In this slice-of-life story set in September 1979, we meet Laurie Caswell, a bookstore clerk at the Northbrook Mall. That Saturday night she goes to the movies with her boyfriend, Dennis Nolan. Later, they go to her house and share some booze. After he leaves, she has a vivid dream of the dying mall in 2021 and is shocked at the darkness that engulfs the future. Will the nightmare come true, or will the old book she discovers the next day at a yard sale help change the course of humanity forever?
It’s 1979 and Laurie Caswell is working as a bookstore clerk at the Northbrook Mall. That Saturday evening, she sees a movie with her boyfriend, Dennis Nolan. Instead of dining at a restaurant, the teenage couple goes to her parents’ suburban house for some adult beverages. He leaves, and in the early hours of the morning, she has a horrifying nightmare.
A nightmare of a future where the mall resembles a prison. It’s populated with overweight, black-clad people wearing face masks, and lining up outside the former Sears department store for mandatory Convict-21 injections.
Will the nightmare come true, or will the old book she discovers the next day at a yard sale help change the course of humanity forever?
Excerpt
“The signs on the door demanded that recipients of the Convict-21 vaccine must wear masks, be over the age of twelve and I stopped reading the sign after that. The cosmetics section of the once-thriving department store was minus its display cases. The Avon and Revlon makeup kits were gone. Vibrant young salespeople offering sprays of perfume were absent. No floral fragrances lingered in the air other than generous gusts of alcohol-based sanitizer from spray bottles being squirted by uniformed medical workers. It reminded me of some sort of pest-control team—and it appeared like we were the pests.”
Hearts of Gold
Synopsis
by
Frank P. Whyte
Portland, Oregon is known as the City of Roses. Of course that’s an odd name for a city whose mere mention conjures images of driving winds and torrential ra
A homonymless man writes shows what it's like to look up the laid he skirts when you’re lying prone(d) to the sidewalk, beer / joint / needle dangling from your hand /lips / arm.
