Once upon a time, I wanted to play Grand Theft Auto 3 like everyone in the neighbourhood, but the parents said no. Later I rode ATVs because they weren’t regulated like automobiles were. It’s really unfortunate to live in a country where most everything fun has age restrictions. I notice many unoccupied campers, shacks and cabins along the roads and trails I ride. I mention this to some girls I know who ride. They say they broke into a camper recently, it was easy. I’m intrigued, this sounds fun.

We go out and stop at this camper near an old falling apart building. I look around. There appears to be no-one around. I check the door and it’s locked. The door and locks look flimsy, with a strong pull they give way and the door’s open. Once inside, I look for valuables only to find a bic lighter and some coins. One is a state quarter. Free money! This is too easy. I grab a paper towel off a roll hanging up and wipe down where I touched, only to get laughed

at. The police don’t put much work into investigations, I’m told.

I find this game fun and exciting. We continue to do small acts of theft after school. Not much is gained because people tend to keep valuable stuff elsewhere, in houses and sometimes cabins. I suggest to my friends that they try some cabins. They all agree. I feel we should get some gear together, maybe because I’ve read the anarchist cookbook lately. I find an old backpack for school and put inside a hacksaw suitable for cutting chains, a crowbar for prying open doors and a maglite to see, maybe hit people with, and lastly a .22 pistol that my parents left laying around.

Friends and I set out to rob a proper cabin. One of the friends suggests one that looked promising, but it’s watched over by neighbors. I don’t care, we can just bring more guns after all. That’s what you see on TV, right? Everyone rolls in and I hand a .380 to one of my friends, tells] her to be a

lookout. I grab a crowbar and head to the door. This lock can be unscrewed, my friend says. So they get out a tool kit and take off the padlock. Inside, it’s a fucking goldmine. I start filling my bag with all kinds of ammo for guns I couldn’t find (sadly), and a Schrade lockback knife left in the kitchen. A friend tells me there’s a gun. I’m excited, but sadly its an air rifle. Time to go!

Outside, a friend says she doesn’t know how to unload this gun and maybe she should shoot it. I think this will attract attention. Everyone leaves, but partway down the road we run out of fuel. A friend remembers a sawmill where fuel is kept. We all go to liberate it and after vandalising the sawmill we leave with a container of gasoline. Once refueled, we head home. I look over all the loot. So many bullets for so many guns… One of the mags even works in a rifle of mine.

The next day, I go back and search the cabin. Nothing new, but I take the air rifle. Leaving, I notice a deputy sheriff. I remember the loaded .380 pistol in my pocket and knows if I’m caught with that it’s juvie… So I drive away full speed and head off road. I ride to another county and wait many hours before returning home another way. My friends think this is bad, but we are not deterred. We set out the next day to rob a house. We find a nice one, out of sight from people that can call the cops. The door is dead bolted and the crowbar just won’t budge it. I hold up a friend so she can kick in a glass window. These people don’t have much worth taking, save 2 boxes of federal shotgun shells. But wait, what’s this red cylinder? A fire extinguisher! We spray and trash the house. This is so much fun.

Outside, there was an outer building with a gun visible through the window. The door doesn’t open, no matter how much I push on the crowbar. So I sit down and think. What if we use the ATV to ram the door? 2 minutes later, the door is open but it’s another damn air rifle. Everyone leaves.

Another time, we travel to to this area with a bunch of mobile homes. It seems everyone is away, but the place is gated. I start sawing on the gate’s chain, but a friend shows that there’s a hill we could ride through and gain access. We enter and there’s like 8 mobile homes, so I set upon the doors with a crowbar. There isn’t much in them but some kind of toy gun, clothes and boring shit. I spot a shelter with a locked cabinet. Everyone goes over there and it’s padlocked. I also spot a box of playboy magazines, which will be fun to take after the cabinet is opened. Crowbar is useless, but I spot a maul, which is like a combination axe and sledgehammer. 20 loud as fuck blows or so later, the lock is off and I’m going through the cabinet. It only has an ammo box full of handtools and other boring shit. Then friend says she hears someone coming. We argue then spot a truck coming towards us. OH SHIT OH SHIT OH SHIT

Everyone hops on the ATV and take off with a truck in pursuit. I remember the .22 pistol in my backpack and take it out. I aim it at the truck but there wasn’t a round chambered. We slow down as the bolt gets pulled, but by then the threat is away so I put the gun away. Friend takes off her hoody and tosses it off a hill on the way home. Once safe, friend goes for a bath while I think about how fucking close that was, my adrenaline still pumping. I hear my name called and I’m asked through the bathroom door to go back and get the hoody, since it had a school logo and some personal things. I laugh and say, sucks to be you, get it yourself. She says open the door, and I do. She’s naked in the bath. “Please go get it or else I might get in trouble”. I suggest she doesn’t want to and friend says, “come on you are getting to see my boobs”. I don’t think C cups with tan lines looks so great, but agree to. I take a walk through light sprinkling rain because anything else seems too sketchy. Hoody is found and a long walk home ensues. My friend is happy to have it. She leaves.

Next time the friend and I go to another cabin since they are safer to hit; after breaking a window on the front door we are in. Only this isn’t a normal cabin. It has weird shit in it. Like a second half of a deer mounted to the wall with a toy vagina attached. Everyone is sketched out. I suggest we burn the place to the ground but no one feels like going to get a can of gas and a lighter so everyone just wrecks the place and writes comments on the wall about how sick it is. I’m tempted to go back for a pic. On the way home, mother waits for me and asks why I have a backpack. I don’t really have an answer, so mother looks inside and snaps when she finds the gun. I get in trouble, losing my guns and crowbar.

That weekend, I visit a gun show and trade stuff for a dummy pineapple grenade and a .25 automatic pistol. My family tells me the area they work in is heavily monitored, so I suggest we switch to home invasions. One friend agrees, but the other says no. Later we set out to rob a house with someone in it by an area that’s pretty much been robbed clean. I suggest taking the .25 but I’m told it’s not really needed. So I grab a looted kitchen knife that looks mean and pocket the hand grenade. We set out to some houses but notice people by the road. What a bunch of stupid dumb rednecks, I thought as one jumped on the ATV, turned it off, and took out the key. I wish I still had that gun so I could shoot all 3 of them, but I’m too sketched out to even pull a knife. Friend talks them into believing everyone was innocent and somehow know one of them.

Everyone is let go and ride home but we notice some others with a similar ATV and one looks like the girl I’m with. I suggest we warn them, but friend is like fuck that, let’s get out of here.

I go home to learn someone had called her parents and told about the stop. Everything got downplayed by the lynch mob because they thought my friend and I were innocent. Dumb fucks. I decide to quite whilst ahead. Later, I read in the newspaper that some poor sod confessed to everything I did and some other shit I didn’t know of.

A few years later, a classmate told me that some asshole robbed their mobile home half an hour after getting caught having sex on their picknick table. They had an ATV just like mine, only it was 4x4. That’s how they knew it wasn’t me. I agreed. I felt sorry for the guy in jail who was mostly innocent and decided to never do shit like that again.

The end.