Run: 2026-02-24-01KJ8WRTJHSS479J5F49ZEEKAM

Molly spread the blueprint across the hood of their rusted van, weighing down the corners with a half-eaten granola bar and three loose batteries. The blueprint had been sketched in purple crayon on the back of a Denny's placemat. She had stolen the crayon from the hostess stand, which she considered a warm-up job. Bill squinted at the drawing. He turned it sideways, then upside down. He had been Molly's partner for six years, ever since they'd bonded over a mutual attempt to shoplift the same jacket from the same Burlington Coat Factory. He wasn't bright, but he was loyal, and he could fit through surprisingly small windows for a man of his dimensions. "The party starts at two," Molly said. "Bounce house arrives at one-thirty, clown at two-fifteen. We hit the gift table in that window before the little monsters get organized." "Is that the garage or a dog?" Bill asked, pointing at a wobbly shape near the center of the map. "That's the piñata. Try to keep up." Bill made the face he always made when trying to concentrate, which involved significant nostril flaring and looked like a man attempting to communicate telepathically with a sandwich. He pulled a string cheese from his jacket and began peeling it with the quiet focus of a surgeon. "Side gate is our way in," Molly continued, tracing a purple arrow with her finger. "The presents will be stacked on a folding table in the backyard. We load them into laundry bags and disappear." "What about the parents?" "The dad will be four beers deep by two o'clock. The mom will be having a quiet nervous breakdown over the cake. Neither will notice us." She reached into the van and produced two bright orange safety vests, holding them up like a magician completing a trick. Her surveillance—two afternoons parked across the street with stolen binoculars and a family-size sleeve of Oreos—had confirmed that the household ran on a steady current of chaos even without a birthday party to make things worse. "Nobody questions a person in a vest," she said. "It's the single greatest truth in the history of crime." "I do look official in orange," Bill said, pressing the vest to his chest admiringly. "You look like a traffic cone. But that's beside the point. We walk in with confidence, we walk out with thirty gifts, and by sundown we're selling Lego sets out of this van at triple retail." Bill grinned the wide, untroubled grin of a man who had found his calling in life, or at least had found someone willing to do all his thinking for him. He climbed into the passenger seat and buckled his seatbelt, because he was a criminal, not a maniac. Molly folded the placemat with care, tucked it into her back pocket, and walked around to the driver's side. She paused to check her reflection in the side mirror, straightening the vest across her shoulders. She looked ridiculous. She looked perfect. "Let's go rob some children," she said, and started the engine.