Is Love Worth Catching
By: Molly Buckles, staff writer
The foggy morning sparked comfort in the woman as she blinked open her groggy eyes. She took a deep breath, put on her glasses, and reached for her phone. On her lockscreen was a text message from Theo, her love. That’s when her stomach sank. Her mood instantly changed, and her heart beat a little faster. She remembered events from the night before. Evidence that could destroy her boyfriend's life. She refuses to believe that Theo could be behind this whole heist. As a detective, it is Rose’s job to crack cases and capture con artists, and she is very good at what she does, but she does not want to solve this case. She is so good at her job that she already knows who stole the precious earrings from the Louvre. She just doesn’t want to admit it.
As Rose walked to work that morning, her coffee felt a little warmer in her hands than usual. Or maybe she was just thinking about it too much because she was trying to distract herself from the real problem. She felt a vibration in her pocket. It was Theo, again. She hadn’t responded to the text before. Rose loves Theo, and Theo loves Rose. They have been together for a little over two years, and their relationship is unmatched, but there has always been something about Theo that Rose couldn’t quite put her finger on. Something mysterious that she would push away because his other qualities overpowered this feeling. Rose took a second to respond to his messages; he was acting normal. She tried to tell herself that it wasn’t him who stole these earrings, because why would he? Why did he need these earrings and go through such lengths to get them?
When Rose got to the crime scene the night before, there were no alarms set off, no broken glass, just stolen earrings and a mystery to solve. As Rose collected evidence, she came across a hair tie. The other detectives around assumed that the thief was a girl because of the evidence, and Rose thought the same thing, until she looked at it. This hair tie was one of the thick ones lined with lace. Similar to the one rose had on that afternoon. No one knew it could be hers, but she did. Rose got sweaty and thought maybe this was used to set her up. She recollected her memories from lunch, realizing that she had taken her hair down and laid it on the table. Theo showed up late to lunch. Rose got excited when she saw him and jumped up to hug him, forgetting her hair tie was on the table. The next thing she remembers is parting ways with Theo and heading back to work, four hours before the heist. He has to be the one who took it because no one else would have. Right? Rose took it upon herself to smell the hair tie when she found it on the floor of the Louvre. It smelled of bacon grease and cleaning spray, similar to the smell of the diner they were at during lunch. She thought about Theo when she brushed the hair tie between her fingers. She loves Theo, and Theo loves her. He wouldn’t do this to her. Before Rose thought twice, she “accidentally” dropped the hair tie in a bucket of cleaning solution at the crime scene, destroying it as evidence. Now she and her boyfriend were safe, for now. She hopes that there is no more evidence of Theo.
Theo is a very observant man. He notices the small things, like the amount of food left on random people's plates, the different colored salt and pepper shakers on various tables, and his girlfriend's outfit. After Theo hugged Rose goodbye, he walked back to his apartment, replaying his lunch date over and over in his head. He reached his apartment and turned on the TV. He had write-ups due for work, but he decided to take a nap instead. As he fell asleep, he remembered that Rose had her hair down as they left. He hoped that she had remembered her hair tie on the table because he saw she had pushed it closer to the window than it was before. He decided it wasn’t that big of a deal and fell asleep.
When Theo awoke, it was almost dark out. He walked to his bay window and looked above the city of Paris. He looked at the setting sun and took a picture to send to Rose. He realized his TV was still blaring, so he walked over to turn it off. As he grabbed the remote, breaking news popped up on the screen. The Louvre had been broken into, and the thieves got away. Theo’s first thought was to call Rose and see if she had heard, but then he realized that she was probably already there working on cracking the case. He decided to leave her be and let her do her work. He would check in with her in the morning.
Another morning woke as she rose from her bed. She was tired, sad, and unmotivated for work. Her only thought as she got ready was that she wished she could be rich and not have to work at the stupid diner. Cienna knows that if she had pursued college, she wouldn’t be where she is now; she just doesn’t want to admit it. Cienna is filled with so much anger that if she takes too much of a deep breath, her body will explode, and hot lava will spew out of her. When she showed up to work that morning, she decided she wanted to live her life on edge. She wanted to quit the diner, rob a bank, and move to a random island. This plan was a stretch, but she decided to go ahead anyway. She didn’t know how to place the blame on someone else until she was cleaning the table of a customer. There she found a hair tie. This could be it. This could be the evidence that sets her free. Cienna could plant it, accuse someone, and make a scene. It could all work out.
Cienna hopped on a bus after work and headed for the bank, when she saw that the Louvre was under maintenance. She disregarded it at first, but as she drove past it, she noticed an open window, an opening to a new life. She hopped off the bus and went back towards the open window. Since it was a foggy day, you could barely see 5 feet in front of you. Cienna took this as an opportunity and climbed through the window. She wasn’t looking to steal anything big, just something worth enough for her to hop on the next plane out of Paris. She came across a pair of diamond earrings, worn by the Queen of England many years ago. It wasn’t hard for Cienna to steal the earrings; all she had to do was break the lock with a pen found in her purse and slide the glass upwards. After she grabbed the earrings, she dropped the hair tie in a less obvious place, and then she disappeared. She used the money she made from the diner to buy herself a ticket to Belize, where she is staying low profile, but living the life she desired.