Story: Come Walk With Me (v1)

This vignette takes place in a real place (see included photograph). A beautiful build by AM Radio. Here is the slurl if you would like to visit.)

"Come walk with me" I said, and extended my hand to her as she arrived through the portal door. She looked at my outstretched hand, hesitating long enough that I thought she would refuse. We walked slowly, hand in hand, down the shiny tar road in the middle of the desert. The land around us was barren, the recent persistent lack of rain leading to cracks big enough that little furtive creatures darted in and out. Perhaps there was some moisture to be had deep inside the parched earth. Nothing grew though on either side of the road as far as the eye could see. No man made structures broke the vast expanse, other than the road itself, straight as an arrow. We walked down the middle of the road for a while, the painted yellow center lines between us, dividing, stretching with no end in time. I looked back for a moment, and perhaps because of the haze under the baleful sun, it looked to me like the yellow lines weren't there at the beginning of the road, that nothing had divided us back where we had started. We walked towards what seemed like a small tornado on the road, open big black beautiful umbrellas whirling about in the whooshing air. There was nothing else in the little dust storm, just the umbrellas. We each tried to catch the umbrellas several times but with no success. There was to be no respite from the sun. She laughed sadly, tugged on my hand, and we continued on down the road. In the outstretched silence we could see the ragged shadow of a great big tree in the distance. As we approached it, the tree itself seemed more like a spaceship floating above the road with only its shadow on the ground. We paused briefly at this wonder and then walked on under the floating tree to the car. An old car, beautifully maintained, its grill gleaming, its headlights bright, its engine growling steadily. An empty car at the end of the road. Perhaps it could take us back to the beginning, back to where we had started.