How Jerry and Betty Became the Least Entertaining Couple in the Neighborhood (Section 13)
CBC Reporter Bonnie Gartner raced to the resort’s parking lot. Bonnie, a good physical specimen who kept herself in shape with daily exercise routines, sprinted around most others even though she carried what she could from the cabin she shared with Louise. Looking over her shoulder once she got to their car, she couldn’t see her partner among the others fleeing the floating mountains. “Louise? Lou?”
People raced past her. None carried suitcases, valises, trunks. Some were in streetclothes, some were in nightclothes, some were in sweats, some were in towels or bedsheets.
“Lou?”
Engines started.
Gartner swam upstream through the mob to their cabin. Lou, a heavy woman who carried her weight evenly, stood outside whitewashing a canvas. Bonnie spun her around so they faced each other. “Lou?” What are you doing?”
Lou frowned at her lover. “What does it look like I’m doing, dearest?”
Gartner grabbed the woman’s arm. “Look in the sky, Lou. We’ve got to get out of here.” She pointed. “Can’t you see?”
Louise freed her arm. “How come you never pay attention to my paintings?”
Gartner’s eyes fixed on another sky-mountain coming into existence. “Will you get in the goddamn car? I’ll leave you here, by Christ. We’ve got invaders from Mars and you want me to look at your pictures?”
Lou lifted a palette and prepared colors. “If they are invaders, do you think you can outrun them? If they want to kill us, wouldn’t they have done so already? Do you think any invaders who can pop things that big in and out of existence cares if I paint a lake?”
Gartner watched a dark mist, a shadow, wisp down from the sky and embrace her partner, now so strange, so foreign, so other.
“What’s happened to you, Lou? What’s going on?”
Lou turned back to her canvas, lifted a brush, made a masterful stroke. “I don’t know. Isn’t it wonderful?”
Questions or comments? Bring ’em on. They’ll help me craft a better story.
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