Cast of Wonders 502: Little Wonders 34 – Separation & Connection• Authors:
Lucy Zhang and
Vera Brook• Narrators:
Eliza Chan and
Sofia Quintero • Host:
Cup Jacob• Audio Producer:
Jeremy Carter"Of Bugs, Debts, and Distant Planets" was originally published in Fifth Di… Magazine in June 2021.“Delayed Arrival” is a Cast of Wonders original.Click here to listen to Episode 502"Of Bugs, Debts, and Distant Planets" by Vera BrookThe blue-green farming fields of Kenor surround me like a waist-deep sea as I sweep another fern, the bugs rattling like pebbles down the clear tube of my vacuum. One cold, alien sun hangs to my right, another to my left.
There’s nothing I’ll miss about this world when I leave tonight.
Except Jace.
"Delayed Arrival" by Lucy ZhangThey won’t let Ophelia onto the train even though Daddy has already been seated. She can see him by the window in the fancy car with the conference tables between the one-by-two leather seating. His hat casts a shadow on his profile, but she can still make out the familiar bumpy slope of his nose and his long eyelashes and his light, snowy hair. He looks away from the window as she shouts Daddy and the staff have to pull her away from the edge of the platform. The train whistles.
Daddy says this train is the most advanced of its kind. It lets water into a heat exchanger connected to the exhaust system, vaporizes the water to create superheated steam, and directly conveys the steam into the ports of a fuel injection engine. It’s all over the news that this train can take you across the country in only a few hours, all the way to the Outside. Tickets are restricted since the train can’t carry everyone, but everyone wants to leave. Her friend Pat told Ophelia that he was getting snuck out in his father’s huge suitcase, that the ticketers don’t check important passengers’ luggage—it’s too much work and they don’t want to risk their jobs or their own tickets by upsetting favored customers.Tags: abandonment, connection, Cup Jacob, debt, dystopia, Eliza Chan, exploitation, families, Jeremy Carter, Little Wonders, Lucy Zhang, partners, separation, Sofia Quintero, trains, Vera Brook
