“Can we see a picture of the ride?” asked 2, and Tom handed them each the result of a bright flash they all remembered vaguely now that they were reminded of it, and more vividly each second as the photograph carved its lines into the blur of their memories.
The photograph was from the last moment of the first part of the ride, right when the fear of what was about to happen was inseparable from the wonder of what would come next. Everyone who worked on roller coasters knew that this was the part of the ride where all the best pictures are taken, where everyone looks most foolish and beautiful and fearful and true, and where no one, no matter how brave or wise or vain or camera-conscious, can hide a look that reveals that they truly don’t know what’s going to happen next.
“See,” said 2. “Look. You enjoyed it. Look at your face!”
Tears gathered in the corners of 1’s eyes as he stared at the picture.
“That was so long ago,” said 1. “So much happened after that.”
“What should we call this roller coaster?” asked Tom.
“Life,” said 2.
Everyone got quiet.
“Yeah. Life,” said 8.
“Life,” agreed 1.
“Life,” said 6.
People nodded in silence.
Christo, watching behind the glass, nodded.
“ ‘Monster,’ ” said 5.
“ ‘Monster’?” asked the focus group leader.
“Yeah. Monster!”
“How about The Monster?” suggested 10.
“No,” said 5. “All caps. MONSTER: The Roller Coaster.”
“ ‘Monster’ sounds cool,” said 4.
No! thought Christo.
“I like The Monster,” repeated 10.
“Me too,” said 11.
No, no, no! thought Christo.
“I still like Life,” said 2. “Always will.”
“Let’s take a vote,” said the focus group leader.
Five people raised their hands for MONSTER, three for Life, four for The Monster, and one person (1) said he didn’t have a preference.
“ ‘MONSTER’ it is. Thanks again, and everyone be sure you fill out your paperwork before you leave. Oh, and did everyone get their refreshment-discount coupons to the park?”
Christo was angry almost beyond the borders of the much-surveyed powers of his own comprehension.
MONSTER?!
He did not spend the last nineteen years of his career dreaming that one day he might be remembered primarily as the designer of an amusement park roller-coaster ride called “MONSTER”! Or “The Monster”! Or whatever the hell they were going to call it now.
But his dream was dead now, murdered by idiot whims, and there was nothing he could do about it anymore.
Oh well, thought Christo. That’s life.
Kellogg’s (or: The Last Wholesome Fantasy of the Middle-School Boy)
It wasn’t like this boy to throw a tantrum in the cereal aisle of the supermarket, and it wasn’t like his mother to give in to one, but here they were, for some reason, both making an exception.
“Okay,” she said, and threw the box deep into the far corner of the main part of the shopping cart. “Okay. Don’t let your father see it.”
The family never bought sugar cereals and never bought name-brand cereals, so this split-second sight of his mother’s wrist flicking an official name-brand sugar cereal into the cart was something he had to keep replaying in his head for the next several minutes until he was literally dizzy on the image of the impossible. The sensation of seeing and reseeing that wrist snap was something he couldn’t make sense of, something that would be best described by words he didn’t know yet: surreal, pornographic.
The boy kept an even pace with the white-dirt-frosted black wheels so he could stare uninterrupted at the creature that he and his mother had captured. Yes: there in the cart, after all these years, was Tony the Tiger, caged at last. And Tony the Tiger promised even more fun ahead: in a bright blast of words spilling from his sportive expression, Tony the Tiger explained that the box on which he was emblazoned contained not just name-brand sugar cereal—as if that weren’t enough—but also a miniature treasure chest, and—as if that weren’t enough—inside the treasure chest was a secret code, and—as if that weren’t enough!—the code could possibly lead to a cash prize of one hundred thousand dollars.
(When the boy looked closer, as the box rode across the checkout belt toward the outside world, on the way to the arguably more humane captivity of a kitchen cabinet, he noticed that Tony and the text were technically separate, with no speech bubble connecting them: Tony the Tiger wasn’t saying that; he was just next to those words. Somehow, this felt like it gave the promise a touch less credibility, even though, when the boy thought about it years later, it would occur to him that this should probably have given it more. It didn’t matter, though: everything, even this late-breaking potential scandal, rang with the drama of a new name-brand world he knew he never wanted to leave.)