The Secret Diary of a Criminal (Prologue)

Prologue

Joey is ahead of me on the dirty roof. He reaches a window, possibly to a bedroom and tries to pry it open. It won’t budge though, and he waves me forward to help him. I approach the window and slide my trusty screwdriver under the sill and the window slips open. I put my hands on the dusty ledge of the window and pull myself up. In through the window I climb, but I’ve misjudged myself. I don’t fit, and I fall into the bedroom, the window coming with me. Glass shatters around me and lands on the floor, glinting in the light. I curse, thinking I’ve alerted the neighbours. I signal to Joey that it’s safe, and he climbs in the window behind me. We walk out of the room, looking like it belongs to a young child and down the corridor on the top floor searching for a bargain. The house is nice, it appears quite retro style and has a bit of a posh feel. Maybe owned by an architect of sorts.

I find an iPhone in the study, as long as a Macintosh laptop and a leather wallet. The wallet is filled with about 200 in cash, a credit card, drivers licence and business card. Frank Garman, the business card says. Architect and Designer, Garman Co. What did I say?

“Got anything else?” Joey asks me, as we meet in the kitchen. He’s got a fair bit of jewellery from the master bedroom, and another iPhone.

“Nope, just the wallet and laptop and phone,” I reply, pulling out a can of coke from the bill plastered fridge. I open the can and it comes to life, fizzling like rice bubbles. I gulp it down and burp loudly, having the knowledge of a good day.

We’d robbed four houses so far, all of them generally wealthy looking, and all of them pulling good value. We had got approximately thirty or so technological devices, about twenty five wallets, and we’d even picked up a shiny, teal sports car from the Forman area, where we like to rob especially.

Most of this stuff we would sell on an online site, called Amorters. I have no idea what it means, but it’s a private site for criminals to sell their stolen goods.

The rest of the stuff we would keep ourselves, Joey and I have a pretty good collection back at home.

There’s the sound of a car engine coming from the front of the house, I run to the hallway, and peer through the door, someone’s here. It must be that Frank guy, I told Joey we shouldn’t steal during the afternoon, but he said, everyone’s home at night, so we would have to be silent, which Joey knows is hard for me.

“Come on!” I say, trying to shout, but whisper at the same time. This is the first time in months we’ve been sprung.

I sprint into the Kitchen and grab my bag off of the marble bench. I can hear Frank walking up the pathway to the front door now, and a wave of adrenaline rushes through my body. I have no time to put the coke can in the bin, and we usually try to clean up a bit, but we have no time.

I disregard Joey, I’m not a good friend, but he’s the same way, we just get ourselves out of the situation on our own. Running out the sliding doors at the back I hear the door open and someone sigh.

“Oi! You!”

I just run at the fence, Joey is next to me, but slightly ahead, and he’s charging along. There are footsteps behind me, and I’m scared out of my mind. Joey and I jump off the wooden patio, knocking over a set of chairs as we go. I land on the grass with a thud, and keep sprinting at the fence, my eyes set on reaching it.

The world is watching me in my head. Everyone and everything has stopped to see me. Blood is pumping through me and my feet are pounding along the grass. The fence is metal and quite large, about the size of me, and another half. I don’t pay attention to the colour, or anything else for that matter, I’m in my zone. My feet leave the ground, and I’m soaring through the air. I reach for the top of the gargantuan fence, my finger tips just holding on. I try to cling on, but my own weight is my downfall, I lose contact with the fence, and come crashing down onto the grass. My head is swirling and I have a headache, I lift my head up to face my opponent, then I drop my head and close my eyes. A person’s hand grips my shoulder and pulls me up, it’s probably Frank. I sigh, as I hear the distant wail of Police Sirens. I know I’m a goner, and I slump my hands down by sides, I feel like crying, but it’s not that bad. I’m defeated. By a fence.