[COMPLETED]
[WATTYS 2022 WINNER]
James Quinn can't die. Actually... that's not true. He's died many times - somewhere in the neighborhood of 250 - only to be reborn as himself to live his life over again.
For millennia, he's had to endure this c...
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July 4, 1984 [11]
"Martha?" Steven asked. She didn't respond, but continued to stare at the passing crowd. So he tried again, this time using his robot voice, "Earth...to...Martha... The...robots...have... invaded...the planet..."
Martha laughed. "Oh Daddy. Why would a robot warn the astronaut about the robot invasion?"
"Yeah. I guess that... doesn't really make sense. But... is everything alright sweetie-pie? You seem miles away. Are you having fun?"
"Oh yes, Daddy. Thank you so much for taking me here!" Martha wrapped her arms around her father's massive torso. "What time is it?"
"Five minutes after the last time you asked me. Let's see." He checked his wrist watch. "It is 11:10. What should we do next? We could go to Pirates of the Caribbean or... Haunted Mansion."
"No, that's too scary," Martha said, because when she was six years old, it had been. Though she was no longer under pressure to recreate her childhood to perfection (she didn't need to make it to Illinois – James knew to wait for her), mimicking in broad strokes was still the path of least resistance. And while she'd come to expect a certain degree of psychological deterioration in her father, she'd walk the walk whenever possible to keep as much of him as she could.
"Okay," he said. "How about Country Bear Jamboree or... Tom Sawyer's Island?"
"No, it's too early for the island."
"What? Too early?"
"Let's see the Country Bear Jamboree. Those bears are soooooooo funny!"
"Jamboree it is," Steven said. "Do you want to ride on my shoulders?"
"Does a Country Bear jamboree in the woods?" she asked, standing up on the bench.
"Sometimes Martha, I swear," Steven said, chuckling. "You should be on Carson." He sat in front of her and she swung her legs over his shoulders.
"Who's Carson?"
"A funny man with a talk show. He's old – even older than me."
"Wow! He must be really, really, really old, Daddy." She kicked her legs gently as if prodding a horse. He stood and she soared above the crowd of people walking left and right – andwho needs a roller coaster??
After all the thrills she'd experienced – running with the bulls in Spain, skydiving past Mount Everest, whitewater rafting down the Zambezi River, to name a few – riding on her father's shoulders as a small child still ranked at the top. It was a strange and glorious mix of sensations. The exhilarating vertigo of riding on someone over twice her height combined with an olfactory potpourri – her father's sweat, cheap shampoo, and an intangible quality that Martha could only describe as the scent of security. She tugged playfully on his left sideburn to steer him toward Bear Country and he complied dutifully.
