In For a Penny by James P. Blaylock

in silence. It was impossible to tell whether Alan was still in the room or had gone out, leaving the light on. But then he heard the sound of the television in the living room, the channels changing. Had it been Alan who had turned it on? He held his breath, focusing on the silence, listening for movement.
    Making up his mind, he put his hand softly against the top of the window sash and pushed on it gently and evenly. Just then the bedroom light blinked out, plunging the room into darkness. He ducked away from the window, his heart racing. Minutes passed and nothing happened, the night silent but for the sound of crickets and the muted chatter on the television. He stood up again, took a deep breath, and pushed the window open as far as it would go. After listening to the silence, he boosted himself up onto the sill, overbalancing and sliding into the room. He stood up, hearing voices – his mother and father, talking quietly but urgently.
    He saw the smashed dime in the tray along with some other coins, and in an instant it was in his hand and he turned back toward the window, crawling through, his shoes bumping against the sill as he tumbled onto the ground. He clambered to his feet, grabbing the window to shut it. The bedroom light came on, and he froze in a crouch, the window not quite shut, the curtain hitched open an inch where it had caught on the latch. He hesitated, drawing his hand slowly away from the window frame, certain they knew someone had been in the house. And yet he couldn’t bring himself to move: getting away – getting back – meant nothing to him.
    “Don’t say anything to him,” his father said, close by now. “There’s no use making him worry.” Alan saw him briefly as he crossed the bedroom, disappearing beyond the edge of the curtain.
    “But the oven is still
warm,”
his mother said, following him in. “And sauce on the tray in the trash isn’t even dried out. I think he was here when we came home. What if he’s still in the house?”
    Alan bent toward the window until he could see her face. Somehow it hadn’t occurred to him how young she would be, probably thirty-five or six. He had known that she was pretty, but over the years he had lost track of how absolutely lovely she had been, and he found that his memory of her was shaped by her last years, when she was older and fighting with the cancer.
    “He’s not in the house,” his father said. “I’ve been all through it, putting things away. If he’s not in
here,
which he’s obviously not, then he’s gone. I’ll check the garage and the shed just to make sure. For now, though, let’s just keep this to ourselves.”
    “But what did he want? This is too weird. He was reading one of my
books.
Who would break into a house to read the books?”
    “I don’t know. I don’t think anything’s missing. There was money on the dresser in the bedroom, and it’s still there. Your jewelry box hasn’t been touched. …”
    There was a sudden silence now, and Alan realized that the curtains were moving gently in the breeze through the open window. He ducked away down the side of the house as quickly and silently as he could, half expecting to hear the window slide open behind him or the sound of hurrying footsteps in the house. Without hesitating he set straight out across the back lawn toward the garden shed, looking back at the kitchen window and back door. The light was on in the kitchen, but there was still no one visible.
    Should he get the chair out of the shed? Be sitting down for this? Reenact the whole thing exactly? He dug the five objects out of his pocket and held them in one hand, hopefully anticipating the disorienting shift, the rising of the wind, the rippling air. But nothing happened. He was simply alone in the moonlit night, the crickets chirping around him. His father appeared in the kitchen now, clearly heading toward the back door, and Alan moved back toward the grapevines, out of sight. He heard the door open