Earth: 2017

“Hey future self, when you think about this moment in our life… What does it feel like? (Respond here________)” A girl scribbles, in a thoroughly stickered notebook, not paying attention to the day's lesson. Her teacher swats her table with a ruler, “Excuse me, Ms. Dimos. What are you writing? Those don’t look like notes for class!”

Clearly embarrassed, the girl shuts her notebook in a hurry and huffs “I need to use the bathroom.” The teacher wrinkles their brows at her, they can understand that she means to escape this interaction. And before the teacher can muster a response, she stands up and heads to the door. Some of her classmates stare and whisper to each other, giggling under their breaths.

She shoves the door open as her agitated teacher warns “Ms. Dimos, you are not excused!,” she pushes in her earphones and heads to the restroom ignoring her teacher's words. Her teacher throws their arms up in defeat and quickly calls the front office to report her.

Robina checks her phone from the bathroom stall, a text comes in “the pay will be upfront. Just as soon as we have the jewelry, princess” She hisses through her teeth, annoyed to be called ‘princess’ by the person on the other end. She sends back a text, “I’m no amateur, you better have the full amount. And don’t call me princess!” she shoves her phone into her pocket, and turns up the volume on her headphones while walking towards the mirror.

She places a hand on the mirror, and wipes down the lipstick message so she can see herself. She turns on the water, it takes a few seconds to go from a scalding temperature to something more manageable. Robina runs some of the water through her curly red mohawk. She smiles at herself, admiring her punk aesthetic. She adjusts her fingerless gloves after slipping them back on, and she stares at her deep emerald eyes for a moment. The thought of her parents rushes back to her, and a tear rolls down her cheek. Clutching her locket, her only keepsake of them, she wipes the tears away.

“Robina Dimos, to the principals office.” booms over the pa system, a reminder to her that ignoring that teacher has consequences. Adjusting her patched denim vest, she scoffs “not like I’m planning on sticking around today…”

A trick she learned about this particular bathroom was that it had a window you could open if you had a screwdriver, and she had just the thing to pop it open. She had no trouble getting it open, climbing down was another thing though. “Okay, so no falling this time” she said to herself as she looked down from the third floor of the high school.

There were few footholds waiting for her on the side of the brick building, but it was old and a bit uneven providing a nearly hidden path down for the daring. Robina carefully made her way out the window, and slowly began to climb downward. She couldn’t help but think about the wall-climbing heroes from comics she read, if only to distract herself from the possible plummet. Each step downward made her brow bead with sweat.

After reaching the second floor the hairs on the back of her neck finally started to settle back down. She could hear her heart pounding in her ears still, she looked up at a passing cloud thinking ‘it sure would be better if I could fly…’ bit by bit, she made it to the height of the tall bushes that adorn this side of the school. Upon reaching the first floor she jumps down, dusting her hands off against her ripped jean shorts. Looking down at her leg she notices that she has a few scrapes “that went well” she muses to herself. She makes a break for it after making a rude gesture at her school building saying, “‘later jerks!” before running.

She makes it back home, which is only a few city blocks from the school, and locks herself in her room. She rests on her bed for a moment, “glad I’m the only one here, don’t need another scolding from Terry” she sighs to herself. “Foster care is such a joke, I need my own place” she sits up and pulls out her phone “bouncing around from home to home without a place to belong…” she takes a deep breath, and checks her messages. “Hey, I heard you skipped class again. I’m working late tonight, STAY HOME! Leftovers for dinner, and do the dishes!” Robina scrunches up her face, “great… she knows,” she turns off the screen and sets an alarm for 10pm before laying back down for a nap.

Time passes by as she is lost in a short dream, a nightmare… She hears the faint voices of her parents calling out to her, and then tires screeching… “NOOO!!!” she screams herself awake in a cold sweat, and looks around to confirm where she is. She sits up slinging her legs over the side of her bed, and places her face in her palms. “It was just a dream” she rubs her temples, and looks at the clock “9:40”

She grabs a backpack out of her closet, and checks herself over in the mirror. Her clothing is dark, and nondescript. She pulls the hood of her jacket over her head, and adjusts the bandana around the lower part of her face making sure that none of her tan complexion can be seen through the disguise. Switching out the light in her room renders her nearly unsee-able in the dark. “Perfect” she approves of her gear. She pulls out her phone to send a message “Rolling out,” she send the message to her contact ‘Sand Rat’ and a text is quickly returned “the greens are fresh and waiting for ya o7”

Slinking out of the house at night is always exhilarating for her, but this night she stands to make some serious cash “I’ll be able to get out of town with this one, and then I’m on my own!” She makes a personal dedication, trying to convince herself that this is the right thing for her in this moment.

The plan was straightforward. A few blocks away sat a pawn shop known for its impressive jewelry display, she’d slip in and out easy-peasy. The lights were out when she arrived at the little shop, the front door had a metal shutter pulled down in front but the jewelry was still in the case. “Bingo” she said as she pulled out a portable blowtorch that she’d stolen from the school’s metal working shop, and with that she went to work on cutting the lock from the metal store gate. Then she went to work on the glass, using a diamond cutting tool to cut a hole near the handle so she could unlock the door from the other side. She slipped in, gently closing the door behind her.

Her heart was racing as she came upon her target, the jewelry case. She pulled a pair of cutters out of her bag to cut the alarm, “Shoot, which one was it…” she couldn’t remember which wire she’d needed to cut to disable the alarm. She pulled out her phone to check the diagram again, the screen was interrupted by a phone call. “Not now, Terry!” She quickly rejected the call but now she knew she was running out of time. She decided to cut the glass instead, unfortunately cutting the glass had set off the alarm. She quickly started grabbing all that she could, knowing that the police would only be moments away.