"So kid,watching you I can say you're from Nevermore no?" I heard a man speak up.
I watched over the register of the old shop,the tailor tools scattered around the walls and all kinds of clothing and half made things around too.
A man om hid mid 30s stood up from behind the counter and looked me from toe to head.
"I'd say 5 feet 4 inches tall..." He said grabbing a lace and starting to meassure my height.
"Yeah my eyes are still looking pretty good." He said retrieving.
"Hi mister I want a Nevermore academy uniform for the rest of the second year.." I muttered while he raised my arm and kept taking meassures.
"Well kid I'm surprised,I've never seen ypu before so I must assume you're new on this..." He said while measuring my waist.
"Yeah I'm a new addition to the academy."
"So how long would it-"
"MAAAA!" The man yelled towards the backdoor of the place,enough that anyone's ear in the nearest kilometer would be having a seizure.
With that scream the door opened after a minute with an old lady coming out,about 70 years on her back,and surely it was heavy because the arch of her back and neck could be taken as a perfect curve.
"Ah a new kiddo..." Her voice was like a whistle as she closed by in small steps,which only seemed to affect my patience.
"He's 5'4,maybe let's make him something comfortable for the entire year,he looks like he still will be hitting a growth spurt..." she said in a low voice which I didn't knew if it was because she was so upclose to me or because she couldn't speak louder.
"Yeah ma something that won't restrict his shoulders when they open up..." The man said straightening my back and holding my arms up in a T pose.
"See son you're getting the hang of this..."
"30 years more and I'll let you touch the tools for once..." The old lady said while she started walking to the backdoor again.
"Well kid give us 2 hours and we'll have you your uniform ok?" The man said letting go of my arms.
"Ah wait I need to know if I can change the color of the uniform." I said urgently to the woman who didn't even bother looking back,now I know why he yelled so loud,she's deaf as fuck.
"Only the blazer kid,so tell me and I'll tell her."
"Well I thought a dark navy blue or just black would be fine..." I muttered while looking at him.
"It is fine,only that I'd cost you more since these type of blazers we only have a lot less of these,might even make me look inside the death traps of clothing balls she has around." He said with a joking tone as he fixed my black jacket again.
"Take in advice kid, to wash off blood use hydrogen peroxide and cold water if it's fresh..." He said to my ear,apparently I wasn't so smug.
"Thank you..." I whispered back before heading to the door.
I headed outside and looked at Jericho,the place was filled with people right now even when it was evening,my eyes wandered around to the biggest grocery store I could see and walked inside of it.
After looking around for a time I finally found what would keep me millionaire for the rest of my life as long as I had a coin. A coin exchange machine.
I walked up to it and put my hand inside my pocket,feeling the 50 cent coin inside of it,then I easily chipped a single scrap of it with my nail,and then reversed that chip into another coin.
Obviously I could've done this with cash,but since the paper,printing,and other things in the bill were a lot more complex and traceable,I used coins since they were easier to reverse once I knew how they were made and with what.
91.67% of copper and 8.33% of nickel,the whole trip I spent some time learning to sculpt it up into that shape the coin had exactly.
I was creating money,like how in the Roman empire they would clip part of the coins to then melt it and profit from it.
I did have the golden weeding ring of Robert,but now gold bars have a serial number and year of manufacturing,which would be harder to falsified.
So I stuck to a slower process.
With the chipped coin I kept making coins,each coming easier one after the other since I got used to the reversing process.
Then I dropped a handful of coin,leaving only two inside my pocket,I retrieved 18 dollars with a % taken from the coin exchange.
"Hmmm..."
"This would take forever to get me rich..." Then before any pessimistic thought could go inside my head I heard the register being closed.
I watched to the counter with a teenager boy working with a bored demeanor,his hands working fast to count every item and then tell the price to the client in front of him.
I got behind the client and as soon as she got aside I asked.
"Can you change a one dollar coin for this." I said showing a 5 dollar bill.
"Sorry man but I don't think there's any of those..." He said opening the register and examining it's content.
"Oh wait you're lucky as fuck..." He said taking a coin and throwing it at me.
I quickly caught it on the air before giving him the bill,which he put on hid pocket and then put one dollar inside the register before closing it.
"Thank you man." He said in a tone much more relaxed,apparently 4 extra dollars making his day.
"Thanks you..." I said watching the coin,then I firmly held it inside my palm while walking towards the coin exchange machine and softly studying it.
Even if I didn't have the internet to look up it's ratio,I could figure it out with my now fresh knowledge about coins.
After perfectly having a neat exact copy on my head I chipped it with my nail,and with the really really small chipped part I reversed it into another coin.
I opened my luggage and put my hand inside of it,then after 1 minute I held the heavy luggage up into the coin exchange machine,letting all the coins fall into it.
After taking a time,the machine left me with 2170 dollars,even after the 11% fee this was huge.
That meant I could always come here,fill the luggage with coins and drop them here,obviously when no one was looking neither being suspicious and following me around.
I grabbed all the cash and stuffed it into my pocket,then I closed the my luggage and walked up in front of the register.
"Hey man you saved my life you know that." I said to same teenager boy before handing him a 100$ bill,which he took before even a blink.
"Oh wow dude..."
"Are you serious...?" He said looking up to my face,the surprise also filled with deception.
"Yeah of course it's serious,you literally saved with that coin."
2 hours
"And this is the last book..." I said watching the book about plants,the cover looking pretty good with a marron cover with a slight dark green covering it on lines like vines.
I put it inside my luggage and kept walking around the streets of Jericho, I have almost seen everything around the place and I've stopped in areas to buy everything needed for my stay.
Even buying what every teenager would want at this time.
First guess was drugs but I've tried them all even before turning 10.
So the next thing was buying a Ps5 and a whole lot of games.
I returned to the tailor shop with both hands full of bags,most of them with things asked for the school and the remaining things that every teenager had.
I watched the empty store and softly dropped my things on the floor,sitting on a chair in front of the counter to wait.
After about 5 minutes the same 30ish years old man got out of the backdoor and looked at me.
"There you are! Look kid I did have black which would've been better for your purpose,but the only one was arranged from a special costumer." He said holding up a box which he left on the counter.
"Special costumer...?"
"Yeah Morticia Addams for some time has been asking for the same black uniform,but never actually comes for it. I already have three counting this one..." The man said hitting a box next to him with his shoe.
"Well so I suppose mine is..." I wondered while opening the box,a dark navy blue in front of me contrasting with the while lines,the blue so dark that a slight shadow would make it dissappear entirely.
"And how did you knew at the end it was to hide blood stains...?" I said curiously while reaching for my wallet.
His only response was a perfect sassy smile,and everything clicked on my mind.
"Vampire!" I yelled happily while pointing at his fangs,now the comment of the old lady about leaving him try tailoring actually made sense,they have such a big lifespan that 30 years could actually be meaningless.
"Yeah yeah took you a long time kid. So it'll be 170$." He said closing the box with thud.
"Shesh relax..." I said while handing two 100$ bills,for which I got back 30.
I looked at the box and got around my arm,then I jumped off the chair and grabbed the bags full of things(including my luggage and suitcase).
"See you around I belive!" I said with a smile.
"TELL THE BOY HE'S CUTIE!" I heard a loud voice from the other side of the backdoor,clearly the old lady from before.
He looked at me with a tired face and only dragged his hand on his face.
"My mom thinks you're a cutie..."