Real Life Rescue Mission

A thief walks among us. My roommate and I always prided ourselves that being from Maine we never had to lock our doors, cars or home. Everyone is friendly and instead of taking someone’s cool or unique things they do the normal and polite thing: compliment it and move on with their lives.

Obviously, there are some people in Plymouth incapable of this. In the two years since me and my two roommates have lived in our apartment off campus we have had the following items stolen from us: Birkenstocks, a PS4 controller, a Roku TV remote, a tapestry, a decorative lizard, and a girl once tried to light a cigarette on our stove (I know it’s not theft but the girl was going to burn our house down.) None of the items were recovered, except for two.

The two items we got back were a homemade red, tie-dye tapestry and the decorative lizard, one of a kind bought from an art store. We hung them on our porch and enjoyed them our entire junior year. When I stepped back onto the porch for the start of my senior year I felt something was different, but it would take a week or two for all three of us to realize why.

Once we noticed the tapestry and lizard were gone we didn’t even consider that someone took them: I assumed I brought them home and left them there. No big deal, right? I was traveling home for a concert in the beginning of October so I decided to wait until then. Upon my arrival home, and my dismantlement of the basement and my bedroom, no lizard or tapestry was to be found. This is when I knew we had been hit yet again. There was little hope for recovery.

Fast forward to the end of October. I was on my way to the library. I crossed the street and was haphazardly gazing at the houses when I noticed something that furrowed my brow and stopped my feet: a red, tie-dye tapestry suspended from someone else’s porch ceiling. I hadn’t seen my tapestry in a while, but it was made from one of my former friends who graduated and I knew exactly what the tag looked like. Not wanting to intrude on someone’s porch, because it’s wrong and rude, I took a photo and sent it to my roommates. As I snapped the photo the front door opened and someone stepped outside. “Can I help you?” they asked. I explained my situation when they informed me an ex in a relationship gave that to them and they had no idea where it was from. Interesting, I thought. And I walked away. Unconvinced.

I told a friend about my interesting find, and she told her boyfriend. He took it back for us.

Boyfriend brought the tapestry home in the wee hours of a Sunday morning. That same Sunday night my roommates and I heard a knock on the door and lone-behold it was Thief.

Saying it was a big misunderstanding and we were going to move on and be alright. Thief demanded the name and phone number of my roommate’s boyfriend and we reluctantly gave it to him, but in return, we asked for Thief’s ex’s number. If Thief’s ex had gotten possession of the tapestry, they had to have the lizard. And that is what I really wanted back.

Thief completely blew us off and ignored multiple texts from my roommate asking politely for ex’s number. Thief stopped responding and we assumed they knew nothing about the lizard and we gave up.

Keep in mind: We are not mean girls. We just value unique decorations.

This last Saturday night in this cold, dark month of February, I was home. Both of my roommates were out, around 10:40 pm I got a picture sent to me from one of my roommates. My eyes popped and my jaw dropped when my lizard popped up on the screen, hanging in someone’s bedroom. Texting initiated and it turns out my roommate was in the same exact house that the red tapestry had been discovered.

I slammed my laptop shut, shoved my last pizza rolls into my mouth and got dressed. My contact lenses were already soaking for the night so I was wearing my giant I-Only-Wear-These-In-My-House glasses and my hair hadn’t been washed in two days. But it was rescue time.

My roommate told me to bring a large bag to put the lizard in and I did.

My sockless feet are soaked from snow in my running shoes by the time I walk up to this house. My glasses fog up immediately when I enter the house so I have to take them off, leaving my absolutely blind. I can’t even make out the faces of the people I’m walking past.

My roommate and I were months past our last conversation with Thief, but they knew who we were and we were in their house now. Out of fear of Thief discovering us and foiling our plan we struck up a conversation with a random guy sitting alone. We made awkward and forced conversation until we saw Thief move away from the stairs and give us our chance.

We bolted up the stairs and headed to the bedroom when we noticed the once opened door was now shut and locked, but with the keys hanging out. Naturally, we panicked and locked ourselves in a bathroom so tiny there was hardly room for two. After freaking out from automatic lights going off, and accidentally knocking a photo which was a framed postcard(?) off the wall, we used courage to unlatch the bathroom door and bring our baby lizard home.

My roommate knocked on the door, heard no response, and turned the key. My heart was beating so fast it hid the thump of the bass from the music at the bottom of the stairs. My roommate dashed in to grab her jacket that Thief was letting people keep in there and threw it into my bag. The bag was too small and the lizard was poking his eyes out. Almost home.

Inside my head Thief was coming up the stairs at any second to catch us. Before I could morally examine myself my roommate was headed out the door and I was close behind her. The lizard was in the bag but with my jacket on top of it, leaving me in just a sleep t-shirt. Halfway down the stairs, something hit me and I panicked, froze, and almost ruined the plan. I couldn’t walk out knowing Thief was out there, I thought he was going to see it and cause a scene.

My roommate was having none of it. She gripped my hand and pulled us both out of that hothouse get-together, but not before we both made eye-contact with Thief, who I’m sure by now knows his little heist was undermined.

We flew home full of adrenaline, because of our successful Super Secret Agent Mission and happy to have our lizard back.

So thank you, Thief. Thank you for accidentally inviting my roommate into your house. Our lizard looks fabulous back in his original home.