PANIC by J.A. Carter Read Free Book Online

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,