JW01. Under Locker and Key Read online

  “Ouch. Not much of a friend.”

  Case nodded. “I know. If it doesn’t find its way back, the client will have to do it over. And it can’t sound too much like the stolen one.”

  “Double ouch. That book was a real joy to read.” We stopped at a well-lit house several streets away from my home. “This it?”

  “Yep,” Case said, rocking on his heels. “I’ve already cased it. I know everything about this place now.”

  “Are you going to tell me where the report is, or am I going to have to dazzle you with my amazing skills?” I asked. “With no preparation, I might add?”

  Case grinned. “Come on, retrieval specialist. Earn your reputation.”

  I looked over the house. Neat, orderly. The lawn trimmed to a uniform three inches. Garbage cans lining the street. “The people here are very organized. They’d notice something out of the ordinary. Kid comes home with a stolen report, she doesn’t want her mom to see it. Not yet. She’ll want to appear to slave over it for a while—when is the assignment due?”

  “Tomorrow.” Case folded his arms.

  “Okay, then, the mark would have told her parents that she’d finished it already. No need to flash it around much, and if she did, she’d want to make sure the essay is ready to take to school.” I smirked. “No good stealing homework if you forget to bring it the day it’s due. That puts the essay in the backpack. And the backpack is . . .”

  I examined the house, which, though it was hard to discern the layout from the sidewalk, looked similar in structure to Hack’s house. A window peeked in on the kitchen, where six figures sat at a table. At six o’clock. It looked like this family liked their dinners a bit earlier than the Wilderson and Kingston households did. Made it easy for me, though. All the family members where I could see them.

  Behind the family a short hall led into the garage through a mudroom. “Do they drive their kids to school?”

  “Don’t know. They drive them home,” Case offered.

  “Then it’s there.” I pointed at the garage. “In the mudroom. If I was a thief determined to remember to bring the essay, I’d put the backpack near my shoes, on the way out. Her parents probably tell her to put her things there so she won’t forget them.”

  Case clapped a few times. “You are a genius. Now, genius, go and get it.”

  “I think sarcastically using ‘genius’ twice in the same breath qualifies as overkill,” I said. “You do realize you’re asking me to go inside a house I’ve never been in, where a family is eating dinner, and retrieve the essay without anyone noticing?”

  “That’s exactly what I’m asking.”

  I grinned. “Perfect.” A job where something could easily go wrong. I’d been hoping for a little excitement.

  “What’s your first move?”

  “I need to get my pathways open. Get out of sight.”

  Case shrugged and wandered away, around the corner and out of sight, as I hurried to the house.

  By the garage door I knelt and took a homemade lockpick set from my pocket. I highly recommend making one of your own, though I have to warn you: If an adult finds out you have one, you could get into trouble. I keep mine in an old wallet, and it has served me well; as fun as crawling through a dusty unlatched window into who knows what selection of pointy lawn tools is, the simple approach often works the best and is a lot safer.

  Speaking of the simple approach, sometimes you can go even simpler. I wedged my fingers under the garage door and pulled up. A deep breath and a hoist and the door was up, no lock-picking required. It amazes me how often people leave their houses vulnerable. Do they think I won’t just try the door?

  I tucked my lockpick set away and waited a moment, but no sound from the house. No one had noticed, or if they had, they didn’t comprehend what the squeak and rattle meant. I was good to go.

  Smiling, I walked back to the curb, where the family’s full garbage cans sat, waiting for the next morning’s pickup. I braced myself, kicked one over, then ran for cover beside the house, laughing like a madman.

  Like I told Case, on a street like this, anything abnormal gets noticed. I watched as six people emerged from the front door, riled by my act of petty vandalism. It gave them something to look at while I snuck in, unnoticed.

  As the parents tried to spot the trash-tipping maniac and right their toppled can, and while other houses opened their doors and yelled questions, I slipped into the garage.

  On to the dangerous part. If I had miscounted and someone had stayed behind in the kitchen, I’d be easily caught. Also, the mark could have moved her backpack to her room, or she could have sisters with similar backpacks, or the essay could have been moved out of the backpack to show to parents. Going in so blind is risky; I could see myself having to creep through a full kitchen, sneak upstairs, find the essay, and make a hasty escape through a second-story window.

  What an awesome story that would make later! Man, I love my job.

  But as soon as I opened the door from the garage to the mudroom, I felt a little disappointed. The door to the kitchen was shut. In the dim light I saw a backpack on the washing machine, beside the coatrack. Pink and green: a girl’s bag. I didn’t even have to unzip it; it was already open. No loose papers inside, but two folders and a notebook.

  “I’m going to see what’s taking them so long.” A girl’s voice from the kitchen.

  Grabbing the folders and the notebook, I slid behind the longest coat on the rack.

  The door opened. A girl walked in, opened the door to the garage, and walked out. She didn’t even look in my direction.

  I opened the first folder, and there it was: a five-page essay on Where the Red Fern Grows. In the time it takes for a rumor that the school has banned sodas to scare the whole sixth grade, I had the essay and escaped back into the garage. I crouched behind a car and watched the girl talk to her parents, and they all went back inside through the front door. No one questioned why the garage door was open; the parents, distracted as they were by the hooligan who had knocked over their trash can, were too angry to care.

  A simple grab-and-go because people only see what they want to. All I had to do was leave and close the garage door on my way out. This wasn’t my first cakewalk, and an amateur mistake like leaving a door or window open could cost me more than I could pay.

  I found Case around the corner and tossed him the pages. “Here.”

  “Be careful with those!” Case caught them and looked them over. “This is exactly her writing style. I’ll get them to her tonight. Thanks, J.”

  “Anything for a friend.”

  “If you need something—an art project, a doctor’s note, a hall pass . . .”

  “I know who to go to, like always. You know what? I can walk myself home from here. Go deliver the paper now. I bet she’s grateful for your help, now that she doesn’t have to rewrite an essay on two dead dogs.”

  Case froze. “Aw, man,” he said, his face falling. “Is that what Where the Red Fern Grows is about?”

  I patted his shoulder. “Sorry. We all lose our innocence sooner or later. See you tomorrow.”

  I left, feeling about as glum as Case did. Why, you ask? After all, didn’t I do two successful jobs in one day?

  Yes, and they were boring.

  When I first started retrieving, I did it to make my mark on Scottsville Middle School. I was tired of people calling me “Rick’s little brother” three years after he moved on to high school, so I started taking jobs that used my unique skills, talents gained from years of sneaking things (like Halloween candy) from Rick without him finding out, watching movies, and practicing with Case and Hack. I wanted to be remembered as the greatest retrieval specialist Scottsville had ever known. After I left and moved on to high school, maybe even college, kids would still talk about how I’d infiltrated locked rooms as easily as the smell of popcorn. I wouldn’t be in anyone’s shadow; others would be in mine.

  But after the first couple of jobs, I became addicted to
the thrill of the chase, loved the fear that I’d get caught. I’d never felt so alert, so awake, so alive, as when I was on a job. I loved the heightened senses that came when I was listening with one ear to a combination lock clicking and with the other for the footsteps of a teacher. I lived for creating a last-minute plan when the teacher decided to eat her lunch in her classroom, blocking my way to her confiscated-technology drawer. I needed it as much as I needed to be known for what I did.

  Today’s second job—going inside a house, leaving so much to chance—once would have been electrifying. But now it was nothing more than a little fun. The thrill had evaporated when I’d stopped making mistakes that could have gotten me caught, moving from amateur to professional. No more fumbling with my lockpicks, wasting valuable time. No more searching every pocket before finding my client’s belongings: I’d learned where papers, wallets, and phones tended to settle. Everything had become a sleepwalk, just going through the practiced motions. As much as I hoped one day I’d get a job that would test my limits and make me feel fear again, I had to admit to myself it probably wouldn’t come anytime soon.

  I had become too good.

  WHEN I GOT HOME, I hoped to find an empty couch in front of the TV or maybe dinner set out on the table since it was almost seven. Instead I found someone standing outside my door, checking the time on his cell phone. Back door, that is. Yeah, sometimes I come in through the back door. Remember Becca, my nosy neighbor across the street?

  My eyes widened in surprise. The guy in front of me was an eighth grader. “What can I do for you?” I asked.

  True, I did the occasional job for the monarchs of the school, but some of the time they were the thieves and con artists. Most of them were fine, upstanding citizens, but a few . . . boy, the kind of power that comes with being the oldest really goes to some people’s heads. To have one show up in my backyard was uncommon. Whatever the job was, it would be good.

  “Are you Jeremy?” the guy asked. He was tall and skinny, with a mouth full of braces. He also had on a short-sleeved shirt that revealed a fading bruise high on his arm. Sports injury, maybe?

  “Depends. Why are you here?”

  “My name is Mark Chandler,” the eighth grader said. “They say you’re the best at getting stuff back.”

  “Who told you that?” It never hurts to be a little cautious in my line of work.

  “Lacey Yi. She rides my bus.”

  I knew Lacey. I’d retrieved some makeup for her. “Okay. What did you lose?”

  Mark reached into his back pocket and took out a piece of paper with a rough picture of a key drawn on it. “It’s my house key. My mom is out of town, and Dad gave it to me so I could get in while he was at work. I was fiddling with it in math, and Ms. Browning confiscated it.”

  “Ms. Browning’s not usually that hard-nosed. Why didn’t she just ask you to put it away?”

  Mark shrugged. “She may have done that . . . a few times.”

  “Say no more. I got it.” I studied the picture. The key had teeth on one side and a square top labeled with a black X. “The X  ?”

  “Um . . . to keep it from being mixed up with our other keys,” Mark explained. “My dad’s a little scatterbrained, and it’s easier for him to label his keys than to try each one. The car key has a red X.”

  “I see. Do you know where the key is now?”

  “Yeah. Ms. Browning had trouble opening a drawer and called the janitor. My key was sitting on her desk, and somehow I think my key got mixed up with his. It’s in the janitor’s closet now.”

  Easy. No one monitored the janitor’s closet, and the door had only one simple lock. But something tugged at me. “Why not talk to the office? If it was that important, they’d understand. Why come to me?”

  “I didn’t want to risk them calling my dad. It’s not the first time I’ve lost one of his keys.”

  “Uh-huh.” Mark was hiding something. I could tell by the way he met my eyes too easily and by his slightly embarrassed smile. It was practiced, like he wanted me to see him as the victim.

  It’s not unusual, though. That practiced look appears on about a third of my clients, the ones who are hiring me on behalf of someone else. I bet it wasn’t Mark’s key; it probably belonged to a girl he was trying to impress. Like Case’s job. It would explain why he wouldn’t go to the office. Lots of my clients lie to me about how they lost the item, but as long as I could find it where they said, I didn’t really care.

  “If you lost your key, how did you get back into your house after school today?”

  Mark gaped, and I smiled. Hiding something. Definitely for a girl. I decided to help him out. “The back door was open?” I suggested.

  He sagged, relieved. “Yeah. I was lucky today, but I’m not sure I will be tomorrow.”

  “Right. Are you sure it’s in the janitor’s closet?”

  “Pretty sure. Can the great Jeremy Wilderson get my key back?”

  I sighed. It would be easy, easier than the job Case gave me. But a guy works what he gets. The more clients, the more my reputation would grow, and the more I could help people. “When do you need it?”

  “As soon as possible. My dad won’t remember he gave it to me until he needs it, but that could be soon.”

  I grinned. “Doesn’t he have a copy?”

  Mark fidgeted. “Yeah, he does . . . but I don’t think it’s marked. He’ll remember.”

  Retrieving the key would be a sleepwalk. “I can have it for you by tomorrow morning,” I said. “Before school.”

  Mark smiled, revealing blue-banded teeth. “Great! Should I meet you here?”

  “No, meet me at the elementary school’s playground. It’s closer to school.”

  “Okay. Oh, I almost forgot. What’s your price?”

  I shook my head. “No price. Just pass my name on to someone else who needs my kind of expertise. But if it would make you feel better, I enjoy chocolate cake.”

  • • •

  Before the first bell has rung and the first bus has arrived, when the halls are empty and a retrieval specialist can work without interruption . . . is there any better moment?

  Okay, so maybe later in the afternoon—getting up early felt worse than I thought it would. At least there was one perk: Even if there was anyone around to see me, no one would give a student grief for coming to school half an hour early, especially if that student arrived with his teacher mother. But the only creature to care about me poking around the janitor’s closet was a spider scurrying along the wall.

  I had seen the door many times, but the contents of the janitor’s closet were an enticing mystery. A mystery guarded by a metal door that would be impossible to break down—but who needed to break down a door when it had one easily pickable lock? After examining the lock for five seconds, I knew for sure. Sleepwalk. The job wasn’t worth my time. I yawned and wished I hadn’t gotten up quite so early.

  At the moment the janitor worked somewhere else in the building, sweeping floors, scrubbing toilets—whatever janitors usually do before the kids arrive. I had more time than it takes to run a mile on the school track to open this door and find Mark’s key. But I didn’t need the time it takes to run even one lap. After months of experience, I knew to try the door before using my picks on it. Guess what? It was unlocked. Score one for Wilderson.

  I’d like to tell you that I had to defeat a laser grid and pressure switches. I’d like to say I used a grappling hook to beat a hasty retreat once I had the key. But the truth is, most jobs aren’t that dramatic. I do have a grappling hook, but the Boy Scout uniform I bought at Goodwill as a disguise gets more wear. For most jobs, I walk in, retrieve the package, and walk out. Grab-and-go.

  The key hung on its own ring, separate from the janitor’s other keys. I expected that; a lost key would have a ring and maybe a key chain of its own. But the ring with Mark’s key dangled from its own hook, which was odd. Why wouldn’t the janitor have handed it over to the office once he realized it wasn’t his?
Maybe he figured it was one of his many, many keys, but didn’t believe it enough to thread it back on his key ring. No other explanation made sense, since not even I had known what the inside of the janitor’s closet looked like, and I’d been checking on it for months.

  Mark was waiting for me at the elementary school playground across the street, leaning against the tiny jungle gym, when I arrived with the key. He straightened up when he saw me.

  “Do you have it?”

  I looked around first—I have to assume Becca is always watching me—and then pulled the key out of my pocket. “Depends. Is this it?”

  Mark’s eyes widened. “My key! That’s it. That’s definitely it.” He put out his hand and I dropped the key into it.

  “I can’t tell you how much this means to me,” Mark said. “My dad would have killed me if he found out I’d lost this.”

  “You be surprised how many of my clients face that kind of problem. But now you have it back. No harm done.” I watched his face, trying to figure out what secret he was hiding about the key and hoping it was funny. Sometimes my clients tell me the truth straight-out after the job’s done.

  Not this time, though. Mark’s fingers closed around the key, and he just smiled at me. The smile seemed strange, forced. “You really are the best, aren’t you?”

  “So they tell me.”

  “Well, long live the king. What’s today, Wednesday? I guess I’ll see you in school.”

  “Maybe,” I said, and we returned, satisfied, to Scottsville Middle.

  So what if the job has become boring? I made myself think. So what if everything is just a grab-and-go for people who won’t even tell me the whole story? It felt good to help those needy students that Becca would hang out to dry because they broke a rule or two. It really did. And if I made myself a legend doing it, well, I wasn’t complaining.

  But if that job had been as simple as I thought it was then, I wouldn’t be telling you about it now.

  WHEN DONE RIGHT, LUNCHTIME CAN be better than a class spent watching a movie. It’s free from intense teacher supervision and, since moving up from elementary school also means graduating from recess, it’s the only time students are allowed to let loose and have a little fun. This tends to make the cafeteria pretty loud, but that’s good for me: Any eavesdroppers (read, Becca) would have a hard time hearing what we talk about at my table. Like how Case’s job worked out.