Santiago Dawn
First published in Canadian Science Fiction magazine Neo-Opsis. This story is set in a post-apocalyptic world, where people live on giant island of plastic rubbish. Coconut palms and yams grow on it (those grow on almost anything!) and of coarse the island floats.
I was waiting on the beach, sitting cross-legged on the sand while the breeze stirred the coconut palms. I doodled patterns with a bottle-cap: a tube-light, a battery, wires between them, as if my idea would blow away before Nelson got here.
On the churning sea, his outrigger was easy to spot.
The main hull was bright blue. Nelson made it himself from billie-drums cut into strips, made soft in the oven and hammered in shape in the hot forge.
The boat sliced the waves, coming straight for me.
Nelson waved. "Hoy
