Run: 2026-07-01-01KWE9GN6G6RDK4G015MTADHCX

The back room of Bill's van smelled like stale coffee and regret. Molly had the blueprints spread across a pizza box, tracing lines with a highlighter that had definitely seen better days. "So the party starts at two," Molly said. "Bouncy castle goes up at one-thirty. That's our window." "Our window for what, exactly? Bill asked, still stuck on the plan's premise. "We're robbing a seven-year-old's birthday party." "We're robbing the *presents* at a seven-year-old's birthday party. There's a difference." "Is there?" "Bill. Focus. There's gonna be, what, twenty kids? Each kid brings a present. That's twenty presents. You know what twenty unopened presents from doting suburban parents looks like? That's a Nintendo Switch, easy. Maybe two." "You want to steal a seven-year-old's Nintendo Switch." "I want to steal *several* seven-year-olds' collective gift-giving output, yes." Bill rubbed his temples like he could massage the plan into making more sense. "Molly, there's gonna be parents there. Actual adults, watching actual children, at all times. This isn't a bank at 3 AM. This is a birthday party at 2 PM in broad daylight with a clown." "There's a clown?" "The invitation said 'Coco the Clown will be performing.' So yes, Bill. There's a clown." Molly's eyes lit up in a way that worried him. "That's it. That's our way in." "No." "Bill." "Absolutely not." "One of us dresses as the clown. The real Coco doesn't show — car trouble, food poisoning, whatever — and suddenly there's a totally different clown at the party, and nobody blinks because clowns are basically interchangeable to children." "You want me to be the clown." "You have the shoes." "I have the shoes from *one Halloween*, six years ago, that I have never once mentioned wanting to use again." "They're in the van, Bill. I saw them under the seat last week. That's not the universe telling you no. That's the universe telling you *maybe.*" Bill stared at the blueprint, at the crude stick figure labeled BILL (CLOWN) standing next to a pile of boxes labeled LOOT. "And what are you doing while I'm out there balloon-animaling my way into a felony?" "I'm the caterer. Nobody questions the caterer. I roll the present table right out the back with the leftover cake, into the van, we're three streets over before anyone notices the pin the tail on the donkey game is unsupervised." "There's a donkey too?" "Bill, focus." "You said that already." "I'll keep saying it until you put the shoes on." Bill looked at the shoes. The shoes looked, somehow, resigned to their fate. "If any of those kids cry," he said, "I'm out." "They're seven. Somebody's gonna cry regardless. That's just a party." "That's not comforting." "It wasn't meant to be. It was meant to get you in the shoes."