Shoplifting Porn

I used to shoplift gay porn magazines from a bookstore in Scottsdale Fashion Square when I was an adolescent. I had it down to an art and I would only do it when certain conditions were absolutely perfect.

First I had to have been clothes shopping before I went to the bookstore and with my purchase I would have to receive a large shopping bag. I would politely excuse myself from my mother's company or in the case that I was with my friends I'd just tell them that I was going to the bookstore real quick while they remained captivated by the array of bawdy products at Spencer Gifts. Once at the bookstore I would peruse the magazine rack. I would choose a larger magazine like Cigar Aficionado and pretend to be browsing through it then place it down over the top copy of Men as if it were an accidental misplacement. The result was that the smaller porn magazine was inside the other larger magazine. Then when all the other patrons had left the magazine section I would pick up the copy of Cigar Aficionado again and sit with it on a bench close to the magazine rack with my shopping bag between my knees. While hunched over the bag I would open the larger magazine and discreetly allow the smaller erotic one to slip into my shopping bag. It was then just a matter of covering the deposited magazine with the clothing item and I was out the door.

It worked every time except the time that I chose to try and take a muscle mag from the grocery store while shopping with my mom. I got caught by some high school dropout loss prevention nerd and had to explain to my mother why I was stealing. "I wanted to read about working out," said the horny thirteen year old gay boy. After this experience I swore only to steal from the place where I knew I could, the bookstore in the mall.

The ride home from the mall in my parents car, or the car of the parent of a friend, was unbearable and exciting. Heat would emanate from all over my body from the excitement of having stolen something and also from the anticipation of staring at my new most treasured possession. One time I was so flush that my mother asked me if I was getting sick. As soon as I got home I would rush straight into my room, pretending to be an efficient and responsible young man, proclaiming to those I passed by, "Got to put my new clothes away."

After a while, usually when I had read and memorized all the erotic stories, I would feel extreme guilt for having stolen the magazine and for even looking at it. In the middle of the night, while my parents were asleep, I would take my stolen erotic treasure and entomb it in layers of bags and place it in the trash can outside. I made certain that the encased magazine was buried deep beneath other trash to be certain no one would take it out and discover it.

I'd return to bed after my elaborate disposal but lay there tossing and turning, unable to sleep. I was haunted by the images in the magazine and distraught that I would never get to see them again. Within minutes, without even thinking, I found myself disarming the alarm on the house so that I could go outside and rescue my treasure from the trash. In retrospect cant help but chuckle thinking of myself in those moments: thirteen years old, driven solely by hormones, picking through the trash for a porn magazine that I had stolen and then thrown away out of guilt and self loathing.