Page 15

There’s grass under my feet and a soft breeze. It’s warm and so sunny that I need to lift my hand to block out the rays so I can see what is going on.

I am surrounded by people—lots of people. It appears to be a festival of some sort. A big stage is set up in the distance, and a band is playing some folky rock song I don’t know. A few people are gathered at the base of the stage, but for the most part, people are lounging on blankets or lawn chairs.

It’s less Coachella and more of a small-town country festival.

I look around, frantically searching for anyone or anything familiar. There’s a street with shops that I don’t know, and a large body of water in the distance that could be an ocean or maybe one of the great lakes.

The festivalgoers are a mix of families, elderly, and a few people my age. I get a sinking feeling and realize that I was hoping to see a glimpse of Larry again, but I don’t see him anywhere.

“These guys aren’t bad,” says a guy a few feet to the left of me. He’s sitting in a lawn chair, his feet outstretched in front of him, an open beer in one hand and a nose covered in a layer of white zinc.

“They aren’t good, either,” says his friend, leaning over to grab his own beer from a little red cooler. As he does, his fisherman’s hat slips off and falls to the grass. His long red hair catches in the sunlight, and I realize I do recognize him. It’s the busker from the subway.

“Hey,” I call out, stepping toward them. Neither turn. It’s as if they don’t hear me. Sure enough, when I reach out to shake the man’s shoulder, my hand passes right through as if I were a ghost.

“I’m definitely not dead,” I tell myself.

But I’m also not dreaming. At least, it doesn’t feel like a dream. I feel like me. I have complete agency over my whole body, and everything around me seems so…normal.

Except maybe for the watermelons. There’s a disproportionate amount of watermelon-related paraphernalia. Watermelon tablecloths. Watermelon decorations. There’s even a group of elderly women in watermelon-themed clothing dancing next to the stage.

I’m distracted by the busker standing. He shoves his hands into his ripped khaki cargo shorts and nods along with the band onstage. “For such a shitty band their drummer is decent. More than decent.”

As if to illustrate that point, the drummer bangs out a rhythmic solo that has the crowd cheering.

The song ends with a final clash of the cymbals. The crowd claps and whoops loudly. The lead singer calls out a “thank you, everybody” before waving to the crowd and running offstage.

“I’m going to go talk to him.” The redheaded busker turns to his friend, who shrugs before leaning back in his seat.

“I’ll be back in a bit.”

He reaches down toward the cooler and rummages through a bag next to it. When he stands, he’s holding a black jacket—Mackenzie’s jacket? Or Larry’s? He reaches into the pocket and pulls out a pack of cigarettes. He removes one from the pack, then tosses the rest along with the jacket into his now vacant seat.

I want to stay and examine the jacket more closely, but the busker is walking away through the crowd, which has dispersed some since the band walked offstage. I give up and follow him toward a crop of white tents, next to which there is a small carnival with a temporary Tilt-A-Whirl, and a giant slide you ride down on in potato sacks. I can smell French fries and hear the collective cries of happy children. It’s so vivid and real and yet I know that it’s very much not.

“Hey, man,” the busker says to a guy in a black T-shirt and jeans who is smoking next to a black amp with a guitar case on top. He looks like the singer from the band.

“I’m looking to talk to your drummer. Is he around?”

The singer shakes his head. “He had to head back to work.”

The busker looks around. His eyes settle on a small blue tent with a table underneath that has a sign that reads Royal Canadian Legion, 50/50 draw. He jogs over to the table, speaks with one of the men behind it. The man hands the busker a pen, then tears off a piece of the white paper plate in front of him. The busker scrawls something down on it, hands the pen back to the man, and jogs back over to the singer and hands him the piece of paper plate.

“Would you mind giving this to him and asking him to call me? I’d really appreciate it.”

The singer eyes the torn piece of plate, the grease stain above the phone number clearly visible.

He takes it and nods, then opens his mouth as if he’s about to say something, but before he does I’m sucked right back out and plopped down in the middle of my living room.

“What was that?” I say aloud, momentarily forgetting about Mackenzie sleeping just an open door away.

Hallucinating about my uncle in the subway at least feels logical. I miss him. I think constantly about how I wished we had more time.

But hallucinating about some random band in some random field with people I’ve never met before—that makes no sense.

What if I’m sick?

My brain pivots to that horrible thought.