Young Enough For Bad Choices, But Young Enough To Learn

I work at a small store. One day during a slow period, a girl of around thirteen or fourteen and a man I presume to be her father walk in and spend some time walking around looking for things. Oddly, they are comparing things we sell to items they walked in with, seemingly trying to figure out the price of objects they already own.

Eventually, the two walk up to me. The girl is apprehensive and seems to look up at her father for support before getting up the courage to walk up to me.

Girl: “Excuse me, could you tell me how much this cost?”

She shows me a half-empty bottle that I recognize as something we sell.

Me: “I’m sorry, I don’t think we have any in stock right now. We may have more on Monday.”

Girl: “No, I don’t need more. I just need to know what it used to cost, please.”

Me: “Oh, okay. I think I can look that up. Our prices have changed recently, so are you looking for what it costs now or what it cost when you purchased it? If you bought it with a credit card, we can probably look up the charge that way.”

Girl: “No, I didn’t… I mean, I…”

The girl sort of trails off, clearly struggling to get whatever she is trying to say out. Eventually, she turns to her father to plead for help. The father’s response to this, and everything else going forward, is what I can only describe as firm compassion. He seems to be doing his best to give emotional support to her while still forcing her to deal with things herself.

Girl: “You tell them?”

Father: “I think it would be best if you told her.”

Girl: “I… I’m sorry. I… I stole them. I know I shouldn’t. I just… I’m sorry, I…”

The girl sort of trails off into incomprehension about this point, looking ready to cry and barely able to speak anymore. The father takes pity on her now, putting a hand on her shoulder as he steps up and takes over the dialogue for a bit so she can compose herself.

Father: “Like she said, she made a big mistake and stole from you. However, she did prove responsible enough to realize it was wrong, and she came to me to tell me what she did so we could make things right. We’ve talked it through, and since she already opened or used some of the things she stole, it wouldn’t be fair to you to return things in a damaged state. So, we will be paying for everything she took, and she will be working to pay me back — with interest — for everything she stole. We just need some help figuring out how much everything she took was so we know what to repay you.”

Me: “Oh! Well, you obviously shouldn’t steal from anyone, but it’s good of you to admit it and want to pay us back. If you have all the items, I’ll see if we can figure out the prices.”

It turns out that the girl stole everything a little under a month ago, and ever since, her guilt has been building up every time she saw one of the stolen items in her room like “The Tell-Tale Heart” until it was finally too much to ignore.

We have redone some of our prices since the original theft, but when I explain this to the father, he says we should use whatever price is higher where prices differ. It takes long enough to add everything up that I have two customers come to me for something in the meantime, during which time father and daughter step aside and wait patiently. I can overhear at least one conversation while helping another customer:

Father: “Remember what I told you about opportunity cost? In order for me not to lose money making a loan to you, I need to charge you enough interest to cover what I’d expect to make if I had the money invested in the stock market. That’s something like 10%. That’s pretty high interest, so the longer you take to earn the money back, the more you will end up having to pay. I’ll make a spreadsheet, and we can go over your bill and how much interest you’ve paid every month. It will be good for you to learn how bad interest can be before you can get a credit card.”

Daughter: *Meekly* “Okay.”

Father: “I know it will take some work to repay everything, but I know you can do it, and you will earn back the things you took as you cover their cost. What matters is that you did the right thing in the end, and I’m proud of you for that.”

During all this, the daughter is clearly very remorseful and struggling not to cry.

Me: “Okay, I think it all adds up to [amount].”

Father: “Is that including tax? She definitely needs to pay taxes on it.”

Me: “You’re right; I forgot taxes. With that, it’s [amount a bit less than $60]

Father: “Let’s round it up to an even sixty; call it a theft penalty.”

He gives me the money.

Girl: “I’m really sorry about everything.”

Me: “I can tell you are. And I’m sure you won’t try to steal anything ever again, right?”

She shakes her head in a vehement “no”.

Me: “Well then, I think you’ve learned your lesson, and honestly, I think it’s great that you admitted to everyone what you did. I hope that when I have a girl of my own, I can trust her to admit to her mistakes like you did.”

Girl: “Thanks.”

While I wouldn’t exactly call her last “thanks” happy, it did sound stronger, like she was starting to recover from some of the guilt and remorse that was hanging over her head the whole time she was in the store. I don’t know if it was my words that did it or just relief that her whole ordeal was almost over.

In the end, we had a horrible time trying to figure out how to record the money we were given correctly in our system so that we properly paid taxes on it; best we could tell, we had definitely been overpaid. Still, I think that the father probably handled things right; I’m pretty confident that is one girl who will never think of stealing anything again.