The principal’s eyes bulged behind square glasses. “No,” I stared back. “I didn’t take Laura’s money.” Laura was my best friend. We shared clothes and secrets. For her birthday, she got a coin purse necklace shaped like a fish, with googly eyes and a metal clasp for a mouth that gaped when twisted. It jingled when she walked. The principal released me. On the way back to class, I dumped the seventy-three cents I’d stolen into a bathroom garbage can. I was too scared to confess. I didn’t know the answer to the inevitable follow-up question: Why? I still don’t.
Kimberley Lovato is a freelance travel writer and book author who types all day from San Francisco, the south of France, and plane seats.