Author's Note
In celebration of Amazon Prime Video's newest series Panic, I am thrilled to be teaming up with Amazon Prime Video and Wattpad to write this exclusive chapter that puts my characters from this story into the world of Panic!
I hope this chapter intrigues and inspires you to learn more about Panic. Visit the #PanicWritingContest on Wattpad for the chance to put your creative writing chops to the test and learn more about the show!
To find out more about the contest, prizes, and how to enter, check out the #PanicWritingContest here: wattpad.com/AmazonPrimeVideo
Don't forget to watch the series premiere on May 28th, only on Amazon Prime Video, here: http://primevideo.com/
************************************************
I thought I knew what a poor, tired town looked like. St. Augustine, the town where I used to attend school, wouldn't ever appear on a Christmas television special. Not with its busted roads and sagging buildings- but the town had some charm. They kept the small town square neat and clean and brimming with southern nostalgia, hoping to tempt visitors into lingering beyond a quick stop at the gas station.
Carp, Texas didn't give a damn.
I'd been here for nearly an entire year now and had yet to find a single spot that exuded anything but neglect and apathy. Oh, there were a few homes that stood above the rest, with freshly painted siding and windows without aluminum foil pasted against the glass. Heck, just living in a double-wide trailer instead of a single wide put you solidly in the upper middle class around here. If you lived in a house, you might as well be royalty.
The longer I was here, the more I realized the problem extended beyond the town's exterior. It wasn't all that different from my little town in Mississippi- potholes damaged cars, boarded-up buildings outnumbered the rest, and the streets were lined with folks carrying groceries because they didn't have a vehicle.
No, the actual difference was in its people. Their spirits were more worn than the roads. In St. Augustine, they waved and smiled at you when you passed, but here, only a few were strong enough to lift their eyes from the ground in front of their feet. And you were more than likely to get a grimace or a middle finger if they caught you staring.
When Mama called to check on me, I acted like this place was as pretty as a postcard. With her witchy intuition, she saw right through my lies, but she'd yet to call me on them. Clemmy wouldn't have hesitated to tell me the entire human world looked like this place. A world without magic.
As a witch without power, I belonged here. No one would come out and say it, but I knew it. They knew it. We all knew it.
I came back to the present and hugged my knees to my chest. It was the day after graduation, and the night the bravest of the recent graduates would enter Panic. The day of the Jump. Dozens of kids cheered and drank and danced on the beach. This was the most alive I'd ever seen anyone, but every smile and glance had a hunger behind it. These spectators were like the ones in Roman amphitheaters- here for a violent show and only blood would satisfy their appetites.
I peered at the forty foot cliffs of craggy rock towering over the quarry and shivered. There would be blood before the night was over. I was certain of that.
"Sorry, Rose," Flannery said in a breathless voice as she dropped to the towel beside me and handed me a sweating beer. "Took forever to get through that crowd."
"And it didn't have anything to do with stopping to talk to everyone around you?"
She grinned and shrugged before sweeping her braids- cherry red at the moment- over her shoulder and putting the rim of the bottle to her full bottom lip. Mississippi or Texas, it didn't matter where Flannery found herself. She made friends. She would've been fine with or without me, but I couldn't say the same.
YOU ARE READING
Southern Charms
Paranormal[COMPLETED] My grandmother is a witch. My mother is a witch. My sisters are witches. Even my daddy is a warlock when he's not moonlighting as a rat (a consequence of the aforementioned grandmother's temper). So you would think I would be a witch to...
