Take a Picture

Snap. Snap snap.

A few hours later, they were at their neighboring park.

Here, the shadowy night was all but dispelled- both by the lights of attractions still up for hungry tourists, and by the flash of dozens of cameras brought by sightseers and professionals alike.

Frankie didn’t know what to think. The image of that fallen Ferris wheel, not unlike the currently-falling Ferris wheel in the sky above- it was perfectly preserved. With nothing but a thin fence put around the rubble, every inch of her trauma was kept untouched as tourists came to see it, much in the same way they’d come to any park to ride a roller coaster.

While Frankie’s confusion slowly hardened into disgust, Katie, seemingly forever fated to be the walking inverse of her sibling, felt something even more complicated.

In that rubble, she saw the memories she’d repressed. The things she wasn’t sure of, completely spelled out as hard truth. And even more than that… she saw inside the debris something that interested her just like it did the tourists. Maybe more.

When Frankie heard some gasp behind her, she just assumed they were shocked to see such terrible destruction. She didn’t expect the hurried footsteps to come directly up to her.

“Sorry, are you two the Berrytown Girls?”

Katie almost toppled as she drunkenly spun around. It felt so wrong to be out here again. To have people talk to her. Reflexively, she tried to muster her usual smile- only to wonder why she ever did that childish sort of thing to begin with.

The woman who approached them looked so happy. She seemed well put-together enough, certainly more than they were. The expensive camera around her body got some part of Frankie feeling a tad resentful- if only they at least had a decent amount of money, this last chapter of their lives could be spent a little easier- but that aside, she didn’t fear the girl. She didn’t even hate her, until she started talking.

“I mean, the survivors of the Berry Wheel. The ones in all the pictures, where you hit that bitch with the metal pipe? That was badass.”

“…What?” Frankie just swallowed to punctuate her sentence.

“I mean- you weren’t the only ones who made it out of there, but with how you disappeared afterwards, a lot of people into this whole thing got kinda obsessed with you. You’re like, the star of the show! Other than Action.”

“People are… into this?”

“Well, duh. Of course they are. It was probably the biggest tragedy of 2012.”

It was funny to hear her call it a tragedy in that tone of voice.

“That’s nice to know.”

Frankie was about to yell at her before her sister suddenly spoke up like it was nothing.

“Oh, yeah?”

“It’s very nice to know. I had no idea we were micro-celebrities in your world. I too find this whole event quite fascinating.”

“That’s great!” The photographer smiled, raising a finger to her head. “Man, that makes me feel a lot better about coming up and asking you about it. Who’d have known how you were gonna respond. Hey, can I get a picture?”

Frankie shoulder-checked her as she dragged her sister to another part of the exhibit far away.

“Hey, wait! I still want your autographs!”