PANIC (5 page)

He cries out, weakly, breath rattling in his chest as he lays on his back.

“You don’t deserve her,” he wheezed.

“What’d you say, motherfucker?”

“Tell him. Tell him I’m not sorry for looking.”

The boy laughed, long and loud, and she covered her mouth, like they shared a private joke. Her eerie presence made it like a dream, she was a princess, a priestess; watching a heart-cutting ceremony. He lay altared on the earth, exalting the boy with his sacrifice.

He wished he hadn’t. He wished he died choking on hope.

“Her, you little bastard. Your girl. Let her go free.”

The raging fire cast warm, flickering light on her face and he thought he saw her brown skin flush. It ought to have been a candle bathing her features.

He fought to get his second wind, to get his hope back. He’d bury them all and take her off with him and give her a life she deserved.

It had been ten years since he held a woman close to himself, that he felt that sweet feeling. He lay there, choking on smoke, watching his whole life fed into flames and he knew his heart burned brighter than that.

All he had to do was get to his feet.

The boy had to relish it again.

“My girl? You stupid motherfucker, she’s my sister. You think I give a fuck who she wants to screw? She’s bad, man, she’s a killer. She can take care of herself.”

Luis tried to right himself, to leap to his feet and tackle the boy and beat his fists into his face until he lay still. His body convulsed instead and ash shook from him.

“Shoulda asked her to fuck, man. Her business.”

“Shoulda asked,” she echoed, and her wide smile made him die. The kid with the throat injury rasped out a laugh, too.

“Nah, that wasn’t it at all,” he said, kneeling down. “Look at that. You see that?”

He could see the glossy white shoe with a nice, muddy smudge on it and it didn’t look like it would buff out. Luis’ arms were too stiff to shoot up for the boy’s throat and take him to hell, so he crouched there, taunting.

“You stepped on my shoe and didn’t have the common fuckin’ courtesy to say excuse me.”

The veteran laughed, too, rattling his body into shivers. It hurt to move his exhausted body, hurt doubly to laugh.

“-this over nothing,” he rasped.

“Yeah, I know. It’s a bitch, right? People these days got no respect for their neighbors.”

He removed the gun from his belt and toyed with it for a bit before aiming at Luis, helpless like a turtle on his back. The shock left his body frozen in torturous pain.

“Nah, you know what? She can do you. C’mere, Dani.”

Daniela
, he fantasized.
Danica
. His laughter came in insane peals, the only response was that dog in the distance again and the keening sound of the fire, like a rushing river. Their dirty faces looked down on him, rubbed with soot, solemnly watching.

She did that piggyback thing again, just like a damn kid sister. He still was wheezing with laughter at himself, so stupid, blind, lonely, old, slow, poor, worthless.

She fired by mistake and it slammed through his jaw and ripped open the artery in his neck, spurting blood like a garden mister. The red particles spritzed them, his hot blood a refreshing digestif following their destruction and carnage. He whined and gurgled, holding the note because his stiff hands couldn’t plug the wound and show he had fight left in him.

“Finger off the trigger until you’re ready to fire,” said the boy, thoughtfully. She nodded, taking his instruction.

“Relax,” he said to her, and she balanced herself on his shoulders, steadying the gun. Luis could see her cute nostrils flaring as she aimed the gun between his eyes, banking on the perfect shot.

“Breathe in,” he said.

His blood was smeared all over her lips and on her tongue, the bright red splatter glinting in the licking flame.

She pulled the trigger and a bright light sparked from the barrel of the gun, flashing like a roman candle. The bullet disappeared between his eyes and he joined his wife.

00:01, 10/31/XXXX

IT
BELONGS TO them
, he thinks, his mind flitting away with his last sputtering synapse.
They can have it
.

O
NE

B
EN FLICKED A french fry and it beaned right off Danny’s nose as his head bowed low, chewing on the edges of a hamburger. He takes a bit before he reacts as if swallowing or trying not to crack a smile. This was Danny’s idea and Danny wanted his two pals to take the idea as seriously as he had.

“C’mon dude, knock it off.”

“Yeah, grow up, Ben,” says his little brother, Jerry. Their parents must’ve thought they were pretty damn funny. Jerry sucked on his straw, obnoxiously hoovering up the thin pool of chilled shake-like beverage. The noise was like a drain loudly emptying; gutter sound that only teenage boys love, like belching and farting.

“Make me,” Ben replies, indifferently. He bends one limp fry in half and pops it in his mouth. They’re cold and salty, not the best combination. He’s leaning on the back of the hard plastic chair which is bolted to the floor by a welded metal arm. Ben’s sandy blonde hair is parted in the middle, hanging over his eyes, skater style.

They’ve been sitting in the fast food place so long their asses are sore.

No one shares the restaurant with the three boys aside from a couple of older teens behind the counter and an old man sitting at the window watching cars pass by and enjoying the smell of coffee too hot to put to his lips. Cars drift along, their occupants surely glad they don’t have to do much more than pass through this town.

The sky is blue-gray, like the hood of a car, the sun hazy and indistinct. It’s only a few months off from being snowed in and a few months away from walking the streets barefoot.

This spring week off almost seems like a taunt from an apathetic school board.

One of the more popular kids, an eighth grader named Hunter, had been bragging that whole month that he was going to go to Aspen to go snowboarding with his big brother. Many of the kids fawned over him jealously, regardless if it were true or not.

Danny could come up with a good one if he felt like it, but he was too embarrassed. His parents were fighting again, therefore, no cool trips to the lake or Six Flags since one would just accuse the other of trying to curry the favor from the boy. Obviously, this left him almost totally ignored and reliant on himself to stay amused. Even Black Ops II turned his stomach since he had to be in the house to play it and either his keyed up mother or passive-aggressive father might barge in at any moment to involve him by proxy with their ceaseless bitching and sniping.

“Why won’t your mom just get out of my ass?” was a common refrain from his dad, as if expecting Danny to have a real answer for his grown up problem. He had no desire or capability to be the referee, even he had to when they screamed at each other until he got a headache. He’d taken to turning his music up on his headphones just to tune them out.

Most kids would be terrified of their parents divorcing, maybe seeing one or the other only on weekends.

Danny was mostly sick of the cats and dogs. After all, Jerry and Ben’s parents (always Jerry and Ben, he’d refused to acknowledge the stupid pun) were divorced and they seemed perfectly happy. Sure, their mom worked all the time but Danny thought that was awesome since he could come hang out whenever he wanted.

One time, Ben and Danny found a beer way back in the garage refrigerator. It must’ve been his dad’s because his mom didn’t drink at all, except for a glass of wine once in awhile when she had her girlfriends over to play cards or watch Real Housewives. It wouldn’t be missed, they decided, as they burst open the can with the pop tab and it fizzled only slightly, not like a can of Coke at all. It was flat and gross, luckily.

"Gross, dude," Ben said. "Battery acid."

It would be a couple of years before they got interested in drinking again.

By now, a divorce was just what the doctor ordered. Danny didn’t really care what his parents thought anymore, it would just be a relief to him. He wished they’d stop acting like children.

T
WO

“I’M TELLING YOU guys, there’s a hole in the fence.”

Jerry’s face was serious, desperate to be believed.

“Yeah right, Jer. I’ve gone around the whole thing and there’s no way to get through or under. I bet if you got a ladder or something you could throw a blanket on the top and just climb right over,” said Danny.

Ben made a yuck face at the suggestion.

“I’m not carrying a blanket.”

“Who asked you? I’m just saying, dude.”

Jerry ignored the two.

“No, trust me, I’ll show you. Our bikes can’t fit through; we can. Someone beat us to it but we can definitely get in now.”

Danny leans over the table, interrogating Jerry.

“Where?”

“Yeah, Jer, where?”

“It’s down a ridge. It looks like...like someone just drove a car through it or something.”

“When did you see it? It could be all chained up now.”

“Yesterday, me and Tyler rode bikes up the bluff.”

“You’re full of it, Jer.”

“You’re scared, Ben.”

“No way, you little liar!”

Danny stops Ben by lightly swatting his forearm. He’d become expert at cutting through pointless bickering.

“Guys, shut up.”

The brothers shoot each other a look; a silent acknowledgement that this isn’t over.

“Who do you think did it?” says Danny, finally.

“I dunno, we didn’t get that close. We just saw it at the top of the ridge but didn’t get any closer.”

Ben pipes up.

“You know what I heard? Some guys from the high school had a ditch party there. They had beer and girls and everything.”

Danny shook his head.

“No way. If they had you would’ve seen beer cans, right Jerry?”

“That’s how it always is in the woods, though. Beer cans, liquor bottles...”

“Yeah.”

“I bet they did,” the older brother said. “I bet it’s no big deal. We can probably just sneak through the fence and get in through a side door.”

It came off like a bet. Danny had been planning this for weeks but apparently it took his best friends’ younger brother to convince him of it finally. Either they’d do it now or never go through with it.

All of their stomachs were tight, hoping one or the other would definitely nix the idea. Between them were empty wrappers, empty drink cups. They’d shared the rest of the fries, even though they were flabby and lukewarm.

Ben picked his head up. “Back in like 1995 or something, some guy shot up the mall. They said he just rolled right up in an RV, shot the security guard and then went inside. That’s why they closed it, y’know.”

This was his idea of lightening the mood. This would’ve happened before any of them were born.

Danny had heard this story before but never found any proof. If something like this ever happened, surely there would be a news story on it, or it would have an entry on Wikipedia or anything at all like that.

He looked over at Ben who was still leaning back, too cool for school.

“Yeah, Ben? How many did he get?”

“Fifty, dude. Sixty. He killed a lot of people.”

Ben let out a lazy belch and Danny rolled his eyes.

“And the cops?”

“He blew himself up with a grenade before they could surround him.”

“Bullshit.”

“Everybody knows about it, you don’t have to take my word for it.”

“Whatever. That’s not even the point! There’s no ghosts in the stupid mall. It just looks old and cool and like, scary. If we make this video and put it online, we’ll be the shit at school.”

“For like a week.” Ben retorted. “You’re just scared, Danny.”

“It was my idea, dude. I’m not scared. Are you, Ben?”

“Hell no!”

“Are you scared, Jerry?”

Jerry drummed his fingers on the table. “I’m not scared.”

The words hung there in the air, deflating. The boys’ eyes didn’t meet one another.

Danny thought about the guy who snapped, even though he knew it wasn’t true. Ben was just full of it.

He imagined what it might be like at that moment, watching from afar as an assault rifle spat hot lead at stupid adults. The spent clip would drop to the ground, clattering, and a gloved hand would smack another in its place. He’d start in the food court, firing in every direction, indiscriminately.

Vividly, he imagined them dying like sheep, his parents’ heads and bodies being split open and ripped apart by bullets designed to maim flesh. His dad would be off in his own world while his mom held his hand, tentatively, trying her best to seem civil. They would react far too late for it to matter.

A bullet would rip through her neck and deflect upward, smacking through his dad’s cheek so hard that the top of his head would open up like a flap. The skin would peel away violently from the force of the projectile exiting his head and wipe the smirk off his face. They’d tumble lifelessly together on top of each other in a heap.

The killer might start stalking his prey, crouching here, scurrying for hiding spots there. He’d step over bodies with smoking bullet wounds, wading through spent cases with his heavy combat boots. He’d turn his head and acknowledge Danny for a moment then continue on, as if saying “Hey, kid. Got no beef with you.”

It was just an idle daydream.

Ben thought about beer and how impossible it seemed he might get his hands on some.

Jerry had a weird look on his face neither boy recognized, both being too busy trying to be cool and mature to acknowledge what it was. It wasn’t a look you practiced in the mirror to impressed girls.

The younger boy wasn’t trembling or chattering his teeth or looking around wildly, he just looked blank, considering it although they’d all made the decision. He looked lost. It was the look of dread.

“I’m not going in unless you guys go, too.”

T
HREE

ON CENTRAL AVENUE, it’s warm. The valley is like a parabola, flattened by roads lined with buildings; some brick, old, not refurbished or renovated but continually occupied since originally built a hundred years or more ago.