"OK, you know the drill. Just walk in, take what you need and walk out. Same as every day."

As much as she told herself that it never felt any easier. But then again she was nervous by nature, ever since she could remember. Still, how hard was it to just take stuff from stores without being detected? Her dad had shown it to her a thousand times, and he did it like a pro. And she herself had been doing this since she was just a little kid. So besides her anxiety issues, what was her problem?

She faced the automatic glass doors and gazed at her reflection. Her pink fur was a complete mess, dirty and sticking out in different directions, and her clothes were filthy and rank. Being a cat she should have an instinctive concept of cleanliness, but the conditions she lived in didn't make it easy for her to stay sanitary. In fact, her fur was so dirty it was starting to lose its natural luster.

Finally gathering the courage she needed to walk into the supermarket, she took a deep breath and pulled up the hood of her sweatshirt over her head to conceal her identity. The doors opened instantaneously as she took the first step forward. Entering the building she could hear mood music echoing through the aisles and happy families gathering things into their shopping carts. Her nerves attacked again with that sight, for she had always wished she and her dad could be that happy.

"Come on Lexy, pull yourself together!" she silently scolded herself. "Just get what you came for and get the heck out!"

Taking another deep breath she carried on and walked towards the frozen aisle. Her goal that morning was the same as any other: a premade meal and a six-pack of beer for her dad. He would drink the whole thing and sleep for the rest of the afternoon, while she would have to hear everything locked up in her room. She hated it, but what could she do? He was the only family she had, and it's not like she could just abandon him.

Opening up one of the freezers, she picked up a TV dinner and looked around for the store's surveillance cameras. Locating one right behind her, she leaned over the open freezer, brought the frozen meal as close to her chest as possible, cut out the bar code with one of her sharp claws to not set off the alarms on her way out and placed a large Band-Aid over the hole so the food wouldn't leak. After hiding the meal under her sweatshirt, she picked up another TV dinner and brought it close to her face to trick the cameras, and then put it back in its place so the security guards would think that that was the only thing she had touched.

She was so used to those procedures she could almost do it all without even thinking about it. She would steal food for her dad every day, although sometimes he would have her go for the money. She wasn't very experienced in that field, and one time she was almost caught, but she knew they couldn't afford anything, and that was the only way to get what they needed. Every time she robbed she had a lump in her throat that she just couldn't get rid of. She knew it was wrong, but what else could she do? If she stopped, they would starve.

She did the same to each of the six cans of beer, careful enough not to spill a single drop, and to a box of microwave cheeseburgers and a small pack of gum, those last two being for her. Her dad never let her had any of the food she would get for him, so she was used to taking some for herself and not letting him know about it. If he had a single clue about what she was stashing, besides him taking it for himself, she would be in big trouble.

Grateful her sweatshirt was baggy enough to conceal everything underneath it, she headed towards the exit. She looked around to see if anyone was looking at her, but not enough so as to be too suspicious-looking. She needed to get out without anyone spotting her and figuring out what she was really doing. As she reached the sensor gates she looked around one more time to make sure she wasn't being watched, and increased her walking speed to get out of there as soon as possible.

As soon as she reached the street, she let out a big sigh and tried to calm her nerves. Her heart was beating at full speed, and it almost hurt. She kept walking in her fast pace, for now she had to get home safely.


After about twenty minutes of walking, she finally reached her apartment building. It was old and should have been condemned years ago, but the government decided they should let deadbeats have a place to live, and they said it by those words exactly. Because nobody even dared to clean it once a week, the halls were always filthy and reeking of urine. The apartments themselves were no prettier, for nobody cared about the littlest law of common decency. It was an immoral cesspool of hobos, washed up alcoholics and hung over drug addicts desperately in need for another fix.

She tried her best not to breathe through her nose as she climbed the stairs up to the third floor. It was nearing lunch time, so she knew her dad was already starting to get restless. Stopping in front of her door, she knocked in a special way he had taught her. He was a wanted criminal and had many enemies, so that was a way he could make sure he wasn't opening the door to any unwanted visitors. Opening the door, he greeted her with an unpleasant expression.

"Where the heck were you?!" he barked, making her cringe. She didn't like it when he got mad. "Do you know what time it is?!"

"Sorry… I-I…" she stuttered, only to be interrupted by him grabbing her wrist.

"Get in here!" he pulled her inside the unsanitary apartment and locked the door. Then he turned to her with a frown. "Did you get the stuff?"

Making sure not to drop her own supplies, she removed the TV dinner and the six-pack from under her over-sized sweatshirt. He quickly took everything from her, licking his lips, and unwrapped the meal. He didn't even bother to heat it up or get a fork; he just scooped everything up to his mouth using his dirty hand.

Lexy was used to his sloppy behavior. He was a dog, so she figured that came naturally to him. All she knew about him what that his name was Jason and that he was a Rottweiler, nothing else. She could never figure out why her own father never told her anything about him. Even being his daughter, he never trusted her with nothing besides being her errand girl. She figured her mom must've been a cat, because if she wasn't, how else could he be her dad?

Watching him eat she realized how hungry she was, giving it away as her stomach let out a loud growl. She covered it with her hands, hoping he didn't hear it, but it was too late. He had stopped gorging to look at her with a raised brow. She gulped.

"Y-you think I could… maybe…" she pointed at his food, to which he frowned and distanced it from her.

"Now, Lexy, you know the rules. I'm the adult, therefore I am bigger. Therefore I – "

"'Need food to fill the space in my large stomach more than a tiny little girl would ever need.'" she completed his sentence, having heard it about a thousand times already. "I know…"

"Good." he returned to his meal, pointing a mashed potatoes-covered finger at her. "And never interrupt me again."

Lexy sighed and nodded. She slowly dragged her feet across the creaky wooden floor as she headed towards her room, only to be locked inside it as soon as she passed the door. He did this to her every time she would return from her 'special mission', as her dad called it. That's another thing she didn't understand about him: why did he keep her locked up in her room every day? And why didn't he let her eat? She didn't know much about parenting, but that didn't seem normal at all.

She sat against her door and heard him turn on the TV and open one of the beer cans. She knew that it wouldn't be long until he was asleep on his recliner, so she took out her own supplies from under her clothes. The sight of the microwave burgers made her salivate in anticipation, for she hadn't eaten anything in the last twenty four hours. Her fingers trembled as she tried to peel off the package's plastic layer as fast as she could, and as she took a bite out of one of those meat sandwiches she felt like it was the most delicious meal in the world.

She stood in the same spot for the rest of the day, despite the occasional bathroom break, which for her was a rusty old bucket in the corner of her room, which she had to empty out every day by throwing its contents out the window. She liked to hear the TV shows her dad watched, in front of which he would fall asleep. They only had basic cable, but what she liked the most was to hear the daily news report. She liked to know what was going on in the world, since the only world she knew was her room and the supermarket she stole from. Every day the story was different: deaths, catastrophes, natural disasters… It was all so amazing to her…

She felt her eyelids start to get heavy soon enough. Getting up and stretching her arms out with a yawn, she made her way to the moldy old mattress that was her bed and took off her old sweatshirt, leaving her in a black t-shirt and a dark-blue miniskirt. With the mattress squeaking under her weight, she put herself in the most comfortable position she could manage and closed her eyes.

"Tomorrow's another day…" she whispered to herself before drifting into sleep. "Just like every other day…"