the radiation away, but it could never remove the memory of the little bald girl in the yellow pantsuit, who did nothing more than be her friend. They’d shared cotton candy smells. They’d shared teacup rides. They’d even shared laughter as her mother had broken into song about Puff the Magic Dragon, and the stupid lyrics about little boys, imagination, and the Land of Honah Lee.
In a moment of epiphany, Sally realized that The City of Joy wasn’t named for the living; all along it had been a place for the dying. The joy Amy had found was because of Sally and her parents. The girl wasn’t alone her last day. She’d spent it with friends. Sally felt a spark of delight in that knowledge, perhaps the first grain of happiness that would eventually fill in the emptiness in her chest.
Sally ran her fingers through her hair, as she always did when she was nervous. Only this time, strands came away with her fingers. Her hair was starting to go. Soon, she’d be like Amy. But instead of a death warrant, her bald head was more a souvenir of the experience. Sally wondered if she’d look pretty with no hair. She wondered if she’d look like Amy. She wondered if she might just make her avatar appear the same.
She sat back and remembered her last glimpse of The City of Joy. Just before the train had pulled away, heading back towards civilization, Sally had keyed the vidscreen to life. She’d watched the line of yellow-suited people as they’d snaked towards the Magic Dragon. She’d searched the crowd, hoping to see her friend one last time. Eventually she spied her, two tiny arms raised in rapture as the cars carried the sick and damned through the twists and loops of the roller coaster, onward, upward and downward, and on past joy to forever.
***
Story Notes: I wrote this story in one sitting as well. I was having a conversation with someone and someone said, “Imagine if Florida becomes unlivable because of all of the hurricanes.” It got my brain ticking and before long I had the idea of the setting. But as far as the theme, that came right out of the childlike innocence of the cartoon movie character Puff the Magic Dragon. I apologize if I tricked you into reading a science fiction story. It was one of the one’s I’ve written of which I am most proud.
NOW SHOWING ON SCREEN 16
Redemption Roadshow
(Espectáculo de Redención)
Starring the Long Cool Woman, the Burned
Man and the souls of our beloved dead
“Never get on a bus with a burned man and a woman who can speak with the dead unless you are prepared to hear things that will singe your soul.”
– Sonoran Desert Herald
An IMAX Presentation
“After a while he sat in the road. He took off his hat and placed it on the tarmac
before him and bowed his head and held his face in his hands and wept. He sat
there for a very long time and after a while the east did gray and after a while the
right and god-made sun did rise, once again, for all and without distinction.”
From Cormac McCarthy, The Crossing
Dolan Gibb sat at the counter and nodded when the waitress asked if he wanted coffee. She poured with a flourish, then placed a menu in front of him. Dolan glanced over it to see if they'd added anything new, but he really wasn't hungry. He never was when he patrolled this stretch of I–10.
Too many memories.
Too many regrets.
"How ya doing, Officer?" came a gruff voice from next to him.
Gibb turned and regarded the grizzled trucker with the Coyote's baseball-style hat perched high on his hairless head. Jake Robinson. Gibb had known the trucker for over ten years. They weren't friends, but ran into each other about once a month. "Same as I ever was, Jake," replied Gibb. "And you?"
"Not bad. Pulling a load of avocadoes out of San Fernando. Bound for Tucson tonight."
"That's where you live. Right?" Gibb asked.
"Yep. Gonna see the wife for the first time in a couple weeks. Been so long, I may have to re-introduce myself."
Gibb nodded and sipped his coffee. He held back the obvious reply because it was so obvious. Instead, he watched the truck stop patrons out of the corner of his eyes, aware that his presence was a deterrent to delinquency. Seventeen years as an Arizona Highway Patrol Officer had taught him that less is more. So as an alternative to stalking around