They were happy. Fought at the parking lot, argued over the spot, recovered. Urged the boys in, boys didn’t want to go, so they rode in the tube. The clouds dwarfed the mountains and hid the sun half the time which didn’t help the cold but helped the views. She swam out on her own and they watched from the warm rocks. He was smitten then with her. They all went again; they all went in. They called out to each other what they saw. They marveled at big rocks and blue water. Everywhere around them was crystalline light. Mountains in the distance. The stones made it hard to walk so they swam in the shallows on their bellies and laughed as the waves tossed them along the shore.
The entire cafe was some sort of facade. A wonderful one, not as thin as a movie set, but it lacked the grit of a good cafe. The baristas were smiling, for one—they hadn’t stopped their grinning for a second, not even to wipe the counters or contemplate something down the line, and the coffee had been brewing, by his count, for an hour straight. The creature interrogating him seemed in on it.
He knew that, whatever she was, she was going to great lengths to appear as she had all the time in the world, but the man noticed her eyes jutting around the room, her posture changing, leg up, leg down, and he wondered where she had to go. Between the plastered smiles around them and the depth of her gaze, he had to remind himself to keep calm. He reached out in his memory for a book he used to read, but found it difficult to grasp anything.
“What are we doing here?” He asked.
Across from him, she smiled, and a memory of an office, maybe a bank came to him. Her smile felt sanitized, generic, like something made by executives who were trying to recreate a feeling using money.
“Why, don’t you remember? We’re two friends, just going…”
She went on. He looked out the window as he listened. Her words had all the qualities of someone he’d known once, briefly. She spoke with all the phrases one might find in a script about good friends, written by a hermit who’d known little more than penthouses and high society. She reeked of bullshit. Bullshit, he thought. He tasted the word on his mind’s tongue. It tasted familiar. Something inside of him stirred.
A waiter appeared then, robotic smile in tow, and dropped off an almond croissant. It was strange to him that only he would be eating, and still his memories seemed to be on the fritz. He couldn’t recall his own name, only some vague sense that he had been somebody at some time.
The croissant. There was something about it. A different memory washed over him. Someone important that he couldn’t remember. Little bits of light played to him.
She was trying to get him to answer, but he could only stare at the croissant. An almond croissant. A slew of mornings ran through his brain. A woman. His person. He remembered. He remembered.
The creature asked for details, asked him what he was thinking of, but he had enough memory now to know himself, and gave her nothing.
She zipped their jackets up tight.
“Our little secret, right?”
The two little boys nodded.
“Okay,” their mother said, “keep your hats on.”
With a push, their wheels began to turn. With another, their speed picked up. They wondered if it would work again. They laughed as they picked up speed, and their wheels left the sidewalk. Upwards, into a fall sky.
Their sneakers drove them through mountains of cloud, driven in from the peaks to the East. They howled into the wind and threw their hats off. It was hard to remember all the rules when they were flying. Their scooter wheels lit up as they left tracks in the skyscape. They tore down the side of one cloud and up another, screaming like banshees. Bits of vapor clung to their hair as they rode the wind. They looked down on the river, as the world turned and the last arms of sunlight reached out to them. They glided down, and landed back on their block, cheeks red, cold air pulsing in their chests.
Their mother was waiting for them, holding their hats. It was hard for her to let them fly.
“Did you have fun?” She asked.
The change is a subtle one. The modern American claims it to be a trick of light. They don’t pay homage to the warning signals in their guts, the nagging worry at the base of their skull that they’ve been wrenched free of something and traveled a very long way. Maybe they can’t really feel it; maybe they don’t want to. But there are those of us who know the feeling, and we know too not to waste our time trying to explain it. In the old stories, there were always guides, and this is no different. In the old stories, the shadows don’t grow so much as change, and this is no different. In the old stories, those who were led down those trails were altered forever, and we are no different.
TIE fighters screamed behind them in the atmosphere as the brothers argued, yelling back and forth across the cabin.
“Just fix it!” The pilot yelled.
“Suck my balls! Wouldn’t be broken if you could fly—”
A lull in the cabin held as the pilot glared back at his brother. The engineer glared back, wrench in his hand, ready to be thrown. The ship shuddered as an explosion rocked their ship.
“Just fix it,” the pilot said.
The engineer mouthed the words, mocking him, but set to work. The ship rolled, throwing cans and to-go containers around the ship. The engineer hooked his feet in the pipes below him and kept working. The engines behind him whirred to new life.
“There!” He called, now get us out of this”
The pilot said nothing, but pushed a lever forward, and switched five or six toggles around him.
The ship swung to one side, and the engineer smashed into the wall of the cabin.
“Bastard!”
The pilot smiled, but his joy was cut short.
“Hey,” he called back. The engineer leaned into the cockpit and looked out, “too many,” and then he was away into the depths of the ship.
“Top or bottom?” the pilot called out.
“Bottom!” He called as he climbed down into the gunner chair, and donned the headset. They no longer had to yell.
They fell into a sort of trance then. Always had when the times called for it. Both sat with their eyes on the world in front of them, speaking softly, clearly.
“Bringing you two,” the pilot said. The ship rolled and cut hard.
In the gunner turret, the engineer’s chair floated left as he aimed, and bounced as he fired.
“Roll,” the engineer said.
“I’m going.”
They flew down canyons and scattered the TIEs, picking them off one by one.
When they were alone, skimming the atmosphere smoothly, the engineer climbed back into the cockpit and took the copilot’s seat.
“Clear for now,” he said, “decent flying.”
The pilot shrugged, “sloppy shooting.”
They each smiled. The pilot asked, “you think we’ll find them?”
Flying the banner of hope was just another role among the many the young engineer had kept up.
“Can’t hurt to keep looking.”
He looked up to see the pilot watching him. He grinned, and his brother couldn’t help but return the gesture.
They escaped into a cool sea of stars above.