“Rise and shine!” my mom called, pulling the covers off of me, and grabbing my pillow before I could pull it over my head. I groaned. She knew me so well. 

“Come on, we’ve gotta get up and out!” she coaxed. I rolled away from her, facing my nightstand. My alarm hadn’t gone off yet, it was 4:30. I jerked upright. 

“I slept through the whole day?” I cried. We had gotten back around midnight from my uncle’s house, but that wasn’t that late. I had gone to sleep right away, tired from all the food and excitement our family Thanksgiving always offered. Then I remembered what day it was. Black Friday. It may have been my mom’s favorite day, but it fell very low on my list. It was filled with her dragging me to various different stores for my dozens of cousins and relatives, while she deliberated whether to get the Perfect Princess Spa Set or the Magical Fairy Spa Set for my cousin Claire, or whether her step-nephew would rather have a blue truck or a red truck. 

We pulled into our first stop, Barnes and Noble, at 5 am. I knew for a fact that Barnes and Noble didn’t open until 10 normally, but already the parking lot was filled with cars as people streamed in the doors. My mom turned upstairs, and I had to run to keep up with her. Finally, we stopped in the cookbook section, as she mulled over whether 75% off a $50 cookbook or 50% off an $80 cookbook was cheaper. Of course, you also had to factor in the density of the text per recipe, ease of page turning, and the average size in millimeters of each picture. I read the blurb of a few books and grabbed them for my cousins. 

“Are you sure those are the right choices?” my mom asked me.

“Of course! Last time I was at their house, I measured their bookcases, and then I measured these books to make sure they would be exactly 8 centimeters below the top of the shelf.” Unfortunately, my sarcasm was lost on her, just nodding as she kept debating whether her sister would like the 10 inch or 10 and a half inch desk organizer. I pulled out my phone, but before I could finish entering in my password, it was plucked from my hands. 

“Kimberly, we don’t have time for you to go on your phone! I need you to pick out picture books for Mary and Gary. I was looking online, and A Cupcake for Betsy gets better reviews, but…” I turned into the children’s section, relieved when the sound of all the other shoppers drowned her out. It was evidently going to be just like all the other years. We finally left Barnes and Noble at exactly 8:06:32 exactly. (I was bored, and the only thing to do was watch the clock.)

This process repeated itself at Target, Nordstrom, and Bed, Bath and Beyond. By the time we got to County Mall, our second-to-last stop, it was 5:23, and I was exhausted and bored to tears. I begged my mom to let me stay in the car, so I could at least sleep. 

“Don’t be silly!” she told me. “This is the best stop. Plus, you need to pick out a present for your Dad.” 

The mall was huge, and a huge sign boasted that it covered over three square miles. We went straight to the Lego Store, always a hit with my cousins, and a not-too boring store for me. 

“Kimberely, can you pass me the deal spreadsheet?” my mom asked. It was my job, every day after Black Friday, to make a lengthy list of the average prices and sales each product we’d bought had. “Is this a scam?” my mom exclaimed. “Last year they had the Lego Friend Treehouse at $15, when it was 50% off. Now it’s $20 dollars and still 50% percent off!”

“We’re not buying it,” I reminded her. “Plus, there’s a war going on and serious inflation.” 

“But still! And last year the Lego Star Wars Death Star was…” 

“37 dollars and 50 cents, 25 percent off,” I finished. “Mom, you don’t have to tell me. I know.” I sighed and picked out the Lego Colosseum (75% off, a whopping 35% increase from last year) for my third cousin, Lily. 

“Pick out something for Lily!” my mom prompted me. “I just have to find something for Marcus, Lukas, Izzy, Amanda, and Stacy, then we’re onto our next stop.” I sighed. By the way her eyes were flitting between the Colosseum or Eiffel Tower, I knew we’d be here a long time. I peeked outside the store. Williams Sonoma had 75% off everything in the store. I could buy my dad a Zoodle maker, which he’d dropped multiple hints about, and be back in five minutes. I grabbed my mom’s credit card from her purse, and snuck out.

I was halfway to Williams Sonoma when the loudspeaker crackled. “Today only! Black Friday sale! You have a chance to get a new iPhone 14 Pro for free!” All of a sudden, I heard a rumbling of feet from my right, on my left was the Apple store. I wasn’t going to make it to Williams Sonoma, and I could run to the Apple store with everyone else in the mall, or get trampled.  I sprinted to those glass doors.

“Welcome!” an employee greeted the growing crowd. “I’m Blake, and this is the great Apple Store. Today, we’re raffling off this iPhone 14. Each ticket costs only $1!” 

“I thought we were getting this for free!” someone shouted. The crowd murmured its dissent. 

Blake looked flustered. “Well, technically, you will be getting this for free, you just have to pay for the raffle ticket. But still, you could win the iPhone with a total expense of only five dollars! Which of you are willing to face amazing rewards?”

I joined the line of people quickly forming to the counter. My mom had said I was allowed to spend $5 on something for myself! The man in front of me was dressed in an expensive-looking suit, with Airpods obviously in his ears. He was taking an awful long time. “This ticket is ripped!” he complained. “Here, girl, you take it. I will not use something so inferior.” He shoved it into my hands, and turned away dramatically. 

“Hi,” I ventured. “Can I buy five raffle tickets?” The cashier grunted and pulled some off. “Also, should I give this ticket back to you?” 

“The guy paid for it,” the cashier said. “If he wanted to give that to you, it’s yours.” 

“Oh, okay, thank you!” I said. I checked the clock. I probably had at least an hour before my mom made a decision. However, I didn’t even have to wait that long, because after twenty minutes, Blake got up. “I better win,” muttered the person behind me. I turned around and recognized him as the man who’d shoved me one of his raffle tickets. “I bought 600 of those raffle tickets, at this rate I’d only be making a profit of $500.” I checked my tickets. 15478, 15410, 13420, 15879, 13783, and the one I’d been tossed, 15419.

Blake tapped on the microphone. “And the winning ticket is 1, 5…” I still had three tickets left! “4, 1…” Down to one. 

Please, please, say zero, I prayed. 

“9,” Blake said. I sighed, pocketing my tickets, and then I remembered the ripped one. I quickly pulled it out. 15419! “I repeat, 1, 5, 4, 1, and 9,” he sighed. “Please come forth or we will redraw.” 

“I won,” I told him, but was surprised when someone screamed. Everyone swiveled their heads toward me, then I realized it had been my voice. “I won!” I cried. 

Blake held his hand out for me to give him the raffle ticket. He checked it quickly, then raised my arm. “Winner!” he declared. 

“Thief!” someone called. I turned around and the man from earlier was making his way towards me. “This girl stole my ticket. It’s right on this receipt, number 15419.”

“What?!” I sputtered. “But-but you gave it to me! Because it’s ripped, see?” I frantically pointed at the millimeter-long hairline rip. 

The man scoffed. “That’s ridiculous!” 

“Where’s the cashier from earlier? They saw it!” I protested. 

“All the shift one employees are on break right now except for me,” Blake said. He turned to the man. “Do you want me to call security?” 

“Yes please,” he said with a sneer. “Who knows what else this…” he paused to look at me with disgust. “…ruffian might steal.”

“He’s lying!” I cried. “He gave this ticket to me.”

“Of course he didn’t,” Blake said, and I saw us through his eyes. The man was dressed in a sharp and immaculately pressed black suit, with gold cuffs and an expensive-looking watch. On the other hand, I was dressed in ripped jeans, and my favorite sweatshirt, which was worn with age. My shoes were dyed brown on the bottom from walking to school on rainy, muddy, days. “Security, this is Blake. Please come to the Apple Store,” he spoke into his walkie talkie. 

“Affirmative,” crackled a voice on the other end. “We’ll be there in under a minute.” 

I looked up and saw two people, dressed in blue-black uniforms with long guns and tasers, hurrying down the escalator three floors above us. They looked down and pointed at the store. I knew they were coming for me, and I ran. I burst out of the glass doors and peeled down the mall hallways. I could hear them now, running behind me, so I turned the next corner and disappeared into an H&M. I pressed my face against the wall, so as not to be recognized and sighed with relief as I heard them pass. The next second, I felt a gun against the back of my head. 

“Put your hands up,” a stern voice told me. I obliged, my hands shaking. They sighed. “Turn around,” the voice commanded me again. I turned around and saw a security guard, quickly placing her gun in her holster, obviously surprised at my youth. “You are aware that you could be charged with petit larceny and grand larceny in the fourth degree, depending on how Mr. Bincroff decides to press charges, and the felony of fleeing from peace officers. Come with me. Will you cooperate or will I have to use these?” She held up her handcuffs. “It is in your best interest to cooperate.”

“But…!” I protested. I looked up at the disappointment on her face, and the way she was glaring at me.  “I…, I’ll…, I’ll come with you.”

“Thank you,” she said curtly. 

I kept my head down as we passed other shoppers, and it seemed like an eternity before we finally got to the security office. She opened the door to a small room with a couple of benches.
“Wait here,” she told me. “I just have to contact my supervisor.” She left the room. I scanned it, but there didn’t seem to be anywhere else for me to go. 

The door swung open, and I expected to see the guard walk in again, but instead there was a girl a few years older than me, with red hair, and earbuds in. She stopped when she saw me. 

“What are you in for?” she asked, plopping down next to me. 

“How do you know it’s not murder?” I snapped, fighting back the urge to cry. I stared hard at a crack on the ceiling, shaped like a shoe. 

“You wouldn’t be in here if it were,” she smiled. “And you don’t seem like the type of person to commit crimes. Trust me. My father’s the chief of police, so I know my stuff. I’m Abigail Montgomery. Your posture’s all wrong, and I don’t know if you noticed it, but you’re squeezing your fingers so tightly, and your eyes have been fixed on that crack on the ceiling for the entire time I’ve been talking. If you were guilty, they would most likely be darting around. I find it hard to believe you’re in here,” she took my hands reassuringly.

Her matter of fact tone made my eyes well over, and I slumped into the bench, sobbing. Between sobs, I mumbled my story to her. When I finished, and looked up, she had a fiery determination in her eyes. 

“Well then, let’s go bring you justice!” She jumped up and grabbed a receipt and a pen out of her purse. 

“Wait…you believe me?” I asked incredulously. 

“Of course! I was taking your pulse while you were talking. You’re telling the truth.” 

“Wow, you’re crazy good.” 

“I was born into it. I want to be a criminal detective,” Abigail shrugged and jotted down something on the receipt, placing it on the bench. “Come on!”

“What?” I gaped at her. “I can’t just leave!”

“Yeah, you can. I wrote my dad a note, taking responsibility.”

“But…you could get in so much trouble! And so could I! The felony of fleeing and tease an officer or something.”

“Fleeing a peace officer. Do you want to go to juvie from being falsely accused of a crime?”

I shook my head. 

“Great, let’s go!” she grabbed my hand. “Wear this,” she told me, grabbing a black hat and a huge I ♥ NY sweatshirt out of a bin. “And pull your hair back in a bun. But it’s all just a precaution. You’re with me, so you’re inherently trusted.” 

I barely had time to pull it on before Abigail pulled me in the direction of the Apple Store. She stopped at the Gap next door and ducked into a dressing room. “Wait here,” she whispered. “I’m going to go try to find the cashier and you’re too recognizable. Can you describe them?”

“Uh…” I sputtered. I used all my concentration.  “They had black hair… and a tattoo on their hand. I don’t know what of, though. Sorry, it’s been a long day.” 

“Don’t worry, that’s more than enough. The tattoo is very helpful. I’ll be right back,” she winked and disappeared. I panicked, and started counting seconds. Exactly 234 seconds later, she reappeared with the cashier from earlier. Abigail scrutinized the room. “This is too public.  I know a place that’s secret.” 

She led us to a small alcove off the movie theater. “Alright, Kimberly, meet Brooklyn.” the cashier gave me a half-smile. 

“Wait, how do you know my name?” I asked, panicked. 

“It’s right there on the paper sticking out of your back pocket,” she said, like it was obvious. I pulled it out, finding an old school assignment with Kimberly Puller written neatly on the top. “Anyway,” she said, “Brooklyn agrees with your story.”

“But no one’s going to believe me,” Brooklyn said. “When he was buying the raffle tickets, he gave me a diamond credit card. You can’t get those unless you are virtually a millionaire. And wealth is power in this world.” 

Abigail smiled. “Wealth may be powerful, but justice is more powerful than anything!” 

Brooklyn scoffed. 

“Really!” Abigail insisted. “There’s security cameras in the store, aren’t there?” 

“Of course,” Brooklyn rolled her eyes. “We only have merchandise worth hundreds and thousands of dollars. There’s one right above the cash register, and I can never check my phone at work.” She realized the implications of what she was saying. 

“Do you have access to them?” I asked eagerly, trying not to let myself hope too much. 

“I just got them last week. But you can’t go in that store. They’ll recognize you.” 

“Oh no, they won’t!” Abigail exclaimed. She opened a closet on the side, and in their lay dozens of janitor uniforms in all sizes. She grabbed a pair of glasses out of her purse, “I always have them for emergencies!” 

I grabbed a small sized uniform and a cart as Abigail whispered the plan.

I mopped the hallway as I watched them enter the store, Abigail holding a Starbucks coffee, asking Brooklyn a barrage of questions about MacBooks. As they were passing the Employees Only door, she turned around a little too quickly and the coffee spilled everywhere. 

“Hey you!” Blake called out to me. “We’ve had a spill in here. Clean it up!” I quickly entered, but no one gave me a second glance. While I aggressively attacked the coffee, hiding the door with my cart, Abigail and Brooklyn slipped in. Although they reappeared only a couple of minutes later, it felt like an eternity. Every glance someone sent me was a lifetime in prison, every cough was the FBI, here to arrest me. Abigail slipped a hard drive in her pocket, and I left, knowing the floor was spotless. I moved out of sight of the store, and after a few moments, Abigail rejoined me, for it would be too suspicious for Brooklyn to come with us again. 

“Ready?” she asked, and I ditched the janitor gear as we sprinted to the security headquarters. 

We were turning the last corner, when I heard someone yell, “STOP THIEF!” I spared a quick glance behind me and saw multiple security guards heading towards us. Abigail pulled me into the headquarters, and shoved the hard drive into the computer. 

Please work, please work! I prayed with all my might. I’ll never complain about Black Friday again! 

“Running again?” the man, Mr. Bincroff, sneered, with seven security guards and Blake behind him. “You won’t look so cocky when I get my hands on you.”

“Hurry up!”  I spun around, watching as Abigail replayed the footage of him buying the raffle tickets. “I’m a highly important man, and I demand that I get these tickets right away.” 

Mr. Bincroff turned red. “I didn’t say that!” he protested. “They must have mocked up the video!” But even Blake was giving him the stink eye.  “This ticket is ripped! Here, girl, you take it. I will not use something so inferior.”  I watched, breathless, as Mr. Bincroff obviously pushed the ticket into my hands. 

“Hi, can I buy five raffle tickets?” 

Abigail looked over at me and smiled. “Justice!” she mouthed.

“Also, should I give this ticket back to you?” 

“The guy paid for it. If he wanted to give that to you, it’s yours.” 

“Oh, okay, thank you!” 

Abigail stopped the video. Half of the security guards quickly stepped back from Mr. Bincroff, while the other half eyed him and clutched their guns in the holsters.

“KIMBERLY!” my mom burst in, wrapping her arms around me protectively. “Kimberly Stevell Puller, do you know how much I was worried about you?!” 

I gulped. With the craziness of the past few hours, I had forgotten about my mom. Blake walked towards us. 

“I would like to extend my sincere apologies,” he said, extending his hand out to my mother. 

“You would like to extend your sincere apologies?” she shouted, chastising him, as he tried to back away. 

I went over to Abigail. “Thank you, so, so much!” I cried, hugging her. “And you too!” I exclaimed, spying Brooklyn entering. They seemed surprised by the hug, their hands stiffly patting me on the back. 

“Guess what?” my mom asked. Before I could answer she blurted out, “In exchange for the inconvenience, Apple has decided to give us 50% off of everything until the end of November! Since I was too busy looking for somebody to finish our holiday shopping, we’ll be back here bright and early tomorrow!”

“Mom, today’s the last day of November,” I told her, hoping we would just go home now. 

“We still have 4 hours!” she declared. 

By 11 pm, I was going cross-eyed watching my mom debate whether to buy my grandmother the silver case with gold flowers or the gold case with silver flowers, to go with her new iPhone. Why did I promise never to complain about Black Friday again? I wondered, before dozing off into oblivion.