Amal Shafiq and the Cat Burglar

It was eleven o’clock in the night and the village of Alfriston was as silent as a graveyard. In the upstairs bedroom of a rundown little cottage lay Amal Shafiq, a girl of twelve with far too much imagination and far too little sense.

Amal had been tossing and turning in bed for hours, terrified at the thought that she was all alone at home. Her family had relocated to this part of East Sussex a mere month ago, and she had already heard stories of the skilled cat burglars who frequented the area. She had brushed them off as tall tales then, but now that she was all by herself in her spooky new house, they seemed a lot less likely to be fabricated.

Just as she was finally on the verge of sleep, Amal heard a loud, crashing noise from the driveway. She shot up immediately, scrambled out of bed, and stumbled down the creaking staircase. Someone was outside the front door! The scared twelve-year-old peeked out of the window, trying to catch a glimpse of the intruder. Unfortunately, the foggy air outdoors made it impossible to catch sight of anything other than vague silhouettes.

Amal collapsed on a sofa, overwhelmed with terror. She was home alone in the middle of the night, with a robber outside who could break in at any moment. She had no way of contacting her parents, as the ancient telephone still hadn’t been repaired. Amal racked her brains, trying to come up with a plan. She decided to be brave, and live up to the example set by Jo March and her other role models. So she crept into the kitchen and grabbed the deadliest-looking knife she could find. She would sneak out through the back door and attack the looter from behind. Hopefully, the element of surprise would be enough to defeat them. If it wasn’t... well, at least she’d go down in history as a true heroine. With her family’s social standing, she may even be featured in the Good Night Stories for Rebel Girls series.

Silencing her daydreams before they could carry her away, Amal turned the knob of the back door and slipped into the narrow lawn outside. She slunk around to the front, ready to pounce as soon as she saw the invader. She took one step further, expecting to finally encounter them, only to see the tail of a cat disappear around the corner, leaving behind the debris of a plant pot it had destroyed minutes ago.