Thief! Read Online Free PDF

explanation now would just make her look even more guilty. What was she supposed to say?
    I was going to take the cup so I could join the Cosmics, but I chickened out. I touched it, but I didn’t take it. It’s got my fingerprints on it, but I’m innocent  . . .
    Yeah, right!
    ‘Anne and I . . . We were just talking. If I tell Mr Simmers about Anne now, it’ll look like I’m just trying to pin the blame on her,’ Lydia replied at last. ‘And it wouldn’t do any good anyway – she couldn’t know my locker combination.’
    No one said a word.
    ‘Dad, Mum, please let me go to another school,’ Lydia begged.
    ‘Lydia, you are going to stay at Collivale School and you’re not going to bow your head or look away from anyone. You have nothing to be ashamed of,’ Mum said stonily.
    ‘It’s not that simple, Mum.’
    ‘Oh, yes it is,’ Mum argued. ‘If you walk around with your chin on the pavement and skulk in corners at the first sign of anyone you know, everyone will think you’re too afraid to face them. D’you understand?’
    ‘Yes, Mum,’ Lydia whispered.
    Only Lydia knew it really wasn’t that simple. What about earlier at school, when Shaun Lucas had called her a thief in front of the whole class? Lydia knew she wasn’t a thief. No way was she a thief. So why had she spent the next half-hour crying in the toilets?
    Dad stood up and walked over to the window. He stared out into the night, his whole body held rigid as if he was in pain. Lydia held her breath. Maybe that way she could hold on to the tears in her eyes. Mum took hold of Lydia’s hand and squeezed it gently.
    This is it, Lydia thought miserably. This is the worst moment of my life.
    She was soon to find out that she was wrong.

Chapter Six

It Begins
    ‘Thief! Thief! Thief!’
    Lydia’s blood roared through her body. Her face was burning; burning hot, then burning cold. And her stomach turned and churned inside her.
    I don’t care, Lydia thought fiercely. Call me what you like – I don’t care.
    She stood with her back against the storeroom wall, surrounded on all sides by the others in her class. Her former friends. Every lunchtime for over a week now, Lydia had had to go through exactly the same thing. They all lay in wait – carefully choosing the moment when they could torment her. The moment when the teachers were far enough away so that even if they did see what was going on, they would only be able to make out numbers, not specific faces.
    Only the teachers never saw anything and Lydia had given up hoping that they would. And now it was worse. Now it wasn’t just the ones in her class tormenting her; people from other classes were beginning to join in too.
    ‘Thief . . . thief . . . thief . . . !’ they chanted, over and over.
    Shut up . . . shut up . . .
    Lydia thought the words were in her head. She thought her mind was screaming them, desperate but silent.
    ‘Shut up . . . SHUT UP!’ Lydia opened her mouth to exhale and the words fell out before she could stop them. ‘SHUT UP . . .’ Her words were petrol thrown onto a bonfire.
    ‘THIEF! THIEF!’
    Lydia bit into her bottom lip, hard, until she could taste her own blood in her mouth. She turned her head slowly. They were all there: Anne, Shaun, Kwame, Maxine, Bharti, Frankie . . . Lydia looked directly at her ex-best friend, Frankie. Her eyes narrowed and filled with scalding hate. Frankie didn’t chant with the rest of them but she didn’t stand up for Lydia either. And, surprisingly, Anne wasn’t shouting with the rest of the mob either. She stood next to Frankie, their arms linked as they watched.
    Lydia saw Anne say something to Frankie which was lost under the chants of the rest of the crowd. Then Anne and Frankie turned and walked away to another part of the playground.
    ‘THIEF! THIEF!’
    The buzzer sounded twice for the second lunch session. The chanting of the mob trailed away to nothing. Some were already turning away and