That day on that hill, by the bay, a lot of things went wrong. What with Randy almost drowning and Lamar breaking that kid’s nose – considering he’s usually nonviolent and pacifistic – and Antonia freaking out about the dog, it was a pretty bad day.
Me and my friends Randy, Lamar, Kimmy and Lamar’s little sister, Antonia, had absolutely nothing to do, so we went down to the bay to spend the meager fifteen dollars we had between us. We went down there to a little gas station to buy an otter-pop for Antonia – they’re only fifty cents – when suddenly somebody came running out of nowhere and smashed into us.
“Hey!” I yelped. “He took our money!”
Sure enough, the guy went dashing off with our money. Randy jumped up and took off after the guy. They rounded a corner and we lost them for a few minutes. When we finally caught up to them, we arrived just in time to watch Randy grab our money and then get shoved into the water.
“Randy!” we screamed. “Randy, are you alive?!”
Normally Randy was a pretty good swimmer, but because he was so desperate to keep the money dry he was flailing about like a miserable attempt for a fish. He had water in his mouth and everything, and was hacking and spitting and stuff. Lamar jumped into the water, grabbed the money and left Randy to fend for himself. Randy regained his balance and managed to get out of the water alive.
Still spewing water, Randy led us back to the gas station. We bought Antonia an otter-pop with the money that was dry and were looking at some magazines when a dog came up outside the door.
“Aw, look at the dog,” Kimmy and I cooed. “Let’s go pet him! Come on, Antonia.”
The dog ran up to us and smiled, his tongue hanging out happily. I leaned down to pet him when suddenly Antonia gasped.
I turned around. “What’s the matter, Antonia?”
She turned pale. “A dog,” she whispered, and slowly backed up. “I don’t like dogs.”
The dog turned around and bounded over to her joyfully. Antonia screamed shrilly, and before I knew what was what, Antonia had dropped her otter-pop and was running for her life from a schnauzer (she is only six). We ran and caught up to her, and managed to carry her back to the gas station without a further incident. Walking in the door, Kimmy stepped into the now-melted otter-pop and fell flat on her face.
As we were leaving we saw some poor fool banging on his car, having locked himself out.
“Need some help?” Lamar called.
“No thanks! I’ll just go in and jack my car.”
“Huh?” we all asked.
“Yeah. They sell car-jacking kits in there for like, fifteen bucks. No big.”
We stared at each other in horror. Did that mean anyone could go in and legally buy a kit to jack somebody’s car?
“Say, could I borrow some money?” the guy asked. “Mine’s in the car.”
“Sure,” I said, and was just peeling out a ten when I frowned. This guy looked weirdly familiar…
Before I knew what was what, Lamar had reached out and smashed the guy right into the side of the car. There was an unhealthy crunch as his face hit the metal.
“That’s for stealing people’s money, shoving them into the bay and jacking people’s cars!” Lamar yelled, and we were on our way.
“Whoa,” Kimmy said, shaking her head. “That dude is a public menace. I mean, that’s like three crimes committed in one day. Plus I bet that was his dog, so that’s four, dog at large.”
“America’s youth is going to be criminals,” Randy sighed.
“Will be,” I corrected. “America’s youth will be criminals.”
“America’s youth will be car-jackers,” Antonia said sadly, and we agreed.