The downtown streets of Vista Valley City were bustling with activity both night and day. Only at night, the streets were crawling with creeps, streetwalkers, scumbags, and all kinds of other variation of criminal that found the darkness of the night makes their criminal lives much easier. It was no place for two young, runaway girls.
For Dayleen and Ladia Kazeem, the chances out on the cold, scary streets were much better than the so called home that they had endured for the last few years. Though, the streets were literally cold, and it was difficult to find a safe and warm place to sleep when they were tired. The only place Dayleen, the oldest sister at fifteen, could think of was the Valley Vista Living furniture superstore. It was risky, and they had to make sure they were never seen by any employees during the day, but when the store closed down at night, it was warm and comfortable.
Dayleen hid in the crevasse of some boxed drawers and dressers on shelf display while nine year old Ladia hid in a toy chest in one of the display rooms on the other side of the walkway where crowds of home shoppers once treaded during store hours. The last of the managers were still wandering around the building and Dayleen had figured out that the very last manager leaves at around nine thirty pm and the janitor at eleven pm. So while the janitor finished his rounds on the second floor where the girls had chosen as their room, Dayleen and Ladia hid in their usual spots and waited it out, communicating with walkies.
"Ladia", Dayleen whispers into the walkie, "are you good?"
"Yeah, but its hot as shit in here", Ladia complains, she was sweating inside that box but she couldn't get out just yet as she could still hear the janitor's floor sweeper moving around nearby.
"Just a little bit longer. He should be almost done with this floor, hang in there." Dayleen reports as she could see him through the boxes gliding across the floor in the distance. "I don't know why you chose to stuff yourself in that toy box."
Ladia lifts the lid of the toy box a bit to get some air. She had forgotten her backpack by the bed and hoped that the janitor wouldn't see it and throw it away, but the janitor never really went into the display rooms, he mostly stayed on the walk aisles. Good thing too because he would also notice the stashes of food in the dressers that the girls made sure to keep unaccessible to the customers. It has been a month and the sisters have been able to live in this furniture store undetected. During the day when the store was open, they rarely stayed together in the store and usually kept their heads down or avoided any employees so none could ever think that they were there all the time. The only problem was the food court where the cashiers would certainly recognize them and wonder why they were always there, so they only visited them once and after that they made sure to sneak in to the back of each shop after they closed and make off with whatever snacks they wanted. Otherwise, food was found outside of the store. With no money, the girls filled their stomachs by ordering at restaurants and ditching before the check came back, grocery stealing, and any other means of acquiring food. Anything but eating out of the garbage.
However, Dayleen and Ladia knew that they weren't going to be able to live like this forever, or even for the next year. They had to keep it moving and that meant leaving their home city forever. But for now, Vista Valley Living Furniture was their home and Dayleen thought they should stay for as long as they could which meant until they were caught and kicked out.
When the janitor finally left the second floor, shutting the lights off, Dayleen and Laida exit their hiding spots and meet each other in their display room, a room that would've been their dream room had they ever been given the option.
The first thing they do is yank open the drawers containing all the snacks and drinks and start munching while removing the VCR from another hiding spot and hooking it up to the display television set that actually still worked. It didn't get cable, but they didn't need cable, all they needed to do was hook up the VCR that they brought with them from home to watch their movies.
"I want to watch Pinnochio this time", Ladia says, taking off the lid of a ice cream bucket.
"Why Pinnochio?" Dayleen asks, she was already grabbing Toy Story.
"We can fast forward passed the monstro part", Ladia says, rolling her eyes, knowing that her sister had always had a fear of the whale. Dayleen always had a fear of going into large bodies of water because of the thought of monstro.
"Fine, whatever." Dayleen puts in the VHS tape of Pinnochio and just like back at home, Dayleen and Ladia lay in bed, eating ice cream and other snacks while nestled in blankets and pillows. Neither of them had to worry about setting an alarm clock because they knew that either one of them always woke up early well before the store opened.By the time any managers or employees could make it to the second floor, they would already be in their hiding spots until the horde of customers grew big enough that they could emerge from their hiding spots, blend in, then make their way out of the store for the day.
But for whatever reason, after falling asleep, the two girls were in a much deeper, much more comfortable slumber than usual.
Dayleen in particular was deep in a dream. She was back at home, sitting on the couch with her mother who was speaking to her in gibberish. The television was on but nothing recognizable was on screen. All of a sudden, they both hear Ladia calling out to them from outside in the backyard. She sounded like she was in distress. Both Dayleen and her mother rush outside where Dayleen saw herself staring at something in horror but couldn't see what it was that she was looking at. Her mother had disappeared and suddenly her whole body felt warm. That warmth turned to intense heat. She looks up and she could see the sun high in the sky. She puts her hand over her forehead and could feel damp steam coming off her skin from the heated beads of sweat.
"Why is it so hot?" she could hear herself ask. Then, suddenly, in the dream, Dayleen realizes what may be happening in real life. The lights of the second floor had been turned on. The store was opening.
Dayleen jerks herself out of her sleep and sits up in bed. Sure enough, the store lights were on.
"Ladia!" Dayleen shakes her sister awake who rubs her eyes and sits up. "We overslept! Come on! We gotta hide!"
As they scrambled to clean up and make it look like two homeless girls weren't living there, they could hear the voices of a guy talking to someone. It was a store manager. He was on the phone and talking about some holiday setups as he made his way down the aisle.
It was too late, Dayleen and Ladia were not quick enough to gather everything before the manager was close enough to be able to catch them. Dayleen hides behind the display wall and Ladia ducks behind the bed just as the manager walks by. He looks over and notices that the t.v was on and that a VCR was hooked up.
"Hold on a second, what the fuck?" the manager goes to investigate the display room. He notices the bed was a bit ruffled and there were food wrappers laying around.
"Who's in here?" the manager calls out. He walks deeper into the display room and turns and almost misses Ladia ducked by the bed.
"Hi!" Ladia chugs the bucket of melted ice cream at the guy and makes a run for it.
"What the fuckin shit! Hey!" The manager yells. Dayleen runs down the aisle and she eventually catches up with Ladia.
"What about our movies?" Ladia asks Dayleen as they ran down the stairs.
"Fuck it, we'll find new ones somewhere!" Dayleen replies as they dash across the first floor. Some other employees were standing there looking at them in confusion as they ran. The girls were laughing because even though they were forced to find another place to live and had lost their VCR and collection of favorite Disney movies, it was fun as hell running out of there.
They meant to burst through the doors of the building but they did have to wait for the sliding doors to open before for their anti climactic escape into the streets of Vista Valley City where their next journey was either of their guesses.