Creep

This is taken from a Post Secret submission stating "My fancy college is a sweet place for a total klepto like me.� I thought this was interesting, and thought it would be a good writing exercise to expand on it. Let me know what you think.

 

I walked quietly down the long dormitory hallway, my soft-soled Converse tennis shoes barely making a sound on the old threadbare carpeting. I’d learned to walk tenderly years ago somewhere in between running undetected into the bathroom in the middle of the night unnoticed by my parents fighting in the other room, and sneaking out of my window to escape my drunken mother passed out on the couch in our dirty living room.

 

College dorms were something different altogether. They presented an entirely new challenge. I’d toured other colleges in the state, from the small local ones where everyone was either ultra liberal or extremely conservative, to the state colleges where there was enough financial aid and low tuition rates to make it affordable to the Joe Middleclasses of the world. This one was by far the most upscale experience I could get while being one of the few in the school with any kind of financial assistance that wasn’t from The Bank of Daddy. The challenge wasn’t sneaking around unnoticed from these girls (the ones in their rooms were undoubtedly asleep or reading Sylvia Plath, and the ones who were out were already so drunk they wouldn’t remember their own names in the morning); but rather, it came in taking from them what they knew to be materialistic but unimportant. A pair of diamonds, unnoticed as a trinket in a box full of like trinkets, or a favored bottled perfume, if only half a bottle.

 

Small items, really, but one mustn’t get too greedy. Not when you lived this close to one another. This wasn’t a hotel, after all. I’d stolen enough from people over the years to know the level one could steal from without getting caught. When one lived in a dormitory full of girls on a renowned campus, one could in no way afford to get greedy.

 

So instead, I opted for the things that they wouldn’t really miss, but things that would make me look like I belonged too. It was uncomfortable, being a poor kid going to a rich white school. But that wasn’t a new story. I knew that. But what made mine so damn special was that my theft wasn’t an outward act of vandalism or rebellion, but rather came from a deep compulsion to take what I wanted when the mood struck me. There was no exact rhyme or reason to it, but an unyielding need to take what I suddenly had to have below only oxygen.

Author's Note

This is experimental, but please let me know what you think of content. Too much rambling? It is in no way finished, but I wanted some critique on what I have so far.

Reviews

[Des]

Never too much rambling. I really, really, really like it. Just enough rambling to give a short family history and just enough rambling to give evidence of a grade 'A+' kleptomaniac. Good job, I can't wait to see the finished product.