Hourglass Nightmare

The darkness of the mostly-inoperable park surrounded them. It was late enough that a small place like Merrytown shut down for cost-saving. Kiddie could run a little later in a bigger tourist success like Berrytown, but here there wasn’t even much of anyone who wanted to come see this place after dark. It was a coin toss if you’d even see anyone else trudging around in the dark here- though, if you’d gone out on that night, you would’ve at least encountered the two sisters who once tried to see every park in the world.

“I like them… I like them.”

Frankie was startled by her big sis finally talking. She’d been silent for minutes, so it wasn’t clear what she meant as she refused to even look at her.

“Like what?”

“I still like the parks.”

Frankie kept walking. I never said you didn’t… she thought, but quickly realized the question she’d asked up in their apartment building was close enough for someone like her.

“Do you remember…”

“The balloons?”

Katie froze, not expecting to be cut off.

“It’s just… I can’t stop thinking about them.”

Frankie nodded. She’d already put the pieces together- everything making up the puzzle that was her sister. From as far back as when they were kids, she was always this way.

“Why… why can’t I forget? Why can’t I just… be happy, like you?”

“It’s not easy for me either.”

Frankie’s fist shivered.

“Just thinking I’m going to lose Cheryl… that, everything, all of this is going away… it rips me apart.”

Then, Katie was the one to nod.

“But you keep going anyway.”

“I have to.”

She grabbed her big sister’s hand. When she looked at her, she made sure she’d listen- staring her right in the eye, Frankie made her case.

“Let’s do this. Let’s go wherever you want, and resolve some of this dissatisfaction still plaguing your heart. It won’t be a perfect ending, but… we can make things how they used to be, just for awhile.”

Katie’s eyes fell a little.

“…Okay.”

“And then I get to go back and see Cheryl.”

“…Right.”

Katie kept walking with Frankie in silence for a short while, before the crumpled-up young woman let free one more nagging thought.

“…There’s something else I keep thinking about.”

Frankie saw this color in her eyes separate from the grief, separate from the despair. It was… some kind of fascination.

“I want to go back to Berrytown.”