our friend stole his parents bank card one summer

i was poor white trash

my dad’s bank card was the free drink chips from the bar

and by those standards we were rich

but by any other we were dirt poor

the cool thing about growing up poor is you don’t know any different so you aren’t aware of it

my friends had money

when you are little you don’t notice

high school years made the differences apparent

anyway

he stole their bank card

we would go to the atm and try out different codes

took a week before he got the magic number

it was their anniversary, how sweet

mine is one of the kids birthdays

i switch it up

too hard to keep track

use the same password most of the time as well

not about that

over caffeinated, rebound headache from the cluster yesterday turning into another today

this is my life

back then it was simpler

so my buddy wanted to rebuild a motorcycle

once we cracked the sweet code we were in the money

sort of

it was a summer of small crimes

after he got the cash we would ride our bikes from the south side to the north

put a thousand miles on our bikes that summer

literally

had an odometer on my bike, it was fancy

he would order parts for his bike, we would ride our bikes back and forth everyday

the only thing we couldn’t get was the transmission

but we were clever little duders

so we broke into the junk yard and stole one

like ninjas

we found it during the day

snuck back in the night

i wasn’t the money guy

wasn’t the mechanic

wasn’t the brains

but when we unbolted that big chunk of metal, i was the only one that could carry it and run at the same time

it was exhilarating

the dog caught our sent as the last bolt dropped

i picked it up and when ran like the wind through the back fence

this was the summer before i tasted beer

before i got high the first time

a month before i made like a busy bee in the neighbor girl’s honey pot

so this was as good as it got

adrenline and laughter

riding bikes and stealing shit

it came to a head not long after he finally got it running, took it out to the hills to fuck around

it fell on his leg and the muffler burned him bad enough to go the hospital

had to have it aerated weekly, where they peel the skin and scab off to encourage healing

guess that is what you get for stealing your parents money to make a secret motorcycle

and had a blast

now a days i don’t really talk to any of them

there were four of us and one moved away

one found a better class of friend

the last, and the one i was closest with just went our separate ways

but we had that summer

a thousand miles of fun

good friends, bad intentions and a fucking blast

this was the summer that started my downfall