Way back in the day…

I stole money from a retail store called Ups-N-Downs. I took $250 from the cash register. I faked a return and had another sales person help me. She was so young and I was stupid, thinking I could get away with it. I had her tear off buttons and blow cigarette smoke on a jacket. I filled out a return for cash form and I gave myself $250. I think it was more, I can’t remember. Anyway, a couple of weeks went by and nothing happened, so I thought I got away with it.

I wasn’t doing to well in my sales. I sold shoes better than I sold clothes. I was an Asst. Manager and I needed to be more prodcutive, but it just wasn’t working. One day, the District Manager came in with a few others and announced they were doing an audit on the store. My heart started to pound; pound right out of my chest.

They pulled me aside, and I just knew they were going to get me for the stolen money. But they didn’t. They said because my sales were so poor they were going to transfer me to another store, part-time. I was pissed. But relieved at the same time. I transferred to the other store but I just didn’t fit in.

I left that retailer and started a job at different retail store. Things started out pretty good until I got a call from my previous employer. I got busted. They called me in their offices and confronted me with all the information they had. I was so humiliated and embarrassed. I told them…get this…that I needed the money for an abortion! What a dummy! They said if I didn’t return the money, I would be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. The district Manager said when I filled out the return for cash form, if I had used a friend’s address and phone number, I may have gotten away with it. When they called the name and number I put on the form, which was fake, that’s how they busted me. I freaked out. I mean, really freaked out!

I had a boyfriend at the time and I told him what I did. I told him the same story. He was a good guy and brought me the money from his paycheck. You have to understand that back in the 80′s, it was like it was now. But I was younger, no college and I was hanging on by a thread.

He bought it too. And not only that, I lost my job at the other retailer store too. I was desparate. I hated myself. I came really close to killing myself because I wasn’t raised that way and my parents would have so disappointed. I finally moved on from there but it was hard. It took me a long time to go forward.