Monica found this in the mail. They said to publish it or "something would happen." We're scared so, presenting, whatever this is... (I think it was Bennington)...
April stepped outside. The mall was covered in tinsel and purple fabric when we went in. Her car had stopped running in the parking lot and we were looking for somewhere to get gas. She’d gotten her license last May, trying in vain to ward off any jokes about her name. She was eligible for a learner’s permit on her birthday—April 2—and she waited an entire month. None of us could drive yet if she wanted to, and she wanted to, but not for the name. The jokes were a constant source of embarrassment and genuine hassle: besides being teased by girls, boys, parents, and teachers, April missed her cousin’s wedding because customs wouldn’t let her into Canada. “You’re smuggling drugs.” She had nothing on her, called them racists. April’s stepbrother was Columbian, an apparently “implausible” combination according to the Canadian Border Police. I didn’t think about it at the time—none of us did—but I guess she was probably right. April could read people better than any of us. I’m not even sure I knew what that meant in 2007.
Brian and I walked onto the concourse, looking for a map. I’d been here for a year and this mall still confused me every time, pumped full of bad air and the smell of pretzels; Brian barely knew his way around either, but he’d been here since 2003. After what happened in Cleveland, his family moved across the street where we’d end up four years later. His escape to the east was rough; I only had too many houses and too many schools, though of course this was always supposed to be the one, Baltimore City, a destination I never understood. Dad never told me. I asked him a lot of things, and he always told me if he ever talked about what he did, someone could get hurt. He’d point at the TV and say, “Look at the hole in Cleveland. As far as you know, I am Spider-Man.” My own torment was the inversion of the hot mom archetype: everyone told me my dad was in the CIA. I didn’t know nor care what that meant. We never talked about it.
And I liked America. Still do. What’s so funny about being in the CIA?
“Dude, what the fuck?”
I was asleep and drooling on the bench by the elevator next to the Auntie Anne’s. Brian said I started dozing when he was looking at the map, trying to figure out the distance between Anthropologie and the Apple Store. He picked me up by the wrist and we started upstairs. I looked for April just before getting on the escalator—she was still outside, still talking to someone on the phone.
We rode up into the food court, burgers and Chinese food in a huge half circle always inviting. Not now. Next time. The Subway led us out into another glass corridor. You see the smell of that bread, everywhere; it lingered and traveled in the air like McDonald’s French fries. “Should we go upstairs?” I told him the only car rental place in a mall that I ever saw was in Gremlins 2: The New Batch. “Yeah, okay. Like you’re so smart. Ooh, you know where they have gas stations and where they don’t. Come on. Let’s go.” I shrugged it off, and as we started towards the escalators, he asked, “Are you ever going to tell me something that’s actually classified? What happened to my city, man?”
I wasn’t looking when Brian got on the escalator. April had texted me from the parking lot, wondering where we were, irate and confused as I was about being stuck in the mall. There was tinsel everywhere, even though it was still early-October. I started looking for Halloween decorations, but I couldn’t even find a Halloween store or a Party City or one of those seasonal places. Nordstrom’s was already advertising Christmas sales, and Prince was singing “When Doves Cry” and I was lost.
I took another escalator to the fourth floor, ending up right in front of the Anthropologie and the Apple Store, which were apparently right next to each other. Prince was singing “When Doves Cry” as I pulled out my phone and called April. It rang and went to voicemail. I tried Brian, same thing. I tried April seven more times and Brian three, and then I took another escalator up and Prince was singing “When Doves Cry” and I could see the entire atrium, tinsel rustling in the air conditioning. There was nothing on the fifth floor but rolls of purple carpet and boxes of tinsel—the floor was unfinished and dotted with paint, and Prince was singing “When Doves Cry” as I climbed the fire escape down to the second floor, surprising a few families outside Build-A-Bear but basically making it out okay. April finally called me back. “Where are you?” I told her I was asking people in the mall for the nearest gas station, but she immediately knew I was lying and said so.
James was driving over with a can of gas. He’d be an hour. I asked April if she wanted to see the top of the mall. She hung up. I stepped outside.