Mall Princess by Rose Pacult

From the Perspective of a Mall Princess in an Indiana Mall’s Food Court Who Finds Two Panhandlers with Crosses Around Their Necks

Who are you even? Standing by the Orange Julius. What are you getting? Panda Express? Arbys? Do you want some fries with your Chik-Fil-Le Chicken Strips? How dare you two. Hanging in my Mall. Might as well be in the church. Looks like you belong there. Not here in my effing Mall.

What are you doing? Ignoring me, ignore me, A-Hole! Remember everything you learned about the minister, and then you and him won’t let nighttime in this Chapel. You and him are damn obvious sore thumbs here.

I’m joking, dears, don’t allow me to say a prayer. Under no circumstances. Unless it is to Forever 21.

I resist you and him. Big dumb raggety dolls like you don’t deserve the Mall. Go pray, why don’t you, for those crosses swinging from you twos necks to close up and CHOKE your hue brist. It isn’t on me who comes in here or not.

I forgot there are these kinds of prayers. Prayers with the body. Well you two, you and him, let me layer on spit with my arm sleeves, Bad-as-Ever, they’ll call me. Hate the smears on the church? Won’t you swallow already? You and him, you’re salivating. Let the humans catch you. I’d LOVE to see that.

Yes, so, before you and him, I digress. My displeasures.

Turn away from the mundane huge cross. Maybe then I’ll let you in this Mall legit and all.

That’s the bible cross. I’m talking about the Bible CROSS. You asses. The. Bible. Cross. You know of it? Why are you staring at me so big and dumb? Well, I know you’ve been to Indiana, haven’t you? We’re here, aren’t we? Certainly, certainly didn’t stop anywhere and at the least, went to Notre Dame, no of course not. You just came to this Mall. You don’t believe in God, and that’s a blue bruise on my throat from where I sit. You don’t need to find yourself in Indiana, and you really were there the whole time, I know it, in the church across from me, all those years in South Bend.

You didn’t hear it from me. You heard it at Baskin N Robbins from a cashier. Listen, everyone forgets it, since you and him say it hardly ever, but Indiana is healthy and serious with lazy no-gooders, the towns, the villages, are like one huge and belligerent chicken coop without a rooster.

No, wrong, Indiana. Indiana is always wrong. You and him are nuns, unlike there (anywhere but here).

Jump into this Mall, you heard me, there’s a picture on the wall waiting for you to time travel back to before the Malls were built...hide and show….show and tell…..eff the fuck off, you and him are cavalier. You keep the cross around your neck, instead of in your pockets. When it doesn’t happen, when a boring Indiana supportive form entangles your tongue, I should not believe you and him. Unlikely, but subscribe to The Wall Stress Journal and NFTs Weekly, underscore your prayers to live fast and die young. Avoid the sweet museum, Limited Toos, Express, Hot Topic, etc., they’d sell an eagle a brassiere in a heartbeat before the eagle knew.

You and him, you hate that? I’ll take it away. Run from this, you and him, you don’t know what you want.

Or run toward, that’s never really available to you and him. That’s the entrance point, the opening to the Mall, the entrance, the starting point that will also be the exit. Scream something inside a changing room at the Aeropostle. Just scream into your pile of clothing, just scream so you don’t disrupt the stores. Shhhhhhhhh. Don’t disrupt the stores. The stores will take revenge on you! They'll send you two fuckers straight back to whence you came! The garsh damn church!!!

You and him are less vibrant there, in the cornfields, call me your daughter, your princess. Scream less? Scream more. You and him opine to scream more nearly never. Opine to be unlike a brick wall, more a cracked glass. That’s how you and him unmake your beds each morning.

To concur, you and him are here. There you are, you fucks! Now go enjoy the Mall.

Rose Pacult (she/they) is a multimedia artist, with works appearing in museums like Haus am Lützowplatz, Bunkier Sztuki, Kunstquartier Bethanien, Städtische Galerie Wolfsburg or at the gallery Massimo de Carlo London, or in festivals like the Biennale arte di Venezia and the Winterthur Urban Arts Festival, and works with the collectives Gelitin, Market Ready, and Club Fortuna. They are the author of Vol. 2, Knowing Zasd by His Walk (Dokument Press), Lighter + Lighter (Hausu Mountain), Schreiben Mit Jungpionier Espinosa (Galerie im Turm), Unfolded Perception (Grund), Bending (Juste Ici) and numerous art books. Their work appears in The Brooklyn Review, Essay Daily, Untoward Magazine, Glamour Girl, and Crook & Folly. They have exhibited in over ten countries and currently serve as art director for a Los Angeles production company. Their main purpose in life is fan-girling and finding purpose in the works of others. If they could do anything, they’d learn to park the car correctly.