Member-only story
A Sack Full of Candies and a Little Thief
My Mom Taught Me a Lesson That Stuck
The neighborhood market store had it all. Kind of a supermarket of the old days. My mom needed some stuff and, as always, she took me with her. Next to the cashier, standing proudly on the floor, there was a huge sack full of candies. A rainbow of candies wrapped in colorful and shiny packaging. After finishing my mom went to the cashier, where the owner calculated on a piece of paper the cost of her groceries.
I was standing right next to the magical sack. It was talking to me at that specific time, “Take me, take me!” Without a second thought, my little palm dove into it, and grabbed as many as it could hold. I still remember the noise of the wrapping paper while I was squeezing the candies to fit in my palm. Both, mom and owner heard the noise, too. They were both staring at me.
I kept my right sinful arm with the goodies behind my back. I was hoping for the ladies to move on with what they were doing, and stop staring at me with disapproval. Mom, in a cold, steady voice, requested me to show her my right arm.
Still keeping it hidden behind my back, it was holding tightly to my little treasures. It took me a century to carefully pass over the candies to my left arm, but that noise… it was so quiet in there and the candies passing from the right palm to the left palm, were making a loud screech of the cellophane. I was hoping I was the only one to hear it.
Then, I did what she asked me to and showed her my right arm. Then mom asked me to bring both palms in front of me. There was no escape this time. I had to do it.
In a calm, but very steady voice, mom said, “Mia, why didn’t you ask? I could have bought these for you. That was a very bad thing you did.”
I whispered “I’m sorry.”
Mom paid for the candies, giving apologies on my behalf to the owner, and we left the store.
On the way home, she told me that for my actions, she will give me a lesson to remember for the rest of my life. Our yard door had a design made of iron, and she would tie me there with a rope and put a sign next to me to reading “She’s a thief! Feel free to throw stones at her!”
