Almost at the top now. She risked a glance behind her and saw a steep slope of jagged rock, the dark water breaking at the base of the ridge. It suddenly seemed a million miles away.
For a second the fog cleared from her head, the anger and the hurt were blown away, and she wanted to crawl back down the rock, back to the safety of the beach, where Bishop was waiting. They could go to Dot’s for late-night waffles, extra butter, extra whipped cream. They could drive around with all the windows open, listening to the rising hum of the crickets, or sit together on the hood of his car and talk about nothing.
But it was too late. Matt’s voice came whispering back, and she kept climbing.
No one knows who invented Panic, or when it first began.
There are different theories. Some blame the shuttering of the paper factory, which overnight placed 40 percent of the adult population of Carp, New York, on unemployment. Mike Dickinson, who infamously got arrested for dealing on the very same night he was named prom king, and now changes brake pads at the Jiffy Lube on Route 22, likes to take credit; that’s why he still goes to Opening Jump, seven years after graduating.
None of these stories is correct, however. Panic began as so many things do in Carp, a poor town of twelve thousand people in the middle of nowhere: because it was summer, and there was nothing else to do.
The rules are simple. The day after graduation is Opening Jump, and the game goes all through summer. After the final challenge, the winner takes the pot.
Everyone at Carp High pays into the pot, no exceptions. Fees are a dollar a day, for every day that school is in session, from September through June. People who refuse to pony up the cash receive reminders that go from gentle to persuasive: vandalized locker, shattered windows, shattered face.
It’s only fair. Anyone who wants to play has a chance to win. That’s another rule: all seniors, but only seniors, are eligible, and must announce their intention to compete by participating in the Jump, the first of the challenges. Sometimes as many as forty kids enter.
There is only ever one winner.
Two judges plan the game, name the challenges, deliver instructions, award and deduct points. They are selected by the judges of the previous year, in strict secrecy. No one, in the whole history of Panic, has ever confessed to being one.
There have been suspicions, of course—rumors and speculation. Carp is a small town, and judges get paid. How did Myra Campbell, who always stole lunch from the school cafeteria because there was no food at home, suddenly afford her used Honda? She said an uncle had died. But no one had ever heard of Myra’s uncle—no one, really, had ever thought about Myra, until she came rolling in with the windows down, smoking a cigarette, with the sun so bright on the windshield, it almost completely obscured the smile on her face.
Two judges, picked in secret, sworn to secrecy, working together. It must be this way. Otherwise they’d be subject to bribes, and possibly to threats. That’s why there are two—to make sure that things stay balanced, to reduce the possibility that one will cheat, and give out information, leak hints.
If the players know what to expect, then they can prepare. And that isn’t fair at all.
It’s partly the unexpectedness, the never-knowing, that starts to get to them, and weeds them out, one by one.
The pot usually amounts to just over $50,000, after fees are deducted and the judges—whoever they are—take their cut. Four years ago, Tommy O’Hare took his winnings, bought two items out of hock, one of them a lemon-yellow Ford, drove straight to Vegas, and bet it all on black.
The next year, Lauren Davis bought herself new teeth and a new pair of tits and moved to New York City. She returned to Carp two Christmases later, stayed just long enough to show off a new purse and an even newer nose, and then blew back to the city. Rumors floated back: she was dating the ex-producer of some reality TV weight-loss show; she was becoming a Victoria’s Secret model, though no one has ever seen her in a catalog. (And many of the boys have looked.)
Conrad Spurlock went into the manufacture of methamphetamines—his father’s line of business—and poured the money into a new shed on Mallory Road, after their last place burned straight to the ground. But Sean McManus used the money to go to college; he’s thinking of becoming a doctor.
In seven years of playing, there have been three deaths—four including Tommy O’Hare, who shot himself with the second thing he’d bought at the pawn shop, after his number came up red.
You see? Even the winner of Panic is afraid of something.
So: back to the day after graduation, the opening day of Panic, the day of the Jump.
Rewind back to the beach, but pause a few hours before Heather stood on the ridge, suddenly petrified, afraid to jump.
Turn the camera slightly. We’re not quite there. Almost, though.
dodge
NO ONE ON THE BEACH WAS CHEERING FOR DODGE Mason—no one would cheer for him either, no matter how far he got.