The Shoplifter Chapter One

SHOPLIFTER



THAT TYPE OF GIRL



I will never know how I got into all this. I was an eighteen year old senior in high school ready to graduate in a couple weeks. My grades were good, my ACTs and SATs were great. I had applied to three really good colleges and been accepted by all three. I had chosen the very best, Brighton University, an excellent, small private school. My parents had set up a college fund for me years ago and I had added two very attractive scholarship packages. My life was about as good as it could get.
I was very popular, well dressed and coddled by over protective parents. I did not come from a broken home. I did not do drugs, nor smoke, nor drink, nor hang out with trashy kids.
I had only one concern about leaving for college in the fall, my new boyfriend. For the first time I actually had a boyfriend. My parents had always been very overprotective of me. I am an only child. All through grade school and the first two years of high school they really discouraged my dating in any fashion; even in a group. I was always popular, had lots of friends, but my relationship with boys had been very limited until recently.
About four months ago, I had started to date Kyle Wainright. This was a big step in my young life. Kyle was an all round good guy: top student, president of our senior class, and a good soccer player. We knew one another very well. All through high school we had been together in classes and in the same group of friends. My parents, and Kyle’s parents, knew one another as well and approved of our dating at this point, but it was clear they were trying to discourage any real intimacy between us.
Looking back, it was so obvious: we were both only children and our parents were live vicariously through us. They had all these great plans for our futures, but really these plans were their plans. We were to avoid all pitfalls and really achieve something with our lives.
So Kyle and I had been good friends for a long time, but nothing more until the last few months. Now we were actually “going together”.
We were the cute couple. He was tall, handsome and in very good shape. He had nice longer, light brown, hair, and dark eyes which were striking. We looked good together, but it was our personalities that were the real winners. You could tell kids at school wanted to be in our group. Even adults, like our parents, found our relationship attractive. Kyle liked my friends and I liked his, which seemed unusual at my school. He was one very nice guy to hang out with. We had fun together.
As time passed and we actually started to date exclusively, the question of sex came up, of course. He began to make it clear he wanted to move our relationship in that direction. He talked a lot about commitment and I did feel committed to him, but I had very strong opinions about sex. I had watched too many kids my age make some very bad life decisions, and sex by far was the most common mistake. Sex was not going to happen for me until much later.
First, I have to admit to you, I was aware of a very strong sexual curiosity deep within me but I assured that it never surfaced when Kyle was around. I knew my limitations when it came to intimacy and heavy petting was out of the question. I worried that I could not handle tempting situations.
My virginity was very important to me. First, I had a very strong moral issue with sex before marriage, but also, my sexual innocence was such an important part of my persona as I viewed things. I was the cute virgin and I liked playing that role.
Now put on top of that, health class had really scared me. The thought of disease or unwanted pregnancy really bothered me. The pictures were terrible and the text so vividly portrayed all the bad stuff that could happen. Frankly, health classes in high school had scared the crap out of me. I wanted nothing to do with sex at this age.
So Kyle and I had kissed and hugged some, but I was not going let him go further. From time to time, he would get all over me to move even part way to the next level, but I skillfully and emphatically resisted. Sex was not going to happen and I needed to avoid the temptations that I knew I could not handle if things went too far.
I liked my image. I liked who I was. I was the cute, sweet, innocent virgin; and I liked that. I was the consistently happy, carefree one in our little crowd and I was always the center of attention.
None the less, it was going to be hard to leave Kyle and go to college in the fall.
My family was also a consideration when leaving for school. I could not have a more loving and supportive mother and dad. They were both very busy with business, activities, and friends, but they found time to be involved in my life as well.
My Dad was a wonderful guy. He was doing very well in a very large international trading company, Aronow & Associates. He made tons of money but he had to travel a lot. He had business friends and associates all over the world and was constantly in contact with someone, somewhere.
He and I had always been close and as I grew older it was obvious how proud he was of me. As I move through my high school years our relationship had just grown stronger. My world was changing and he was traveling internationally more and more, but he still made time for his Caroline.
I was no longer his little buddy, but I had become a young woman he clearly admired. Our relationship was about perfect, he was always there for me, but he knew when to step back a little as well.
He bought me a new Ford Mustang for graduation; cute, blue, I love it. He gave it to me early in my senior year so I could get used to driving it while still at home, but that was just his excuse. He really wanted me to have fun with it while I was still in high school. I had a great dad.
Mother was also very much on my team. I was still her little girl. She had not been able to see me as an adult yet, but she could not have been more supportive. She just flat doted on me. She arranged everything from my hair to my shoes to make sure I was always looked my very best.
Here is something very important to this story. My parents were very active socially and like to include me a good bit. Looking back that is another way of saying…they liked to show me off. There were many times around their country club friends, when they would just brag on me to the point of embarrassment. I have to admit it was a thin line for me, because up to a point I found all the flattery very exciting. I know I glowed with embarrassment, but also appreciation. They made me somebody very special in their circle of friends, and I was the cute center of attention in many conversations.
My mother had been a Miss Michigan finalist while in college. Many, including my Dad, said I resembled her a lot; blonde hair, blue eyes; with a slim shapely build. I was a bit taller than my friends, perhaps a little smaller in the top; but, but, but, I had a butt to remember. It was by far my best “asset” according to my amigos.
My amigos were three very close friends from my class at school. We had been buddies since freshman year. We were known as the four amigos. We were together whenever possible. We were the group all the kids wanted to hang with—the cute girls. The boys all wanted to date us and the girls all wanted to emulate us.
In our senior year we had started to spread our wings together. One of our main events was to run over to the mall after school at least a couple times a week. There were times when we might buy a little something, or get a soda, but mostly we just walked around together.
Think about it. When we started going to the mall we were seventeen years old and we had nothing more interesting or important to do after school than to go to the shopping mall and waste time. None of us had part time jobs. We didn’t need them. None of us were in music or sports or extracurricular activities or anything that mattered. We were so lazy and coddled.
Looking back it was very clear, our lives had one glaring shortcoming…we were bored.
This might be something very hard to understand, but it is very important to my story. Each day we went through the same routine with no motivation to change. We were upper class kids, from well to do parents, with everything handed to us. I had even been handed a brand new Ford Mustang to get around in.
Consider the subject of money. Money was never an issue. In fact, it was never discussed. None of us needed jobs, we had plenty of money. In my case, my Dad gave me money whenever I asked. I had my own credit card and he made sure the monthly balance was always paid, no questions asked. In fact, often he would just leave money on my dresser. My friends all had plenty of resources as well, but I was the one to have extra funds if needed.
My parents, my school, the entire community did everything to assure life was good and safe. All I had to do was fall in line and move along with those things expected of me, and that was fun to do. The track ahead could not have been more clear…college, marriage, and a predictable upper middle class future with two or three kids.
The boredom was impossible for us to recognize, but looking back it was a big issue. There was something missing from my life for sure. The highpoint of my typical day was our typical afternoon trips to the mall and the silly things we said and did there, nothing more. We were so complacent and bored, but we just didn’t recognize it.





THE MALL



So we come to a fateful day in mid May, just a couple weeks before graduation. School was out at three, and the four amigos were at the mall by three thirty.
I drove separately this time. My plan was to simply walk around at the mall for a short while with the amigos, then leave them and run to Mallmart alone to buy some makeup and head home. I wanted to be home in time to change and go to a soccer game beginning at six. Kyle was playing and I wanted to surprise him by being in the stands.
Dad was out of town and mother would be gone for the evening getting ready for a charity auction. Dinner for me would therefore be “on the fly” at home in route to the soccer match.
Everything went as planned. I was feeling very euphoric, almost what you could call a “high”. The four of us walked around the mall catching the attention of a good many guys who were just walking around the mall as well. Some of them we knew from school.
Now I must go back to my favorite subject, clothes.
I really looked great. I was wearing my favorite school outfit; a short dark red pleated skirt and a white sleeveless top with a little black vest. My skirt was very cute, but very short. Like several of my other skirts, it had been a subject of discussion at home. Dad typically thought most of my skirts showed way too much, while my mother thought most of my skirts were ok. This skirt was among the shortest I had. Both mother and dad agreed this skirt should stay in the closet, but for me it was ok. I loved the reactions I got from the boys as I walked down the halls at school.
I really had great looking legs, but my very best feature was my butt, and in a short skirt it really caught attention. As I walked I could feel the hem of the skirt moving against the back of my upper legs and that caused a wonderful tingle.
Frankly, I have to be honest; I really got off on the whole thing. This outfit and the responses I got from the boys when wearing it really turned me on. I would get these strange wild feelings deep inside that had me addicted to the game.
These wild feeling would grow and grow as I showed off. Looking back I cannot believe how aroused I would get. Sometimes I wondered if I could drive home without having a wreck.
My sexuality was such a conflict for me. I referred to myself as the reluctant virgin and these afternoon walks at the mall with the amigos provided a constant reinforcement of that perception. I would flirt with these guys until they practically cried without a moment’s concern. I was a virgin and I was in complete control of the situation.
Yes, I had this deep seated sexual curiosity, but nothing could alter my firm resolve to arrive at my wedding as a moral woman. We amigos constantly kidded about doing things with these boys, but these were things I loved to talk about but would not do. This had gone on all senior year.
This afternoon was no exception. There were a lot of kids at the mall and we ran into several groups of guys who tried to corner us into conversation, but we had perfected the art of “flirt and move on”.
There had been two groups of tall black boys who really tested our game. In both cases they were particularly insistent, tagging along for a bit making somewhat rude comments about how a white girl would enjoy a “date” with one of them. I remained in the center of the amigos, but it was clear a lot of their comments were directed at me. I was the only one of the amigos with light hair and blue eyes. We moved along, but not before their attentions had stirred me up.
Other than boys, our conversation at the mall was about fat people and the embarrassing things they would wear. We were young, slim and cute, and I was the cutest. We had so much good chatter about fat “trailer court” men with “plumber butt”, and even fatter women. Our most critical titters were saved for fat white women dragging half-breed black babies around. These little kids could be so cute, but the mothers were a spectacle. They gave the bored minds of the amigos a lot of entertainment. How in the world does a white woman end up in such a way; overweight, ugly and dressed like crap? It seemed like they were constantly pregnant and their waddle was a hoot for us. What spectacles, what grand entertainment.
It was four by the time I left the others at the mall and headed to Mallmart for my stuff. I was a bit behind schedule, but I was hurrying. I was really upbeat about the whole idea of surprising Kyle at his soccer game.
I parked, went in and went directly down the aisles headed to the cosmetics section. I was in a hurry. No shopping today. I knew exactly what I wanted.