and we can’t give up on that. I’d carry you if I could, but I can’t. It’s only a few more blocks.”

  Cindy closed her eyes and opened them again. Sammy took it as a nod, and they staggered on.

  They teetered up the last few blocks as the rain came down in sheets. Sammy laid Cindy against the building’s front door. It was locked, and the windows still had the grates, but a few of the windows along the side glowed. Somebody was inside. The rest of the windows were dark, so the occupants were most likely squatters, but what kind lived in a locked-up place?

  She bent down and rubbed Cindy’s arms. “I’ll be right back, okay?”

  Cindy stiffened, looking as if it took everything she had to hold on.

  Sammy went back along the side of the building and found the rock where she’d hidden the chain. She’d use it to pull down the escape ladder, but the ladder was pushed all the way up and out of reach. She ran along the back, looking for a door or a window without a grate, but she came up against a fenced-in courtyard.

  She doubled back, fingering one of the windows’ grates. It looked as though she could scale it and might get high enough to reach the ladder. Sammy looped the chain around her neck and climbed. She held on and swung the chain. She’d have to lean out more to snag the rung, so she inched up, extended her arm, and swung, clanking the ladder, dropping it a notch.

  She leaned out farther and swung again. The chain looped around the bottom rung. She pulled hard. The window grate peeled away. Sammy held onto the chain, pulling the ladder with her as she fell. The chain slipped free, and she tumbled to the ground. Her shoulder took the brunt of the fall, but at least the ladder was down.

  Sammy climbed the ladder and pushed up the window, but it didn’t budge. She pushed down, then up. The room was too dark to see much inside, and she had to feel her way to the door, stumbling on unseen junk. The hallway had one of those cheap rope lights strung along the bottom of the wall, giving enough of a glow to see the stairs at the other end.

  Sammy held the chain, racing through the hallway and down the steps. The first floor had a similar glow. Sammy clicked open the front door and slowly opened it, glancing back for any surprises. She grabbed Cindy before her head hit the floor and pulled her inside.

  Sammy figured if the squatters had locked the place, they wouldn’t be rolling out the welcome mat. The hallway had a runner over black-and-white tiles. The place looked good, maybe too good. If the runner weren’t there, she could drag Cindy.

  “Let’s get up, okay?”

  Sammy slipped her shoulder under Cindy and walked arm in arm. The floorboards whined with each step. Lights seeped under the first room door, flickering as if somebody moved from behind it. “You’re doing good,” Sammy whispered. “Let’s keep going.”

  Cindy leaned heavily on her. Please let the next room be free.

  The door they just passed swung open; air swooshed by them. Sammy spun, pressing Cindy against the wall.

  A reedy guy with slicked-back black hair charged them with a bow knife. Damn! She’d left the chain by the front door. She grabbed a handful of bearings. See how he’d like a face full of these.

  The next door clicked open. They were trapped. Cindy slid down the wall.

  Chapter Four

  _____________________________

  Sammy reached for Cindy, dropping the bearings. The wet coat slipped from her grasp as Cindy tumbled to the floor. A large figure moved in the shadows toward them, holding what looked like a sledgehammer.

  The figure was a barrel-shaped lady in a brown floral dress. The hammer was a cast iron skillet, just as deadly, but it seemed less menacing. She gazed down at Cindy, appearing to be about Gladys’s age. The pan dropped to her side. “Put knife away.”

  “They are trespassing.”

  “They are kids.”

  The guy put the knife into a sheath clipped to his belt. “Trouble comes in all sizes.”

  The lady bent over Cindy and pressed the back of her hand against Cindy’s forehead. “She is burning hot. Igor, take her to the room next to mine.”

  “Mama, you cannot take every stray who lands on doorstep.”

  “Do as I say.”

  Igor sighed and lifted Cindy, struggling until he shifted her closer to him. “Did she swim in these?”

  “It’s raining out there,” Sammy said, stepping aside for him to pass.

  “I will get blankets,” Mama said.

  “Why not music and warm bath?” Igor carried Cindy down the hallway, passing an apartment lit up like Gladys’s house.

  This place must have power. Sammy raced to catch up with Igor.

  “Open door.”

  Sammy pushed open the door and flipped on the light switch, but no lights. “Where are the lights?”

  “You want lights, you pay for lights.” He laid Cindy on two large throw pillows.

  The room darkened. Mama stood by the doorway, holding a stack of blankets in her arms. “Igor, get light in here. I can see nothing.”

  “Anything else, Mama?”

  Mama dropped the blankets and told Sammy to help her get Cindy out of the clothes. Igor ran an electric cord from the apartment next door as Sammy held Cindy while Mama stripped off the wet clothes, dripping as she laid them over a wooden chair. Igor hooked up the light and seemed to enjoy the show.

  “What are you looking at?” Sammy asked, sneering at Igor.

  Mama laughed. “You have to give him something for his troubles.”

  Yeah, a fistful of bearings. Sammy laid Cindy down. The light from the nearby lamp glistened off Cindy’s pale wet skin.

  Mama covered Cindy with the blankets. “Bring heater here.”

  “She has blankets—”

  Mama shouted something to him in a foreign tongue. Sammy guessed it was Russian.

  Igor sighed and marched out.

  “What’d you say to him?” Sammy asked.

  Mama didn’t take her eyes off of Cindy. “She is sick and needs medicine. I have nothing strong enough for infection.”

  “If you tell me where I can find it, I’ll get it.”

  “You need doctor for medicine.”

  “If I go to the hospital, couldn’t I get a doctor to give me the medicine?”

  “You have money for doctor? For medicine?”

  Sammy shook her head.

  “Don’t be foolish child.”

  “So this medicine is in the hospital, right?”

  Mama nodded. Igor came in with the heater and hooked it up.

  “Do you know where they keep the medicine?”

  “It is in pharmacy,” Mama said. “You think you can go in and steal it like donuts in coffee shop?”

  “What’s the setup like in this pharmacy?”

  “Setup?” Mama asked, turning to Igor.

  Igor rattled on in Russian. The warm breeze from the heater felt good.

  Mama laughed. “We have thief among us?”

  “The thief can steal us a heater. Latasha has none for her room.”

  “She can share with Keisha tonight,” Mama said. “I will write down what you will need and tell you what I know of pharmacy setup.”

  Sammy nodded. She didn’t like stealing from places she knew nothing about, especially with no time to study the comings and goings of the place.

  “It will not be easy,” Mama said, grabbing Sammy’s wrist. “Do not bring police, or it will not be good for you or friend.”

  The iron gr
ip on Sammy’s wrist let her know that Mama was serious. “I won’t.”

  Mama let go and turned to Igor. “Bring pencil and paper.”

  Igor looked away from Cindy. “Making list?”

  Mama nodded. “There will be two things on list, one for her and one for me. It will be good to get both.”

  Sammy figured it wasn’t just a request. A wave rolled in her belly like a bunch of butterflies trying to get free.

  Mama stood, staring down at Sammy. “We’ll see what kind of thief you are. For her sake, you better be good one.”

  Chapter Five

  _____________________________

  The smoked white glass doors opened to the hospital. A few steps away was another such set of doors, but these didn’t open.

  “Welcome to Premium Health,” a machine voice said. “How can we be of assistance?”

  Sammy leaned into the crack between the doors, but it wasn’t wide enough to see anything.

  “Please state the nature of your visit.”

  “I’m sick.”

  “If this is an emergency, please enter through the emergency entrance.”

  Sammy walked out and around, following the arrows to the emergency entrance. The doors opened, but it was the same smoked white glass.

  “Please state the nature of your emergency.”

  “I’m sick,” Sammy said, trying to peer through the crack of the door.

  “Please state the conditions of your illness.”

  “If I knew what it was, I wouldn’t be here,” Sammy said. “This is a hospital, isn’t it?”

  “This is a private facility. State health-code law number JT562103–B states that only gravely ill patients may enter this facility. All other illnesses may be attended to at County General.”

  Vaults would be easier to get into than this place. A warning message of arrest and imprisonment came next. Sammy marched out and around the building, looking for a way to get into the place.

  A dark-haired lady strolled into a back door. It was an Employees Only entrance, requiring a badge.

  Sammy waited for what seemed like forever before a girl in her twenties trotted out. The badge was clipped to her hip, making it an easy swipe.