Looking for Hope

by: Dawn DeWinter

 

 CHAPTER 14 – THROUGH THE REARVIEW MIRROR

One thing was certain, that Dawn had nothing to do with it. It was Pepe’s fault entirely. For Dawn was having sex with Carlos in the back seat of Carlos’s Oldsmobile; so you see she couldn’t have caused the car accident.

The way Dawn was having sex with Carlos was like this: First, she held the poor thing down by his neck with one hand, and then with the other she rubbed his body all over, the wrong way, against the grain of his hair. Carlos was lying quite still and trying to get sexually excited – while no doubt feeling that this was all meant for his own arousal.

But Pepe had been sexually satisfied by Kermesse earlier in the afternoon, who was now curled up half asleep on the front seat beside him as he drove the Oldsmobile along Interstate 40 west of Oklahoma City. Pepe was possibly distracted by the game of romps going on in the back seat. He began staring at the car mirror (or looking-glass) when he heard Dawn exclaim, "O, you wicked thing! Your mother should have taught you better manners!" Carlos was sitting on one knee, putting out one hand and gently touching Dawn’s balls.

"Do you want my stick?" Dawn asked. "I’ve got plenty of stick. I’ll light a bonfire in you, Carlos. You arrested me, and you’ve not been punished for that yet. I’ve been trying to decide on the appropriate punishment, and I’ve decided it’s a spanking. I’ll kiss you gently as I do it, and as I make myself snug inside in you. Then afterwards, you’ll dress yourself as Conchita, and this time I’ll blow you."

Carlos had replied, "Let's pretend that I'm a hungry wolf, and you're a bone."

"No let’s pretend you’re the Queen, Carlos. That means you must roll over on your stomach even before I ask, and I must spank your bottom. All the most important queens have been English. Why think how different the world would be had there never been Queen Mary the Orange or Queen Matilda the Plant-a-gent or Victoria who liked her men to have a Prince Albert!"

"The English love being spanked, as EVERYONE knows. The Scotch must like it too, since they go around with a bare bottom under those tartan skirts they wear. They’re practically begging for a friendly spank, aren’t they? However, no one talks about the Scotch. They’re sort of like Canadians that way. So all I know for certain is that if you’re an English Queen, I must spank your bottom until it’s quite red."

Carlos didn’t want to be spanked. He folded his arms across his chest instead. Dawn wasn’t going to take no for an answer. While she’d already spanked two judges, a district attorney, a high school principal, and three prison guards, she’d never spanked a police officer. She was dying to try it. So she told him to look in the rearview mirror to see how sulky he looked. "You’re being bad," she chided, "which means I really will have to spank you."

There was some mock fighting, then a "don’t you dare," then the sound of a slap, then some giggling, and finally a "how did you like that?"

It was all too much for Pepe. Obsessed with the rearview mirror, he forgot the road ahead. Somehow – he was never able to explain how it happened – the Oldsmobile ended up going the wrong way on the Interstate. In a way, all looked normal: the Oldsmobile was dutifully staying within the white lines, but everything was abnormal, for a car does not normally travel at high speed against traffic on a divided highway. Yet it somehow got through the oncoming traffic. Possibly the silvery ground mist protected it from collision.

Dawn screamed in the back seat. In sexual ecstasy. Kermesse screamed in the front seat. In mortal terror.

Pepe aimed the Oldsmobile at the nearest ramp. He hardly knew how he got there through the traffic. It seemed just to melt away, except for a twelve-year-old Volvo being driven by a little old man, who grinned at Pepe. The Oldsmobile veered to miss the oncoming Swede. (Those Volvos are, after all, built like tanks!)

Consequently, Pepe wasn’t able to control it as it hurtled down the entrance ramp, with the result that it forced a glazier’s truck off the road. A huge pane of mirrored glass went flying off the truck. Through the mirror the Oldsmobile drove, the glass shattering into a million pieces that were – thanks to a benign Providence – either too small or too large to harm the Oldsmobile or its passengers. After crashing through the looking glass, the Oldsmobile drove into a shallow pit filled with ash from a recent grass fire. It came to a halt in a cloud of gray ash that could not hide the fact that the car could no longer move on its own. It needed a tow truck.

Two hundred and fifty dollars later, the Oldsmobile was resting in a garage in Yesbut, Oklahoma. It didn’t take Dawn long to realize that everyone in town had a name starting with "J". She thought that might be evidence of inbreeding – that and their four index fingers. Locals jokingly (notice the "J" word?) told Dawn that the extra fingers allowed them to give the finger to more people.

The first of the Yesbuts encountered by Dawn and her band was the county sheriff Jerry. He claimed to be sympathetic – "yes, I know what it’s like to damage a new car, but it really was your fault, you know. If that "lady" (by which he meant Dawn) hadn’t been acting immorally in the backseat, there wouldn’t have been an accident at all. I feel your pain, but here’s a moving-violation ticket for $150."

The tow truck driver Jacques also expressed concern. "Yes, I feel terrible about your accident. I am sure that I will not be able to sleep tonight for thinking about it, but you could have avoided it, you know, if you’d owned a European car. Next time drive a quality vehicle made in France or Belgium. A Peugeot or Renault would have avoided the pit ash entirely. It just handles better. That will be $100 for the tow."

The garage itself belonged to two cousins, Jacob and Jeehad. Each was an expert mechanic, but the garage was a shambles because of their bitter rivalry. Jeehad was especially eager to commiserate – "yes," she said, "I felt just dreadful when I heard about your accident, but you deserved it. How could you," she asked, "allow someone in a diaper to drive an automobile?"

Dawn was about to reply that Pepe was older than he smelled, but couldn’t get the attention of either Jeehad or Jacob, who had started shouting at each other. Wrenches and hammers were flying. Jacob stopped fighting just long enough to say that "yes, he would help fix the car, but couldn’t do it anytime soon because of his cursed cousin." Briefly, the two cousins tried to fix the Oldsmobile, but each deliberately undid the repairs being done by the other.

The chaos in the garage was increasingly frustrating to Dawn and her companions. She looked for someone to bring the two cousins to their senses. Jesse offered to help. He seemed to be some sort of preacher, judging from his high, starched collar and ostrich-like neck. Jesse said, "Yes, I am sure I can persuade the cousins to fix your car today, but they will want some extra pay. Give them the car in payment, and they’ll soon take out every dent."

Jens, Jurgen and Julio weren’t much more helpful. "Yes," they admitted, "it’s a crying shame to see an Oldsmobile damaged, but its owner probably deserved to have an accident. I’m sure he drove a few cars off the road with it in his time. After all, it’s a hog of a car."

At nightfall, Dawn and her intrepid band searched for a motel. Yesbut didn’t have one. Several people said, "yes, we can provide you with accommodation in our own home," but then they demanded a price that no sane man would pay. Of course, Dawn wasn’t particularly either manly or sane, and desperate for a clean bed, she offered her body in trade.

"Yes," said Jiang and Jabba, "we’ll sell shelter for sex, but only if we can have a workout with your underage teens." Josef offered beds, but only to those prepared to look the other way as he beat his wife and kids. Jita was by far the most demanding: "Yes, you can stay with me, but you’ll have to pay all my expenses for a year, listen to my incessant whining, and forgive me for having caused your accident in the first place. I was playing with the machine that paints the white lines on the highway, and I accidentally created a detour into oncoming traffic."

Carlos had to be forcefully restrained by Ches, Freda and Jim. His fury alarmed Mortimer, who suggested that another town, any other town, would be a better resting stop. "It’s definitely time to go," said Whitt. Everyone agreed. Indeed, so anxious were they all to leave Yesbut, that they persuaded Carlos to leave the Oldsmobile behind. "You can return for it after we have found Hope," suggested Duchess.

They stayed the night in Jabberwocky, by reputation Oklahoma’s most dangerous town. But Dawn spoke for them all when she said, "Better here than Yesbut, for it was a truly hopeless place."

Aren’t you pleased this chapter is short? Aren’t the Yesbuts the most tiresome people in this entire tale? The next chapter is even shorter – as short as Dawn’s temper, attention span, and skirts.

 

 

CHAPTER 15 – A BED CHECK

At this point in the journey of Hope, who was sleeping with whom? The curious would like to know. The prurient need to know. Even the pious must know. A bed check should tell us.

In room one, Dawn and Carlos made out. More precisely, Dawn was making out with Conchita. It was Conchita’s first time with anyone. Hundreds of times she had she walked the streets of Dallas looking for sex, which she never found, since jealous, zealous Carlos had arrested anyone who propositioned her. Thanks to Dawn, Conchita would become a permanent part of Carlos’s life, even when he was officially off-duty.

In room two Duchess and Mortimer slept– in two separate beds. Duchess had sprained her back while playing sexual games with Suzie, the hat lady. Hence, Mortimer was taking care of Duchess. He even ran his fingers like a mouse across her back to relieve her pain. They were bonding, but Mortimer was still too shy to ask any lady for sex.

In room three Jim and the Queen frolicked. So eager was the Queen to roll over onto her stomach that he still didn’t know that Jim was female. Jim was having so much fun being the top "man" that she wasn’t about to disillusion him. If he needed to make love to a man, a man she’d be. In time, however, Jim hoped that the Queen would warm to femdom.

In room four Freda and Bill talked. Excitedly. All night. They had fallen in love, Bill with a woman, Freda with a man. They vowed to complete their sex change and then to marry as man and wife. So confident were they that one of their wealthy friends – either Duchess or the Queen or Suzie – would lend or give them the money for surgery that they even fixed a wedding date. Freda talked for at least two hours about the sort of wedding dress she wanted.

In room five Pepe and Kermesse hugged. Two teens in love, they planned their future into their dotage. They would start by badgering their parents into permitting them to finish the school year in Ottumwa, Iowa – Kermesse at The Amazonian School for Girls and Pepe at the O’Reilly Military Academy. They realized that they probably wouldn’t be able to wear diapers at a boarding school – at least indoors – but they both swore they’d find a way to wear them while they rolled in the hay outdoors. Pepe at a military school? Yes, it boggled the mind. But he’d grown up a lot since Sammy had been "blowed up real good."

In room six Suzie and Ches bonded. It was their first night together, but they found themselves drawn to each other’s feline grace and suppleness. Suzie thought Ches "the perfect tomcat," and Ches, after learning that Suzie was one of the biggest landowners in Yokum’s Patch, decided that she was someone he wanted to curl up with, a big smile upon his face. He found her rhymes so funny that he sometimes forgot to ask for money. However, he never forgot about being fed, even with a pretty girl in his bed.

In room seven Whitt, Gloria, Sissy and Gryphia quarreled. Four people, two beds – they’d have to double up. They tossed two coins and old friends Sissy and Gryphia ended up in one bed, Whitt and Gloria in the other. By morning, the mock girl was no longer a virgin. After four orgasms in six hours, Sissy and Gryphia knew two things: that each was a lesbian and an exhibitionist.

Meanwhile, Gloria was trying to keep Whitt at bay. Foreplay she loved, but intercourse she feared. Even with the pill, a diaphragm, and a condom, she worried about pregnancy. And rightly so, because Whitt and Gloria were both as fertile as rabbits. She was pregnant by morning.

In the locked car trailer Boreman read a teen magazine, over and over again, until he’d mastered its philosophy. Then he fell asleep, a young girl’s pin-up on his chest. All night long he dreamt of Alice in Wonderland; little did he know that he’d soon be smooching with her.

 

CHAPTER 16 – THE GARDEN OF SNEEZEWEED

After a day spent racing each other down Interstate 40, the caravan of Hope arrived at the Motel 5 ¾ on the west side of Albuquerque, New Mexico with energy and time to spare. As Duchess and Gloria, the March Heiress, were bickering over the room check, payment demanded in advance, and the Queen was decreeing the sleeping arrangements, Dawn was idly scanning the single tourist brochure at the motel desk. It urged everyone to go to Petroglyph National Monument in West Mesa not far from the motel. "A virtual museum of over 15,000 rock paintings," Dawn read, "some of which were scratched or abraded on canyon walls 3,000 years ago."

Might Hope be found in the canyons of New Mexico? Dawn reflected for a few nano-seconds, and then decided it was a distinct possibility. After all, Hope had once written Dawn about her love of painting. She’s said that’s what she liked best about her hometown – the thousands of paintings it had on display. Well, how many cities had more than 15,000 paintings? Not even Paris or London, Dawn decided.

There was another clue that pointed to the Petroglyph National Monument as a place where Hope might be found. The West Mesa escarpment, the brochure said, was a holy place for American Indians, who still held religious ceremonies there. Dawn asked herself, "Where might Hope be at a time like this? Wouldn’t she be seeking the consolation of religion, and what better religion than the oldest still around? Besides, Hope really admires Indians. She watches that movie about Gandhi every chance she gets."

Everyone but Jim and Carlos thought Dawn’s canyons would be a monumental dead end. They said they wanted to shower or shop for more clothes. Jim and Carlos may have been exceptions because both were eager to keep an eye on Dawn. Certainly, it was jealousy that induced the Queen to accompany them to the outdoor picture gallery. Naturally, they went in his limousine, with the Queen in front with Jim, who had difficulty concentrating on both his driving and the Queen’s roving hand. In back, Dawn soon fell asleep, hear head inside Carlos’s unzipped jeans.

When they arrived at the park, they agreed – with time being short – to go their separate ways in order to cover as much ground as possible. Dawn, determined to explore remote Rinconada Canyon, ran off on her own, paying little heed to signs or landmarks. Soon, she found herself lost and disoriented in a box canyon. The peaked rock beside her was the only thing she could recall having seen before – because it reminded her of a doll’s house. "I think I can see the park entrance," said Dawn to herself, "if I can get to the top of that butte. And here’s a path that leads straight to it." There was nothing straight about the path. Dawn, panting diffusely and sweating profusely, soon realized that it was more like a maze than a path. It kept bringing her back to the dollhouse.

She wandered up and down, around and around, but each time came back to the dollhouse, one time running into it, scraping her upper thighs and ripping her nylon panties before she realized she was back where she started. So far all that she had learned from her exploring was that she should wear a longer skirt the next time she went in circles.

A slight deviation (by Dawn’s standards) in her route brought her to a patch of wildflowers. Dawn had no idea of their names. She called every flower a rose, rather than by any other name. As she’d testily say when corrected, "A pansy is a rose is a rose as far as I care."

So she didn’t know that the tall stalks of orange flowers were globe mallows, though she wouldn’t have been surprised to be told that people also knew them as sneezeweed. After she’d blown her nose a couple of times, her runny eyes took in the purple-blue Irises, rare purple lupines, and bright yellow paper flowers.

"O bright yellow flowers," said Dawn, addressing herself to the paper flowers, "I wish you could talk."

"Herro, you rike paper frowers?"

"Huh, did you just talk to me, bright yellow flowers?"

"I make origami. Here is an Iris I made. If you rike it, it’s yours. It is a gift."

And then Dawn saw her standing behind the paper flowers – a Japanese girl about five feet tall in a bright yellow dress that had some of the elements of a kimono, including voluminous sleeves. Dawn thought there was no flower more beautiful in New Mexico than this teenager.

"Your paper flowers are beautiful," Dawn gushed. "My name is Dawn and I’m on a journey of Hope. What’s your name? I bet it’s as beautiful as your face."

"My name is Tagetina." She blushed as she bowed.

"Oh, you make it sound so Japanese. Are you an exchange student?"

"No, my famiry move here two year ago from Tokyo. My father is artist. He paints. My mother was riving here in New Mexico, but she became riberated woman. She divorce my father. Now she a teacher in Princeton, New Jersey. I miss her very much. I wish I rive in New Jersey too."

"She’s not the only girl here, you know? Why are you ignoring me?" It was another teenager, this time dressed in orange. She too had blended into the bank of flowers. "My name is Holly. Your name is Dawn, isn’t it? That’s really a stupid name, you know. It’s the sort of name a drag queen would call herself. Say, you aren’t a drag queen, are you?"

Dawn was furious. Stiffly she announced, "I’ll have you know that I am a cross-dresser. I am certainly NOT a drag queen. Why the very idea of it!"

"I guess you have some sense, then. But no clothes sense, none at all."

Dawn didn’t like being criticized, so she began throwing questions at Holly, "What are you doing in this lonesome canyon? Aren’t you frightened of being out here with nobody to take care of you?"

"You mean a big ADULT like you? Please, give me a break!"

"But which way would you head if any danger came?" asked Dawn, desperate for some clue as to the direction of the exit.

"You don’t know, do you? You’re lost in the canyon! What a bow wow you are!"

"Why are you being so rude to me?" asked Dawn.

"Duh, you really are thick. I’m a teenager! That’s why."

Dawn and Holly began shouting at each other, their voices getting ever more shrill. "If you don’t hold your tongue," Dawn said, "I’ll hold it for you with my teeth!"

"Sirence, both of you!" cried Tagetina passionately. "I am sorry for raising my voice. But you both owe the other more respect. Dawn is ancient woman. You, Horry, have to respect her rike a grandmother. Ms. Dawn, prease forgive Horry. If she is rude, it is because she thinks you are cute. Her being rude is a defense machination. She is rike Doris Day and Rock Hudson. She is very, very rude to men she rike the very most. If she say that you are ugry, Dawn, then she very much in rove with you."

"Dawn, you’re not ugly. NOT. I also bet your little thing withers with embarrassment when it gets near a woman," jeered Holly. There was silence for several moments, while twelve cheeks reddened.

"It’s not going to wither when it’s around you two," Dawn replied, hoping to get Holly into a better temper with a compliment. "The wildflowers here are beautiful, but none of them can compare with you two."

"It's my opinion that your opinion of our looks matters hardly at all," Holly said in a rather severe tone. "After all, you’re a fading flower yourself, with drooping petals."

"Are there any more people in the canyon besides us?" Dawn said, ignoring Holly’s last remarks.

"There’s one more person in the canyon. He’s the biggest queen I’ve ever seen," said Holly. "He’s wearing a red satin blouse with lavender cotton Capris. I wonder if he’s your friend …."

"I wonder," Tagetina interrupted with a polite cough, "if your friend rikes women?"

Dawn didn’t like this question at all. It reminded her that Jim was actively courting the Queen, and Jim was, regardless of how she dressed, very much a female. And yet she could not ignore the fact that the teens were sex-obsessed. They even seemed to be interested in older men who looked like younger women. But were they old enough to play? It was a thorny question to ask, since the teens might get quite prickly, they might even lie, but Dawn was duty-bound (since this is a moral tale) to leave their petals unplucked if they weren’t eighteen.

Just as she was about to ask, they heard footsteps thumping along the gravel path. It didn’t sound like the Queen, who floated like a feather when she walked. Dawn looked around in confusion, and found that it was Jim carrying the Queen upright in his arms. Together, the Queen’s head towering two feet above them all, they looked like a carnival giant.

"It’s the fresh air that did him in," panted Jim. "He couldn’t stand the wonderfully fine air that you have in this mesa."

Suddenly, Holly was dying to talk to the Queen, but why?

"Old person," she started in her winning way, "how do you survive if you can’t breathe clean air? Not that you’re surviving very well, by the look of you."

The Queen fought back: "Pimples, speak nicely! I really should ignore you entirely as we have not been properly introduced, and normally I believe that small children should never speak first. However, I don’t want to miss an opportunity to insult your home state, so let me say that I am amazed that anyone can abide the smell of these New Mexican wildflowers; and there are far too many herbal essences as well. The air is so aromatic of sage I expect to be served a turkey dinner, and I do not like turkey. It reminds me of the Middle East. A goose has, ahem, more alluring connotations. And I’ve always loved chicken. In any case, where I come from, the odors are much more pleasant, and they do not make you sneeze. Achoo, achoo!"

"God bless you," said Jim, who started sneezing herself.

"What sorts of barnyard odors do you have back home?" said Holly.

"I own a mansion overlooking the Mighty Mississippi, though I spend much of my time in its garden of artificial flowers cavorting with my many friends." He started sneezing again.

"Gets-your-hounds-out," said Dawn sympathetically.

"So your garden smells only of stink of old men?" asked Holly.

"Better that than the curdled mother’s milk on your breath, little girl. Achoo! There are lots of wonderful odors wafting across my estate – the smell of river mud and diesel oil, of rotting vegetation, and the fetid gases from the swamp at the southern end of my mileage. Achoo! Some talk of owning acreage; I measure my estate in mileage; so you should show me respect, little girl. Achoo! Achoo!"

"I can see from the passing lanes on your face and the inflated airbags on your hips that you’ve got considerable mileage," sneered Holly. "But do tell me, do you sneeze as much in Mississippi as you do here?"

"Pray stop mumbling. Open your mouth a little wider whey you speak. I never sneeze there. Only here. What is it? It must be these cursed flowers."

"It’s just one of the frowers," Tagentina said. "It’s the grobe marrows. They make people sneeze."

Holly started to bawl. She staggered around blubbering. Blinded by her tears, she collided with the Queen, and both fell to the ground. There they writhed in mutual pain, her body racked by sobs, his by sneezes. Despite himself, the Queen began to feel sorry for the teen. "It’s obvious," he thought, "that she insults her betters because she feels so badly about herself, the poor dear."

Jim helped Holly to her feet. "Holly honey, what’s wrong? You must, achoo, tell us if there’s anything we can do to help you."

"Everyone tells me I smell like sneezeweed. I make people sneeze!" She started crying again. "I’ve tried every soap ever made, but nothing works. I can’t get a date to save my life. The only one I’ve ever met who doesn’t sneeze at the sight of me is Tage here. She’s my best friend, but she’ll never be more than that. Neither of us likes pussy."

Dawn asked, "Is that why you insult people. You reject them before they reject you?"

"Partly that, and there’s also a lot wrong with you."

"Now be honest, Horry. You said bad things to Dawn and the … queen because you were nervous. You hope that one of them wants to be your boyfriend."

"Yes," Holly wailed. "I’ve become so desperate to find a man that I’d even be willing to date a dried-up prune. Today’s my eighteenth birthday! I’m the oldest virgin in history! If I don’t find a man soon, I’ll die. I’ll literally die!"

There was no sign of Carlos, so Dawn felt free to make a proposition, er, a proposal: "Holly, sweetie, I’m definitely a man under these clothes, and I’m willing to make love to your ripe young body tonight. You won’t have to start your nineteenth year still a virgin, not if Dawn has anything to say."

"You won’t be able to have sex with me, you’ll be sneezing too much," Holly cried.

"I won’t be sneezing, I swear," Dawn said. "I’ve sneezed less often than everyone else, haven’t I? And afterwards, I know just the place for you. It’s called Newark. Anyone who lives there has no sense of smell. If weeds bothered them, they wouldn’t live in Newark. And most of the boys your age will have broken noses. So they’ll be quite immune to sneezeweed. When word gets out about your marvelous sexual technique – which I will show you – you’ll have as many boyfriends as you need. Besides, you’re a swell looking babe."

"Achoo, amen!" said Jim. The Queen added, "And once you’ve been with Dawn, in comparison every boy will be spectacular."

All of them walked in silence till they got to the visitor center. Once there Tage and Holly made up their minds. After two phone calls to parents and the return of Carlos, who’d been exploring Boca Negra Canyon, Tage and Holly joined the little band of searchers. Incredibly, the two girls hoped to find hope in New Jersey; yet they agreed to head westward until Dawn had found her Hope.

As for Jim and Carlos, they’d lost all hope of Dawn’s settling down to one man, or even one woman, for more than a day. Both gave her the cold shoulder, so she rode with Holly. Tage sat on Carlos’s lap, and later that night at the motel she introduced him something she called SEXUGIVMI – the folding of two bodies into pleasing shapes.

Meanwhile, Dawn was making love for the first time while wearing a gas mask. Holly later said the sex was "okay", but admitted she hadn’t much enjoyed Dawn’s attempts at oral sex. After Dawn had fallen asleep while inside her, Holly stroked the rubber around Dawn’s head as she contemplated her future. She wanted it to be better than her past. "I definitely have to check out Newark. After tonight, I know that I can’t wait in Albuquerque for the right lover to come around. I deserve more out of life than this."

Dawn awoke at three a.m. from a nightmare. Dressed as Alice, she’d been running hand in hand with a man, who kept telling that he’d be the one she’d end up at story’s end. She couldn’t see his face, but supposed it was Carlos, Whitt, Ches, Jim (who dressed like a man) or, shudder, the Queen. She was running as fast as she could in vagabond shoes, yet the man kept crying, "Faster! Faster!" but Dawn felt she could not go faster at her age.

The most curious part of their run was that the trees and rocks around them never changed their places at all. However fast Dawn went, she never seemed to pass anything. She was entirely out of breath, and still the man cried, "Faster! Faster!" and dragged Dawn along. "Are we … nearly there?" Dawn managed to pant out at last.

"Nearly there!" the man mocked. "Why we’re two thousand miles from there! Faster!" And they ran on for a time in silence, with the wind whistling a tune in Alice’s ears. She couldn’t make out the words; they were too faint. "Perhaps the wind’s battery is down," she thought. She called out, "Yo wind, turn your speakers up man."

Her wig blew off as she and her man ran past a dogg pound, and then traveled through a hole in the ground until they found themselves at the top of a heap of fashionable dresses, but they were all too big for Dawn, who felt little and blue.

"Now! Now! cried the man. "Faster! Faster!" And they went so fast that at last they seemed to skim through the air, hardly touching the ground with their feet, till suddenly, just as Dawn was faint with exhaustion, they stopped, and she found herself on the ground, breathless and giddy. "I can’t make it," she thought. "I can’t make it anywhere."

The man propped her up against a big apple tree, and said kindly, "You may rest a little now."

Dawn looked around her in great surprise. "Why, I do believe we’ve been under this tree the whole time! Everything’s just as it was! I’m still far from Hope. But I’ve been racing across the country. How could I be no closer to finding Hope?"

"In this country," the man said. "it takes all the running you can do just to stay in the same place. If you want to get somewhere else, you must run at least twice as fast as that!"

"I’d rather not try, please!" moaned Dawn. "I’m quite content to stay here – if only I could sleep."

"But you must not sleep, because you’ll find Hope in a place that never sleeps."

"I know what you need," the man said, taking a carafe from out of his bib jeans. "Have a pot of Sri Lankan coffee. It will recharge you. And while you’re restoring your battery, you’ll permit me the liberty of taking your measurements. And when I’m done, you must make a brand new start on your quest for Hope. And do go faster, dear. You’ve been quite a tortoise up till now."

The man took a ribbon out of his pocket, marked in feet, and began measuring Dawn all around as she stood still as a statue. "Ah, just as I thought, you’re 151 feet high and 35 feet wide at the hips; you’ll fit in nicely. And do wear that dress, I like it a lot." The man then flew off, and as he did, Dawn thought she saw Superman soaring over Gotham City.

Once awake, Dawn could not get back to sleep. Over and over again, she said to herself, "Hope, the search for you has wrecked me, ‘till I’ve become half the woman I might have been, half the hero of my dream. Hope, Hope, it’s over now. I’m beat. There will be one last stop – Las Vegas – and then we’ll know that everyone else was right all along, and that I’ve been nothing but a pawn in someone else’s scheme."

 

Continued in Chapter 17 – Dawn Fiddles

 

 

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© 2001 by Dawn DeWinter. All Rights Reserved. These documents (including, without limitation, all articles, text, images, logos, compilation design) may printed for personal use only. No portion of these documents may be stored electronically, distributed electronically, or otherwise made available without express written consent of the copyright holder.