Shoplifting Vampires (2.1)

Chapter Two 

August 2017 

Many minutes of silence had passed, and Spikey had yet to announce his plan. He was just sat there in the chair, staring upwards at the ceiling, thinking. I was just about to hurl another insult at him when he suddenly jumped up and ran out of the shack. He was faster than any of us, faster than was probably humanly possible. We instinctively jumped up after him, exiting the shack and venturing back out into the woods.

“The plan is simple, comrades!” Spikey had climbed to the top of the log pile, already way too overexcited. The sun was hidden from us by the dense trees, so we were free to be outside without burning to a crisp. His pale skin gleamed in the dappled light, and his eyes glinted red. “As we just started to discuss in The Shack, we are implementing a scheme which I have just decided that we shall give the code name F-U-C-K.” he gestured down at the red spray paint that covered the logs. “Purely for the sake of the running joke, of course”

“Fuck?” Nails scrunched up his nose in confusion. “What does that stand for then?”

“FUCK UPPER-CLASS CUNTS, KIDS!” He screamed it at the top of his lungs, throwing himself off of the log pile several feet down onto the dry undergrowth that covered the floor of the woods. The ground welcomed him with a thud and he rolled it off expertly, jumping back to his feet, a huge, goofy grin spread across his stupid face. Sometimes I wondered if he was part cat, rather than undead, since he always came away unscathed. I laughed at him as he dusted off his jacket, pulling out another cigarette. It was a stupid name, and we all knew it, but who cared? We were all fifteen forever.

The woods seemed so quiet and peaceful, even when we were screaming and swearing our heads off or smoking or drinking and just generally being stupid kids. It was nice to be away from the town, for once. We tried to get out of there as much as we could. Despite claiming to love it, I knew we all dreamed of escaping to some big city one day. I, for one, wanted to be a music producer in London, live in a little shitty studio flat with a crackhead flatmate and earn no money and also be nearly made homeless until my music suddenly blew up online. Well, that’s what I told the career adviser at school because they needed to write something down. I knew I wouldn’t ever be able to leave; I had made a promise to this town that I had to keep. I also knew Spikey wanted to leave so much more than anyone, but he was tied to this town more than anyone else. The possibility of ever leaving, alive at least, was slim. For all of us.

Spikey blew his smoke up into the air, and I watched it slowly dissipate into the warm air as he turned back around to us. “The plan, my fucking scumbags, is like I said, simple. We implement a tactic that I like to call the redistribution of wealth. It’s a classic anti-capitalism move, rooted in years of oppression by the local governments and councils and the goddamn fucking people of this god damn fucking town.”

“Spit it out, dumbass!” Nails glared at Spikey over the top of his sunglasses, looking like the poster child for teen angst and 90s Britpop and grunge bands. Well, I guess we all looked like that.

“WE FUCKING LOOT THE SHIT OUTTA THAT PLACE!!” Spikey screamed at the top of his lungs, his voice hoarse and raw. I shook my head and gave him a playful shove.

“Yeah, fucking tell the whole town your top secret plan then, why don’t you?” I laughed, practically snorting. “Your master plan is to shoplift from the supermarket? That’s it? Wow, very anti-capitalist indeed, comrade.”

“Shut the fuck up, Rev, it’s more detailed and complicated than that!” He flicked his cigarette into the leaves and then took a run up before jumping onto it with his two big combat boots. His leather jacket billowed out behind him, and for a moment I really thought he was going to fly.

“Well, go on then, what’s so complicated about it? You already shoplift from like all the shops within a like, twenty-mile radius!”

“Nah, he’s banned from pretty much all of them now, so he needs a new hobby to keep him busy. That’s what this plan is.” Nails chimed in. “He only used to steal fucking monster energy cans anyway, or like, the occasional bottle of cheap vodka. He’s not the amazing thief he makes himself out to be. He got caught stealing fucking Pick-n-Mix sweets last night, for fucks sake!”

“He is standing right fucking here, bozos. And he actually does have a fucking plan to share and implement if only you would shut the fuck up and listen to me.”

We all chuckled, even Rusty. But we did indeed shut the fuck up, because though we would all hate to admit it, Spikey usually did have some of the greatest plans ever conceived within the group. I guess he would have seen himself as the leader, and most of the time we did just go along with whatever he proposed. His plot to drive out the new, nosey neighbours who moved into the property beside William and Dahlia’s house worked perfectly, though it did become a little bit dangerous.

I can’t wait for this one. 

I glared at Nails, who cracked a smile at me.

“Okay, right. The plan.” He cleared his throat and looked round at us, pushing down his sunglasses to reveal bloodshot, red eyes. He looked worse than usual, but I didn’t want to comment on it. “Right. We start off small. We actually buy shit when the store opens, and pretend we’re supporting the business. Get friendly with the staff, maybe one of us gets a job there, though even I know that’s a stretch. Maybe we get that Andy kid who follows us around to be our inside man somehow. Anyway, then we start small, taking small items like sweets or drinks, slowly building up. As we do this, we spread the word. Get all the kids from the town and school involved. You already know they’ll say yes to it. That’s just this town. And, they can’t catch all of us, right? And then, after a few weeks or months, we all hit the store at once. As many of us as we can muster up, using, uh, persuasion, if we must, all target the store at the same time. Storm the doors, push the staff, grab what you can, and bleed the store dry. They’ll be empty by the time we’re done with them. If it doesn’t shut them down the first time we keep doing it until they’re forced to close because they’ve lost so much stock. Hey, why are you laughing at me?”

The seriousness in his voice startled me a little, and I ceased laughing, my mouth dropping back into a straight line. “I’m not laughing at you. I’m laughing at the fact you only swore once throughout that whole plan. That’s how I know you’re serious about this.”

“Of course I’m fucking serious, dickhead. This is the only plan we have, and I’m not letting them take away our town like that. Once they finish building the supermarket, they’ll move on to housing estates and flats and new schools and who knows what else. And then there’ll be more people around and the risk of someone finding out about us, and William and Dahlia will be too big. They’ll move away to a new town and find new kids and we’ll be left here exposed to the public. What do you think they’ll do when they find out vampires are living among them? They’re not gonna fucking accept us with a big warm hug, are they?”

He pulled another cigarette out from his pocket and lit it, inhaling sharply.

“I don’t see how this is going to play out. You just want us to shoplift from the store when it’s built?” Nails scrunched his face and shook his face. “They’ll catch us and ban us, man, like they always do.”

Can I say something? 

All of our heads snapped in Rusty’s direction.

“Fuck, dude, you can get into our heads just like Nails can? And all of at the same time?” I asked as we all took a step towards him. He was staring down at the floor, his curly ginger hair falling over his sunglasses. He shrugged. “For fuck’s sake man, why can’t I do that yet?”

Yeah, I can. And I don't know why you can't. Can I say something? 

“Fuckin’ go ahead!”

I think it's a good plan. What else can we do but try? We can't be exposed, and as much as I hate to admit it, Spikey's right. The supermarket is just the start, gentrification will surely follow. It always does. William and Dahlia have been forced to leave so many towns because of things like this. We might as well try, and I reckon it could be fun. For a while, anyway. It'll give us something to do over the summer.

Nails nodded in agreement, and Spikey took another drag of his cigarette. It was a fucking dumb idea, but it’s all we had. We were fucking dumb kids, mixed up in something much bigger than we could ever have imagined. And we had absolutely no idea.

“Fuck it. Yeah. I’m in. Let’s do this.”

Spikey leapt up into the air, punching both fists towards me. “FUCK YEAH REV, SHOPLIFTING VAMPIRES OF THE WORLD UNITE!”

“Shoplifting vampires? That’s would make one fucking good band name.” Nails said, and then Spikey tackled him to the ground and we were back to our usual selves. Four delusional idiots who were bound to each other in more than just friendship.

“Fuck yeah it would! How about we finally start a band as well as plan the most daring supermarket heist England has ever seen? I bagsy being the drummer.”

The sun was setting quickly, our faces were tinted with just the hint of an orange glow, and the summer ahead looked promising.