Farah Rishi - I Hope You Get This Message

Still, Marco didn’t even glance away from the TV. Jesus. Jesse wondered how long it had been since he’d even blinked.

A gaudy wall of color behind the counter gave him pause. Rows of scratch-off lottery tickets, screaming promises of instant cash, including Lucky Star Lotto, the kind of tickets Dad used to buy compulsively and squirrel away in an old utility cabinet in his work shed, where he’d spent most of his time with those goddamned, good-for-nothing machines.

Once, when Jesse asked why, his dad grinned, revealing white teeth against his thick black beard. Times can get tough, kid , he’d explained, locking the drawer. Luck is valuable. We gotta keep luck for a rainy day. For all Jesse knew, his old man had never scratched a single one. It pissed Jesse off to think about it now. All that money his dad had thrown away, money that could have been used for bills, for family movie nights, for keeping his promise to take Mom to Cali with him one day. So much waste .

The door chimed. A guy in a navy-blue track jacket entered the store. Black hair, a sharp nose, a clean face—he didn’t look much older than Jesse. Though the QuikTrip was thick with the smell of burned coffee, when the boy edged over to the coffee station, Jesse got a whiff of his shampoo: woodsy, like freshly cut cedar, mixed with something like vanilla.

He had never believed in things like “aura”—though his counselor had told him if he had one, it’d be the color of the night sky, dark blue and hazy purple. He wasn’t even sure, sometimes, that he believed in souls. But if she was right—that some people did give off auras and presences and energies—then this guy’s could only be described as a fiery-white, unrelenting orbit, a gravitational pull. And Jesse was caught in its path.

The boy filled his cup to the brim, and it took his long legs only two easy strides to bring him to the register. Marco tore himself from the TV and recoiled in surprise, as though he hadn’t even noticed the guy come in, much less appear in front of him.

Marco scratched his chin, his expression returning to its usual state of vacancy. “You need a lid for that?”

“Nah, gonna chug it,” the boy said. His voice was a smoky vibration of bass, and something shivered down Jesse’s spine. Did he go to a different school? Was he a tourist? Just driving through? He wanted to see his face, a want like a rush of blood to the head.

He tugged at the leather cuff around his wrist . Impulsive. The word rang in his brain. His counselor had called him that. You lack impulse control. Like a dog chasing a car . Think about that the next time you’re itching for a chase. His fingers slid beneath the smooth leather, and he squeezed his wrist, hard.

The register dinged; Marco slapped the drawer to close it. Change exchanged hands.

“I’ve always wondered—does anyone actually buy those?” the boy asked suddenly. Jesse couldn’t see what he was referring to, but Marco spun to see what the boy was looking at: the lottery tickets, glittering like jewels.

“Oh yeah. You’d be surprised.”

“Yeesh.” The boy ran his hand through his thick mop of hair. “Can’t put a price on hope, I guess.” His laugh was rich, buttery smooth. Like he put his whole soul into it.

He left as quickly as he’d come, leaving only the subtle smell of cedarwood. Jesse slipped his hands into his pockets, feeling the peanut butter jar and bread still snug in their place: weights that tethered him to his purpose. He started for the door.

Suddenly, the store phone started ringing at the same time that Marco’s cell began blowing up with text message pings, the simultaneous sounds breaking through Jesse’s mind-numbing daze and snapping him to attention.

“Oh, shit ,” Marco was saying to himself, not answering his texts at all, just staring at a news reporter on the TV screen. The show he was watching had been interrupted by a breaking news announcement. Marco turned up the volume.

It was live footage of the president himself, pink-faced and shaken as he read out an official statement. “… was decoded at fifteen hundred by US intelligence. Officials have confirmed that the alien planet calls itself Alma, and that the signal we received is indeed a message, a warning of an impending judgment…”

The words seemed to blur in Jesse’s head. Something about seven days.

A colony. Earth was the colony.

Termination, an experiment, an alien threat against humanity. The static was actually a message , the worst possible kind. He could barely keep up.

Then there was a rapid slew of information on new travel restrictions and security measures… but it was like Jesse’s brain had imploded.

Security measures? Was this a joke? What kind of security measures were you supposed to take when it came to freaking mass genocide by an alien planet? He felt dizzy. His thoughts were spiraling too fast to understand. The convenience store faded to white, falling away. Only the sound of his own breathing echoed in his head, drowning out the president’s televised voice.

Seven days. Seven days. Earth might end in seven days. For practically as long as he could remember, Jesse had wanted a way out. But this was ridiculous. A conspiracy theory. It had to be.

Could it be real? He was a Roswell kid, for Christ’s sake. Half the tourists that came through believed in little green men. He knew better than to fall for this shit.

And yet… this was different. This was the president. Would the president lie?

Okay, yes, maybe. But was everyone lying?

He wondered, fleetingly, whether his counselor had heard the news. He wondered how she would try and spin this one for the positive. How she would try and “turn loss into opportunity.” How much loss would she face, would they all face, before she would admit it was nothing but bad luck?

His eyes trailed from the TV, and suddenly, the little gold stars on the lotto tickets were all he could see—glistening, blinding.

Times can get tough, kid. We gotta keep luck for a rainy day.

He ducked under the counter, as though he could feel the stars pulling him in like magnets. He peeked over at Marco, still glued to his screen. The cell phone in his grip lit up with more text messages.

Can’t put a price on hope, I guess.

Jesse’s fingers hovered over the scratch-offs, itching for the feel of their perforated edges. Itching to feel his fingertips skirt the surface of stars. He pulled at a corner ticket and tore.

“Hey!”

He swiveled around. Marco had turned and caught sight of him. For a second they were frozen there, staring at each other, while above Marco the corner TV still babbled the news of the maybe-end-of-the-world.

It was exactly like a dream.

Except that it wasn’t.

Before Marco could say anything else, Jesse vaulted over the counter and bolted for the door.

Marco was right behind him. Jesse reached out and knocked over a magazine rack. Marco tripped over it but managed to grab the back of Jesse’s jacket as he went down, pulling at it, almost taking Jesse down with him. But Jesse caught himself and jerked away. Marco was back on his feet, nimble for his size, just as Jesse regained his balance. In this small space, there was no way Jesse could outrun him; he’d have Jesse pinned to the ground a few feet out the door.

He was facing Marco now, who was breathing heavily. Jesse hadn’t given him enough credit.

“Hand it over,” Marco said.

When Jesse tried to pivot, Marco rushed forward and threw a punch. Jesse dodged it easily. His countless suspensions and occasional expulsions for fighting came in handy.

But all that was over now. Everything was over. The future looked like one split second of mushroom cloud. What the hell did Marco think he was fighting for? Why did he care?