Shoplifting is for creeps. Creeps and nerds. That's what my dad always says anyway. He calls it stealing. And I agree with him, just this once. I found out what a mess it could get you into last week.

I was hanging around with Cropper. We were just drifting about, looking in shop windows, wandering through the racks of things in the shops. You know what I mean. Killing time. Cropper was talking about nicking something, for fun he said. He slipped a small plastic toy into his pocket. I went cold, all over. What if he was caught! It was scary stuff.

We got out onto the street OK and Cropper started to crow.

"Easy!" he said, "Nothing to it!"

"You were lucky. They've got cameras in there."

"They can't watch everything!"

"You might be on a film. The cops will come knocking on your door."

"Rubbish! I was behind all the shirts and things. The cameras couldn't spot me from there!"

We walked on. I half expected to hear a siren. No-one came running after us. I began to breathe easier.

"You want to try now?"

"No way!" I said.

Cropper sneered at me. I hated it when he did that. It made me feel like a wimp. Like I was a nobody in his eyes, and that meant a nobody to the whole world.

"Chicken!"

"I am not!"

"Y'are!"

"I don't want to be arrested!"

"You won't be."

I shut my mouth and refused to argue.

"Look," said Cropper, "I’ll nick something for you, then it'll be me that gets arrested, OK? You won't have to do a thing."

"But I don't want to nick anything!"