Ten-year-old Bobby Dimas stands in the overgrown wild grass beside a rusted chain link fence. Cars drone by on the other side. His left shoe is planted on a dirt hill carpeted with black ants. A few climb the side of his Nike, but most trek around, forming a distinct shoe-shaped outline on the ground.
Bobby sees none of this. He’s the Bionic Man. He’s far away, stopping criminals from robbing a bank.
“Bobby.”
The voice hooks him and drags him back into his quiet corner of the schoolyard.
“We need to go.”
“Leave me alone.” Bobby follows the fence. The dry grass is silent under his feet.
“Bobby.”
What would the Bionic Man do? He would turn around and punch the guy, is what. His bionic arm would make the power sound and the man would go flying.
“I said leave me alone! I’m not supposed to talk to strangers.”
“I’m not a stranger,” the man says, and as if to verify this a squirrel shuttles down a nearby tree, beelines up his body, and nestles on his shoulder. “We need to go.” The wind flutters his long black jacket like a cape. His eyes are sun-glistening algae on waves.
“Who are you?”
“You can call me Sam.”
“Please leave me alone, Sam.”
“I’m here to take you home.”
“I can walk home.”
Sam chuckles.
The playground has emptied out, and Bobby breaks into a run, certain he’s missed final bell. As he does, a film of mottled dirt stretches over the walls of his school like a scab. Moss sprouts from cracks and thickens into throbbing veiny tendrils, which crawl along window frames and up eavestroughs. Bobby stops, and the strange metamorphosis stops too.
“What’s happening to my school?”
“It’s falling away. Don’t run so fast.”
“I did that?”
“Yes you did.”
Bobby drops cross-legged to the ground, buries his face in his sweaty hands, and cries. This day has been a jumble. He always has breakfast with Mom before she drops him off for school, then waits around the locked blue doors with the other early kids, the clanging bell, then home class, then recess. Today he doesn’t remember having breakfast, doesn’t remember waiting for the bell or being in home room. He doesn’t remember waking up. Today hangs in space, as cold and smooth and lonely as the cement floor in the gym shower. How long has he been out here? An hour? A year?
Sam sits down beside him and wraps a strong arm around his thin shoulders.
“I know this is hard.”
“What’s happening to me?”
“You’re being reborn.”
“Like a Jehovah’s Witness?”
Sam laughs and shakes his head. “Not like a Jehovah’s Witness, no. More like you’ve woken from a dream. You have powers now. For one, you’re not stuck in time.”
“I didn’t mean to wreck my school.”
“I know. It just happens.”
“I want it to go back to normal.”
“Okay then, close your eyes.”
Bobby closes his eyes. The ground dissolves under his feet and he’s falling; he reaches out and grasps Sam’s arm.
“Now open them.”
They’re in the school yard. The building has been restored. Kids run and scream all around them. They are at the base of Big Hill, which looms over them like an ancient king. Countless toboggans have skimmed Big Hill’s slopes. Endless children have had their first kiss in its lush grass. To grades one through six Big Hill is immortal.
Bobby remembers what happened, and recess no longer floats in space. Dennis Grady had come down the hill on his banana seat bike like he could fly. He hadn’t seen Bobby, kicking reeds at the bottom.
Suddenly the playground is empty. The sun is going down.
“We have to go,” Sam says, as he takes Bobby’s hand. “How do you usually wake up in the morning?”
“My mom kisses my forehead.”
Sam leans forward and gently kisses Bobby’s forehead. Big Hill rumbles and cracks down the center. Light spills out, forming a trail to Bobby’s feet.
“Let’s run,” Sam says. They do, hand in hand. As they enter Big Hill, the dream world fades behind them like it never was.
Bobby focuses his bionic eye. He can see forever.
THE END