by Elle Klass
I knew my warehouse well and came back through a different window I considered my emergency backup. I skulked quietly to the staircase and eavesdropped on their conversation. “How much is left?” asked Einstein.
“I have three dollars and twenty nine cents. Peewee has this broken chain he found yesterday,” answered Star. Uhgg… the kids hadn’t gone away, which meant I’d be caught attempting to go up the stairs. I crunched into a shadowy corner and quiet as a butterfly listened to their discussions. They were homeless waifs too and invaded my makeshift home for the night. The girl and younger boy were naïve I assumed they hadn’t been on the streets long. The older boy I presumed spent more time on the streets.
“Today we will hit the train station and play it out same as we did the market,” declared Einstein. A commotion followed his order as they collected themselves and left. I sighed, relieved, and I dragged myself upstairs to my makeshift bed.
By evening, the smell of cooked food wafted through the air and into my cubby which awoke me and forced my stomach to growl in hunger. They were back. I listened for a while, attempting to gain the courage to introduce myself. I lived a solitude life, no friends, no family. When my stomach and wishes for friendship reached their greatest I mustered up the nerve to present myself, it didn’t happen the way I planned in my mind. I reached the bottom step and tripped, falling flat on my face. They scattered like roaches, except the older one. Offering me his hand, he helped me to my feet.
“You OK?”
“Sure, yeah, thanks.” My face must have blushed several shades of red. I jump in and out of windows and trains, yet I tripped on a step.
“I’m Einstein, and you are…”
“Uhh… I don’t have a name.” I stammered. Still recovering from my embarrassing fall I couldn’t fabricate a clever name for myself to give him. My real name was out of the question.
His lips turned up in a quizzical smile, his eyes rolled upwards as if deep in meditation, and he chuckled. “I get it, you don’t want to give me your real name. We don’t go by our real names. We have nicknames. My parents didn’t name me Einstein at birth.”
I giggled but remained speechless while he placed his hand under his chin, twisted his lips and scanned me with his bright eyes.
“You look like Cleopatra. Cleo, that fits you.”
“Yeah, OK. I like it.” I muttered deliberating on the name. In school I remembered learning something about her being the queen of Egypt. A royal name, it worked, and maybe I was the queen of this warehouse. Inwardly I chuckled at the thought.
The youngest boy and the girl came out of hiding and introduced themselves. Peewee approached me with a hotdog on a stick and offered, “We have extra.” The silence and awkwardness now broken.
“Thanks, I’m starving.” I wasted no time taking the hotdog from Peewee. A fire glowed in the trashcan and they roasted hotdogs over it and they had buns.
While we ate, I discovered Star and Peewee were brother and sister.
“How did you meet?” I inquired.
Einstein cleared his throat and glanced towards Star and Peewee. They met his glance as if giving him their seal of approval. “I’d had good day and was celebrating with a hearty meal at Harry’s Pies. They make every flavor of pie; apple, coconut, key lime, chocolate fudge brownie… I ordered a hamburger blitz. I followed it up with a slice of apple pie and a scoop of vanilla ice cream on the side. It was good! My belly full, I left and headed back to the docks. I rounded a corner and heard muffled talking. When I looked toward the voices I saw these two huddled in a corner.” He pointed at Star and Peewee. “I couldn’t leave them there and neither would tell me where they lived, so I brought them back to the docks with me.”
The room fell silent and my mind searched for the words to ask my question. Two young children, Star my age and Peewee a couple years younger not fit to be alone on the streets, alone in an alley, why were they there? I deliberated for a few seconds and decided to tell my story, then maybe they would share theirs. “I left home a few months ago when my mom disappeared. What about your parents?” There, I asked, and expected no more of an explanation than what I gave. Star opened her mouth to speak then looked at Peewee who stared at her with huge, blank, round eyes.
After a sigh she stated, “We don’t have any. They died when Peewee was a baby. I barely remember them.” She stole a glance at Einstein who sat quiet. “We’ve bounced around from one foster home to the next and the last place, the dad was crazy. We left.”
Their lives had been as fraught with torture as mine I found that to be comforting.
Einstein broke the silence this time. “Since we are confessing I guess it’s my turn. I left home several months ago when, I, uh, we, my parents and I, didn’t get along so well.” None of us asked anymore questions that involved our past lives. Stashed in a closet was the best place for them.
Over the next few days, we got acquainted with each other and I understood why they called the older boy Einstein. He was smart and assigned us jobs, such as collecting food or small items we needed such as jewelry or electronics, anything we could use to make a few bucks. Day to day we never knew what types of trinkets and treasures people would throw out waiting for us to find. He even taught us how to work in pairs and pickpocket unsuspecting people to steal items we later sold. He worked on this with Star and Peewee, but to me it was new.
“You’re a quick study.” He told me after we teamed up to snatch a man’s wallet. The man took it out of his pocket to remove his credit card, setting the wallet on the counter as he swiped. I tripped and fell into him and Einstein slipped the wallet into his own pocket while the man helped me up and asked if I was OK. I thanked him and proceeded out the door. The wallet contained eighty three dollars which we kept and tossed the wallet into a dumpster. The money served in feeding us well and I felt like part of a family complete with brothers and a sister. Yet, as much as I liked them and trusted them, I never showed any of them my secret place and I was near positive they’d never find it - my safe place.
Approaching Winter
We burned stray wood and paper in the trashcan for warmth, and stock-piled blankets, coats and extra clothes during the frigid winter months. Star and Peewee huddled together for warmth and Einstein held me close. The city was marvelous and bustling with life making it easy now to fit into a crowd and earn extra money. We tricked people out of hundreds of dollars in cash taking advantage of their generosity.
Einstein found an old small plastic Christmas tree in a dumpster and brought it to the warehouse. He insisted it wasn’t Christmas without presents so we found gifts for each other and placed them under the tree. It was the first Christmas in my life I celebrated. My mother never celebrated any holiday, nor did I ever receive gifts on special occasions such as my birthday. My mom’s gift every year was an expressionless ‘Happy birthday’. I found a working gold watch with engraving on the underside of the face plate, but that didn’t matter. I gave it to Einstein because of his preoccupation with keeping track of time. Star found and gave Peewee a new pair of shoes as his were falling apart at the seams and unsuitable for trudging through piles of snow. Star gave me a fiction book as I loved to read, and Einstein gave Star a tiara because she adored anything with sparkles and glitter. Instead of eating leftovers or cooking canned meats or hotdogs, we took our money and ate inside a nice restaurant. We splurged and partied creating an unforgettable Christmas.
Einstein survived on his own longer than the rest of us and wanted more than dumpster leftovers and abandoned warehouses. He grew eager to leave and developed a plan to heist jewelry and small valuable items from people’s homes while they were away on vacation. Later we’d sell everything for cash.
We became obsessed with staking out neighborhoods and houses. The four of us wanted the same thing, a “normal” life. We found homes spaced apart geographically, hoping to draw less attention than if we hit homes in the same areas. Einstein and I hit the first home and everything went smooth
as melted caramel. We chose the house after observing the owner’s leaving the spare key hidden under a stone behind the house. The ordinary neighborhood and tract homes meant no alarms. For our first heist we made a wise choice.
Once inside the house we used our flashlights to find our way around, careful not to shine them towards the windows and take the chance of alerting the neighbors. In the master bedroom we found a solid gold chain, two gold rings with precious stones that Einstein said were amethyst, emeralds, and onyx but mostly costume stuff. How Einstein knew each stone stumped me. In the dining hutch we found crystal goblets. Einstein claimed they were real crystal because he wet his finger, swirled it around the top of one glass and made it sing. A cool trick I wouldn’t have known on my own. I took his knowledge of precious stones and crystal as clues to his upbringing and guessed he’d lived a more privileged life than myself.
“How did you know to do that?”
The corners of his lips turned upward in a smile. “I can’t tell you all my secrets.”
We wrapped the goblets in dish towels using great care and placed them into our backpacks.
After Einstein and I successfully hit a few homes, Star decided she wanted in on the scam. Einstein thought it was a bad idea because of Peewee, but Star insisted. She wanted a piece of the action. She and Einstein butted heads over it causing friction amongst us.
One night Star and Peewee followed us out and caught up to us as we finished hijacking items from the house. The second we stepped outside the house a familiar whisper, “Cleo” alerted me Star followed us. My body halted mid-stride as I caught sight of her and Peewee’s shadows standing against the wall of the house. Einstein motioned for them to edge their way to the back of the house where there were no light sensors. Star shuffled towards us, but Peewee stepped out too far and the lights went on brightening the entire side of the house. Oh crap! We fled in varying directions. I held the bag of loot in my hand and once I ran I didn’t turn my head to look behind me. I hastened my pace at the sounds of people. Several blocks away I cowered in an alley to catch my breath. Einstein was right behind me and ducked into the alley with me.
“Star and Peewee, are they with you?”
He shook his head as if to say ‘no’ and turned his eyes downward. “It’s time to leave” he said after a moment of silence.
“OK, yeah, we need to get back.”
He grasped my shoulders. “Leave - as in this city. There were too many lights, commotion, and sirens at the scene for Star and Peewee to slip away. They aren’t as savvy as we are. The police are gonna be looking for us next.”
My mind absorbed with escaping I missed the wailing sirens. He was right and my head reeled at the implications his words threw at me.
“You think they’ll tell on us?”
The nod of his head told me ‘yes’.
I couldn’t leave yet I needed my bag from its secret place.
“We gotta go back to the warehouse. I have something hidden there that I need.” His eyes grew soft, and he agreed.
Back at the warehouse, I went straight to my secret place. Within minutes the sound of voices tickled our eardrums and lights flashing beneath us.
“Squish in beside me.”
Without a moment to spare Einstein squeezed in the cubby hole. Radios blared on the other side of the cubby and police scoured the building but came up empty. I whispered in Einstein’s ear, “Star and Peewee squealed quick.”
“They did - or the police are here for something else.” ‘Something else’ was possible. Either way, neither of us wanted to get caught. Hours passed with Einstein and I scrunched on top of each other. Teenage hormones, close quarters, and our semi attraction to each other brought our relationship to a new level. Our hearts raced together from the excitement. Einstein held me flush against him.
“I love you Cleo.”
The sound of his words caused a wave of want to wash came over me and I kissed him. My first kiss ever. I drove my tongue deep inside his mouth. Einstein’s words and kiss melted my heart. My own mother never showed me any affection. As I kissed him, he kissed me back. We explored under each other’s clothes. Our fingers and hands discovering the joys of the opposite sex. I yearned for his love and firm embrace. The moment sent thrilled me, I didn’t want it to end.
The next day we waited for Star and Peewee, but we both knew the police found them. Under the cover of dusk we snuck out, taking great pains to not get caught.
An Alternative
The bus station was several miles away and creeping in the shadows along the alley ways was taking too long. A gas station with flickering lights was ahead and a brilliant idea flashed through my brain.
I pointed towards a truck parked at a gas pump. “Look, maybe we can jump into the back of that truck and catch a ride.”
Einstein stopped and observed, curling his lips as he thought a minute. “If he goes inside we can make it, but we’ll be exposed for a couple minutes.”
“We aren’t exactly in the good side of town. Do you think people are gonna care about two kids running across the street?”
“OK, follow me.” He slipped across the street. I waited for his OK and followed him to where he waited beside a dumpster.
“What are they dumping in their trash?” I asked with one finger over my nose as the trash inside wreaked of a rotting dead body. Einstein shifted his eyes my way and placed his finger over his mouth stifling a laugh. The man finished pumping his gas, climbed into his truck and drove away.
We stayed in position and waited for another vehicle. Several cars later, and the second we were getting ready to move on, another truck rolled into the station. It was old and sported a patchy paint job, along with several spots of rust. We looked at each other, knowing this was the one.
“I will distract him; you jump in the back.”
“Cleo, what…”
I didn’t wait for him to finish and wasn’t walking the entire way. I pulled down my shirt enough to show my blossoming boobs and walked past the man at the pump dropping a trinket from my pocket. Next, I leaned over and wiggled my butt in his direction to pick it up and walked inside the store. He took the bait following me inside the store a few minutes later. My head start enabled me to sneak through the tall stocked shelves to the back and slip outside the door. I ran around the front to the truck and leaped into the bed where Einstein waited for me.
“Smooth. Lucky for us he’s a pedophile.” Einstein barked, half annoyed and half laughing.
I smiled out of sheer satisfaction. “You bet.” We lay flat and motionless against the bottom of the truck bed.
A few minutes later we heard the driver approach, mumbling under his breath, “Why do I chase cute young ass? Untouched meat.”
He got into the truck and it started with a sputter and cough before it jerked forward.
Together
The city lights dwindled into sparse street lights and trees. My lungs filled with exhaust fumes, and my body felt as though a jack hammer pounded it into a pulp. The truck slowed, turned and abruptly stopped, our heads slamming into the back of the cab.
The door creaked open and a heavy foot hit the ground then another, his footsteps cumbersome along the pavement. Next they halted and lumbered their way back. With the truck bed so junky we had nowhere to move. We looked at each other and then at the huge hairy hand that forced its way over the truck bed, we both jumped out and ran. “What the fu…” He called, but we scurried into the woods surrounding his house. I rested myself against a tree to catch my breath. The prickles in my side bore the illusion that a thousand knives were poking into it. Einstein fell to the ground, both of us panting.
“This is eerie… hmm… What is it that happens to teens alone in the woods?” Einstein asked widening his eyes into basins of fear.
“Nothing more than teens alone in the city with many types of nutcases.”
“Really, haven’t you ever been to the movies?” A look of curiosity flashed across his face.
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br /> “No, never.” The sadness in my own voice resonating inside me.
“There is always a crazy stalker with a machete or chain saw waiting to chop up innocent teens.” Einstein declared, still wearing his fear face.
“I grew up in a place like this, the woods surrounding me. I was more scared alone in the city with so many people until I found you. It was creepy, and I kept myself hidden at night.” I allowed my body to crumple next to his, we lay on the forest floor, his arms around my waist.
As the morning sun peaked, we continued our journey to the nearest town. Neither of us had any idea where to find the road, so we kept on a straight path through the woods. Birds chirped and squirrels chattered in the trees. We followed a stream we found.
“Hold still, I hear something,” whispered Einstein.
Keeping still with our ears open, we both heard a loud chink-chink sound. He grabbed my waist, pushed me behind him and we crouch walked behind a bush. The heavy footsteps pounded the forest floor until they were on top of us. We peered through the bush and saw him, the same man in whose truck we hitched a ride. He carried a shotgun in his hands. We sat still as the hundred year old redwoods we hid behind until he turned and left.
My heart slowed inside my chest. He turned back suddenly, and in an instant, raised his gun and shot through the bush. The pellet whizzed past my forehead. Quick as lightning, I jumped to my feet and headed anywhere but there. I heard Einstein behind me and the man’s heavy footsteps followed in pace. I ran through brush, jumped over hundred year old tree roots, my legs gaining agility as I jetted through the woods. Another chink-chink sound followed by a shot deafened the forest, but it wasn’t even close. My body took on a flight of its own, stopping when I got to the road.
I looked and Einstein was beside me his long legs in stride with my short ones. A few cars buzzed past us honking their horns and the man stomped back into the forest, defeated. We made it to the other side of the road after playing chicken with the traffic.
