...Raven and her First Case...

Her closest friends, the ones that knew her longest, call her Raven.  Going even further than that: Jason was the one that called her Raven the first time and started the whole thing.  She didn't refuse the name.  (But she would be quick to point out that it was not her that named herself.)

Jason lived four houses down from her, she being smack dab in the middle of Aladdin Street.  He lived closest to the cinder block wall that closed off the cul de sac.  Foot falls were broken into the wall, the kids only having to perform a quick hop up and over to another world that was filled with kids.  On this side of the wall, for Raven, was the weekly Bookmobile.  It was Monday night, but she didn't let the day bring her down: she was going to make it.

Samantha was her given name, and the one she knew much longer than than the moniker given to her.  It was the name mom was most proud of.  She loved calling her all the variants of her name and used them in almost every sentence she could.  There was a lilt on the 's' and the sing song for whatever remained.  Sam.  Sammy.  Samantha.  Sam-Sam.  Sambuco.

She was scaling back down the wall that Monday night, with a handful of books under her arm.  The scaling was more treacherous coming back than going, and even worse at night.  She could fall between the wall and the thin fence.  No one would see her for weeks, she surmised.  And, there was spider webs here and broken blocks of concrete that was thrown over when they completed the wall.  Shoddy she said to herself.

On leaping from the mid-point of the wall facing Aladdin she heard a boy's voice behind her, "Hey."  She instinctively started and pulled back.  The boy's face was hidden by the harsh shadow left by the tungsten lamp hovering above.  She was in plain view.  Samantha wore her hair with a ponytail to the side, askance.  She didn't have time today to brush it back 'right'.  She wore a denim jacket and jeans.  She had neon bangles from the Circle K that was over on Lincoln.  They never carried them again.  Shameful.

Sam had no idea who the boy was at first, but she quickly thought she had seen him when he moved in a few weeks ago...provided this was the boy, "Hey, who are you and why are you hanging out by my wall?"

The boy physically moved back a step and then his shoulders wilted a bit as he chuckled.  "Sorry.  I didn't know what to say."  She adjusted his footing, "You're the one that jumped out of nowhere.  I didn't know what you were."  His voice undulated in the explanation, it must be the truth.  Plus, she was out here climbing walls at 8:30 at night.  He then said, "Raven."

"Huh?"

He pointed to the book, "Edgar Allen Poe.  The Raven."

"Yeah.  Well, there's some others stories too."  She started to walk back down the street toward her house.  She could see her father with the garage open.  The light was streaming onto his truck.  He was timing plugs tonight, "You just move in?"

He walked respectfully apart from her, "Yeah.  Just my mom and I.  Right over here."  He didn't need to point to the house.  She's the one that had seen the sales sign for several months.  She also made it a point to explore the house more than a few times.  The dog door was not locked.  There was always a weird smell when someone moves out.  It was like an old pizzeria.  The Liefs didn't smell, but their German sausages stayed behind and took over.  "How do you like it?"

"S'ok."

"Alright, well I got to go home now."  She realized she hadn't made eye contact with him at all.  Was it rude?  I don't know, she thought.

"Ok.  Bye, Raven."  She could almost see the smirk under the hood.  Whatever, dude.

She didn't say anything out loud and shifted the books in her hand as she approached her house.  She had checked out the Raven, again.  Along with it, she found that the Osburne Book of Ghosts was available...again.   Halloween was months away, but she wanted craft ideas for the house.  Luckily no one took the Good Housekeeping Guide to Halloween.  It had cupcake recipes and some decorations that were simple to make.  Lastly she had Book of Allegorical Tales from Jack Seward, it had a short she enjoyed called Monster.

"Hey Twinkle."  That was her dad's pet name.  It sounded like Twinkie to her girl friends.  She rolled her eyes without him seeing.  It was her dad and she loved him more than any man on Earth.  He didn't say much, but he always knew what to say.  Even Twinkle.  "What books did you get this time?"  He leaned on the truck and wiped his hands.  The hood was closed, so he was done for the night.

"Halloween books."

"Thinking ahead?  We'll go to the craft store this weekend.  I know you ran out of clay.  There's a giant hand drying out in the back."

"You know me."  She said awkwardly.  Her smile crooked and her brown eyes sparkling as she found she was embarrassed for no good reason.  She side-straddled to the door.

Raven.  She didn't even know what the boy really looked like, but he called her Raven.  Twinkle. Sambuco.  Raven, it didn't have a bad ring to it.  She sat at the kitchen table and her mom stole an unsolicited pet of her sandy brown hair.  Mom smoked so the cigarette smell was always on her right hand.  Gross, mom.  Samantha opened the book and committed the ingredients for the dark black cupcakes to memory.  It had black licorice frosting that she started craving badly.

Hm, Raven.