I pick Abby up from the train station at 12.30. As I arrive in the central hall, I already see her running up. Her backpack is wobbling from side to side on her small frame, long brown hair shagging in front of her eyes, and a dazzling smile.

“Abster!” I call out as she jump-hugs me. I almost fall over from the impact.

Putting her feet back on the ground, she kisses me on the cheek, lingering a bit. “Happy birthday Ravi.” She tells me in my ear.

“It’s good to see you again. It’s been too long.”

“Yeah…” She sighs. “Way too long.”

We stand there hugging for a bit. I missed my best friend so much. Texting and phone calls don’t come close to being able to physically spend time together. It’s too bad we only have a day-and-a-half before she’s going back to Vlissingen.

“OH!” she suddenly pulls back, flinging her backpack over her shoulder and opening it, without looking at me. She takes out a huge, badly gift-wrapped packet. As she placed it in my hands, I can feel it’s soft.

I take it out, and it’s a black hoodie. It has a small drawing on the front in white outlines. I recognise it as a line-art version of a composition we made together for a project in our final year of primary school.

“This is..” I start. “Yeah! Turn it around!” She interrupts me with great enthusiasm.

I do as I’m told and hold up the back. It has a colourful picture on it of a Halloween version of the little mermaid. Not Disney style: Abby style. It fits the refurbished story we made up last summer perfectly.

I’m caught between happiness and awkwardness as I think of wearing the sweater. On the one part: I love the art. I love that Abby made that for me. And I still love the little comic we’ve developed together. Yet, if I wear this at school…

I smile anyway, and kiss Abby’s cheek to hide what doubts may be lingering on my face. “Thank you so much Abs. This is great, I love it!”

She lets out a breath she was holding and smiles back at me. “So, tell me, what are we going to do today?”

“What do you want to do?” I ask in return. 

“Oh, everything!” She grins. “I want to go shopping, and to the movies, and maybe meet your new friends from city hall square?”

“That’s cool.” I reply. “We can go to the movies tonight. My parents expect us to have dinner at home around six, so we could check the square right now, see if the guys are there. And then there’s plenty of time for shopping.”

I lead Abby to my bicycle and have her sit on the luggage carrier. She holds on tight as I cross through the pedestrian zone for a shortcut to the square. She talks about school in the meanwhile, chattering about her projects and her new friends. I know about those, of course, but I can’t help feeling a little jealous. Not sure if I’m jealous at the friends for being in class with Abby, spending more time with my best friend than I do, maybe even making her forget about me at some point. Or that I’m jealous at Abby for having other friends in the first place.

Of course, I could count the city hall square gang as my friends, but it doesn’t really feel the same. As much as I’ve become one of them, I’ll never really be one of them. They don’t know me like Abby does, and they probably never will. And I like them less. If one of them would move away, I probably wouldn’t even miss them.

I find Fuzz and Yinthas at the square. I introduce Abby, but they’re too wasted already to care. And it’s only 1 pm… Fuzz offers me a hit of the joint, but I take one look at Abby’s shocked face, and refuse. We chat for a little bit, only to live up to my promise, then I excuse ourselves to take Abby shopping.

“Bring food.” Fuzz tells me.

I look at Abby. She knows what I’ve been up to these past months, but I am reluctant to have her see that side. Abby’s always been quite well-behaved.

“Sure.” Abby replies with a polite smile, which surprises me.

“I want to see how you do it. I think it may be exhilarating.” She says.

My heart leaps in my throat. On the one hand, I’d like to show off my skills. On the other hand: we have no diversion, and I don’t want to put Abby in any danger.

“I don’t want to force my bad habits on you.” I tell her.

“Please?” She pouts. And I can’t say no to that pout. I smile and give the okay, but turn serious immediately as I set out the rules.

“One: never put anything in your pocket or your bag. They have security cameras and they watch for that stuff. Two: don’t run, don’t look nervous. We’re just going to be chatting, like nothing’s up. Three: don’t pick up anything that has a security tag. We’re going for foodstuffs. Nothing else. Four: when we pick up the last thing we need, we’ll take it across the store, and exit on the other side. Got it?”     

“Got it.” Abby breathes. 

“Cool.” I smile. “Let’s go.”

I take her to the HEMA in which I usually do my grocery shopping. I talk to Abby about my English assignment as we head straight for the food isle. I pick up some buns, a couple of croissants and some pre-sliced cheese and sandwichmeats. Abby eyes me curiously and picks up a bag of chocolates. I nod. Then we walk to the closest exit, and turn, like we forgot something. We head all the way through the store to the south exit and walk out. I can see Abby’s body poised to run, so I grab her hand and force her to walk normally until we round a corner. No one paid any attention.

“OHMYGOD!” Abby exclaims. “That was SO awesome! You’re the coolest, Ravi!” She eyes me like I’m some sort of superhero. It makes me enormously proud, though I can feel myself blush at the praise.

I’m certainly not the coolest. I know that. I know I’m a loser and a pathetic shoplifter. But it means the world to me that Abby looks at me like this. It fills me up and makes me bolder.

I stuff the food in my battered black backpack. “Did you say you wanted to go shopping?” I wink at Abby.

“I want to dye my hair.” Abby tells me, still wide-eyed from pure adrenaline.

“I guess we can have lunch with Fuzz and Yinthas and then go home.” I tell her.

“No! We need to get the dye first. Can we steal it?” She asks.

I ponder that. I know where to get the dye. There’s a large store that sells it, as well as copious other items and clothing. It has two exits as well, and I’m familiar with the security. However, there are alarm stickers in the packages of hair-dye. We need to get those out before taking them. 

I relay as much before taking Abby to the store. She picks out a lilac fade-out dye that’s just super cool. Then we go look at some clothing. I told her to pick some items to try on, and take out the alarm sticker as she changes. It’s shitty that I can’t help her out, but it would alert security if I’d enter a changing room with her, for wholly different reasons.

Instead, I distract myself by browsing clothing as well. I find a shirt with a skull on it that doesn’t have a security tag attached. It’s slightly oversized, but it looks cool, so I take a couple more items and enter a changing room as well. I stuff the shirt in my bag and show off all the other items, putting on an annoyed expression when the changing room attendant looks my way.

After I’m done, I hand her all the displayed items, stating I don’t like any of them, and wait for Abby at the entrance of the women’s changing room. 

Abby comes out smiling, holding the items of clothing she took in, as well as the hair dye. She shouldn’t be smiling, since she’s going to put all the items back. I remind myself to tell her.

“No luck?” I prompt.

“Yes!” She squeeks. “Er, no. But it’s okay.” She corrects herself. The attendant eyes her curiously.

This is not good. “You look lovely in what you’re wearing right now.” I say in my sweetest voice. Abby smiles and blushes, looking away shyly. I take her hand and lead her out, giving her a kiss on the cheek in the process.

“Awww…” The attendant coos. I just love it when my fast thinking is rewarded.

I lead my best friend out of the store by the hand. I hold the hair dye, just in case. We walk closely together and happily strut past security. No alarms go off. We walk like that for a bit, then drop down on a bench and pocket the prize.

I’m taken by surprise as Abby kisses my cheek.

“What’s that for?” I ask her.

“Um. Thank you?” She says.

“You’re welcome. Remember. If you ever do this again, you shouldn’t smile as you walk out. You’re disappointed in every item of clothing you tried on. That’s why you’re returning them.”

“Can you steal clothes this way?” Abby asks.

I grin, and show her the shirt. “Oh, that’s so cool! How did you do it?!”

“This one didn’t have an security tag attached, and the attendant wasn’t checking the number of items I brought in, so it was easy. I put this one on the bottom of the pile I was holding, so no one saw me take it into the changing room. Then I tried on the other items and acted like I hated them. I put the shirt in my bag and returned the rest.”

“But can you steal items that do have the security label attached?”

“You could, but the alarm will go off. So never do that. But the tags aren’t always attached properly. Some will come off if you pull them gently. Never pull them hard, because some of them have dye in them. If those explode, you’re thoroughly fucked.”

“I’ve got scissors.” Abby ventures.

“Do you want holes in your clothing?” I reply.

“I could mend those.” She shrugs. I shrug as well. I guess that could work.

“Always take a pair of pants into the dressing room. You can put the security tags of the items you stole in the pockets. But go easy. If you go in with ten items and only come out with three, then you’ll be flagged for sure. Best to steal one or two things and put the majority back.” I convey.

Abby nods, like she’s studying for an exam.

I guess we’re really gonna do this. I know I’m being a bad friend, teaching her all this, but it’s somehow thrilling to do this with Abby. To be able to share my bad habits with her. To feel like we’re up to mischief together, like we used to. It makes me feel so much closer to her.

We scope out a clothing store that doesn’t have dressing room attendants that give out numbers and we head out shopping. I find a mesh shirt that I’ll never ever dare to wear, but want to own anyway. Best thing about it is, again, the lack of a security tag. I find some other items that I like, and two pairs of pants that I don’t need. Then find Abby in the women’s section. She’s finished her search as well. We head to the dressing rooms in the middle. The good part of it being that they aren’t labelled for just one sex, so we can take stalls close to each other.

I execute the plan. Tell Abby the clothing she’s trying on doesn’t look good on her and mock my own choice of pants. I find one black shirt where the tag comes off without too much effort and stuff the thing in the pants pocket. I put the rest of the clothes on the discard rack, where Abby has just put hers, and walk towards the exit.

The second we’re outside, I hear a guy calling. “Boy! You’ve dropped something!”

My hands immediately go to my pockets, as I turn. Did I lose my keys again?

But the grinning shop attendant behind me is holding up a white security tag.

“Run!” I tell Abby, pushing her away from me. I already see the security guard jumping into action, and I know I’m fucked. But if I start running in the opposite direction, Abby will be okay.

But Abby doesn’t run. She stares at me, as I’m caught by the security guard. Even follows me as I get escorted to a stuffy office upstairs. I plead with my eyes to make her go, but she doesn’t budge.

I’m starting to wonder if she’s stupid, but the determination in her eyes tells me something else. She is sticking by me despite the consequences.

My heart clenches, and I feel tears starting to well up. I didn’t want her to do this. I don’t deserve that kind of devotion. I love her so much. Probably even more because of this... But now it’s my fault if she gets into trouble. And I really don’t want her to get into trouble. Especially not because of my mistakes...