The curious incident of the missing cookies

I stumbled through my kitchen in the weak morning light asking the same questions we all ask in the early morning: “What time is it? Where am I? Who forgot to put away the milk last night?” My sleepy eyes scanned the bookcase I use for a pantry and upon noticing an irregularity in the items present, I asked another question: “Where are my cookies?” A bag of individually wrapped cookies that had been there the morning before where now missing and their absence sent my mind into a quick montage of all the reasons why the snacks might be gone. “Did I eat them all? Did I move them? Did I take them to school?” No, no, no, where the answers. There was only one explanation for the missing cookies—theft!

Who would steal cookies from a lone foreigner living in the inaka? Little girls, that’s who!

For months now, I’ve returned home to my apartment building to find things outside moved around. My bike would be in a slightly different place, a rubber ball would be in the basket, wooden boards and rocks would be scattered in new patterns…and since I don’t have any neighbors, these changes would have to be done by some other force. For a long time I didn’t have a clue what was going on until one day I returned home a little early and discovered two little girls singing behind my building.

The first thing out of their mouths when they saw me was “kowaiiiiii!”, meaning scary, and it was obvious that I had surprised them (I was quite surprised too). I smiled and asked them what they were doing to which they responded with a blur of Japanese. I then used my expert Japanese to ask them their ages and hobbies while they asked me how tall I was. We chatted for a while and they insisted I tell them which of the four apartments in my building was mine—a piece of information I decided to keep secret. They demonstrated their skill at “head, shoulders, knees, and toes” and then departed with a confident good bye. I actually enjoyed talking to the two little girls because even though they are young, they didn’t show any shyness and had a lot of energy to throw at me (they also threw some rocks at me).

Now back to the missing cookies! So just this past week I returned home to find the little girls singing behind my apartment and riding around on Storm Crow, my old bike. They were happy to see me and once again threw a bunch of questions at me (but no rocks this time). I was in a hurry that day, so there wasn’t time to chat for long before I had to head inside. They saw me go into my apartment and then proceeded to start a game of “ring the doorbell 1,000 times and giggle each time” before finally leaving (I told them I was busy and couldn’t play). I set to work about my various chores upstairs and didn’t think much of the girls until the following morning when the cookies were missing.

As I stood in the kitchen looking at the empty space where the bag of cookies had once been, I thought, “How did they get in?” and then noticed that the sliding glass door behind the pantry was not locked. I slid opened the door and my eyes widened at the site of multiple cookie wrappers scattered in the grass outside.

Of course this doesn’t pin the cookie crime on the little girls, but they are my prime suspects at this point. I’m not really that upset—more shocked than anything. I think it’s kind of funny too and it’s sure to be a wonderful childhood memory for the girls later in life (stealing cookies from the local gaijin!). I’ll be double checking all my locks from now on and I’ve toyed with the idea of putting my oni mask downstairs to frighten away any other cookie thefts.