Chloe Took Maya’s Lunch and Used Her Meal Card — Then the Cafeteria Computer Showed Who the Account Really Belonged To
Chapter 8 — The Tenth Card
The account belonged to former student Olivia Perez.
Olivia’s family moved away fourteen months earlier.
Her account should have been closed.
Instead, it remained active.
And money had been added to it repeatedly.
Hundreds of dollars.
Mrs. Helen frowned.
“Why would anyone add money to an inactive account?”
Linda checked the funding source.
The deposits came from the district’s emergency meal assistance program.
Mr. Morris looked at her.
“Is that normal?”
“Absolutely not.”
They checked other former-student accounts.
More appeared.
Closed students.
Transferred students.
Inactive profiles.
Still receiving meal-assistance funds.
Chloe stared at the screen.
“I didn’t do that.”
Mr. Morris believed her.
The deposits started long before Chloe created her first duplicate card.
Someone else had discovered the same weakness in the cafeteria system.
And had been using it on a much larger scale.
Linda checked the administrative logs.
The accounts had been reactivated using the credentials of district nutrition coordinator Paul Grayson.
Mrs. Helen knew the name immediately.
Paul oversaw meal-assistance funds across five schools.
Mr. Morris contacted the district office.
By the end of the afternoon, auditors were involved.
What started with Chloe taking one girl’s lunch had just exposed a problem worth thousands of dollars.
