“Duh nah duh, nah nah nah,” I sang, not entirely surprised to find that the heist music playing in my head was being vocalized out loud. At least I wasn’t crawling around on the ground and trying to do flips. Yet.
We were a block away from our mark. Luke, missing the memo—knew I should have made memos—was wearing a green shirt and light blue jeans. He smiled when he saw me and then his smile froze and his whole face went confused. Though honestly? That was a pretty typical reaction to my presence.
“Why are you wearing all black?” he asked me.
“This is my caper outfit.” I gestured to my stealthy get up and did a little twirl. I did a fist pump when the twirl didn’t make me fall down.
Luke still appeared confused, but also fond, and that was a typical reaction to my presence for him.
“You have to wear all black when going on a caper,” I explained what should be obvious. Duh.
Luke stared at me.
“It’s the law,” I continued. Black was functional and stylish! Even if it was kinda stuffy.
“Is that so?” he asked with a lopsided smile.
“To avoid being seen,” I informed him wisely. I’m invisible. Like the night.
“Yeah, that makes sense.” Of course, like I’ve ever said anything wrong in my life. “At night.” Duh. “Which it’s not,” he pointed out.
Offensive! Hadn’t he learned that facts just got in the way?
During the day, the night was technically invisible because it didn’t exist. But me in all black clothing in the middle of the day? Okay, I wasn’t invisible. I was the opposite. Ultra-visible. Also, it was hot. Maybe Luke could give me his clothes instead? No, undressing together would just be distracting.
Luke gave me his no nonsense, serious face, which was supposed to help me focus but also made it difficult to focus because he looked hot. Paradox. Distracting Luke when he tried to concentrate wasn’t America’s favorite pastime, but it was mine, along with complaining about baseball.
We had capering to do though, so I tried to pay attention while Luke outlined our plan. “Look, I’m just gonna go in and drop the keys out the window.” Then I would get the keys and we would drive off into the sunset with our purloined car.
The brilliance of the plan was in its simplicity. That was a thing supervillains said. Score, I wasn’t just a villain but asuperone. Also, less steps meant less chance for us to screw it up. The Ahmads wouldn’t find it weird for Luke to stop by, even without their son. He was gonna get a book for school he left there the other day.
We got ourselves together, gave each other a quick kiss for luck, and put our plan in motion.
Zach wasn’t home, but his car was, parked out on the street. There were some cars parked in the driveway so that meant the people in the house wouldn’t be able to see us take Zach’s vehicle, but the downside was that Luke likely knew whoever was in the house and would need to chat with them for a bit, which meant Ryan would be by himself outside and that guy couldn’t be trusted unattended.
Hey! That guy was me. It’s just, I was pretty excited, and Luke went inside and I stood in front of the house like a totally normal giant weirdo who couldn’t stop moving because of the thrill and adrenaline and whatnot.
Waiting for Luke to drop the keys out the window, I realized I was just a guy dancing around out here in all black. I was trying to be natural, but I couldn’t even tell you what color Zach’s house was. I couldn’t even take in my surroundings. Did Zach live in a house? Maybe it was a tent or a castle or a spaceship.
Probably he lived in a house.
I went to hide in the bushes off to the side of the spaceship. Then I realized hiding in the bushes was super weird. Next, I pretended like I was just jogging by their house/castle a few times, but all black, so that was too hot to keep up.
I got so into trying to be natural while loitering outside a house that it took me a second when I heard a little jingling noise and something fell to the ground. I looked at the keys. They sat there on the grass under the window, doing a very good job of being inanimate objects. I kept looking at the keys. The keys were looked at by me. I kept staring at them. They keys did not stare back because they didn’t have eyes.
Right. I should go get those.
Making a weird high-pitched noise while I did this, I got the keys and managed to not jump up and down in delight.
The cool thing would happen soon.
As soon as Luke got out of there. My role wasn’t just to get the keys. I was the getaway driver!
Maybe one usually need experience for that position. At least, maybe one should have driven before. I had no argument for that—wow, that was a first—but I was going to freaking get away drive anyway.
However, a head popped out of the window next to the one I had fetched the keys from under.
“Are you robbing us?” said a person who looked similar to Zach in a voice completely unlike his. More suspicion in his tone, less superiority.
