Some of us are old enough to remember when you could go into that mall without a second thought about your personal safety.
Guess them days is gone ... forever.
I remember those days (though I was a child) well. Totally safe, not a care in the world.
Then when I was in my high school years and visiting family, I’d go to the mall and it was like going into Ecuador but a bit nicer.
Oh, and we had this one tall kid with us (he was black too) and didn’t hold the door to an elevator quite long enough for these thugs (who were kids themselves) and threatened him and even made the ‘gun shooting’ gesture.
Later on, in the mall, we heard a *POP* and we all looked (in slow-motion, of course) at our friend but it turned out it was just a balloon. We took those kids threats THAT Seriously and that was probably 14 or more years ago.