Dark Museum

Sophia

If Sophia imagined a futuristic mall, she would have hoped for something more high tech than the dying cavern of shops where she and Diya stopped the morning after they admitted Josh to the hospital. With his condition stable and nothing to do in the waiting room, the women took the opportunity to stretch their legs and buy Josh something clean to wear.

Kieron promised to call with updates, happy to stay behind to try and steal some more sleep.

Angel had gone home hours prior, citing "better shit" to do.

No video advertisements floated from the ceiling or along the walls. No holograms of any kind. No robot checkout clerks (except for the self-checkout lines at the drugstore they stopped at before the mall, but Sophia argued being one's own cashier wasn't a robot). No moving walkways (except at the airport, which Diya assured her were still there). Nothing hovered (except for a type of flying camera Diya described, which helped her and her urban explorer friends photograph places that were too dangerous to get to). No one wore matching silver jumpsuits.

Cigarettes were electronic, though. As were books and pencils.

"Well, it's not so much a pencil as a stylus for my tablet," Diya explained, not that it helped.

Most of the stores in the mall were shuttered. Employees working at the kiosk stands in the walkways entertained themselves on their phones, not looking up when potential customers approached.

"So is this a low-tech middle-of-nowhere mall or..." Sophia glanced around. The few scattered shoppers had their heads down, texting. "Is this the way it is?"

"Not a whole lot has changed on the mall front," Diya said, shrugging. "Except that they suck. What year are you from?"

"Nineteen eighty-nine."

"Wow. The eighties. This must really suck for you. How do you even wrap your head around all this?"

Even Gap was closed.

"It doesn't seem real," she said. "Like any minute now I'll wake up. Like it's all been a big mistake."

"You got in touch with your brother, right?"

"Yeah. My parents hung up on me. I guess he was with them because he called me back to yell. How'd he get the phone number so fast? I don't even know what it was."

"It's called Caller ID. You must've just missed it." She continued when Sophia didn't say anything. "They get a notification of who's calling while the phone's ringing."

"You're gonna think I'm weird, but I'm afraid to see my parents again."

"After thirty years, I guess that makes sense. How old were they when you knew them?"

"It's not really age that I'm talking about. If I forgot to call them when I got somewhere, they weren't just worried, they took an hour out of their day to tell me about it like I'm too stupid to walk out of my own house without getting kidnapped."

"And now that you were kidnapped ..."

"Exactly. I'm twenty-five years old. I have a good job. Sure, I flake out sometimes, but what happened to me ... I mean, she blindsided me. I could have been so careful and it still would have happened." She sat on one of the empty benches. "Or maybe I was being stupid because I was distracted by a boy."

"A boy, huh?" Diya sat beside her.

"Josh. I left work early to see him in concert, and we met in the lobby of the place afterward. There was food and champagne. I thought I might get lucky."

"So where's the problem?"

"I got in a car with a stranger." She covered her face. "I can never tell my parents! This is Kidnapping 101. It's not like I randomly accepted a ride from someone. I know how to use the subway! She told me she was Josh's sister, and he was too drunk to get home by himself. I mean, that's what I thought at the time, but it turns out she drugged us, so really there was nothing I could have done. Right?" Her heart raced as though she might cry. "But then looking back on it all, I should have known better."