Hey Guys! What’s Going On?

By Jenkin Benson

craig was decidedly unenthralled by the corpse of the berry creek galleria, sundale, illinois’s own henge of an abandoned mall.

he’d been extra-persistently endeavoring to break into urban explorer tiktok for 7 months now, only amassing an unimpressive following of just under 800 tweenagers and 40some conspiracy addicts. berry creek was going to be his first mall. his first irruption.

based on his preliminary reconnaissance (thumbly massaging his iphone’s screen), only two 20+ second loops of the mall existed: two plausibly buzzed zoomers archiving a brief breaking and taking-a-gandering.

mainly just whoops and woos. not a real examination. but, to their credit, they did discover that the derelict cheesecake factory had an unlocked side door.

the mall was 800k square feet of, mostly, uninvestigated potential content. but, as soon as craig found the vestige’s opening, berry creek’s internet non-presence became immediately understandable.

the mall closed down in 2016. it was not possessed by the enrapturing historyend vivre that shopping centers cadaver’d in the early mid-90’s radiate. even great recession era closures have a distinctly enticing je ne sick quoi that bring in the infinity scrawl ad revenue.

nothing about the berry creek’s familiar post-aughts quasi-eurovilla design howled “mystique” and “virality.” cumbrous, geared up, don’t’d, trodden, craig came upon an atrium that appeared more interrupted than forsaken,
like at any moment an uncle would totter out of the williams-sonoma with a new automated meat tenderizer.

defeatedly, he heaved his night vision goggles at the honestly pretty clean and glinty tiling of the concourse. it was 11am. why had he even brought them? he felt evacuated, as destitute and depeople’d as the mountain dew™ chill zone, which loomed at his haunch.

and then, a scuttle at said haunch. he shifted left. a plump and unbothered raccoon sauntered out from the chill zone and over into the adjacent, devoid hollister co.

in the storefront’s still pristine window, a relic poster of shawn mendes stared sympathetically: “craig, you should treat you better.”

a pricking sort of asmr traveled from craig’s crown to his cheerless abdominals. the space smalled. was his forehead kissing the mall’s firmament? was the ½ of a pre-livestream weed gummy too much?

“i left my shift lead job at jimmy john’s for this?” he whispered to himself, and also shawn mendes, and also maybe god.

“i had an okay life.”

////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

craig trudged down a skeletal escalator. he dragged back up. he plopped his camoshorted ass onto a bench and relinquished a well-meated sigh.

and that’s when he saw it: a fountain.

how had he not heard its phlegmy gurgle in the
exdecadent silence of the property?

he giddily traipsed over to the flow, eyeing the peculiarly mallow tinge of the water.

“hellyeahfuckyeah,” craig muttered. the asmr had dissipated.

how was it working? electricity? was there any? suction? how did fountains even work?

its squirt was modest, a diameter of about 8 to 10 feet. 4 small jets neatly spat at its center. it had a sort of olive gardeny vibe to the engravings on its side: no peeing cherubs, but mini-columns chiseled all around.

craig did not hesitate: “i gotta check that out. they could defs fuck with this?”

ostensibly, “they” meant “my followers,” but also, really anyone conscious or vaguely conscious online.

it was Go Live time.

he readied his camera stick recording pole.

3–2–1

“Hey Guys! What’s Going On?”

3 viewers

“I’m At The Ruins Of The Berry Creek Mall!”

5 viewers

“And Lookie What I Have Personally Discovered!”

4 viewers

“This Place Is Totally Abandoned, But Somehow This Fountain Is Still On And Working!”

9 viewers

craig was not disheartened. maybe no one will watch this live, but the post-live footage could get picked up by the algorithm. and maybe that could pay for at least half of this excursion’s gasoline investment.

a comment blipped up:

“are you going to get in?”

the account didn’t have a thumbnail. not even the basic grayscale sapient outline that defaults before one uploads a profile pic. it was just the comment box. and then more faceless remarks:

“haha get in haha yeah.”
“lol get into the water now.”
“do it do it do it do it.”

50 viewers

“damn fr? they like this?” for the first time in months craig grinned. maybe this would be a threshold break? maybe he would reach 1000 followers after months of piddling rise and ungrowth? maybe the hurdles will cease?

he stanky legged as he attempted to unlace his hiking boots with a single hand, his incited gaze not deviating from the phone’s aura.

“Okay Squad! I’m Gonna Do It!”

207 viewers

craig’s paltry livestreams typically maxed out at 150 viewers. as he stepped onto the side of the fountain, as he witnessed his digits rise from 207 to 263, his hypothalamus began to dump a slurry of -amines and – erones. he was not unaroused.

“get in it now.”
“enter the pool”
“quickerquickerquicker”

still no thumbnails.

457 viewers

from the outside, the fountain looked like it was about 1.5 feet deep max. but, as craig eased his pinkly pale toes into the vessel, he was astonished to find that the water went up to nearly his waist. it was also somehow tepid and a bit viscous. this wasn’t jacuzzi water. no, it was more like when you make the mistake of ordering gravy at a chain diner.

817 viewers

“holy sweet shit.”

where were these people coming from? his livestream must have been randomly awarded the mini-jackpot of an extended reach? he had heard of that happening to digital creators, but he assumed the fortuity was reserved for the most undeserving of giggly hacks.

“to the middle boy”
“yes piggy yes go”
“the swine wades and wades”

1005 viewers

“wait what the fuck?”

craig stood idly in the center of the fountain, taken aback by the abrupt rudeness of his commenters. also, his now fully erect dick strained against the submerged tightness of his compression shorts. ache and thrill.

the seconds sidled by.

2053 viewers

he stared up at his phone. his fingers gorged and gripped the pole. the comments had stopped. craig stared at himself, and over 6000 incorporeal, serverized eyeballs behind thatself.

“oooookay…”

he started to slog backwards, his eyes fixed on his phone like it was some sort of intimidating semi-aquatic predator.

more commentlessness.

3022 viewers

he avoided one of the fountain’s streams and began maneuvering at a diagonal to the edge. his flesh was wet and his nerves were skeeved. maybe he’ll go with just 1/4th of a weed gummy before the next stream?

a sudden screenburst:

“OHDOOMOHDOOMOHDOOM”

the capitalization spooked craig as if he were a much smaller mammal. he jerked, his heel plunging down upon the valve of a small pipe, a misstep which spurred another lurch.

craig ceded his pole, phone and all, to the pool.
his balance evanesced in the ripple. the left round of his parietal bone collided with the beige fibermesh of the fountain’s edge.

////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

“yo, caiden, shine your flashlight over to your left. i just heard some scurrying.”

“you skibidi’d out or something, yung myles?”

“dawg shut the fuck up. if i can’t graduate because we get arrested cause you wanted to go on a repeat adventure, i am going to spin kick you.”

boy 1 – myles promptly followed his threat with a cirrus exhale of thc vapor. boy 2 – caiden sliced the beam of his torch to the side. a hollister co. sign leered down at the two very seventeen year olds. below it, a gnawing.

“ohhhhhh dudddeeee fuckkkk whattt the hellllll…”

the two lads lowered their attentions about 20 degrees to a near perfectly rotund raccoon, who had paused mid-nibble, to assess the intruders.

a scoot.
a scamper.

2/3rds of a second and the critter had returned to the umbra of the vacant clothing racks, surrendering their last morsels.

“bro, that’s a fucking finger.”

Jenkin Benson is a 2nd year PhD student at the University of Notre Dame. He principally studies the creative interchange between Welsh and Irish modernists. This is his first published work of fiction. You can find links to his poetry here:  https://www.chillsubs.com/user/siencynapbened.