A-Void by Babak Govan (phonics readers txt) 📕

parking lots going empty for a day, much less for months. I traverse the ironed gate before the Disneyland Railroad and for an instant, I see Kayla wave at me from inside one of the coaches.

When she was ill, she sat in the cornermost areas of the house. One night before a dinner party, I found her resting an elbow on the nook table, brushing the remains of her hair with the same hand.

“Hey.”

“I can’t look pretty.”

“Baby, you’re beautiful.”

“My makeup doesn’t even make me pretty anymore.” Her lips quivered. “Don’t look at me.”

“You make your makeup pretty.”

A teardrop rolled down her cheek, and as I touched her cheekbone she became so small again.

That night, I worried again if her eyes would open in the morning. In the morning, like always, I awoke early, ready to shake her. It was taking longer to rouse her.

“Please open your eyes for me,” I whispered. “Tell me about your rest, your dreams.”

“Hello? Hello?”

Water from muscular green hoses runs through capillaries ahead of the Main Street Opera House. The golden Emporium’s open doors invite me to observe its many trinkets and souvenirs. Past the Penny Arcade and Candy Palace, I gaze at the meandering metallic letters etched on the windows below the embellished rooflines, illuminated by the handsome light posts that peer into the paneled corridors.

As I approach the central Partners statue, I recall learning about Walt Disney’s philosophy at a Boredom Society meeting. “It’ll be worth the investment,” he replied to warnings that decorated trolleys and carriages and elaborate parades would be wasteful.

I follow the weeds squeezing through the dividers between the reconstruction of the retro-futuristic Tommorowland and Matterhorn Mountain’s bobsled station. Water falls from the mountain’s blue ice caves halfway up, but I do not hear the Abominable Snowman’s roar.

Strangely, I feel lured to go behind-the-scenes. I jump the turnstiles and climb the roller coaster tracks to Harold, the Snowman. His unlit eyes the color of dried blood. I touch his white mane and extended fangs and claws, feeling the hands that put him together.

Behind him, from the entrance of the cave, I scan the park. Outside, to the east, two more smoke clouds form.

By the Flying Dumbos of Fantasyland, an area I have always imaged as built of pastel candy pieces, my attention is pulled from the colorful elephant topiaries to the gigantic billboard raised grudgingly above Pinocchio’s Village Haus cottage restaurant.

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Behind the “Cast Only” sign hanging over a stately wooden gate, a sidelined parade of porcelain teacups and an enormous blue caterpillar wait. Maybe beyond them, past the huge costume heads of the Seven Dwarfs, I imagine, are hidden garages of unrealized attractions. I realize that I can visit the members-only Club 33 in New Orleans Square, but my burning back reminds me that that’s not a priority.

I watch a few mallard ducks trail through the Rivers of America, where the Mark Twain Riverboat shadows Tom Sawyer Island, and no Davy Crocket canoes are among them.

I return to Main Street, and from its Emporium I take a small Steamboat Willie doll for Isabella. Almost involuntarily, before leaving through the corridors, I look up at Walt Disney’s private apartment above the skinny Fire House. Will Disneyland too soon be gone?

Cleveland greets me behind self-inflicted foggy windows. I place Steamboat Willie beside Isabella’s unicorn and then let him out to share a scrap meal with me.

I gaze south toward Mexico, but the infection rate there is 99 percent. We must return to Los Angeles with our fears about Jasmine and Isabella’s whereabouts, and everyone else’s.

TIME 2

“He’s bought vaccines for his whole family! He thinks I’m aligned with him somehow.”

“So you can get them?” Jasmine threw the stack of books she was carrying onto the sofa. Before I could answer, she said, “Billy, I can’t believe we can get vaccines!” She burst into tears and hugged me tightly. “We might live.”

“We still have to get into New Jamestown, but if we’re not granted our Expatriate Notices, we just have to survive with the vaccines.”

“Hold on.” She looked at her Organelle. “Why is my boss texting me at this time of night? It’s almost nine.”

“Again?”

“He wants me to look into something right now,” she said, scrambling through her Organelle. “Today they asked me to add another menu to the automated phone system. It’s the twelfth one! You have to go through twelve steps! You know what the worst part is? They had me install a punisher, so that if you press ‘0’ they kick you back to the very beginning again! And, that’s after I spent half the day just trying to log on so I could work. I constantly fantasize about getting completely out of The Centrifuge!”

“Just ignore it, honey. Soon, we’ll be working just two marathon workdays each. Imagine all the time we’ll save on meaningless commutes, meetings, memos, mandatory breaks. We’ll spend the rest of our time doing what we want! Everyone will