Pilfer Academy

by Lauren Magaziner

  As he put on slacks, a shirt, and a pair of Converse sneakers, he was pleasantly surprised by how perfectly everything fit him. How long had they been planning for his arrival?

  He walked outside to find the corridor and stairs empty—but the entrance room was full of voices.

  “Come on, Robin!”

  “You can do it!”

  “Hold your breath!”

  “No, don’t hold your breath!”

  “Thirty more seconds!”

  George wandered into the room. There was a girl lying upside-down on a couch, her feet straight up in the air, her black hair almost brushing the ground. Two round-faced twin girls were cheering on either side of the upside-down girl, and a tall boy held a stopwatch.

  “Uh . . . are you all right?” George said to the upside-down girl.

  “Oh, I’m fine,” the girl said.

  “What . . . what are you doing?”

  She raised an eyebrow—or lowered it, depending on perspective. “You’re the new kid, right?”

  George nodded.

  “New kid! No way!” one of the twins said, clapping him on the shoulder. “We’re all first years, too!”

  The upside-down girl flipped herself off the couch and stood up, grinning. She was freckly and tiny. She ruffled her hair, which was full of uncontrollable corkscrew curls.

  “Last week, we had a Practical Applications exam where we had to walk on the ceiling with sucker shoes. I passed out because of a head rush, so I’m trying to train myself—don’t worry,” she said, catching sight of George’s nervous expression, “I was fine. They got me down eventually.”

  “Oh . . . okay.”

  “Aw, Robin! You scared him! Don’t be nervous,” the tall boy said, patting George on the back. “You’re going to love it here! I’m Neal.”

  “That’s Beth,” said one twin, pointing to the other.

  “And this is Becca,” said the second twin, gesturing at her sister.

  “And I’m Robin,” said the curly-haired girl.

  “I’m George.”

  “Come to breakfast with us!” Beth insisted.

  After his encounters with Tabitha and Milo last night, George didn’t think that his other classmates would be so friendly. But here they were, inviting him to breakfast! He could definitely use some friends. “Breakfast . . . yeah, sure!” he said.

  They walked through hall after hall, and when they passed the foyer, Robin stopped for a minute to refill her water bottle with lemonade from the spitting fountain. She drank the whole bottle, filled it up again, and drank it all again. On her third refill, she smiled at George. “I can never have enough liquid sugar,” she said.

  “It’s true,” Neal said, throwing his hands up. “Robin has a crazy sweet tooth! There was this one time where she stuffed seven doughnuts in her mouth to distract a security guard while the rest of our team snuck past. Do you remember that, guys?”

  Becca burst into laughter. “That was hilarious! The look on his face—and remember what happened—”

  “When he—”

  “Then they—”

  “After I—”

  “Yes!”

  “That was soooooooo funny!”

  They all looked at George, who had no clue what they were talking about.

  “Uh . . . I guess you had to be there,” Beth said.

  George followed silently as they dragged him into the Autolycus Wing. They popped into a room full of taxidermied animals and mounted animal heads, and George walked headfirst into a dead wildebeest.

  “UGH!” George said, jumping backward. “What is this stuff? And why is it here?”

  “They’re species from all across the globe—all sorts of stuffed endangered animals that were being sold on the black market,” said Neal.

  “These were bought on the black market?” George gasped. He didn’t even know there was a black market.

  “They weren’t bought, George.” Robin laughed. “They were stolen . . . duh. Thieves never buy what they can take.”

  “Oh, right,” George said, kneeling down to stare at a stuffed sloth. Its soulless glass eyes were the absolute creepiest things George had ever seen.

  They passed through more rooms of stately furniture, a room full of wooden rocking chairs and wooden clocks and wooden puppets, and a room filled with mattresses from every single president of the United States. There was no walking space, and they had to trampoline on the mattresses to get across, careful to avoid a snoring teenager curled up on one, looking like she’d fallen asleep on the way to breakfast.

  The tall golden doors at the end of the mattress room opened up into the beautiful dining hall. George gaped at the arched ceilings, round tables, and a balcony that overlooked it all. A buffet line hugged the room on both sides, covered with trays and trays of food—buttermilk pancakes, wheat toast, white toast, rye toast, French toast, crepes, croissants, scrambled eggs, ten different types of omelets, eggs over easy, eggs over medium, eggs over hard, corned beef hash, home fries, hash browns, bacon strips, sausage links, scones, biscuits, English muffins, pumpkin muffins, chocolate chip muffins, bran muffins, blueberry muffins, blueberries, bananas, strawberries, raspberries, whipped cream, clotted cream, jams, jellies, chocolate sauce, caramel sauce, tea, sugar, and honey.

  George’s mouth watered at the sight of it all.

  He copied Robin, Neal, Beth, and Becca as they each grabbed a tray and proceeded to the left buffet line, plopping scoops full of everything on their plates. When George finally got to the end, he had a mountain of breakfast food almost too heavy to carry. But he somehow managed to wobble over to the circular table where his new friends were waving him over.

  As soon as he sat down, George scooped a bite of pancake into his mouth and felt his taste buds dance a jig. “Ist foo ist so ee-ish-us!” George hummed. He meant to say this food is so delicious, but with a mouthful of food, it was the best he could manage.

  “Obviously,” Neal said cheerfully.

  George swallowed his bite. “Why obviously?”

  “All the food is stolen from the finest five-star gourmet restaurants. Only the best for Pilfer students!” Neal said with a proud nod.

  “George,” Beth said. She seemed to be studying him in the same way that Tabitha had yesterday. “Why are you here?”

  “Um . . . I was kidnapped.”

  They all laughed.

  “Yes, but why?” Robin said. “Why you? What’s your talent?”

  “Like, I was invited here because of my jittery fingers,” Neal said. He held up his hand, and true to his word, his fingers twitched relentlessly. Even Neal himself was twitchy—he could hardly sit still without fidgeting around. “I can five-finger discount like no one’s business,” he bragged. “In fact . . .” He dug into his pocket, revealing four sets of utensils—George’s, Robin’s, Beth’s, and Becca’s.

  They all clapped wildly.

  “We’re double legacy,” Beth and Becca said together.

  “You mean your parents are criminals?” George asked.

  “Well, they’re reformed now,” Beth said casually, cutting into her sausage with a knife and fork. “They didn’t want us to go here.”

  Becca nodded. “Our dad always warned us about staying away from ice-cream trucks, but . . .”

  “Who can resist the call of ice cream?” Beth finished. “We went out for a walk two and a half years ago and never came back. I feel bad about that sometimes. Our parents must be so worried.”

  “I miss our parents,” Becca said, mid-chew.

  “Now, what about you?” Neal said, pointing to George. “What brought you here?”

  “I—well—Strongarm said something to me yesterday . . . about cunning and sneakiness and a disregard for . . . something. I don’t remember exactly.”

  “Well, I got invited because
of my name,” Robin boasted.

  George’s forehead furrowed. “Robin?”

  “Robin Gold.”

  They all watched George carefully for a reaction.

  “Robin Gold? That’s not real,” George finally said.

  “I swear!”

  “I still can’t get over it,” Neal said with a laugh.

  “My parents didn’t even realize until it was years too late,” Robin said. “In any case, I won’t have to change my name when I graduate.”

  “Change your name?” George asked.

  “Come on. You didn’t really think that Ballyrag, Strongarm, and Browbeat are their real names, did you? When we graduate, we get to choose a more intimidating name.”

  George laughed, thinking that Strongarm and Ballyrag were the least intimidating people he had ever met. “What are their real names then?” he asked, diving in for another bite of hash browns, but his fork hit the table. “HEY!” he said, standing up. “My plate is gone!”

  He looked around. A row of teens and adults were snatching plates out from unsuspecting students. They all wore the same uniforms—burgundy blazers, stiff-collared shirts, bow ties, handkerchiefs, and scowls. George leaned in closer to see a crest emblazoned on the uniform jackets—a clawed hand grasping rubies, diamonds, and other gems. The cursive beneath the logo read Pilfer Academy of Filching Arts.

  “The waitstaff,” Becca whispered, “are the people who flunk out of the program.”

  George paled. Flunk out of the program?

  An unhappy-looking pimply boy dove for Robin’s plate, but she swiped it away at the last second.

  “I’m not done yet,” Robin said coolly.

  The teenager stomped off to a different table.

  “Can I get seconds?” George said. “I’m still hungry.”

  “Seconds?” Beth laughed. “George, you can have hundreds, if you really want it!”

  George smiled and walked toward those beautiful buttermilk pancakes. But as he passed Milo’s table, he slowed down.

  “—I don’t know,” Milo was whispering to a group of boys. “He arrived yesterday.”

  “And? How do you think he’s going to rank?”

  “Dunno,” Milo said, leaning forward, so he was half off his chair. “But I’m not going to stand by and let some new kid steal all the attention. We have to mess with him.”

  “Yeah!” two boys said heartily.

  “This is our school. And tonight let’s make sure George Beckett knows his place.”

  George stood by the buffet, staring at the oatmeal, his heart pounding. He hadn’t said two words to Milo, but already Milo was planning to sabotage him. Milo hated him, and he didn’t even know why.

  Anger swelled inside of George. As if being kidnapped and taken far away from his family wasn’t enough. He was stuck in this stupid school, where he definitely didn’t want to be. Tabitha had stormed off and left him alone last night. And to top it all off, Milo and his friends were planning something horrible. George’s cheeks and ears flushed crimson, and his hands were shaking.

  Before he even knew what he was doing, George dipped a piece of toast in syrup and walked casually toward Milo’s chair. Milo was leaning forward to whisper with his friends, his butt waggling in the air. Unnoticed, George slipped the toast on the seat of Milo’s chair and continued walking like nothing had happened.

  He briskly trotted back to his table, but as he was sitting down, he locked eyes with Tabitha, who was sitting alone across the hall. She looked at him with a wide-eyed, slack-mouthed stare. Instantly, he knew that she knew. He slowly sat down at his table.

  “So, how long have you guys been here?” George asked, ignoring the fact that Tabitha was still staring at him.

  “Eight months,” Robin said. “I came right after the final exam in December. They passed two people on to year two, so they took Tosh Gupta and me at the same time to fill the empty slots. . . .”

  George was barely listening. He kept straining to hear the inevitable sound of Milo sitting on sticky toast.

  “. . . and I came just over a year ago,” Neal said. “Feels like forever.”

  “Want to talk about forever?” Beth said. “Becca and I would be starting seventh grade right now. Two and a half years of being in year one, and you’d think they’d have—”

  SQUISH.

  It was quiet, but George heard it.

  A moment later, Milo threw a chair across the room and jumped up, looking murderous. “WHO DID THIS?”

  The whole dining hall went silent. Milo peeled away the piece of French toast, but the syrup still stuck to his bottom.

  “I SAID WHO DID THIS?” Milo curled and uncurled his fists like he was about to punch the nearest thing that moved.

  George looked at Tabitha in panic. Was she going to tattle on him? But she just folded her arms and pressed her lips together.

  “What’s going on here?” asked a man holding a tray of tortellini, which George thought was the oddest choice of breakfast food.

  The whole dining hall hushed as the man sauntered toward Milo.

  “Sir,” said Milo, bowing his head. “Someone put syrupy toast on my chair . . . and I sat in it.”

  “How very dastardly, indeed.”

  George inspected this strange man. He had eyebrows, eyebrows, eyebrows. It was the only thing George could think when he looked at him. They were thick and long and every-which direction, and George just wanted to comb them smooth. Beneath his eyebrows, he had a wobbly face the shape of a rotten pear with a sharp, beaky nose.

  He was also bald. Completely bald, as if his eyebrows had slurped up every bit of hair from the rest of his head.

  The man peered around the dining hall, and his squinted glance rested upon George. “And you are?”

  “Eyebrows,” George accidentally said aloud. “I—I mean George. George Beckett.”

  “The new boy, yes?”

  George just nodded. He couldn’t trust himself not to say eyebrows again.

  The man inched closer, hunching over Milo like a question mark.

  “I hope you weren’t about to fight, Mr. Hubervick,” the man said. “We are thieves, not thugs.”

  George didn’t quite know the difference between a thief and a thug, but it seemed to make sense to Milo, who nodded vigorously.

  “Very well,” said the man, a slight frown curling at the corner of his lips. “Now . . . Mr. Beckett,” the man said sternly, “could I steal a moment of your time?”

  “Me?” George said.

  “Yes, you. Follow me.” The man led the way, and students parted for him as he brushed past, with George marching behind. A few people shook their heads sadly at him, and others looked worried.

  “Come now,” the man said, guiding George back into the room of springy president mattresses.

  By the power of deduction, George knew exactly who the man was, why students bowed their heads when in his presence, why the whole dining hall fell hush, why following him out of the room felt like walking the plank. It didn’t take a genius to figure out who could have everyone’s knickers in a twist.

  “Dean Deanbugle,” George said, dodging a run-in with a china cabinet.

  “Please,” he said, holding the door to the next room open, “call me Dean Dean Deanbugle.”

  In uncomfortable silence, George followed the dean across Pilfer Academy—up stairs, around a loop, down stairs, and up another flight again. Around a corner, under a curtain, through a heavy bronze door, and into a musty old room with just a simple bookshelf. The dean began to push books in and pull some out in rapid succession—so fast that George almost couldn’t keep up.

  When he finally pushed in a yellow book, the wall rumbled and the ground started to spin. Dean Dean Deanbugle pulled George onto a rotating platform, just as the bookshelf swiveled around to the other s
ide of the wall. George realized that the books were some sort of secret code to get into the dean’s office.

  The other side revealed a room with wall-to-ceiling windows, and George could see miles and miles down the hill. Far away, there were a slew of trees that stretched out like a canopy.

  George moved to the window to get a better look, and the light shone in so brightly and hotly that he felt like he was under a magnifying glass.

  Dean Dean Deanbugle cleared his throat, and George remembered the trouble he was in. He took a seat in the stuffy chair across from the dean’s desk.

  The dean leaned forward. “Let’s talk about breakfast, George,” he said. “I know what you did to Milo.”

  George’s stomach dropped. He was caught. In trouble. Probably about to find out what severe punishment actually meant. But—in his wildest hopes—he dared to dream that they’d send him home. He didn’t know whether to be terrified or excited, and he wrung his hands together anxiously.

  “I’m sorry!” he finally spluttered. “I’m really really sor—”

  “You may be worried that I will send you to the whirlyblerg.”

  “The . . . the what?” George said.

  “The whirlyblerg. THE WHIRLYBLERG! Chamber of doom and destruction!”

  George frowned.

  “But I know exactly what you were doing, having once been a student myself.” Dean Dean Deanbugle suddenly broke into a crooked grin. “You were trying to catch my attention! You were trying to impress me!”

  “I was?”

  “And I must say, I was very impressed.”

  “You were?”

  “Absolutely, m’boy!”

  “So you’re not going to punish me?”

  “Punish you? For that grand display of unparalleled stealth? For your indubitable cunning? You have exhibited amazing thief qualities, and I couldn’t be prouder!”

  “Oh . . . okay.” George breathed a sigh of relief.