《Encore, Alexandria!》 The Much More Successful Company The blackout was a few months ago, but Marie Joyce remembered it like it was yesterday. She was in the system, something that everyone was prone to doing at that time. Her work day was done and the weekend was coming and she was ready to do what she loved to do most, play the piano. She sat down in the fluorescent green room that she called her studio and started playing. She could feel the weight of the keys on her fingers, could feel them spring up in that ever so delicate way as she took them up into the air. The piano itself was a worn upright from an obscure Japanese brand, something that her father gifted her when the system was still a giant box worn on the head. Marie¡¯s father has been known to have a hunch since those days, but still logged in on a regular basis. Then, it happened. Not gradually, but in the blink of an eye, gray noise came into every single one of Marie¡¯s senses, like pins and needles only for every inch of the body and every sensation, including vision and hearing. She screamed. Her screams only punctuated the gray noise. It was like this for three hours, by the count of the analog clock in her bedroom. Then the system lost power, everything went black in her vision, there was only silence in her hearing, but fortunately she could feel the sensors on her skin. She pulled down her system mask and looked around her drab and small apartment. There was, in fact, a genuine leather piano bench she was sitting on, though the thing that she was playing so delicately earlier was her desk. The apartment itself was nothing special, on an eight story walk-up just outside of what used to be Washington, D.C. Marie lived and worked in this apartment, living as a woman in her late twenties and working as a customer service representative. For what company she works for and what service they provide is unimportant and uninteresting, but I¡¯ll tell you anyway. She works for Daedalus Incorporated, which provides the service of shipping packages internationally for a much larger, much more successful company. Marie¡¯s job was to accept calls from angry customers who wouldn¡¯t receive packages from the much more successful company and would blame Daedalus Incorporated. The much more successful company will remain unnamed to clear my name of any charges of defamation or slander. Marie¡¯s apartment was filled with useless, novel trinkets that she had ordered from the much more successful company, even before she worked for its subsidiary. That being said, she would order items into the tenure of her career as well. One of these items was her system. The system was exactly that, an intricate system of computers that connected the entirety of the human race in a digital reality. When the system, and the reality therein, was turned into a gray noise, people were, rightfully, pretty annoyed. After a few hours without the system, Marie found herself passing a stress ball in between her hands when her phone rang. When she answered it was another customer service representative. This one worked at the much more successful company, and informed Marie that she should expect the system up by the end of the night, at the very latest the next morning. That was two months ago. Marie still had her drab apartment and her drab job, the only thing that kept her slightly connected to the meatspace her body inhabited. During the first few weeks, the much more successful company gave an ordinance, with the help of the Pan-American Alliance and the city of Greater Columbia, that all citizens should remain inside. It only took a few murders and several heart attacks for the three parties to agree to let people out of their apartment buildings, despite the fact that the air had been deemed uninhabitable, barring filtration, years prior. Marie took the trek down the eight flights of stairs that led into her lobby, surrounded by the people she knew as neighbors and not much more. ¡°Geez.¡± Marie said, upon exiting the complex for the first time in a very long time. ¡°What a shithole.¡± There were murmurs about the courtyard that seemed to echo her sentiment. The sky, despite not being run by a shoddy computer, had been a gray noise ever since Marie could remember. Towers of drab apartments cascaded into the gray noise, the sun poking down onto the civilian populace like a street lamp in fog. Stolen story; please report. A delivery truck came into the courtyard, bearing the logo of the much more successful company on its side. The radio was playing a song by an artist long dead that Marie had learned to play on her system piano, and this provided a small sense of comfort to her before a crowd stormed the truck and the hazmat suited driver who was operating it. ¡°When will the system be back online?¡± asked one of the tenants. ¡°What does (the much more successful company¡¯s CEO) have to say about this?¡± said another. The hazmat suited driver paid no attention to them, simply loading packages, also bearing the logo of the much more successful company on their side, into the loading dock of the complex to be sorted later. When the hazmat suited driver came back to his truck, an eldery man, made sinew by ages within his apartment, attempted to strike a punch. The driver, who was the only strong and healthy man among the crowd, took this in stride, got back in his truck, and left the tenants to explore the courtyard. And explore, they did, only stopping when they came to the fenced in yard that separated the complex from the rest of Greater Columbia. Marie came across a small calico cat, balding and crusty and wheezing like on life support. Maggots were crawling and biting around its feet. Marie picked up the cat, swaddled it in her thin sweatshirt and brought it up the eight flights of stairs into her drab apartment. The cat screamed and hollered the whole way up. At one point, a neighbor asked what was in the swaddled sweatshirt and was promptly taken aback by the anguished cries of the calico. When arriving back to her apartment, she laid a small bowl of water on the floor for the cat, who didn¡¯t dare to escape from its comfortable home of polyester and cotton. There were two phone calls on her answering machine; one from the much more successful company, promising that the system would be up within the week, and one from her father. Marie¡¯s father, Carl Joyce, lived in a rusty two-story shack on the outskirts of Delaware. In his last few years of retirement, senility had gotten the best of him. During his rambling message, he spoke of Marie¡¯s mother, who had been dead and gone for a decade or more. He said that her lung cancer, the thing that had taken its toll on her in the later years of her life, was getting worse. She promptly deleted each message and walked into the kitchen to check on the condition of the calico, whose screams and hollers had died down a bit. The little thing had fallen asleep, raspy snores coming from its deviated septum. This incident with the calico happened one month into the blackout. After the second month, the much more successful company no longer gave the courtesy call to each of their customers, lying that the system would be back online soon, leaving said customers pretty annoyed. After that, hazmat suited delivery drivers brought packages to the complex on a regular basis, sometimes three or four times a day, unloading the whole truck each time. At the end of the second month without the system, Marie ordered a keyboard from the much more successful company, which arrived within the guaranteed three days. It was a large, thin box, being that the keyboard had the full 88 keys that Marie was used to playing. She opened it gingerly and laid it equally gingerly onto the desk where she would practice within the system. When she put her hands on the keys, her foot on the small plastic sustain pedal, the sound was almost offensive to her ears. She laid a fifth chord on the middle C that just sounded different from the luminous and warm tone of the off-brand Japanese upright that she was so used to playing. The calico, now considerably more furry and with considerably less maggots, approached curiously, hopped up onto the desk and rubbed her head on the edge of the keyboard. Marie had found out after a few days of having the cat that it was female and she gave it a name; Regina. After Regina rubbed the edge of her jaw on the felt speaker of the keyboard, Marie stopped. She looked around her living room, which also happened to be her bedroom and kitchen, and finally felt isolation, the kind that seeps deeply into one¡¯s soul. She realized that the room was mostly empty, say for the desk, the piano bench, the newly ordered keyboard, an assortment of useless and novel trinkets, and an assortment of molding dishes piled up in her sink. This isolation led to a scorned, painful face, which led to tears. For three hours she sobbed until there were no more tears to cry, and then sobbed a bit more. At this point, a knock came to her door. A Friend I feel as though now is a good time to give you some background into Marie¡¯s life before I divulge the information of who was knocking at her door. Marie grew up like anybody in the twenty-first century, losing more hope year after year. After a relatively uninteresting stay in the public school system, she was shipped off to university, right at the end of the war. The war that would eventually consolidate all of the world¡¯s nations into five megastates did not phase her collegiate endeavors. A stinge with drugs, alcohol, and bad sex, however, did. Dropping out during her sophomore year, when the air was deemed uninhabitable barring filtration, she moved to the city of Greater Columbia, started working as a customer service representative for Daedalus Incorporated, and bought her first system set-up. This was when she met the mysterious person known only as Jones. Jones supposedly lived on the other side of the continent, working in a fulfillment center for the much more successful company in Angel City, where the air was yet to be deemed uninhabitable. They were an enigma. Their avatar had no distinguishing features, say for the general humanoid shape that they took. Marie met Jones in a digital cafe in the system, drinking digital coffee and smoking digital cigarettes. They were both in line, waiting to order their digital coffee, when Jones struck up conversation with Marie. They got to talking and have been what we would call pen-pals ever since. Once they had sent actual letters to each other, contained within Christmas presents. Jones got Marie sheet music for Debussy concertos; which would have been useless, given that Marie already had this book in the system, and had learned every song in it, but this one had a physical poster inside, a poster that now hung in the eastmost corner of Marie¡¯s drab apartment. Marie got Jones physical coffee and physical cigarettes, both grown at the equator. Ever since the black-out, Jones¡¯ phone had been out of service, set only to an answering machine whenever Marie, or anybody else, would try to call. Marie had given up a few weeks ago. Now, onto the door. Jones was considerably shorter than Marie, something that surprised her and took her off the scent that she was staring down the barrel of her longtime friend. She attempted to close the door in their face when they put an arm between the door and the frame. ¡°Marie, it¡¯s me.¡± Jones said, in that ever familiar voice. ¡°Jones?¡± Marie asked. ¡°Is that really you?¡± Jones nodded. ¡°Can I come in?¡± Marie opened the door and they both made their way from the small hallway that adorned all of Marie¡¯s coats into the single room which inhabited her life. They sat down in relative silence for a good while. ¡°Mind if I smoke?¡± Jones asked. Mary nodded and Jones pulled out a cigarette, the same brand that Marie sent them years prior during Christmas. At this point, Regina the calico approached Jones and rubbed against their leg. ¡°Nice cat.¡± They said. ¡°Thanks.¡± Marie said. ¡°How the hell did you get here?¡± ¡°Hitching rides on trucks and trains mostly. A lot of walking in between the rides. God, am I glad to sit down for a second. Those stairs are really steep.¡± ¡°I¡¯m aware.¡± Marie¡¯s face looked like that of a dead woman, staring blankly down onto the ground. ¡°How¡¯d you know that I live here?¡± Jones motioned with the pack of cigarettes in their hand. ¡°I had to do a little digging in my files to find an exact address. I was so relieved when I found out that I hadn¡¯t thrown out the envelope you sent my gift in.¡± If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation. ¡°You hadn¡¯t?¡± Marie asked. ¡°Call it sentimentality. I had a lot of friends in the system, but I always liked you the most, Marie. I just had to see you, to hear you play again.¡± During the years prior, Jones would often find themselves in the fluorescent green studio that Marie often called home after long days of work. They would come to the small concerts that Marie put on for herself, playing the pieces that her and Jones would compose together. Jones motioned towards the cheap plastic keyboard that Marie had just christened a few hours prior. ¡°Do you think you could play me something?¡± ¡°I don¡¯t know if I can play anything anymore.¡± Marie said. ¡°I just got that thing today. I played one chord and it just felt¨C wrong.¡± ¡°I see.¡± Jones said, nodding. ¡°Could you try, at least? I¡¯d love to hear Passepeid.¡± Marie smiled for the first time in a long time. ¡°Sure, I¡¯ll give it a go.¡± She went up to the desk, sat down at the piano bench and played the first note a couple of times. She looked to Jones for encouragement, who gestured for her to keep going. She played through the whole song, eventually winding up at the last refrain and stopping abruptly. Jones put their hand up to their chin and pondered for a second. Marie could feel tension going up her spine. ¡°I like it.¡± Jones broke the silence. ¡°But you¡¯re right, it just doesn¡¯t sound the same as it did in your studio. There¡¯s something missing; a resonance, a warmth maybe. I¡¯m not sure. Anyway, this is no instrument for someone of your talent to be playing on.¡± ¡°It¡¯s all I¡¯ve got.¡± Marie said. ¡°I spent the last of my paycheck on it.¡± ¡°I¡¯m afraid I can¡¯t help you, monetarily wise.¡± Jones put out their cigarette on the heel of their army surplus boot. They were worn and rattled, like Jones themselves. Jones looked like they were in their thirties, though they were only twenty-three years old by the count of Marie from prior information. A few months trekking across the country does a lot to a person, supposedly. It also tends to empty one¡¯s pockets at a rapid rate, which Jones explained to Marie. This gave Marie prompt motivation to clean some dishes and cook them a warm meal of home fried potatoes and steamed corn. The meal itself was nothing to write home about, but it did give Jones some motivation to get some shuteye. Jones spent the night on Marie¡¯s futon, snoring through their own deviated septum. Marie took the headphones from her system setup and gave practicing on the cheap plastic keyboard another go. This yielded more positive results, but there was still something that didn¡¯t feel right about the instrument, the way it played or the way that it sounded, she wasn¡¯t sure. She played through most of her catalog, stumbling often. Each wrong note she hit took a little bit more out of her sense of pride. The phone rang around midnight. It was her father, Carl Joyce. ¡°Marie, my sweet, how have you been?¡± Carl asked in a warm, neighborly tone. ¡°Dad. It¡¯s nice to hear from you. Sorry I didn¡¯t answer you yesterday.¡± Marie said. ¡°Yesterday?¡± Carl considered this for a second. ¡°Oh yes, your mother¡¯s condition has taken a turn for the worse. But don¡¯t worry, I¡¯ve checked her into a hospital. She should be good to go within a few weeks, what with all this new medical technology they¡¯ve got.¡± Marie sighed, remembering the cold, snowy day of her mother¡¯s funeral. ¡°Sure, dad. I¡¯m sure everything will be just fine with her.¡± ¡°How are you doing?¡± Carl asked, joyously unaware of the grim tone he had set. ¡°How¡¯s the new job?¡± He was referring to the customer service representative position that Marie had been hired for six years ago. Marie chuckled hopelessly. ¡°It¡¯s fine, dad. I¡¯m excited about it, y¡¯know.¡± ¡°That¡¯s good, that¡¯s good. Hey, you get some rest now, slugger. It¡¯s bound to be a busy day tomorrow.¡± At this, Marie looked down at Jones, in the midst of rolling over. ¡°Yeah, I¡¯m sure it is.¡± About Jones The next day did not turn out to be a busy day, seeing as that it was a Saturday, one of the only days that Marie did not have to work answering phone calls from angry customers. Being in the meatspace together was strange for Marie and Jones. Marie woke up first, and wasn¡¯t sure how to stop Jones¡¯ snoring. She eventually brewed a pot of coffee out of some of the only grounds that she had in her cabinets. The smell alone was enough to wake them. The two spent the morning discussing their jobs, because they didn¡¯t have much else to discuss. Marie didn¡¯t have a lot to say about hers. According to her testimony, every day felt basically the same, with each day blurring together into the next. The only reason she remembered that it was, in fact, a Saturday was that her alarm had been automatically turned off. Supposedly, the fulfillment center that Jones worked at had been destroyed in a flood a few weeks ago. They were one of the lucky few who did not have to come into work that day. They chalked this up to a cosmic certainty; said that it was a sign from the universe that they should come to Greater Columbia and visit Marie, to see her play. They had always been the more superstitious of the two, always talking about the alignment of the stars and what have you. ¡°Did they give you something for the damage?¡± Marie asked. ¡°For the loss of your job?¡± ¡°All they did was offer me relocation to another fulfillment center out in Lonestar.¡± Jones said. ¡°I would have had to move my entire life anyway, not that I had much of a life to begin with. So, I took all my savings and all my things and made my way out here. The rest is history, I guess.¡± The life that Jones had before their trek into the east was mostly crowded with mystery until today. Over the course of the afternoon, they told Marie that they had gone to school for journalism, thinking, very daftly, that the pen was mightier than the fog. Then, much like Marie, they dropped out as the air in Angel City was deemed uninhabitable, barring filtration. Why journalism drew their fancy was deemed irrelevant, though they did reveal that writing had always been a passtime of theirs. In the backpack that they had made their way across the country with was a little spiral notebook, filled with beautiful and cathartic little prose passages. This was on a page that Jones randomly flipped to when their writings were brought up in conversation: ¡°Bloated bodies, floating on the factory floor. I¡¯m glad to be alive, But now there¡¯s nothing more. Jaundiced eyes staring into my soul. I¡¯ve lost all control. This world is a bomb and I can¡¯t cut the cord.¡± Stolen novel; please report. ¡°What was it like?¡± Marie asked. ¡°Seeing all of them.¡± ¡°I wouldn¡¯t say it was a new experience or anything.¡± Jones said. ¡°I¡¯ve seen dead bodies before. A few funerals here and there. One time I ran over an old woman with my car and she was dead before I could do anything.¡± There was a pause after this. Marie would have been disturbed if it weren¡¯t for the distinct mark of regret in their voice. ¡°But this was different. To see destruction on that scale was something I hadn¡¯t seen since I was a child.¡± ¡°Since you were a child?¡± Marie asked. ¡°I was just a kid when the war started. A shell hit the house next to me one day when I was watching cartoons.¡± Another pause. ¡°Some shrapnel came into the window and whatnot. That was my first funeral, the neighbor I had played with twice. I had to wear a suit.¡± This would not be something that would be mentionable, but Jones was the type of person who would never never never wear a suit for any occasion. Their coat was made entirely out of patchwork, with provocative statements written on each individual patch. It was during this pause that Marie made a realization. ¡°The war didn¡¯t come to the west coast, especially not Angel City.¡± She said. ¡°Where did you live when you were a kid?¡± ¡°Three miles that way.¡± Jones said, pointing south. ¡°I went to college after reformation, when the Pan-American Alliance was but a sapling on the international stage.¡± ¡°What made you quit journalism?¡± Marie asked. ¡°If you don¡¯t mind my asking.¡± Jones lit a cigarette. ¡°After the car crash, I just lost hope. Spent a lot of time smoking weed and whatever. The crash was really weird. I had only been driving for about a year or so. I was going crazy fast down the freeway and then somebody was turning on and I didn¡¯t have a chance to slow down. Both cars were totaled. The other one did a flip into the air. I was just lucky enough to still be on the ground by the end of it.¡± ¡°What did you do?¡± ¡°I got out and tried to do something. So did everybody else on the freeway. The oncoming traffic came to a complete standstill and everyone watched as I was trying to pull the girl out of her car. I could feel the warmth leaving her wrists as I did it. After I got her out of the car, we all knew she was gone and I just sobbed.¡± ¡°How did you know?¡± Marie asked. ¡°Her face was soup.¡± Jones finished their cigarette and placed the butt respectfully into a small pocket on their patchwork jacket. They dug a fresh shirt out of their backpack and asked Marie if they could bother her for a shower. Marie obliged, and was calmed a tad by the sound of the water trickling down in a sporadic rhythm. Regina sat scratching at the door as Jones was bathing. After their shower, they emerged in their fresh shirt, bright eyed and everything else. It was at this point that Jones suggested getting a meal, something that would constitute as a late lunch or an early dinner. ¡°Are you sure you want to go out there?¡± Marie asked. ¡°Things have been crazy since the blackout.¡± Jones chuckled a bit. ¡°We¡¯ve spent enough time holed up in here,¡± they said. ¡°especially you.¡± ¡°Where do you suggest we go?¡± ¡°Anywhere.¡± Jones gestured wildly. ¡°I haven¡¯t lived here in years, I¡¯m sure Greater Columbia has changed considerably since it was squeezed into existence.¡± They leaned down and pulled a fresh pack of cigarettes out. ¡°I¡¯d prefer somewhere where I can smoke, though.¡± ¡°I think I know a place.¡± Marie said, smiling. Where Were You? The pair walked about a few blocks down the road from Marie¡¯s apartment complex, where they got onto a bus stop, leading them into the city of Greater Columbia. Jones looked at the ruins of what was once known as Washington D.C. as they got off of the bus, slowly perturbing the other passengers trying to exit the vehicle. ¡°Goddamn.¡± Jones said. ¡°Still a shithole.¡± They made their way down past the bombed out remains of the national treasury, to a diner on the corner of a numbered street and a non-numbered street. A large ¡°Help Wanted¡± poster was hung on the door, which Jones noted as they entered the restaurant. They lit up a cigarette as Marie pulled a small vaporizer out of the pocket of her peacoat. They blew smoke into the air and talked as the waitress brought subpar eggs and instant coffee to the table. ¡°What were you doing?¡± Jones asked at one point. ¡°When the blackout happened, I mean.¡± ¡°Playing the piano, as always.¡± Marie said. ¡°When it happened I was so freaked out, I didn¡¯t know what to do.¡± ¡°What did you do?¡± ¡°Scream, for a few hours.¡± ¡°Enlightening.¡± Jones¡¯ voice went half an octave deeper as they exhaled more smoke. ¡°What were you doing when it happened?¡± ¡°I was about to log on, didn¡¯t experience any of it for myself. I bet it was a fucking nightmare. I¡¯m sorry you had to go through that.¡± ¡°It¡¯s okay.¡± Marie lied. She still had nightmares about the blackout, that grey noise that engulfed all of her senses for the better part of a day. She worried that she screamed during these nightmares, something that Jones had not mentioned during their short stay. ¡°I was sitting in a cafe.¡± Said a voice from the booth beside them. It was an old, balding man, much taller than Jones or Marie. ¡°Reading Harlan Ellison.¡± He said. Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website. ¡°Pardon me?¡± Marie asked, spinning around in her side of the booth. The balding man turned around to meet the pair. ¡°When the static hit, I was sitting in a cafe, reading I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream.¡± ¡°How apt.¡± Jones said, taking a drag from their cigarette. The balding man chuckled a bit, nodding and mouthing some type of affirmation. ¡°I¡¯m sorry, I don¡¯t mean to be rude, but who are you, Mr. Ellison?¡± ¡°Does it really matter?¡± The man asked. ¡°You might as well just call me Mr. Ellison.¡± ¡°So, tell me, Mr. Ellison,¡± Jones started, much to Marie¡¯s chagrin. ¡°What were you like in the system? How was that person different from the one I see before me?¡± ¡°Um,¡± Mr. Ellison said. ¡°I¡¯m sorry for them.¡± Marie said. ¡°We don¡¯t mean to bother you.¡± ¡°No, no. It¡¯s fine.¡± Mr. Ellison said. ¡°In the system, I was running a successful business, selling second hand instruments and trinkets and novels.¡± ¡°Did you ever sell a Carl Joyce a piano?¡± Jones asked. ¡°It¡¯s hard to remember.¡± Mr. Ellison took a sip from his own coffee. ¡°All of the records are gone now, but I think I do remember selling some oldie a piano a few decades ago, an off-brand Japanese thing, the name of which I can¡¯t exactly remember. I was glad to get rid of it. It was just taking up space in my shop. Why do you ask?¡± ¡°Just curious.¡± Jones said, standing up from their seat. ¡°Thank you for your time, Mr. Ellison.¡± They bowed slightly at this, adding a bit of formality to their statement. ¡°I¡¯m glad to give it.¡± Mr. Ellison said. Marie put a little bit of cash onto the counter and left the diner with Jones. On their walk back to the bus station, they saw an antique shop on the corner of a non-numbered street and a numbered street, with a Royal typewriter and a Yamaha upright piano next to each other in the window. They took a passing glance at these items, but had to make their bus back to Marie¡¯s apartment. A long silence wafted over the pair for the first time since Jones first came into the city of Greater Columbia. Marie took a drag from her vaporizer and looked at the bombed out remains of the national treasury. There were hazmat suited workers taking loads of United States currency into a large fire, billowing smoke into the air like a twisted ballet. ¡°What do bombs sound like?¡± Marie asked. Jones ruminated on this for a moment before saying one word: ¡°Loud.¡± Perfect Practice Marie put down her fingers and a discordant noise came from the felt speakers of her cheap, plastic keyboard. Regina the calico ran into the bathroom at this. Marie stopped and got up from the piano bench, pinching the bridge of her nose and sitting down on the futon with Jones. She took a hit off of her vaporizer and stared out the window longingly. Upon closer inspection, she saw that there were more trucks bearing the logo of the much more successful company delivering more packages. This was the third time today. Each time a delivery happened, Marie and Jones would hear a practical stampede of tenants rushing down the stairs, followed by the same stampede going up the stairs just a few minutes later. This stampede in particular was nothing to write home about. Before Jones had shown up, when Regina still had maggots about her feet, the stampede was likely to shake the whole building. These days, it was just a gathering of people on the stairwell. ¡°Marie, I gotta ask you something.¡± Jones said, in the middle of the upward stampede. ¡°What is it, Jones?¡± Marie asked. ¡°Have you ever played on a physical keyboard before I showed up?¡± Jones got up, striking a match and lighting another cigarette. Before Marie could respond, they were blowing smoke out of their nose and talking in the most mundane manner. ¡°I don¡¯t mean to judge or anything,¡± they started. ¡°But I¡¯ve heard beginners before and what you¡¯re playing right now sounds more like a beginner than anything else. So I figured I¡¯d ask, have you ever played outside of the system before?¡± ¡°No.¡± Marie said. ¡°No, I haven¡¯t.¡± ¡°I see.¡± Jones said, exhaling mundanely. ¡°Well, if you¡¯re going to start from the beginning again, let¡¯s start from the beginning again. What was the first song you learned how to play in the system?¡± ¡°How could that help?¡± ¡°Just humor me, okay?¡± Jones took a knee and placed a hand on Marie¡¯s shoulder. ¡°Now think back, what was the first song you learned how to play?¡± And Marie did think back to every single song that she learned how to play on the piano, trying to find that first one. The brain, often working in mysterious ways, gave her the memory of the song, but not how to play it. She remembered that it was in the key of C, but nothing more. ¡°It¡¯s a Neil Young song. I think it¡¯s called ¡®Mellow My Mind¡¯.¡± Marie said. ¡°There you go, Neil Young, ¡®Mellow My Mind¡¯. That¡¯s perfect. Do you remember what key it¡¯s in?¡± Jones got up and led Marie to her cheap plastic keyboard. ¡°C. I think it¡¯s in C.¡± Marie said, utterly confused as to what was happening. ¡°Awesome. Now, just start with a C.¡± And Marie started with a C, on the middle of the keyboard, eventually moving down an octave once Jones suggested doing so. She placed the fifth over it, letting the chord ring out. ¡°Now, add some rhythm to it.¡± And she did, playing the chord as close to the tempo as she could. The progression of the chords slowly came back to her and she started playing as if she had never had a day without practice. Marie got through the whole song, smiling and adding little embellishments onto the chords at the end there. On the last note, she let it ring out and then hit another C chord abruptly, just as it appeared on the recording of the original song. Jones gave an enthusiastic applause, rocking back and forth on the futon. ¡°Marie, that was amazing. The keyboard itself still leaves something to be desired, but this is the best I¡¯ve heard you since the blackout.¡± Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation. ¡°Practice makes perfect, I guess.¡± Marie said. ¡°No, no. Perfect practice makes perfect. That, my good friend, was perfect practice.¡± So, they continued into the night, trying to go through each of the songs in Marie¡¯s catalog, eventually always coming back to ¡®Mellow My Mind¡¯ by Neil Young. It got to the point where Jones would sing a warm melody over Marie¡¯s instrumental. Jones had a soft, raspy voice, something that carried like a cobweb covered phonograph playing an old soul single. Marie stopped before her second instrumental solo. ¡°I never knew you could sing, Jones.¡± Marie said. ¡°Really?¡± Jones asked. ¡°I¡¯m sure it must have come up before.¡± ¡°It truly never has.¡± Marie said. ¡°I like your voice. It¡¯s nothing to be embarrassed about.¡± ¡°You know, that¡¯s funny. My mother said the exact opposite thing before I went to college.¡± Jones said. ¡°She said I was a bad singer, but should use my voice in another fashion. I guess that¡¯s why I chose journalism in the end.¡± ¡°Well, your mother is a liar.¡± Marie turned around to face Jones. Jones chuckled. ¡°Tell me something I don¡¯t know.¡± Jones lit another one of their cigarettes and looked out onto Greater Columbia. This is the least energetic that Jones had been since coming into the city. The only sound between the pair was the ticking of the analog on the wall. Marie got up from her chair and picked up the Debussy concertos book off of the coffee table. She set it up on the cheap plastic stand of her cheap plastic keyboard and began playing Passepeid. In the middle of the first refrain, Jones put a hand on Marie¡¯s and she in turn stopped playing and looked up at them. They looked down with pitying eyes and asked. ¡°Is it alright if we go somewhere?¡± Marie nodded and they took the trek down the eight flights of stairs that led into her lobby. It was pitch black when they got outside. The smell of trash never seemed to dissipate from the air, but simply turned cold and wet in the nighttime. They went to the same bus stop and made their way through the same neighborhoods until the bus was heading out into what used to be the suburbs. A gated community was fenced off from the rest of the world, and it looked as though this had had some effect on the real estate value of the homes inside. The neighborhood was completely empty, say for the scurrying of a few pests through the overgrown bushes. Before Marie could ask for context as to where they were, Jones started to climb the fence. Not being one to spoil a party, Marie began to climb the fence as well. Jones lit up a cigarette, walking in as if they owned the place. ¡°This is where it started.¡± Jones said, pointing to the end of a cul de sac. They came across a rotted out mailbox with the name Jones painted ever so thoughtfully on the side. Next to this mailbox was the remains of a two-story shack not too dissimilar from the other two-story shacks in this neighborhood. The pieces of this two-story jigsaw puzzle were strewn about the place, some embedded within the house marked Jones. Our Jones took a step into the intact house, the screen door still hanging by a single screw at a ridiculous angle. Marie carefully followed suit, pulling a flashlight from her purse. She entered the shack to hear Jones rifling through the kitchen. Taking a few steps closer, Marie could see their legs kicking wildly into the air. ¡°What are you doing?¡± Marie asked. ¡°I always knew my old man had these in here.¡± Jones said, pulling half a carton of cigarettes from a compartment below the sink. ¡°Is that why we came here?¡± ¡°No, the smokes are just icing on the cake.¡± ¡°And what would be the cake itself?¡± ¡°The cake itself would be found within my bedroom.¡± Marie looked down the hallway and then back to Jones. ¡°I don¡¯t like what you''re implying.¡± She said with a smile. ¡°Get your mind out of the gutter and follow me, please.¡± Jones started down the hallway and made their way into the last door on the right. They went into the room and found a good amount of garbage thrown around. Many people had been in here before Jones and Marie and many more would be afterwards, by Jones¡¯ estimation. They opened up their closet, praying that something still be in there, and indeed it was. The thing was a plastic tub, full of sheet music of all kinds. More About Jones After spending a bit more time in Jones¡¯ childhood home, the pair made their way back up to Marie¡¯s apartment, with stale cigarettes and musty sheet music in tow. Jones lit up some of the cigarettes, marking how strong they were, and Marie looked through every single piece of music, marvelling at the sheer variety of it all. ¡°I don¡¯t understand,¡± Marie said, sitting on the floor with every book open and spread out. ¡°How do you have all this? I thought you never learned how to play.¡± ¡°I never said that.¡± Jones corrected. ¡°I only said I never learned how to play piano. The only thing I knew how to play was the trumpet, and I grew out of it once I started spending more time in the system.¡± ¡°But, this isn¡¯t sheet music for the trumpet. This is for the piano. Why do you have all of this?¡± Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator. ¡°Call it hoarding.¡± Jones said. ¡°Besides, I wasn¡¯t able to give you a present last Christmas, so here you go.¡± Marie perked up, her eyebrows askew. ¡°Trumpet you said, I thought I saw a case in the bin.¡± And that she did. Marie pulled out the case to find a trumpet in one solid piece. It was strange. She had neer seen one in person before. And definitely never one in its case. She had always assumed that they came in two pieces, not whole. Marie stood up with the trumpet and handed it to Jones. ¡°Could you play me something?¡± She asked. ¡°Nah,¡± Jones said, waving a hand. ¡°I wouldn¡¯t even know what to do.¡± ¡°I¡¯m sure it¡¯s buried up there in that brain of yours.¡± Marie sat down next to them and encouraged them to play the instrument. They blew into it and made a singular, rambunctious noise that caused quite a stir amongst Marie¡¯s neighbors. Making A Little Society The next few weeks were complete and utter bliss, at least in the apartment that Marie Joyce called home. Every day, Marie would go to work answering phone calls, practicing the piano on breaks, and Jones would be smoking cigarettes and reading and writing. The useless and novel trinkets that adorned Marie¡¯s apartment were now in a tidy order. The same could be said for the dishes that were piling up in Marie¡¯s sink when Jones first arrived. The pair would often go down to that same diner and order the same thing for their lunch every day. Some days, they would see Mr. Ellison or some new, random friend that Jones would adopt within the course of a brief conversation. One day, on the way back to their bus stop, Jones asked to stop at the only functional Smithsonian Institution in Greater Columbia; the Aerospace Center of Pan-America. They found their way in for a small fee and stepped into the entrance where a large model vessel was suspended in the air in front of them, utilizing projections to enhance the experience. The projections would show little people walking through the vessel, seen only through the large windows on the vessel¡¯s side. Like a zero-gravity can of soup, it floated gently across the lobby. Practically nobody was in the area, as most were unaware that this particular tourist trap was even open. Upon closer inspection, there was a projected sign that informed those within the lobby that this was a model of the U.S.S. Hermes, set to land on Mars within the next month or so. ¡°What do you think they¡¯re going to Mars for?¡± Marie asked. ¡°They¡¯re gonna create a whole new society.¡± Jones said. ¡°With the pilots running everything and the passengers mining for rare materials to send back to Earth.¡± They returned to Marie¡¯s apartment. It was a Saturday, which meant that most of the day would be spent with Marie practicing, only stopping occasionally to play card games with Jones. Jones didn¡¯t mind being alone on Marie¡¯s futon as she practiced. At least, they didn¡¯t seem to mind from Marie¡¯s account of the events. They had brought an electronic reader, packed with all the books a young person could dream of, as well as a deck of playing cards. These two items alone seemed to entertain Jones for the duration of their stay. Marie had just finished playing a Bach Sonata when she got up to play another game with Jones. This cycle had been going on all day and the sun was just beginning to set, sending that absurd pink sludge across the skyline of Greater Columbia. ¡°What¡¯re we playing?¡± Marie asked. ¡°You cool with Blind?¡± Jones asked in return. Marie shrugged and Jones began dealing out the cards. ¡°Y¡¯know,¡± They began, ¡°I think you¡¯re getting better at that little plastic thing, much better, in fact.¡± ¡°Thanks.¡± Marie said. ¡°I was wondering, would you ever consider doing a recital, like we used to?¡± Marie froze at this, remembering back to every recital that she had played within the system. Most were done in clothes that she would never be able to afford, with a grand piano of the same variety. Most were done to hundreds of people, all cheering and applauding at the end of each piece. ¡°I¡¯m not sure if I¡¯m ready for that.¡± Marie said, twiddling her thumbs. ¡°What does ready have to do with it?¡± Jones asked. ¡°If I would¡¯ve waited until I was ready, I¡¯d be in Lonestar right now, packaging up little boxes for (the much more successful company).¡± Jones sighed, smoke billowing out of their gullet as they stood up. ¡°If I would¡¯ve waited until I was ready, I might not have gotten my license at all, and that poor old woman would still be alive. The point being, you can¡¯t just wait until the right moment to do something, you just have to do it, consequences be damned. Isn¡¯t this what you¡¯ve always wanted to do?¡± ¡°I don¡¯t know.¡± Marie said. ¡°I¡¯ve always wanted to see another country, but this¨C I¡¯ve already done this. Does it make that much of a difference if it¡¯s in the meatspace or in the system? I¡¯ve already waited for this, and I waited and I waited and I waited and it was good when I finally got the guts to do it, but then everything was pulled out from underneath me. Jones, I have to thank you for cooking dinner most nights and for giving me all this sheet music, but honestly, I¡¯m so tired after these past few months. I don¡¯t know if I¡¯ll ever be ready to do this again.¡± One thing that Marie failed to mention in this little speech was the fact that she had almost a nervous tick playing the piano as of late, almost as if her body was expecting the flash of grey noise to overtake her and never ever ever let go. If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it. Tears were starting to form around the brims of Marie¡¯s eyes, but she wiped them off and stood her ground. Jones stood up and bit at their nails, walking over to the edge of the room, observing the fourth truckload of the day being unloaded. The building shook. ¡°I¡¯m sorry.¡± Jones finally broke the silence. ¡°I didn¡¯t mean to push you.¡± ¡°It¡¯s okay.¡± Marie said, ¡°That¡¯s been enough about me. How about I hear about what you¡¯ve been doing in the corner while I¡¯ve been playing?¡± She was desperately trying to change the subject. By her account, Jones didn¡¯t have anywhere else to go. Jones grabbed their backpack and pulled out the electronic reader and their spiral notebook. ¡°I¡¯ve been reading a favorite of mine, Soul Music by Terry Pratchett.¡± Jones said, waving their electronic reader around frantically. ¡°And I¡¯ve been working on something, a story or a book I haven¡¯t really decided yet.¡± ¡°You¡¯ve been writing a book in that?¡± Marie said, pointing to the spiral notebook. ¡°What else would I have been doing? There¡¯s no way that one can keep their attention on a single thing for that long unless they¡¯re writing a book.¡± ¡°What¡¯s the book about?¡± ¡°It¡¯s about a bunch of superheroes trying to save a doomed world.¡± ¡°Sounds bleak.¡± ¡°Anything but. You see, this world is about to end. Some inevitable, yet highly preventable natural disaster is coming to wipe out the Earth on a cosmic scale, so all of these superheroes get together and they find one guy; a guy with the power to control time. They hook up this guy who can control time to a big machine and attempt to send the entire planet back in time. That¡¯s when the villain comes in and convinces them that the guy who can control time is in immense, fatal pain and that the world would be better off dead. So they let the cosmic radiation hit the planet and everyone dies.¡± ¡°How is that not bleak?¡± Marie asked. ¡°Because of the moral: don¡¯t live in the past, even if it means dying in the present.¡± There was another silence in between the pair after the moral to Jones¡¯ story was stated. After this, they simply went about their business. Jones wrote their book and Marie kept practicing on the piano, trying her best to get the flinching down a tad. The next day, they went to the same diner and ordered the same food for lunch. Jones offered up some passages out of their book, which was titled ¡°The Unbeatable Foe¡±, when Mr. Ellison overheard them and asked to sit at the booth. Mr. Ellison explained that he once fancied himself a literary critic and absolutely adored the raw energy that Jones put into their prose. It was during this exchange that Mr. Ellison got a really good, personal look at Marie for the first time. He noticed all of the little details that make Marie Joyce Marie Joyce and finally something clicked in his old, balding head. ¡°You¡¯re the girl with the piano, aren¡¯t you?¡± Mr. Ellison asked. ¡°I beg your pardon?¡± Marie asked in turn. ¡°That¡¯s why you asked about the piano I sold a while ago. I think I¡¯ve seen some of your recitals. You¡¯re absolutely incredible. When are you going to play again?¡± ¡°I¡¯ve been practicing here and there, but that¡¯s it. I¡¯m just keeping it for myself for right now.¡± Marie tucked her hands deep into the pockets of her sweatshirt, the same fabric that swaddled Regina the calico now swaddled Marie¡¯s hands. ¡°That¡¯s a shame.¡± Mr. Ellison took a sip from his coffee. ¡°I know a guy, runs a small theater house not far from here.¡± Jones perked up at this, sipping at their own coffee. ¡°What¡¯s the name of the place?¡± They asked, much to Marie¡¯s chagrin. ¡°I think it¡¯s called Valhalla, if I¡¯m remembering correctly.¡± Jones got up and shook hands with Mr. Ellison, thanking him emphatically before putting some money on the counter and leaving. Audition After a few weeks of tracking people down and asking them random obtuse questions, Jones was finally able to get the address and contact information for Valhalla. It was, just as Mr. Ellison had said, right down the street from the diner where Jones and Marie would have their lunch on an almost daily basis. The pair made their trek down there on a Wednesday night, seeing a small play put on by three or four people quickly changing costumes in between scenes. The play itself was called ¡°Going Through Motions¡±, and was set in a fulfillment center. At the end of the play, the fulfillment center collapsed, and a dull applause followed the deaths of these few characters the audience had spent the last few hours getting to know. I feel as though I must clarify now that the fulfillment center that Jones called their work was not the only one to have gone structurally belly-up within the past decade. Large protests came about after the first couple, sparking outrage amongst the board members of the much more successful company. The act of protesting has died down as the public had become desensitized to the news of a fulfillment center collapsed, especially after the much more successful company began to shift the blame to the independent contractors which built the centers. Marie could feel the life drain out of Jones during the last fifteen minutes or so of the play. There was a silence among the audience members that could cut through melted butter. Only the occasional shifting of boots or jackets accompanied the anguished cries of the performers, being trapped in by a make believe forest fire. After the play ended, Marie turned to Jones. ¡°Are you okay?¡± She asked. ¡°Never been better.¡± Jones said, lighting up a cigarette. The pair made their way to the lobby to meet the cast and crew and the owner of Valhalla, one Mrs. Wilma Kyle, who stood tall and spindly like a praying mantis with multiple spots of skin covered in intricate tattoos. It would be revealed later in conversation that ¡°Going Through Motions¡± was a play written by a friend of Mrs. Kyle¡¯s, and that this was only its second production in the whole world. Jones struck up this conversation with Mrs. Kyle, as Jones is known to do, and it wasn¡¯t long before they asked about the availability of performances. The author''s narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. At this point, Marie took an embarrassed step outside, hitting her vaporizer and waiting for the news from Jones. She had secretly hoped that there were no such slots available for a performer like her, that she could just fade into obscurity and die happily with her cheap, plastic keyboard. These hopes were crushed when Jones and Mrs. Kyle came out of the theater with delighted smiles. Mrs. Kyle waited until everyone had gone home for the night and then wheeled out an upright piano, the same brand that Marie played in the system, and asked her to play something. She played a C chord and then went into ¡°Mellow My Mind¡± by Neil Young. Mrs. Kyle said nothing, there was another silence throughout the room, though it was only the three of them there and no one dared adjust their boots or coats. ¡°Could you play for two hours?¡± Mrs. Kyle finally said, lighting up a cigarette of her own. ¡°Not of that song, mind you. Just play something, anything for two hours.¡± ¡°Yes, I think I could do that.¡± Marie said. ¡°Very good.¡± Mrs. Kyle stood up and began to usher the pair out. ¡°I don¡¯t have anything running on Friday night, so we can have you play then. One last question before you go.¡± Marie nodded. ¡°Do you think you can pull a crowd? A local crowd, I mean.¡± ¡°I don¡¯t see why not.¡± Marie said with just a splash of insincerity. ¡°Alright. See you Friday.¡± Mrs. Kyle said, locking the front doors behind the pair. Jones¡¯ face turned from one of excitement to one of extreme regret as he noted Marie¡¯s posture. She looked like a mannequin being held up by a pole up the rear. She kept her arms straight and picked at the beddings of her fingernails, tossing them into the gutter outside Valhalla. ¡°Are you okay?¡± Jones foolishly asked. ¡°I¡¯m sorry, I just thought an audition wouldn¡¯t hurt.¡± Marie took a long, deep breath. ¡°I¡¯m fine. It¡¯s better to die in the present right?¡± Nightmares It was Thursday morning and Marie had called off of work to get more practice time in. She stumbled on every single note, played all of the chords in the wrong rhythm. She was a nervous wreck, and Jones did very little to help. Jones does very little in this chapter, actually, as they have gone out for a pack of smokes. In between each song, Marie hit her vaporizer, desperate for something to ease the tension she felt in her spine ever since agreeing to play. Regina the calico was her only comfort, giving her slight little mews of encouragement that did, in fact, help Marie to keep going. It was around lunchtime when she got two phone calls, both she let go to voice message. The first phone call was from Mrs. Kyle, asking Marie what exactly she planned on playing tomorrow night, so that a showbill may be written up. The second call was from her father, Carl Joyce. Carl was asking about Marie¡¯s performance, how he could arrange travel, lodging, tickets, and what have you. Marie told Mrs. Kyle exactly what she planned on playing, after a careful consideration of all the sheet music she had available to her. She then told Carl that tickets were sold at the door, and as far as hotels go, he was welcome to sleep on the futon with Jones, but she would not be able to provide much else. Carl told her that he should be able to see her next time, then. After this, Marie fell asleep on the futon, stale tobacco wafting slowly into her olfactories. She had another nightmare about the blackout. Her brain, in an attempt to make sense of the whole ordeal, had implanted the memory that there was a physical form she could see. This form was her own, though indistinguishable to the naked eye from the grey noise, she knew it was her body. She would take her hand up to her head and run it through her hair, more feelings of pins and needles on the hands. Marie woke up screaming. Jones was standing over her when she awoke, immediately offering a comforting hand. ¡°Are you alright?¡± They asked. ¡°I¡¯m¡ª¡± Marie started, then looked at the clock on the wall. She had only been asleep for a half an hour. ¡°I-I didn¡¯t expect you to be back so late.¡± ¡°Sorry, I ran into a friend. Mr. Ellison to be more specific.¡± ¡°What are you getting at?¡± ¡°He has a surprise for you, we just have to go downstairs.¡± If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it''s taken without permission from the author. Report it. ¡°Mr. Ellison lives downstairs?¡± Marie stood up, humoring Jones by puting some boots and a coat on. ¡°Where else would he live?¡± Jones started down the hallway. ¡°Come on, let¡¯s go.¡± And so they did go down four flights of stairs leading to one of the larger apartments in the complex. There were two bedrooms in the place. When Jones and Marie crossed the threshold into it, they noticed a dusty old room to their right, this would be Mr. Ellison¡¯s bedroom, which they dared not look into, even for a moment. They got past a hallway with a bathroom and saw an attached kitchen and living room. The living room had a gigantic window leading out into the apartment¡¯s courtyard. The building shook, though nobody could see any of the trucks bearing the logo of the much more successful company on their side. They were only visible from the back of the building. Mr. Ellison¡¯s living room was like a museum out of some textbook, filled with little trinkets and knick-knacks spanning from all over Pan-America. His bookshelf had some novels still leaning on their side, with large chunks of his collection laying about the apartment. Mr. Ellison poured himself a scotch, making smalltalk with the pair before getting to the point: ¡°So, Marie,¡± he started. ¡°I¡¯m sure Jones has told you I have a surprise waiting for you. Have they said what the nature of the surprise is?¡± Marie shook her head. ¡°Well, all praise to the tight-lipped Jones!¡± Mr. Ellison said, opening the door to the second bedroom, set diagonally against the living room. The walls were covered in posters and at the end of the room was an upright piano, of the same Japanese brand that Marie played within the system. ¡°Jones told me that you needed something else to practice on.¡± Mr Ellison said. ¡°Consider this your studio until tomorrow night.¡± ¡°Mr. Ellison, I don¡¯t know how I could possibly thank you.¡± Marie said. ¡°No thanks necessary. We all rely on the kindness of strangers, after all.¡± So, Marie practiced on this off-brand Japanese upright for a few hours. Jones told her that it was the best they had ever heard her play. Mr. Ellison gave similar sentiments from across the living room. That being said, Marie still felt something off about the physical act of playing the piano. Her songs eventually lost enthusiasm to the point where Jones stepped in. ¡°Hey, you wanna get back upstairs?¡± They asked. Marie nodded and followed Jones out, promising Mr. Ellison that they would both be back tomorrow. They made the trek slowly up the four flights of stairs and sat on Marie¡¯s futon. Marie was twitching ever so slightly. ¡°I¡¯m sorry.¡± Jones eventually said. ¡°I didn¡¯t realize this would shake your nerves so much. If it helps, I think you¡¯ll do great.¡± ¡°Thanks, Jones.¡± Marie said. That night, as they both slept, Marie was woken by the screams of Jones in the middle of their own nightmare. They ran to the bathroom and lost dinner before coming out to give some explanation and apology to Marie. They said that the dream wouldn¡¯t make any sense, even if they tried to explain it, but that it was about all the things they¡¯ve seen, mostly the bodies. Opening Night It wasn¡¯t a particularly packed night at Valhalla when Marie went on stage to play. The exact number of people within the audience was seven, including Jones, Mr. Ellison, and Mrs. Kyle. The air conditioning was turned up as high as it could go. Still, something wafted over Marie as the house lights went down and the stage lights went up. She hesitated for a second and no time longer before walking confidently and calmly out onto the stage. Her head would have been filled with a good amount of nonsense when she went up, given that it was usually filled with such contents, but she felt a clear focus to get to the keyboard and just start playing. And play she did, starting with ¡°Mellow My Mind¡± by Neil Young, coincidentally enough. Afterwards there was a brief spattering of applause, and with every brief spattering of applause she heard, a little bit more was chipped away at her self esteem. She felt as though the audience was playing a practical joke on her and her sense of expectations. Eventually, the show was over and everyone was asked to leave. It was at this point that Marie realized she had forgotten her vaporizer in the apartment and asked to bum one of Jones¡¯ many cigarettes. When they were out in the cold of night, smoking away is when Jones said this. ¡°That night, sitting there, watching you perform.¡± they said. ¡°It reminded me of a quote from one of my favorite authors. ¡°Abandon all hope, ye who enter here?¡± Marie asked, exhaling blue smoke. Jones shook their head. ¡°If this isn¡¯t nice, I don¡¯t know what is.¡± This put a smile on Marie¡¯s face. Before they were both asked to leave the premises of the theater house, Mrs. Kyle provided Marie¡¯s portion of the door money. It was barely what she made in two hours, let alone two days. If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it. So, Marie Joyce walked up the eight flights of stairs to her drab apartment with her best friend and felt a sense of contentment that hadn¡¯t become of her in a very long time. She checked her answering machine and was greeted by the joyous, confused voice of her father. Carl congratulated her on a job well-done, something that he was sure of her deserving without physically being there himself. Marie and Jones shared chit-chat for a few hours after hearing this message. The nature of their chit-chat was typical of conversation of that caliber. They were two young persons still very much getting to know each other and learning as much as they could in a short period of time so that the information may become useless and mundane as the years go on. During this particular session of chit-chat, Marie revealed that she had never learned how to ride a bicycle. ¡°Really?¡± Jones replied to this information. They were both smoking cigarettes now. ¡°I was always afraid of the things, same with cars.¡± Marie said. ¡°Why do you think I take the bus everywhere?¡± ¡°You don¡¯t like the danger of it?¡± Jones asked, hunched over like some sort of primate. ¡°No, I don¡¯t like the responsibility of keeping danger at bay. Let the danger come to me all it wants. At this point, I¡¯m used to it. But don¡¯t tell me I¡¯m the only hope. If I was the only hope, damn this world would be depressing.¡± It was at this point that the phone rang a second time. It was the coroner''s office in the town that inhabited Carl Joyce¡¯s rusty two-story shack. They were informing Marie that her father had kicked the bucket. Old Farts ¡°How did it happen?¡± Was the first question that came out of Marie¡¯s mouth rationally. The denying and the bargaining part of the equation didn¡¯t come out quite as coherently. She felt every part of her sink about an inch when she first heard the news. The first thing she asked in a panicked state of affairs was whether or not the phone call was a prank. The next thing she asked was if the coroner, a man who has put his entire career into identifying dead things, was sure that her father was really in such a condition. Eventually, she broke down, still holding the phone and banging it lightly upon her head. Through this episode of tears and yelling, Jones was finally able to get enough sense into Marie that she was able to inquire about the cause of death. Carl Joyce died in the ghastly dark of a Friday night, slipping in the shower and bleeding out from the crack on his head. His neighbor was the one who found him. She was an old woman who would take walks with Carl and help him remember his medications. She let herself into the house and the rest is history. Using bereavement pay from Daedalus Incorporated, Marie booted up to what used to be Delaware for the funeral. Most of the people around were those that Marie was never really aware of except for in the passing senile ramblings of her father. All the old farts spoke of Carl as a fair and just man, somebody who would help another when they fell down. All of them also mentioned how young he was when he passed. When Marie saw his body for the first time, she noticed that his hunch wasn¡¯t as obvious when he was laying down. She was the only child that Carl ever had. With no siblings to speak of, she was the sole heir to Carl¡¯s very small savings account, as well as all of square footage within the rusty old shack that Carl had once called his home. She went up to the rusty old shack and let herself in. There was still a brownish stain across a good amount of the bathtub where Carl had his last waking thoughts. Marie found an old stash of cigarettes that her mother had behind the refrigerator and lit up on the back porch, looking out into the ocean. The Atlantic was alive, a sludge monster trying desperately to claw at the remaining living and breathing folk who had not come under its spell. Marie observed this monster in zoological interest and puffed away at the stale, decades old cigarettes that were currently in her hand. She was procrastinating. Being the last living heir to Carl¡¯s possessions, Marie was burdened with the task of going through all of said possessions and finding which ones to keep, donate, or simply throw in a landfill as snacks for buzzards. She spent the next hour or so procrastinating. She brought a big, hinky radio out onto the porch from the living room and played muzak, the kind of thing that you would hear in elevators before the elevators too went silent. She sat on the porch, watching the primordial ooze of the Atlantic ocean, smoking decades old cigarettes and listening to muzak until the sun set. By Marie¡¯s best recollection, she now only had two days to sort through all of Carl Joyce¡¯s worldly possessions before having to return to work at Daedalus Incorporated on Wednesday morning. She slept on the couch that night, feeling as though she had no claim to any of the beds within the house. She was simply a drifting stranger, the thing her father had become to her in his final days of senility. Every couple of hours she would wake up, eventually drifting back off to sleep after realizing that nothing tangible had woken her. When the sun came in through the pulled-down blinds, marking her eyes like bright yellow warpaint, she finally stood up to face Monday. She made herself a pot of coffee and lit up a cigarette and waited for the mail. One of the tasks she was assigned was to inform the post office that the man who lives in this address is dead, and that they should forward all of Carl¡¯s mail to Marie¡¯s address in Greater Columbia. So, she waited and waited and waited, all the while drinking cheap, bitter coffee and smoking stale cigarettes. When the postman finally arrived, she got up to meet him at the door. Carl¡¯s house was one of the few left in existence that still had a mail slot on the front door. The postman seemed confused. The strapping young lad was surprised to see someone who wasn¡¯t Carl standing in the house, smoking cigarettes of all things. When Marie broke the news, he seemed more upset than she was when first hearing of Carl¡¯s passing. The postman also described him as a fair and just man, a man you could count on, so long as he took his medications. Marie informed the postman of the address that all the mail should be forwarded to and the postman explained that he would need the address, as well as proof that Carl had actually died, in writing. Marie shuffled about the living room, trying to remember in her caffeine and nicotine phased mind where she had put the documents. The place seemed even more scrambled than when she had first arrived. Eventually, she found the documents and gave them to the postman, who had a last batch of letters to deliver to the house. Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings. The first few things in the stack were nothing of interest, simply bills that have yet to be paid and coupons for local grocers. Then there was a letter from one Stephen Lawrence Jr. This stuck out to Marie because she had actually met Stephen right before she had gone off to college. Stephen Lawrence Jr. (and he insisted that the Jr. stay on the end of his name, even after his father¡¯s passing) was somebody that Carl Joyce had met during Carl¡¯s brief stay overseas at the end of the war. There was a running gag between the two old men that Stephen had beaten Carl as far as numbers of battles they had seen during the war. The current and final score was Stephen:1-Carl:0. Carl was something of a society bred type, and only ever went to war because he had been drafted when what was known as Canada was looking to lose. That great nation had decided on Carl because he had been through boot camp at a time of peace in order to pay for his own collegiate endeavors. Stephen was another story, he went to boot camp to avoid college and eventually went AWOL and moved up north in order to avoid the scorn of what was once known as America. Stephen had also been drafted, though his enrollment in what was known as Canada¡¯s armed forces was more of a clerical mistake than anything else. Clerical mistakes were very common among the nations that would eventually be consolidated into five megastates. The letter from Stephen read like this: Dear Carl Joyce¡¯s Extended Family, The Joyces, If You Will. I was so sorry to hear of Carl¡¯s passing. I immediately penned this letter because I wasn¡¯t sure if I could make it out to the funeral, seeing as that I live considerably far away from Carl now. We have been pen-pals for a good long time, and talked on the phone every single day. Carl stuck to his convictions, even in his final days when his head was turning into a viscous soup. I always knew him as a real stand up guy, even if this might contrast with the view that you, as his family, had of him. I¡¯d like to remind anybody reading this that Carl isn¡¯t really gone. At the very least, he won¡¯t be really gone for a good long while. As long as you keep the memory of his dopish smile and his unnerving stubbornness in your heart, he will still be with us. I, on the other hand, will be dead and gone after my last breath, as there is nobody left to remember me. I do not give this as a prayer for pity, because I do not deserve any pity. I was a lazy, belligerent drunk who alienated his two wives and five children and will most likely die with no-one able to make it out to my funeral, for one excuse or the other. I treated life as a right, something that I was entitled to. Carl, on the other hand, treated it as the privilege that it is. I would like to address the next part to Carl, specifically, though you are welcome to read if you would like: How¡¯s it going, motherfucker? It¡¯s your old pal Steve. I wanted to tell you some things that I never got to say when you were alive. I figured I might have to wait a comic amount of time to let you know in person, so I¡¯ll tell you them now: If you¡¯d like to know anything more about the man you knew as Carl Joyce, please feel free to give me a phone call. The number is listed on the return address of this envelope. Best wishes, Stephen Lawrence Jr. Spelunking Marie did decide to give the number listed next to the return address a call. She waited patiently in between the rings, hoping only slightly that nobody would answer. Stephen Lawrence Jr. did answer with a glimmer of hope in his raspy old voice. ¡°The Joyces?¡± Stephen asked from the other line. ¡°Just the Joyce.¡± Marie said, twiddling her thumbs. ¡°Marie Joyce to be specific.¡± ¡°Oh boy, I haven¡¯t seen you since you were a wee-little thing.¡± Stephen chortled and coughed within the same breath. ¡°I¡¯m so sorry for your loss, though I bet you¡¯re fuckin¡¯ sick of hearing that.¡± This provoked a chuckle out of Marie, which grew to a laughter between the two. ¡°Still got it.¡± Stephen confidently said. It wasn¡¯t long before Marie stopped beating around the bush. ¡°I was wondering if you could help me, Mr. Lawrence.¡± She said. ¡°My father was Mr. Lawrence, god rest his soul.¡± Stephen said. ¡°You can call me Steve.¡± ¡°Okay, Steve.¡± Marie looked around the packed house, very much aware that she had less than 48 hours to return to work. ¡°I was wondering if you knew of anything big or valuable in my father¡¯s life. Any strange accounts he wouldn¡¯t have told me about? Any big possessions he¡¯s kept hidden around the house that he mentioned?¡± ¡°Oh, I see.¡± Stephen said. ¡°You¡¯ve been given the task of sorting through all of that old, dusty junk!¡± There was a pause, you could hear Stephen taking a puff from a cigar. ¡°I don¡¯t remember much. He didn¡¯t have life insurance or anything, could never afford the stuff. The only thing I¡¯m aware of is something that I gifted him a few Christmases ago.¡± When asked which Christmas, it turned out to be the year that Marie had received a book of sheet music from Jones and that Jones had received physical coffee and physical cigarettes from Marie. ¡°It was a typewriter. I got him the thing to help him remember stuff.¡± ¡°What sorts of stuff?¡± Marie asked. ¡°All sorts of stuff!¡± Stephen said. ¡°This is the man¡¯s life we¡¯re talking about. He had to remember at least something, so I sent him a typewriter so he could write down what happened every day. I got the idea after a consultation with his doctor.¡± ¡°What made his doctor think of that?¡± ¡°I brought it up as something that helped me remember, even though my forgetfulness was a lot less severe than Carl¡¯s. It helped me get all of the awful gunk out of my soul and put it somewhere. You may remember, I was not as congenial a man as I am now.¡± Marie did remember. When she first met Stephen Lawrence Jr., he was fresh off of his second divorce and the last of his children had disowned him, blaming him for the inherited drinking problem that would eventually take their life. It was Thanksgiving break from Marie¡¯s first and last semester of college when she met Stephen Lawrence Jr. for the first time. Even then, he was smoking a cigar, making dirty small-talk with her father, comparing their freshly shaved heads to male genitalia. ¡°Do you know where he might have put it?¡± Marie asked, regarding the typewriter. ¡°I think it was in your mother¡¯s recovery room.¡± The recovery room was just that, a place where Marie¡¯s mother would recover after long bouts of chemotherapy. When Marie went up to inspect the place, something that she couldn¡¯t bring herself to do before, there was, in fact, a typewriter sitting on a desk, next to a spattering of papers, half-full of something or other. Unauthorized use: this story is on Amazon without permission from the author. Report any sightings. Marie approached the archaic, little machine. She felt the cushion squish down ever so slightly, in the shape of her father¡¯s ass, as she sat down in the cheap office chair next to the desk. She couldn¡¯t help but think of Jones, and the book about superheroes that they were writing. She made her best guess as to how to operate the thing, loading in a new piece of paper and savoring every emphatic thump of the keys as she wrote a single sentence: ¡°Don¡¯t live in the past, even if it means dying in the present.¡± Marie Joyce looked through all of the half finished accounts of Carl¡¯s last days, following them chronologically from the day when Jones first showed up at her door in Greater Columbia. It was a series of mundane and repetitive days, cut off abruptly by the last page. The last three sentences that Carl Joyce wrote were: ¡°I just got off the phone with Marie. She played a recital tonight. I am so proud of her.¡± These three sentences gave Marie ample motivation to stop procrastinating and start sorting through all of her father¡¯s possessions, which was her assigned task. She started by taking two gigantic garbage bags and throwing away all of the old bags of stale potato chips and disposable bowls full of molding cereal that had accumulated in the week before Carl¡¯s passing. Before this moment, Marie was content to sleep on the couch, taking in the smell of stale potato chips and molding cereal. Periodically, towards the end of sorting out what was trash, she would call either Jones or Stephen Lawrence Jr., trying to find somebody to talk her through her severely boring task of cleaning up a dead man¡¯s house. Jones was the first one to answer. They said that Regina the calico and them were in good spirits. They also stated that they had drafted a letter describing a terrible stomach sickness in the case that Marie would need more time away from the operations of Daedalus Incorporated. ¡°Take all the time you need.¡± Jones said at the end of the phone call. ¡°I¡¯ll hold down the fort here.¡± And then they said their goodbyes and the pair hung up. Marie knew full well what Jones sounded like when they were in shambles, and was well aware that they were likely to implode emotionally if Marie didn¡¯t return promptly Wednesday morning. She did, however, think that the letter describing her having a terrible stomach sickness was a nice gesture from her good friend. The second person she called while spelunking through her father¡¯s possessions, as mentioned previously, was Stephen Lawrence Jr. Marie informed him that she had found the typewriter and all of the logs that Carl had kept of his life. She told him truthfully that she went through every single one, sorted them by date, and placed them carefully within a three ring binder that used to hold his taxpayer¡¯s information for the Pan-American Alliance. ¡°I guess when you get death,¡± Stephen said. ¡°You don¡¯t have to worry so much about the other thing.¡± Stephen laughed at this, as he had a tendency to laugh hysterically at his own jokes. This laughter was not a hysterical one, though. It was simply a chuckle, something made out of condolences, apologizing for the joke that came before it. Marie shrugged this off and asked Stephen about a few other things she found throughout Carl¡¯s home. She had found several dusty pornographic magazines in a shoe-box under his bed and asked Stephen what the best thing to do with them was. ¡°Threw them away with the chips and the cereal!¡± Stephen said. ¡°If they were to be donated, they would be promptly thrown in the trash anyway.¡± Marie asked as well about a rusty bicycle that was in the overstuffed garage, the only thing within the space that was worth any value. Stephen said to Marie that she should find a way to get it back down into the city and fix it up. Marie informed Stephen that she had never learned how to ride a bike, to which Stephen said to learn, because ¡°life¡¯s too short without a bicycle.¡± She spent until the evening of Tuesday, when her train was to leave from what used to be Delaware to Greater Columbia, spelunking through the rusty old shack of Carl Joyce, bringing back the satchel she arrived with, a bicycle, and a typewriter. An Early Christmas Jones, Regina the calico, and Mr. Ellison were bright eyed and everything else when they greeted Marie back to her apartment. She was wearing the satchel she had left with and carrying the case for the typewriter. She had stored the bicycle in a specific bicycle storage area when she got in, electing to pay the measly sum of a rental space in exchange for having to carry the rusty old thing up eight flights of stairs. Jones and Regina went for a more physical approach to their greeting, embracing Marie in the warm way that only friends can. Mr. Ellison opted for sitting on the couch, waving a casual hand and brandishing a casual smile. The first thing mentioned after a quick greeting was that there was a message on Marie¡¯s answering machine from Mrs. Kyle of the Valhalla theater. It had been so long and so much had happened that it took a few moments for Marie to realize who they were talking about when Jones referred to Mrs. Kyle. The message on the answering machine, which was left on the day that Marie left for what used to be Delaware, but Jones hadn¡¯t the nerve to listen to without Marie there, stated that Marie¡¯s opening at the Valhalla theater was a flop and offensive to anybody with ears. The message continued in telling her that Marie and her ¡°silly friend¡± Jones would not be welcome to perform, but were more than welcome to patronize the theater¡¯s business. The message ended with an abrupt wish for a good day and then a dial tone. This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author''s consent. Report any appearances on Amazon. There was a great silence between the three for a moment. Marie seemed to be the least upset by the message, with Jones trying their best to not break down in a fit of anger and Mr. Ellison sitting in bitter contemptment. ¡°What¡¯s in the case?¡± Jones asked, trying desperately to change the subject. ¡°I brought something for you, Jones.¡± Marie said. ¡°Consider it a long overdue exchange for all of that sheet music.¡± She hoisted the case up onto her desk, making sure to move her cheap plastic keyboard onto the floor first, and motioned for Jones to pop it open. And then they did. If you were there, you could see the sparkles flaring within their eyes, like those of a young kitten about to gut a baby mouse. Within the typewriter was the paper that Marie had typed the one sentence on. ¡°For my book?¡± Jones asked. ¡°That spiral notebook is no instrument for someone of your talent.¡± Marie said. They exchanged another neighborly, warm embrace before Jones sat down at the desk and pulled out said spiral notebook, transcribing, starting at the beginning again. Return to Sender And so, that Wednesday, Marie went back to work at Daedalus Incorporated, answering a staggering amount of calls from angry customers of the much more successful company. The desk had turned from Marie¡¯s music studio to Jones¡¯ writing studio. They accompanied Marie¡¯s work with the rhythmic clacking of the keys, getting considerably fast at a remarkable rate. It was only a few days into this that Jones ran out of things to transcribe, having to come up with brand new material for their book. They described how it felt so much longer when they were writing the entire thing by hand and thanked Marie for introducing something that made the act of their art very much faster. ¡°Have you never had a typewriter, or any other kind of keyboard?¡± Marie asked after this statement regarding speed. ¡°I had a little laptop computer once.¡± Jones explained. ¡°My best friend gave it to me when we were both in high school as a birthday present.¡± ¡°What happened to it?¡± ¡°One day, I was heading home from school when a bomb hit the Washington Monument. The impact caused the ground to shake and I fell into the pool in front of it. The whole area is concrete now, probably including that laptop.¡± ¡°I¡¯m so sorry. Did it have anything on it?¡± ¡°Nothing important, y¡¯know.¡± Jones lied, and then got the sudden notion that they should tell the truth. ¡°Just the first one.¡± Jones said. Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation. ¡°The first what?¡± Marie asked. ¡°The first book I tried to write. I only got about 50 pages into it.¡± Jones looked up at Marie¡¯s expectant eyes. ¡°I bet you¡¯re wondering what that one was about.¡± They said with a smile. Marie nodded. ¡°My first book was about a vampire. I was really into monsters back then. This vampire, the main character of my book, really doesn¡¯t want to be a vampire, because he¡¯s a pacifist. He decides to live his life in quiet solitude, feasting on the wild boar and deer within the forests surrounding his small town when someone comes to his door.¡± ¡°Who?¡± Marie asked. ¡°The postman, of course!¡± Jones said, gesturing. ¡°The only person that someone like that is guaranteed to see every day! I thought I was so clever. That¡¯s about when I stopped writing the thing, when my laptop fell into the pool at the Washington Monument.¡± ¡°What was it called?¡± ¡°¡®Return to Sender¡¯ or something trite like that.¡± ¡°I¡¯d very much like to read it.¡± Marie said, getting up to get a glass of water. ¡°Maybe when you¡¯re done with ¡®The Unbeatable Foe¡¯, you should rewrite and finish ¡®Return to Sender¡¯.¡± This caused the rhythmic clacking of Jones¡¯ keyboard to stop as they considered something for a brief moment. ¡°Why do you care so much?¡± Jones asked. ¡°About my writing, I mean. I¡¯ve never been particularly great at writing. If you¡¯ve noticed, I can hardly string a sentence together when I¡¯m talking with people, let alone when I¡¯m writing it down. So, I¡¯m just asking, why? Why did you bring this goddamned heavy thing all the way from your father¡¯s home just so that I would have something to write on?¡± ¡°I saw it and I thought of you.¡± Marie said. ¡°I can¡¯t really explain it other than that. I saw it and the first thing I thought of was the fact that you were writing that superhero book and what the moral of it was. I¡¯ve read what you¡¯ve had to write before and I think that it¡¯s beautiful, but it¡¯s that moral that really kept me going when I was at my father¡¯s house.¡± ¡°Thank you.¡± Jones said. ¡°I really appreciate that.¡± An Offer That Saturday, Marie, Jones, and Mr. Ellison went down to the diner on the corner of the numbered street and the non-numbered street where they had first met. It was here that Mr. Ellison gave the proposal to Marie that her and Jones move into the two-bedroom apartment that Mr. Ellison currently resided in, and that he take Marie¡¯s studio. ¡°No.¡± Marie said. ¡°I can¡¯t possibly let you do that.¡± Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings. ¡°Why not?¡± Mr. Ellison asked. ¡°There are two of you and only one of me. It¡¯s the utilitarian solution, if nothing else.¡± After some discussion between Marie and Jones, they agreed that they should take Mr. Ellison up on the offer. The trio arranged for the move to happen at the end of the month. Absolute Bullshit Over the next few weeks, Marie, Jones, and Mr. Ellison were tasked with packing up all of their belongings for the big switcheroo that Mr. Ellison had proposed. Mr. Ellison had a lot more possessions to pack up than Marie, and Jones had only arrived in Greater Columbia with a backpack. There were a lot of possessions that Mr. Ellison suggested that the pair of youngsters keep, as he would have no use for them anymore. Chief among these items was the upright piano that Mr. Ellison had specifically ordered for Marie, turns out. He also gifted the two a vast collection of his paintings, surreal, colorful things that, in the end, covered every single square inch of wall within the apartment. Marie, in the process of moving in, took down one of these paintings, hung it up in the bathroom, and replaced it with the poster from the book of Debussy concertos that Jones had gifted her years ago. During these last few weeks, Marie kept up a very rigorous phone relationship with Stephen Lawrence Jr., whose letter to her dead father she kept so that she wouldn¡¯t forget the number written next to the return address. She told Stephen that she gave Jones the typewriter that he had gifted Carl Joyce years ago and congratulated the pair on making a little domestic hole for themselves. ¡°That¡¯s what it¡¯s all about.¡± Stephen said. ¡°Making a little domestic hole full of art that you can comfortably and contently die in.¡± It was at this point, during their first phone conversation, that Jones asked Marie who she was talking to. Marie politely let Stephen go and then explained: ¡°Stephen Lawrence Jr.¡± She said. ¡°The memoirist?¡± Jones asked, baffled. ¡°The what?¡± ¡°Stephen Lawrence Jr. was a soldier who went AWOL from the United States and fled to Canada. After the war he wrote a memoir about it.¡± Jones pulled out their electronic reader and brought up a copy of Stephen Lawrence Jr.¡¯s memoir, Disposable Firearm. The book itself was part memoir, part political commentary. The political commentary part was a scathing condemnation of the Pan-American Alliance and their promise that the world would be free from conflict from now until the end of the time, thanks to the consolidation of the world. Unauthorized usage: this tale is on Amazon without the author''s consent. Report any sightings. Stephen Lawrence Jr. described this as: ¡°...bullshit. Absolute bullshit. The world will never be free from conflict as long as there are people who have and people who don¡¯t have. All this consolidation does is paint a broad brush of the human race, something that has never and will never work in attempting to rid the world of conflict. Trust me, within the next century, there will be a new war. Not of nation versus nation, but of people who don¡¯t have versus people who have.¡± The book itself was published by the much more successful company, stating in their editor¡¯s note at the beginning of the book that ¡°Mr. Lawrence¡¯s opinions do not reflect the opinions of [the much more successful company] or [the much more successful company¡¯s CEO]. ¡­ We do, however, find it important, according to the Pan-American Alliance¡¯s official stance on free speech, that Mr. Lawrence is able to express said opinions.¡± When questioned about it by Marie, Stephen simply said that the book was ¡°nothing important. They¡¯re the ramblings of an old fart shaking a boney finger at the world around him rather than doing any damn thing about it.¡± Marie, reading his memoir, tended to disagree, asking him questions about the contents of such on her regular phone calls. And so that became the routine among the little drab apartment that contained Marie¡¯s life; Jones would work on their book and Marie would work, reading Stephen¡¯s memoir on breaks. At night, she decided that it would be her set time to practice the piano. Slowly, the thing began to become second nature to her again. When she sat down, playing on the cheap plastic keyboard in her lap, she felt as though that the instrument was an extension of herself, feeling as natural as if she was born with a piano attached to her fingers. Eventually, after a few weeks of this splendid routine, Marie, Jones, and Mr. Ellison made the designated switcheroo between apartments. At this point, Jones was about halfway done with their novel about superheroes. The Worldly Council of Superheroes On the first day, the pair¡¯s rooms were picked out for them, as the Japanese upright piano in the room next to the living room hadn¡¯t moved. This was most likely due to its size and weight, being that it was a pain to get into this room in the first place, Mr. Ellison didn¡¯t want to go through the trouble of relocating it, if only simply down the hall. Jones spent the afternoon decorating the small room that was now theirs with doodles from their spiral notebook, hung up with rolled up bits of parcel tape. Marie spent that same afternoon setting up her bed and playing the piano, with the reluctant help of Regina the calico. Marie still had her job at Daedalus Incorporated, still answering phone calls on behalf of the much more successful company, but she didn¡¯t care very much what the phone calls entailed. Even if the angry customers would scream at her and call her worthless, she wouldn¡¯t care, because she could very easily, on the break between phone calls, could swing over and play the keys on her upright piano. She played the thing delicately, slowly relearning her entire catalog on the new instrument. It was almost exactly the same as it was within the system, allowing her to get goofy with her style of playing every now and again. Jones did not have a job to speak of, simply working eight hour shifts being a writer, chipping away at their novel about superheroes. One night, about a week after they had moved in together, they were extraordinarily drunk on cheap whiskey. Jones was divulging the entire plot of their novel about superheroes, the specifics of which Marie had never heard before. Supposedly, in Jones¡¯ novel, there were three superheroes that led the worldly council of superheroes that was given the task of keeping the Earth safe. The main one, the ubermensch if you will, had the power of nigh invulnerability, as well as the power of leaping far into the air, sometimes for miles. Jones made it a point that this ubermensch could not fly around the world and turn back time, because that would make the deal of the guy whose power is to control time rather redundant. The main superhero¡¯s name was Knight Errand, and he had a cape that could go on for miles if the reader so imagined it. Knight Errand¡¯s second-in-command was a brooding, yet distinctly funny-looking superhero, with no superpowers to speak of and a ratty old mustache poking out from under his cowl. While there was nothing beyond human capability that this mustachioed superhero had to offer, all of his physical prowess was at the peak of human capability. This included his intelligence. The novel was set in the 1970s, a time long before Jones was born, and the second-in-command solved mysteries in the smoggy city of Pittsburgh. In the world Jones and Marie inhabited, Pittsburgh was mostly a slab of concrete now. The mystery-solving second-in-command was very simply named Sleuth. Along Sleuth and Knight Errand was a token woman, a witch from a time beyond man, having traveled back in time to save mankind from himself. She was by far the most powerful of the trio, able to rip apart human beings to the sinew with a single thought. She was the quiet one. Her name was Temptress. In the first act of Jones¡¯ novel, Knight Errand and Sleuth got an alert on the giant supercomputer that monitored Earth and the Universe for potential existential threats. Within the first page, they got the alert that this wave of cosmic radiation was to hit Earth within two months and there was nothing that, with all of their strength and intelligence, could be done about it. Temptress entered the room and was given this information and the trio was left to decide what to do with it. The rest of the first act was told out of chronological order, explaining the rise of superheroes within this fictional 1970s from the perspective of each of our heroes. At the end of the first act, there was a chapter that spanned a single sentence from the perspective of the guy who can control time: The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident. ¡°I¡¯ve seen the end, and frankly, I¡¯m not very impressed.¡± He thought. It was at this point that Marie, also drunk on whiskey, broke Jones¡¯ spiel about their novel by yelling: ¡°I think you should send some chapters out.¡± Marie¡¯s cheek was propped up by the half-empty bottle that the pair had been glugging from. ¡°What?¡± Jones asked, chuckling. ¡°I know that guy.¡± Marie said. ¡°That memoirist army guy who knew my dad. He¡¯s got a foot in the door. What if I sent him some of your writing? Maybe he could do something with it.¡± ¡°That¡¯s very nice, but this is just a little passion project. I¨C¡± ¡°And that¡¯s why I think you should send it somewhere, anywhere. I think the world needs to know about Knight Errand and Sleuth and Temptress.¡± Marie had gotten up at this point, gesturing wildly around the duo¡¯s newly arranged living room. ¡°The world needs heroes.¡± She said. There was a silence between the two. ¡­ ¡­ ¡­ And then Jones spoke, ¡°Can you play me something? I¡¯d like to come into your room and I¡¯d like you to play me something.¡± ¡°Why indertabubbly¨C¡± Marie trailed off, suddenly on a mission to get to her bedroom and get to her piano bench without vomiting. She succeeded. ¡°What would you like to hear?¡± ¡°Anything,¡± Jones said, smiling, ¡°as long as it isn¡¯t ¡®Mellow My Mind¡¯ by Neil Young.¡± And so Marie played something, the name of the piece is unimportant and, frankly, she couldn¡¯t remember it with both sides of her brain in the morning, even if she tried. The only thing that¡¯s important about this moment is that they were jovial and drunk and singing songs well into the night, much to the chagrin of their newly established neighbors on the third and fifth floors. At the end of the fourth or fifth piece, bootstomps came from the ceiling, cutting Marie¡¯s recital to an abrupt stop. ¡°That¡¯s what I came across the country for.¡± Jones said matter-of-factly ¡°Really?¡± Marie asked. ¡°That was the thing you came across the country for.¡± ¡°That and I just wanted to meet you. To really meet you, I mean.¡± ¡°Thanks.¡± ¡°Marie,¡± Jones said, rolling onto their side. ¡°Holy shit. Thank you! You¡¯ve let me crash here rent free for the past month and a half and have never asked so much as a meal from me. The stars only know that I wouldn¡¯t be able to find somebody as kind and welcoming as you, even if I tried.¡± ¡°You and your shit about the stars.¡± Marie waved a passive hand. ¡°No, I¡¯m serious. I¨C¡± Jones¡¯ speech was cut short by a brief stinge of coughing. ¡°You alright?¡± Marie asked. ¡°Yeah.¡± Jones said. ¡°I¡¯m fine.¡± Just A Little More About Jones After that night, Marie and Jones made it a tradition to get drunk on cheap whiskey on Fridays and Fridays alone. It was after the third of these weekly drinking sessions that the rent had been withdrawn from Marie¡¯s bank account. Turns out she had overdrafted. Jones offered the meager sum that was left in their own account, but it was, sadly, not enough to take care of the debt that Marie now owed to the bank. So Jones offered to sell some of their possessions, starting with their clothes. Marie stopped them from doing this, saying that it would be no damn good anyway. If they were to successfully sell their clothes, then they would be tasked with buying new ones, so they were essentially offering to dig themselves a hole financially. ¡°But I can¡¯t be this much of a burden to you.¡± Jones said in the first of several arguments about money between the two. ¡°I¡¯ll find somewhere else to go.¡± ¡°No, you shouldn¡¯t.¡± Marie said. ¡°Mr. Ellison went through all of this trouble to set us up in such a nice place and we should at least give it a try until the end of the lease.¡± ¡°Tell you what,¡± Jones started enthusiastically ¡°I¡¯m just about done with ¡®The Unbeatable Foe¡¯. I¡¯ll try sending it off to publishers, see if that brings in any more money.¡± And so their argument cycles went like this for a very long time. At the second promise of a draft soon to come, Marie caught on that Jones was stalling, experiencing writer¡¯s block in the final act of their novel about superheroes. During one of their weekly whiskey sessions, Jones divulged the plot of the second act to Marie, and Marie was glad to hear it: In the second act of ¡°The Unbeatable Foe¡±, the guy who has the power to control time, whose name was revealed to be Grandfather Clock, was approached by the worldly council of superheroes. Sleuth had proposed the initial plan to build the machine that would hold Grandfather Clock, a sort of faraday cage of tachyonic energy that would allow him to harness his time powers and send the world back in time. This was not meant to save Earth or the human race. It was simply something meant to buy time so that the superheroes might amass enough will and intelligence to find a more practical solution for the cosmic wave. Grandfather Clock initially refuses this, but is then persuaded by Knight Errand and Temptress to get into the machine, being that he was a team player this whole time. Enter the villain, the titular Unbeatable Foe, Christian Campbell. Christian Campbell was the arch-nemesis of Knight Errand, constantly foiled by the hero''s superior strength and morals. Mr. Campbell, now in his years of retirement as a supervillain, realizes through sleeper agents that he has planted throughout the council of worldly superheroes that Grandfather Clock is about to step into the faraday cage. And that¡¯s where Jones had stopped writing. The last act was meant to be a debate, not of fists but a true debate of words, between Christian Campbell and Knight Errand. Ironically enough, Christian Campbell would be arguing the altruistic side against Knight Errand¡¯s utilitarian side, something that Jones had pointed out as a clever little subtext they had come up with. But, when it came down to actually writing the debate between the two characters, Jones drew a blank, which they said was unusual for them. Usually, they loved writing dialog. They had gotten their start writing plays for their elementary school playwriting contest, something that Marie would also find out during this weekly whiskey session, and so they always found writing dialog to be second nature. Finally, Marie gave Jones some advice that would help them finish the rest of their novel. ¡°Don¡¯t worry about it too much.¡± Marie said drunkenly. With that, Jones got to work. The next two days were filled with the recently uncharacteristic sound of the typewriter clacking from Jones¡¯ bedroom. They finished the conversation. After a little bit of not worrying about it, they thought of a compromise between the two characters that they could write towards, instead of a bitter ending that they wanted to avoid at all costs. Knight Errand and Christian Campbell agreed to let the cosmic wave destroy planet Earth, as long as all of the resources that were being amassed to stop the wave were put to a rocket ship to send newborns to disparate inhabitable planets all across the known Universe. When Jones finished the manuscript, they came bursting out of their bedroom with tears trickling down their face. They then revealed that they had several rolls of quarters left in their backpack, something meant to do laundry with, which became rather redundant seeing as there was a laundry machine within their new apartment. They took all of the money they had in the world and made several xeroxed copies of the manuscript and sent them off to publishers. This was in the middle of the month. Rent eventually came around again, at the first of the next month. With the next cycle of rent came another cycle of arguments between the two. Their arguments had even infiltrated the sacred weekly whiskey session. This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there. ¡°I hate to be this person,¡± Marie started, ¡°but I think you should really consider getting a job. I¡¯ve been paying rent with credit, Jones.¡± ¡°I¡¯m sorry.¡± Jones said, swaying lazily back and forth. ¡°I swear I can find somewhere else to go.¡± ¡°No, listen to me goddammit.¡± Marie stood up, running her fingers through her hair. ¡°We got this nice apartment and this nice life and you can¡¯t just bail on it. You can¡¯t just bail on me. Without you, I won¡¯t be able to pay rent anyway. I was perfectly fine wasting away in that drab apartment four floors up, but you just had to come into my life. You just had to tell me that I needed to play the piano again.¡± ¡°Would you have done it?¡± Jones asked. ¡°Play the piano again, I mean.¡± ¡°Who cares?¡± Marie said, slumping down onto the futon that still smelled of stale cigarettes. ¡°Who cares?¡± ¡°I¡¯ll get a job.¡± Jones said. After they said this, they realized Marie had nodded off. It was another two weeks and there was no word from any of the publishers that Jones had sent their manuscript off to. One day, Mr. Ellison stopped by to see how everything was going. He was greeted by the rank smell of trash molding up around the island in the apartment¡¯s kitchen. The blinds were closed and there was smoke coming from Jones¡¯ bedroom. There were about six or seven butts in the ashtray that Jones emptied into the trash every night. Marie¡¯s door was shut. Mr. Ellison kindly let himself out. This is the part where I feel as though I should explain to you just a little more about Jones, to provide a frame through which to view his actions in a way that Marie cannot fully understand as of yet. Jones was not an only child like Marie was. Jones was born the child of a pastor, being raised with the idea that a dirty hippie would come back from the dead and make everything better eventually. They were also the youngest of six siblings, all born and bred American girls before them. Jones¡¯ father would still act as a minister during the war, and Jones in turn attended a good amount of funerals, not just the one of the kid they played with for fifteen minutes. Their mother moonlighted as a drunk, turning the television up loud and never ever ever turning it to the news. Jones learned from an early age to keep their mouth shut in times of crisis, is the point I¡¯m trying to get at here. As Marie spent the better part of a few days in her room, Jones took on the responsibility of feeding Regina the calico. They also took on the responsibility of cleaning up the kitchen, throwing away all of the moldy food that had accumulated over the first few months of the pair living in the apartment. When Marie finally came out of her room, the place was completely spotless and Jones was smoking a cigarette on the couch, reading from their electronic reader. ¡°Whatcha reading?¡± Marie asked. ¡°Something awfully sad.¡± Jones said. ¡°Why don¡¯t we go out for some coffee?¡± And so they went down to the diner on the corner of a numbered street and a non-numbered street, the diner where they had first met Mr. Ellison. This was the first time that they came to this diner in quite a long time, seeing as they could make their own subpar eggs and instant coffee from the comfort of their own apartment. There was a silence between the pair, only interspersed with the ding of the front door opening. Each time the bell would ring, Jones would look around all paranoid, almost as if they were expecting someone to come in and shoot them in the back of the neck. They turned around spontaneously after one of these checks and looked Marie dead in the eye. ¡°I have one piece of good news, and two pieces of bad news. In what order would you like to hear them?¡± Jones asked. ¡°Bad news, good news, bad news.¡± Marie said. ¡°Ah, the classic bad news sandwich. I like the way you think.¡± Jones reached into their pocket and pulled out a red envelope labeled ¡°Rejection Slips¡± in Magic Marker. They opened the envelope and like a Russian doll, seemingly hundreds of smaller envelopes came spilling onto the linoleum table that the pair sat at. Marie looked through each of them briefly. They were from every single publisher that Jones had sent their novel about superheroes to. Every single one, without a single publisher missing the memo. ¡°From all of them?¡± Marie asked with shock. ¡°What did they say?¡± ¡°They all say the same thing.¡± Jones said, taking a drag off of their cigarette, ¡°that ¡®The Unbeatable Foe¡¯ is a pile of trite garbage not worth publishing.¡± ¡°They really all said that it was trite garbage?¡± ¡°Not exactly. Some were nicer than others, but they always came back to that, even in a roundabout sort of way. That¡¯s my first piece of bad news. Nobody, and I mean nobody wants to publish my writing.¡± ¡°This good news better make up for it.¡± Marie said, still staring at all of the rejection letters. ¡°The good news is that I got a job.¡± Jones said. ¡°You got a job? Where?¡± ¡°Here. I start tomorrow. I¡¯ll be flipping burgers but I¡¯ll be earning a little bit to keep the apartment for as long as we can.¡± ¡°Jones, you really don¡¯t have to do that.¡± ¡°Yes, I do.¡± Jones said, fist to the table. ¡°I have to because of all of the stress I¡¯ve put you through since I got here. I¡¯ve been nothing but trouble and it¡¯s around time I sort myself out. I never should have come here in the first place, but I think I should at least try to help while I¡¯m here.¡± ¡°While you¡¯re here?¡± Marie chuckled a bit at this. ¡°So you¡¯re really taking up your promise of moving out?¡± ¡°No, no. Nothing like that. That¡¯s where the second piece of bad news comes in.¡± ¡°What is it?¡± ¡°Marie, I have lung cancer.¡± Terrible There are certain moments within everyone¡¯s life, moments of great peril, that seem to last for an eternity, where time seems to freeze up on you. This is because, to my best approximation, our brains know that this is important information and would rather see us die of something ridiculously gruesome than ever ever ever forget it. This was one of those moments in Marie Joyce¡¯s life. She watched as Jones puffed away on their cigarette. With time frozen in her brain like this, the blue smoke wafted up into the air in slow motion. She took a long, deep breath that, by her account, lasted about three years. ¡°How long have you known?¡± She finally asked them. If you discover this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation. ¡°Since the day of the flood.¡± Jones said, with slow motion blue smoke hovering out of their lips. ¡°That morning I got my diagnosis and that afternoon I saw everybody bloated and floating on the factory floor.¡± ¡°That¡¯s terrible.¡± Marie said. ¡°I know.¡± Jones put out the cigarette and leaned in, their fingers in between one another. ¡°It¡¯s ironic too. I missed the execution but I still got a death sentence.¡± ¡°That¡¯s terrible.¡± Marie said again. It was the only thing that she was able to bring herself to say. ¡°That¡¯s terrible.¡± If A Tree Falls... Marie and Jones paid for their meal and made their way up the four flights of stairs to their new apartment. They didn¡¯t exchange a word the whole time, or throughout the rest of the night. Not much interesting happened throughout the next few days until the pair¡¯s weekly whiskey session on that Friday. They sat down and cracked open the bottle they had been working on last week and shared gracious sips in gracious silence. Finally, Marie broke: ¡°When was the last time you saw a doctor?¡± She asked. ¡°When I got my diagnosis.¡± Jones said. And so they had a long talk about whether or not they should go see a doctor in Greater Columbia and Jones came to the conclusion that it didn¡¯t matter all that much. ¡°I mean,¡± Jones started, ¡°that¡¯s why I¡¯ve been smoking. The doctor said I could fall down dead any minute, so I want to only enjoy myself.¡± ¡°Will you enjoy yourself at the job at the diner?¡± Marie asked. ¡°Not very much, no. But that¡¯s the beauty of it; I could¡¯ve spent the last remaining days I have on this Earth packaging silly little things for [the much more successful company] or I could spend them here, working an honest job and coming home every night to the sound of beautiful music.¡± It was this little speech that really got the drinking started between the two. Eventually, Jones made two requests: ¡°Could you play me something?¡± Was their first request. ¡°And it can be ¡®Mellow My Mind¡¯ by Neil Young if you want.¡± They felt the need to add. ¡°I wanna see something I¡¯ve never seen before.¡± Was their second. ¡°What do you want to see?¡± Marie asked. ¡°I want to see the Atlantic Ocean, gazing from the head of the Statue of Liberty.¡± Marie followed this request by stopping their melody abruptly and grabbing Jones by the sides of their head. ¡°Jones, I¡¯m going to take you to the Statue of Liberty.¡± She said. ¡°I promise you.¡± She felt the need to add. ¡°When would we go?¡± ¡°Whenever you¡¯d like, Marie. Whenever¡¯s good for you, monetarily wise.¡± Marie smiled at this, and Jones smiled too, something that hadn¡¯t happened in their new apartment in a very long time. This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there. Marie woke up the next morning to the loud, emphatic clacking of Jones¡¯ typewriter coming from the kitchen. Jones had set up shop in the kitchen, brewing a pot of coffee and smoking a fresh pack of cigarettes to greet the new day. ¡°You work today?¡± Marie asked. ¡°Yup, in three hours.¡± Jones said, clacking away. ¡°I just decided to get a head-start on a new thing.¡± ¡°A new thing? That¡¯s not very descriptive.¡± ¡°It could be a short story, or it could be a book by the time I¡¯m done with it. Anywho, it¡¯s about the end of the world.¡± ¡°Oh?¡± ¡°So, after the end of the world, the human race lives in a complex of cubicles. Each cubicle has a toilet, a tube where food is delivered three times a day, and a computer terminal. Everyone talks to each other through these computer terminals and this guy has a best friend in the computer. He decides one day that he¡¯s going to break out of his cubicle, and then he goes on a journey throughout the complex, which is miles wide mind you, in order to see his best friend.¡± Marie smiled at this. ¡°What happens at the end?¡± She asked. ¡°I haven¡¯t decided yet. I¡¯m just kind of making it up as I go along.¡± It was at this point that Marie asked where the original copy of ¡°The Unbeatable Foe¡± went, because she would very much like to read that trite garbage. When Jones gave it to her, she maybe read the first seven pages before shipping it off in a manila envelope to her newly earned pen-pal, Stephen Lawrence Jr. Stephen was the only person that Marie talked to throughout those first couple of days when she found out that Jones had cancer. Stephen said that there shouldn¡¯t be anything to worry about, that he¡¯s had cancer plenty of times and this is only Jones¡¯ first bout with the disease. This failed to make Marie feel any better. On their last phone call, Marie warned that she was to send off a copy of ¡°The Unbeatable Foe¡± to Stephen, who took this news gladly. ¡°I¡¯d very much like to read it.¡± Stephen said. ¡°And especially whatever else Mr. Jones has to write.¡± ¡°Jones.¡± Marie said. ¡°It¡¯s just Jones.¡± ¡°Oh, my bad.¡± Stephen made an excuse that he was just an old fart, his head itself turning into a viscous soup. Marie encouraged him that this was nothing to worry about, a mistake often made. Stephen still felt the need to apologize once more. And so, the arrangement was made that Stephen would be the last bastion of ¡°The Unbeatable Foe¡±. After a little bit of working on their book about the end of the world, Jones went to work at the diner, and Marie was left alone in the seemingly huge apartment. Anything seemed huge to her, compared to the drabby apartment that constituted her life a few months prior. Not much moldy food had accumulated since Jones did their first clean up. There was absolutely nothing to do. Marie was hit with a strong stinge of boredom for the first time in a very long time. This boredom gave Marie the chance to practice the piano by herself for the first time in a very long time. She played through almost her entire catalog before Jones returned from the diner, late into the evening. Marie was reminded of a tree, falling alone in the forest. Blood and Black, Sludgy Shit Marie spent many of her days like this, as Jones and her saved up the funds to visit Manhattan Island, which was still called Manhattan Island, coincidentally enough. When Jones would work the morning shift was the best for her. They would get home around the same time that Marie got off of work, if not a little later. When they worked the night shift, they would arrive back greasy and sweaty and baked by the midnight moon. On these nights, Jones wasn¡¯t much for talking. They simply sat there, smoking their cigarettes and reading on their electronic reader. Marie always wanted to make sure that there was music in the house when Jones arrived home. This music would mostly come from the piano, but on days where Marie was having a rough time, she would throw on muzak on the radio. Jones promptly asked her to turn off the ¡°annoying chitter-chatter¡± every time they got home, which became an amusing gag between the two for a long while. Eventually, they did save up enough funds to visit Manhattan Island, and were scheduled to take one week off of work respectively and go see something that Jones, or Marie for that matter, had never seen before. They were set to take off Northeast in two weeks. It was the day after they had made the reservations for the shifty motel in Garden City where they would be commuting to the island from, and it was Friday. I¡¯m sure I don¡¯t have to mention the pattern to you now. They both were drunk on a new bottle of the same old cheap whiskey and Jones was telling a story from their high school days. They had a Mohican haircut of several bright colors back then. It was the story of when they first started smoking cigarettes. The only thing that happened within this story was that their childhood best friend, the one who had given them the laptop that ¡°Return to Sender¡± was initially typed on, gave them a cigarette. The two were celebrating a freshman year of high school in the bag and the dwindling amounts of summer vacations that were left at their disposal. That is all that happened within the story, but Jones took about twenty minutes to tell the whole thing, adding little embellishments and going on little tangents. It was after this story that Jones went into a coughing fit and was hung over the toilet for quite some time. Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation. They coughed and coughed and coughed up blood and black, sludgy shit. Eventually, Jones wound up on the floor, face up and looking at the ceiling light. ¡°I love you.¡± They said. ¡°What?¡± Marie asked. ¡°I love you. As much as I can love anyone or anything anyway. I just wanted to say it.¡± Marie smiled at this, flushing the blood and black, sludgy shit down the toilet. ¡°I love you too, Jones.¡± She said. Jones passed out after this, and she carried them to bed. Dress Rehearsal After the incident with the blood and black, sludgy shit, Jones stopped smoking cigarettes for a while. They eventually picked it back up again. They always said their last cigarette wasn¡¯t far away from them, if they could only find the bottom of the pack. During that short period of time where Jones wasn¡¯t smoking, Marie was, having picked up the habit in her stay in Carl Joyce¡¯s rusty shack. She felt strange being the only smoker in the house. On the last day, before Jones had officially gotten off the wagon again, Marie didn¡¯t smoke a single thing. She kept like this for a week or so, creating a venn diagram of the time in which either party had not been smoking. Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on Royal Road. The night before they were both to leave for Garden City, Marie played a small concert for Jones. It was all of the pieces that Marie and Jones had composed together in the system. It was on a night where Jones came home closer to midnight, soaked in grease. They sat on the couch, smoking their cigarettes and reading their electronic reader when they heard the first note of the first piece. They immediately leapt off of the couch and came running into Marie¡¯s studio. They spent the entire night humming along with the tunes, despite the stomping of boots from their neighbors on the fifth floor. A Letter The next morning, Marie and Jones were about to leave for Garden City when they were stopped by the postman. This was because of no urgent matter, just the fact that Marie happened to be in the lobby at the time. There were coupons and bills yet to be paid but there was also a manila envelope. She opened it up and found the manuscript that she had sent off to Stephen Lawrence Jr., covered page to page with notes, and with a little collection of handwritten notes afterwards. On the front there was a letter, which contained this: To Whom It May Concern: I received the draft of ¡°The Unbeatable Foe¡± and, I have to be honest, it¡¯s not my usual genre. The men in my stories usually don¡¯t wear pants that are so tight in the crotch area. That being said, I did enjoy the story a good deal. I especially enjoyed the scenes of Sleuth stomping around Pittsburgh, a town which I had found to be my home shortly after I went AWOL from the United States Army. Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere. Jones, I¡¯d like to tell you that your story reminds this old fart in the twilight years of his life that the most important things in this world are hope and silliness. I do like that, even though the Earth is doomed at the end of your novel, you have given the reader a little bit of hope and silliness to grasp onto. If you are able to pull through this thing that Marie says you¡¯ve been going through, I think this will be the first lesson that will take you into being a great novelist. Not that I am a novelist myself. I could never come up with something as fantastical as this. I am, as mentioned before, an old fart resigned to his stories of the greatest war to ravage the world and some opinions that could be broadcast to a wide audience at an angry volume if I were a man of higher ego. Unfortunately, my publishing activities stopped and ended with Disposable Firearm, a book that I wrote when I was younger and angrier. I could give you the name and contact information for my editor for that book if you would like. I want to provide anything I can to help get this novel into the hands of more and more people. Enclosed in this envelope you will find the manuscript with various suggestions I have made to enhance your story for a more commercial or more literary setting, depending on your preference. My deepest regards, -Stephen Lawrence Jr. [ ] The pair of Marie and Jones made it to Garden City in as good a health as they could wish for and in a timely manner. The train ride only took about a half an hour, so I won¡¯t bore you with the details of the structure of the boxcar or the quality of light therein. Marie had failed to bring any sort of instrument and Jones had failed to bring a typewriter, or even a spiral notebook. They were simply two human beings, naked from their artistic tools, ready to have as good a time as they could wish for in what was still largely considered to be the greatest city on Earth. They took a cab into the city and the entire thing seemed alive, with more moving parts than either of them could keep track of. A small child threatened to steal Jones¡¯ boots. Smoking a cigarette, they gave the child a couple of dollars and the child then ran away. When asked about the trip later, Jones said that this was their favorite part of the journey, simply for the strangeness of it. The pair spent the first few days window shopping, looking at things that they couldn¡¯t understand or afford, but that would stay in their memories for the rest of their natural born lives. Eventually, they did get a tour through the Statue of Liberty. Marie and Jones were the only people left in the building besides their tour guide, who promptly fucked off after the designated time of the tour, allowing for the pair of friends to sit, smoking cigarettes and watching the sun set over the Atlantic ocean, that giant blob monster that was coming to grab us all and wait for some other godforsaken fish to be stupid enough to walk on land. This book''s true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience. The pair did not say anything to each other. At first, a thought came to Marie¡¯s mind, but then she tried a mental experiment of sorts. She tried to slow down time. She knew, consciously, that this moment was important information and that she would rather die of something gruesome than forget it. And time did slow down for Marie, just this once. Blue smoke lifted out of Jones¡¯ mouth in slow motion and the light glistened in through the edges of Lady Liberty¡¯s tiara. Marie and Jones were two friends, staring down into the edge of oblivion, and smiling in silence. That, I believe, is the most important thing I can tell you about these two people. THE END