Miracle Boy

It was twilight when Mary woke up. She sighed and rubbed her wrists.

“It hasn’t even been a week Mary and you were caught stealing burger- oh and look at this, for a change, you stole clothes too?”

Right. She had been caught stealing and had been knocked out and handcuffed for it. That would explain the pain in her wrists. She hadn’t made it a week. Mary felt shame creep up her neck. “I did not!”

“Look, I’ve been working since five in the morning and I’d really appreciate it if you’d actually do something productive instead of creating more for me,” Jack said, flipping through his files.

Mary slammed her hand upon the desk. “Stop ignoring me!” Jack threw her a tired glance. Mary barrelled on. “I’m telling you. My house was robbed. No one has caught the thieves yet. I’ve got nothing to live on. I’ve got shabby clothes and practically no food. Tell me, what am I supposed to do?!”

“Work? Earn? Do you see me? I’m just a year younger than you and I’m solving cases. I’m working. There will be no miracle. It’s not like you can change what you’re going through. So instead of waiting for someone to restore your life back to normal why can’t you just live with it?”

“It’s your job to catch the people who stole from me and instead, you’re here, giving me speeches on how to live with it?”

Jack suddenly stood up, rummaged for something under his desk and started to mumble. “The Rusking heist. The Colando Case. They’re all unsolved cases that I’m currently stuck on, and yours is just another one of many. I don’t have the ability to multitask.” He thrust a few papers in her hand. “Why don’t you try to catch them, huh, those robbers of yours? It’s not like you’re doing anything worthwhile anyway.”

Guilt stirred in her stomach, but Mary was not one to back down from an argument. “Fine!”

Jack threw up his hands. “Fine.”

Two days later, Mary was back at the police station. Empty-handed.

Jack looked up and looked right back down to his papers.

Mary rushed to him and tugged at his sleeve.

“What?”

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have shouted at you like that. You were just doing your job and I wasn’t exactly been easy to handle.”

Jack smiled. “Didn’t get anything did you?”

“I kind of lost the papers as well…”

“You’re a clutz.”

Mary pushed his arm away in frustration. Jack laughed and ran a hand over his face. “Don’t worry. We haven’t found these people either. Any evidence written on those papers was probably irrelevant and useless.”

Jack had been a poor boy since birth. He had always cursed God for being born into a financially unstable family, hoping that something would change. Unfortunately, nothing did. So he started to work. He had always been an unusually bright child, which was the one thing that brought him some luck into his miserable life. Being extremely against illegal crimes and injustice due to traumatic past encounters with them, he had decided to become a policeman. And thus, despite his young age, he became one. The only reliable breadwinner of his family.

Even after becoming a policeman, he was assigned to looking at cases and being a sidekick to the real field agents. He constantly worked in hopes of earning more if he solved more. With Mary’s monthly escapades, he was overburdened and tired, which is why when he caught someone familiar red-handed, he didn’t hesitate to point the gun at her.

“You robbed your house.”

Mary stilled. She put the Elephant’s Jewel back in its case. Jack spluttered in disbelief.

“You stole from your house! And killed your parents! Why?”

Mary turned to jack, a careful frown on her face. “Calm down Jack. This is not what you think it is. Just put down the gun-”

But Jack wasn’t listening. The pieces were all starting to add up now. Everything was starting to make sense.

“You misplaced every piece of evidence that we had collected to cover up your tracks. And the Colando Case. The Rusking Heist. It was all you. I always wondered how you were able to go into the towers undetected.”

Mary took a tentative step towards him. Jack stepped back.

“You personally got yourself caught on these ‘fake food-stealing moments’ to show yourself as poor and incapable of getting away with anything. And I let you go that day. Wasn’t that the day you were caught in the Shakon square? The same day the bank robbery happened? I thought you had been looking for food!”

“Jack, are you even listening to yourself? You sound insane! I would never do that!”

“Every other month you’d get caught so that you wouldn’t be under suspicion. You thought that even if you were caught escaping, you’d be looked upon as a poor girl who got caught up in a misunderstanding. No one would guess that you were actually hoarding money. Wasn’t that why you killed your parents? To cover it all up? To hide all the money that you actually have?”

Mary opened her mouth and then shook her head, laughing. Jack looked on, with rage and betrayal boiling in his gut. Mary stared back.

“So you finally figured it out, eh Miracle boy?”

That day was the day that had changed Jack’s life. He was paid a hefty amount for solving multiple cases and for returning a lot of stolen loot back to their true owners. He climbed up the ranks and went on to become a better policeman, and made sure not to trust too easily as he had done with Mary. His family was living in much better conditions and he was living a great life. However, he never forgot about the girl who had tricked him. He never forgot the girl who had turned his life around, though she hadn’t meant to. He would never forget Mary, the young mastermind who had shown him the mind of a criminal.