Sloth Kills

.1

"Amy, are you getting up sometime today?" Amy groaned and mumbled into her pillow. Her mother sighed in frustration and yanked the blankets off of her sleeping daughter. 2

Abruptly exposed to the chilly winter air, Amy's eyes flew open and she burrowed back into the warm blankets. "Too sick, mom," she said.3

"Again? This is the third day in a row, I thought you were feeling better." She bent to place her hand against Amy's head. "You are a little warm," she admitted. "What hurts?"4

"Everywhere. Achey. Must be the flu."5

Amy's mom checked her watch; if she didn't leave in the next ten minutes, she was going to be late. "Alright, stay home, but you better get your homework tomorrow."6

"I will," Amy promised, and closed her eyes. When she heard the front door close and the car drive off, she smiled, and got out of bed. 7

By noon Amy still wasn't dressed. She had all the essentials around her in the living room: Cheetos, a two-liter of Vanilla Coke, a blanket, and the remote. When the phone rang, she didn't even think of getting up to get it. It was all the way down at the other end of the couch for Christs sakes!8

Halfway through Wheel Of Fortune, while Amy was yelling the answer at the screen, spewing Cheetos crumbs, the doorbell rang. Amy ignored it. It rang again, and a third time, but she paid it no attention. Why should she have to get up and answer it? 9

Amy was absorbed in trying to decipher the next answer when there was a knock on the back door. She didn't hear anything, not the lock being picked or the stealthy footsteps coming down the hall cautiously. The man relaxed, believing the house to be unoccupied, and crossed the living room doorway, taking the stairs to the top level of the house on the other side of the doorway.10

Still unaware, Amy screamed at the television, her words coming out nonsensical through the Cheetos paste in her mouth. The man froze, believing he had been spotted. He stepped back into the door way and saw the young teen sitting on the couch. Amy looked up and screamed, choking on the soda she had just taken a drink of. She coughed and screamed and gagged, trying to get up to run to the door. Standing, her legs became tangled in her blanket and she fell. 11

With a smile, the man advanced on the crying girl. He fully intended to kill her, since she could identify him as the thief anyway, but he had been in jail for such a long time...12