But I’m no longer listening, only tittering uncontrollably. I’m no longer doing much of anything but marveling at the absurdity of it all—the futility. And then I’m not even doing that; but just staring at Sunny. Then I’m crying as the tv drones on and the whump-whump of the helicopter slowly remanifests.
––––––––
“Sunny? Preston? Hey!”
I sit up with a start at the sound of Peter’s voice; push myself off the ground.
“Preston?” asks Peter. “Oh, thank God. Is—is everybody all right? Where’s—”
And we just look at her, maybe for five minutes, maybe a hundred.
At last he says, “I ... I circled back immediately ... once I figured out what had happened. But. But you were already gone.” We stare at the corpse; at the slim white girl with her side ripped open and her intestines poking out. “I
