The Girl Who (Cried) Wolf

Miss D smelled trouble as soon as she heard the footsteps approaching her home office.

“Mum, this is the third time this month Myrtle stole my money,” Veronica said, dragging in her younger sister by the hair.

“I didn’t, I didn’t!” Myrtle screamed as she released herself from her sister’s grasp. “I swear, Mum, I didn’t.”

“You’re lying.”

“No, I’m not,” Myrtle growled at her sister. “ I said I swear.”

“What do you swear upon?”

“I swear on—Jesus.”

“You don’t believe in Jesus.”

“Maybe I do,” retorted Myrtle, then turned to her mother. “Mum, Veronica is lying. She only pretends to lose money, just so she can milk more cash out of you!”

Miss D took a weary sigh, pushing away from the computer. “Myrtle, what did we agree on the last time this happened?”

“We didn’t agree on—”

Myrtle stopped, her eyes spread in realization.

“To check into your bank.” Veronica materialized a ceramic pink pig from her bag and placed it on her mother’s desk with a bang. Then out came the hammer, landing on the desk with an even louder bang.

Myrtle gasped in terror. It was her Peppa Piggy Bank!

“No, Mum, please, I didn’t do it, I swear by God and Gabriel and Peter and…”

“Myrtle, please don’t falsely swear,” her mother reprimanded her.

“But you don’t believe in God, Mum.”

“Still, don’t make a habit out of it lest your Grandma hear you,” her mum said, pulling the Piggy Bank closer. “Or anyone else.”

“The pool of us you lie to is big enough without including the divine into it,” Veronica added pointedly. “Plus, you didn’t deny it.”

“The pool of people you lie to us…’” Myrtle mocked her sister in a high, falsetto, but she mangled the words halfway through before giving them up entirely. “Blah blah blah.”

She fell silent as her mum took the hammer.

“Myrtle, either admit that you took your sister’s money, or I’ll open up Peppa. I’m tired of this.”

“And what if the money isn’t there?”

“Then I get to buy you a new one,” her sister said. “That was the deal. As you very well know.”

Myrtle did know it; she was only buying time. “Even if I stole it, I wouldn’t put it inside,” she said as casually as she could. “How stupid do you think I am?”

“Huh,” Veronica scoffed. “Stupid enough.”

“There’s only one way to find out.” Miss D said, raising the hammer. “Myrtle Darcy, did you steal your sister’s money?”

Myrtle Darsley looked into her mother’s eyes and said: “No.”

The hammer clashed against the ceramic, smashing it into pieces.

As Veronica took her bills from the debris, Miss D heaved another weary sigh. “The pool of us you lie to…”

Myrtle opened her mouth to reply, but thought better of it. Ratting out V’s fight with Kyle to Mum would bring her a momentary satisfaction, but not much good in the long run. V would forgive her stealing after a while, but she would never have forgiven her that.

***

The Hammer Swing dropped Myrtle’s savings by €30. She had only stolen €15 from Veronica, but Mum punished her by taking twice the stolen amount.

And she was so close! She’d been saving for the new K2 roller skates, like Martha's! They cost €80, but Mum promised to pay half, so Myrtle only needed €5 more.

Five flimsy euros!

Now she was left with five euros in total. With Peppa gone, she kept her only remaining bill in her shorts.

It’s noble when He steals from the rich and gives to the poor, Myrtle thought begrudgedly, perusing her Robin Hood picture book on the beach the next day. But when I do it, I get punished. What difference does it make if the thief and the poor are the same person?

Veronica was eighteen and could get a job. She was practically rich. Or at least could be if she wanted to. On the other hand, Myrtle’s only source of income was what Mum or Grandma gave her for her birthday or Christmas.

With both of these landing in December, she’d have to wait more than half a year to save enough for skates and almost another half of it for the weather to get warm enough to use them.

A full year!

“I want an ice cream,” Myrtle told Veronica, who was sunbathing beside her. Mum usually gave a few euros to each for a scoop, but today Veronica was entrusted with the money for both of them.

“And I want a million dollars,” Veronica replied unmoving.

“C’mon, please”, Myrtle begged. “I’ll get you a scoop too.”

Veronica propped herself on her elbow and narrowed her eyes at her sister. “I’ll get it for myself, thank you very much!”

She pulled a bill from her bra and held it to Myrtle, who reluctantly accepted it.

Strolling along the beach, Myrtle wondered when her boobs would finally grow. Then she could stash her money in her bra just like V did, and nobody could search there because that would be super rude.

“One scoop of vanilla, please,” she said at the ice cream stand.

“Just vanilla?”

It was some new guy, not the Lady M. Lady M wouldn’t ask Myrtle that — she knew that vanilla was her favourite. Myrtle considered half-vanilla, half-whatever nonsense most people ordered nothing short of sacrilege.

“Yes,” Myrtle said, placing the bill on the counter. “What happened to Lady M?”

“Who’s Lady M?”

“Lady who worked here. She was here yesterday.”

Myrtle liked Lady M. She was a chunky old Lady, always wearing a colorful apron to hide the smudges from the ice cream. This guy was skinny, dressed in a businesslike shirt. Too skinny to like ice cream.

“No idea,” he shrugged, handing her the cone indifferently.

Myrtle was already halfway back before realizing she hadn’t taken the change.

She turned on her heels and sprinted back to the stand.

“I’m sorry, mister, I think I left a coin here somewhere,” she said to The Guy, catching her breath. Running after ice cream was a bad idea.

“What coin?”

“One euro”, she explained. “I gave you a five, and the scoop is four.”

“Oh, well, I don’t see anything here. Someone must have grabbed it.”

As she walked along the beach once again, Myrtle slowed to a crawl to delay her certain doom as much as possible. Veronica would kill her.

Replaying the scene in her head, she couldn’t remember The Guy offering her any change. She asked him about Lady M and gave him the cash; he said he didn’t know and gave her a cone of ice cream. Only a cone of ice cream.

But she couldn’t just go back accusing him of stealing her money. After all, she wasn’t sure.

Maybe V would forget about the change. Just like she did.

“You are unbelievable, you know that,” Veronica said madly. “I can’t even give you a single euro without—”

“I’m sorry, but I think that guy tricked me.”

“Yeah, right.”

“Search me.” Myrtle said madly. “Where would I hide that coin?”

“Oh, you’ve learned, haven’t you? I bet you just hid it in some bush on the way. Or somewhere off the way—that’s why you were gone for so long. But I’m gonna search you anyway.”

When Veronica upended Myrtle pockets, a five-euro bill fell onto the towel.

“Or—”, Veronica paused, a sly smile spreading across her face. “---you didn’t even go to the ice cream stand and kept it all to yourself. Of course you did.”

“These are mine. It’s the only money I’ve got left.” Myrtle said angrily. “If that’s true, how would I know there’s a guy there instead of Lady M?”

“Yeah, right. Guy, my ass.” Veronica put on her sandals and went off in the direction of the ice cream stand.

When she came back, she was licking a chocolate ice cream. “There was a guy, alright”, she said. “I gave him a fiver and he gave me this.”

She threw the one-euro coin on the towel in front of Myrtle.

***

Myrtle had expected Veronica to rat her out to Mum and never get a cent from either of them again. Instead, Veronica didn’t say a word about it and even broke the silent treatment with her sister as they watched Two and a Half Men in the evening.

Myrtle suspected that she had made up with Kyle.

When Veronica entrusted her with 10 euros the next day, she was sure of it.

“And don’t return without two ice creams — chocolate one for me — and two euros,” she told her, cheerily typing on her cell. Then she raised her eyes at Myrtle and made a peace sign with her fingers. “Two cones and two euros. Got it?”

“Got it.” Myrtle grabbed the bills.

“I want one chocolate and one vanilla,” she said to The Guy when she reached the stand.

He took her bills away and put a scoop of vanilla into the cone. Handing it to her, he looked at her condescendingly and said: “One scoop is four, which means that two scoops are…?”

“Eight.”

“Right. And five is less than eight.” He waved a bill in front of her.

“But I gave you two of these. I gave you ten.”

“Nope, you didn’t.”

“Yes, I did.” Myrtle felt her heart race rapidly.

“No, you did not.”

Myrtle opened her mouth to yell at him, but thought better of it. She put her hand into her shorts pocket and gave him the last of her savings with a smile. “Oh, I’m sorry, you are right. I left it in my pocket by accident.”

When Myrtle got back to Veronica, she had two ice creams and two euros. She was now totally bankrupt, but she had found just what she was missing — her own King John.

***

The ice cream stand closed for lunch between noon and 1 p.m. Before going on a break, the worker would close the shutter in the front and lock the back door, making the kiosk unbreakable.

Unless you spent many lunch breaks in it hanging with Lady M and knew about the spare key in the rosemary bush. Then you could simply get in without anyone knowing you’re inside.

Which is precisely what Myrtle planned to do as soon as The Guy got out. She grabbed the hidden key and remained in the bush waiting for him to leave.

But the noon came and went, and The Guy was still in the cart. Still selling.

Selling to the adults and stealing from the kids, she thought bitterly.

It was almost two o’clock, and she desperately needed to pee. As she was trying to decide whether to do it in the bush or go for a swim and give up on this whole thing, the shutter suddenly closed.

As soon as he was out of sight, she unlocked the back door and let herself in. As the door clicked shut, the darkness swallowed her. She locked the door and lit the shack's interior with her cell. Just as she'd expected, he kept two stashes of money—one in the official register, and another one for himself.

His own secret piggy bank of stolen cash.

As she rattled it, she was happy to hear more paper rustling than coins clinking. Yep, this guy was a real richman—her own King John.

She put the piggy bank into her rucksack. She would have to find a good way to explain how she got this money to Mum, but she could think about that later. She needed to get out of here as soon as possible. Her bladder was bursting.

But when she spotted his bottle, she just couldn’t resist it. Placing it under herself, she squatted and relieved herself into it.

Then she poured the whole bottle over all the ice cream tubs.

But not before scooping ice cream into two cones. A chocolate and a vanilla.

He’ll be fired before V and I are finished with these.

As the smell of her pee permeated the dark room, she grabbed the ice cream cones, strapped her rucksack, and left the shack.