The Wish

‘The spread of the disease caused the infrastructures of cities everywhere to crumble like clockwork at a breakneck speed. Large swaths of the population became sick, in sync with their vaccination priority. Senior citizens succumbed first, then medical professionals, first responders and essential service workers, followed by the rest of the adult population. and finally Children 12-17. chaos and panic took root as an ever increasing number of people began to get sick, turning once smart, intelligent, fully functioning members of society into empty,mindless bags of meat, quickly forgetting everything including how to drink, eat and eventually breath. Both the soon to be dead and the dead littered the streets. The World Health Organisation was able to use the emergency broadcast system to inform the public that this seemed to be a long term side effect of the vaccine and they were working on a cure. But that was just the one time and radio stations had gone dead weeks ago.’

Her eyes were bleeding tears of anguish and frustration as she transfixed on the heart- shaped locket she held in her hand. Over her lifetime it had taken on many different meanings but like everything else, those meanings were fading away. At first, a product of her own magic wishes, then a token of Intense, unconditional love, a beacon of hope, a source of strength and inspiration, and finally, in these last desperate moments, an anchor.

Her desperation turned to panic, her own heart now began to race in her chest. her mind began to scream, “WHAT?” over and over again. She stared with ferocious intensity at the locket.

She forced herself to take several calming deep breaths and the encroaching terror subsided for just a second. And in that moment she caught a glimpse of a face in her mind's eye.

Somehow she knew to follow the bread crumb her memory had given her. Habit kicked in, Without needing to think she opened the locket. There was his picture, the warm brown eyes, the dark red hair with tints of silver, the loving smile. She felt safe for a moment and from that feeling came another bread crumb.

‘Star light, star bright, first star I see tonight, I wish I may, I wish I might, have the wish I wish tonight.’

She could hear him as she repeated the poem again. It was his voice now.

“Make your wish Popit”.

She felt warm and protected as she could now remember standing with this giant of a man, her small hand completely wrapped in his. They stood together in a small clearing in the woods as she stared up into an early dusk sky . The feeling felt dreamy, surreal, her thoughts were beginning to drift. Part of her just wanted to let that feeling consume her, it felt so much like the right thing to do, just let go. Then his voice came back “Make a Wish” She felt like she was driving on a long stretch of highway looking into a setting sun, fading in and out of consciousness as short waves of blissful nothingness rolled over her, punctuated with moments of terror as she realized how dangerous this seductive sleep was. She shook her head and tried to focus. “What was I supposed to do?” Like trying to remember a name, in a stream of new introductions at a party she grasped for the task. She tried as hard as she could but nothing was there. What followed was a wave of hopelessness. What had become of her mind she thought.

Then she heard his voice again.

“What did you wish for Popit?”

From hopeless lips she whispered the words.

“I just wish I could remember”

Suddenly she could hear herself as a young girl, telling him.

“A heart shaped locket”

She looked at the picture in the locket once again and instantly remembered, he placed it on her pillow in her room and in that moment of recognition and very much to her horror, her most recent wish came true and she remembered.

Her wish was the keystone, it all came flooding back but in a disoriented way with no timeline, like a million pieces of a broken mirror falling on top of her all at once. Her head throbbed with a constant dull pain as she struggled to make sense of it and slowly some of the shards began to come together and parts of what she was remembering turned her skin to ice and ripped at her heart in a savage way.

She remembered the forest and the night sky, crackling campfires, morning lakes of glass and wishing on stars. He always took her with him, every single time he went. And every evening if the dusk sky was clear they would watch the sunset together and look for the first star, the wishing star. He taught her the poem and he told her the star always knew who saw it first and each star only had one wish to grant but you had to say the poem first. So they would always say it together. Then after a moment had passed they would tell each other their wish. She loved that part and she wished for many different things over the years, but the first time her wish came true, she found the locket on her pillow, the same locket she now held in her hand. She remembered he would wish for the same thing every time. She used to think it was so silly to waste a wish on something that was always going to happen anyways. But the answer was always the same, with a warm loving smile he would put his arm around her shoulder and say “To go camping with you Popit” she loved when he said it anyways. She began to sob because she knew he was gone. She couldn’t bear to see his picture and she snapped the locket shut.

She remembered when her school shut down and how disappointed she was that her class camping trip was cancelled. She was so excited to show all her friends all the things he had taught her over the years as by now she had been on many camping trips with him she considered herself well schooled in the outdoors. She had asked the teacher if she could show the class how to find Ursa Major, and Minor and of course the North Star Polaris. She was even going to teach them the star poem.

She remembered her mask collection. Over the months of quarantines and lock downs she had amassed a collection of 17, each one with a different picture, at first it was fun to collect them but as the weeks turned into months she grew to hate them, she hated the way they would get caught in her hair and make her ears sore and her glasses fog up but most of all she hated it when she couldn’t see her friends smile anymore, she called them smile blockers and wished many, many times for the day they would just go away.

She remembered when he got sick. It was a Monday morning and he was taking her to the same Pharmacy where she had been 4 weeks earlier and this time was no different from the last but once again she was very nervous, she hated needles and as the blocks passed and the inevitable moment approached she thought of what he had often told her about being brave, ‘you can’t be brave without being afraid first Popit.’ and in those words she found the courage to see the task through. She was initially reluctant to say anything when he drove right past the building as she really didn’t want to go anyways but after several blocks she quietly asked, “where are you going?” He smiled at her, chuckled, and said “I have no idea Popit”. “My needle,” she curtly replied. She knew something was wrong when she had to tell him the route home. She wanted to be happy that they were both protected now, they were finally safe. They were supposed to celebrate that weekend and go camping, she was really looking forward to going but he just got worse and worse and worse. By Friday he was in the hospital and he was already gone, he didn’t even know who she was anymore. It wasn't supposed to happen this way, they were protected, they beat it. She screamed her wish with furious anger at all the stars that night. That wish never came true.

The day he died, she was riding her bike to the hospital to visit him just as she had done a dozen times before . She was always hopeful as she made her way down the city streets. Maybe today will be different, she’d say, maybe my star wish will come true and he will remember me. Over the last few weeks other people seemed to be forgetting everything just like he did and the hospital was becoming busier with each passing day. The Doctors told her he had some kind of plaque build up in his brain and they didn’t know why it was happening. She thought of the plaque on her teeth and how it built up when she didn’t brush. Then she thought of cavities, dentists...and needles.

When she got to the hospital this time, she could feel something wasn’t quite right. Some of the people she walked past seemed lost.

She definitely knew something was wrong when a Surgeon joined her on the elevator in full scrubs. He looked like he should be in surgery. The strange part was he didn't select a floor. At first she thought he was going to get off on the same floor as her but when she exited the elevator, he just stood there, like he was lost, just like him she thought to herself. As she approached the nursing station his doctor stepped in front of her and blocked her way forward, paused for a long moment and stared at her. She knew what he was going to tell her, but until he saw the tears streaming down her face it seemed like he had no idea. “I’m so sorry” he finally said. Even though she knew exactly where she was, she suddenly felt just as lost as the surgeon in the elevator.

She remembered a time shortly before air travel became completely restricted, when things were just beginning to go bad, an air traffic controller froze on the job and 2 passenger planes loaded with holiday travelers collided mid air over Toronto’s downtown core, the night sky was ablaze under a jet fueled crematorium, she could still see the huge burning chunks crashing into the skyscrapers, turning them into giant candles. Almost 50,000 people died that night. She couldn't help but think of how lucky they were.

Because of his work he was one of the first to get his second shot, because of her age she was one of the last. She found herself staring at the locket again and she made one final wish.

She wished she would find him again and they could pack their gear and run away camping in the forest, together forever. A moment later the fog rolled into her mind and the anguish in her face subsided. She stared at the small gold thing in her hand, she wondered what it was as she watched it drop to the floor...