The Heart Shaped Locket

The acid rain sizzled and spat as it hit the pock-marked asphalt of the streets of old LA. Only rats walk these dark avenues. Not the four-legged variety, they had more sense and got out or were eaten. Only the two-legged species persisted. Too stupid to run when they could, they were trapped in this ghetto of crumbling concrete and steel. So they plodded through the acid rain, covered in layers of plastic and mylar so that they did not end up looking like the streets, melted and tortured. When they were not roaming, they were scouring the abandoned buildings for food and dry shelter.

Lily was born into this world. She never knew LA, not the good LA, blue skies and salty sea breezes, palm trees, and vibrant life. Life, from the glamorous A-List parties in the hills to the crazy mixture of Latino and African-American vibes that moved your body and soul, to the hope that tomorrow would be a better day. Before the toxic rains swept in from the sea, that burned the eyes, then the crops. Before the entire world went dark from industrial pollution and overpopulation.

Lily's only connection to the good old days was a locket that her mother had given her as a little girl, a silver heart-shaped locket, with a red heart stone in the center, some writing on the back, all on a fine silver chair. Her mother told Lily that it was a magical locket that could take her anywhere, just hold it firmly between her hands and close her eyes. When she was younger it was impossible to see the magic. All she ever saw was the dark sky and the rain.

One day while Lily was ransacking the old library, she found a stash of picture books, she could not read. Pictures of fantastical places with blue skies, happy people, solid buildings, colors and lights, festivities, and happiness. She stared in amazement at each image. She selected the book she liked the best, shoved it under two layers of mylar, and borrowed it for an indefinite period.

Her clan was not the least happy, you can not eat old books. It was thrown on the fire and Lily was beaten for not returning with food. That night, in her pain, hunger, and fear she fled the clan, fighting her way past the night watch, kicking the clan chief in the groin to escape his grasp. She ran, ran through the dangerous ghetto night, as hard as she could to the only place she had ever found a moment of peace, the library.

Lily made her way through the piles of books until she found a recess between two high bookcases. It was partially hidden, the shadow of one bookcase overlapped the other. Here Lily found refuge. Still hurting, still hungry, she held onto the locket and tried to imagine the pictures she had seen. Before she knew it, the pain and fear had vanished. She was standing in a strange world of green leaves, blue skies, and sunshine. Her eyes hurt from the sunlight. She felt a soft warm breeze against her naked body and heard a subtle roar. She feared it, yet, she decided to follow the breeze to see if there was food there. The green leaves opened onto a pure white beach, with the glare from the sun off the ocean. She could not stand to look at it. She covered her eyes, peaking now and then as they adjusted to the brightness.

There, where the water lapped against the sand stood a woman staring out to sea. Lily felt she knew the woman, but could not say for certain. Against all the rules of the clan, in her guttural English patois, she called to the woman. The woman turned and smiled at Lily. She was tall and thin, like Lily, with flowing black hair, bronze skin, and an indigo wrap dress gathered only at the bust line. Lily's eyes exploded. She knew that face, she knew that hair, and as the woman spoke, almost singing, she knew that voice. It was her mother, Rose.

"Mau" questioned Lily?

"What has taken you so long my child," asked Rose in a sweet, smiling tone as she reached out and cupped Lily's face in her hands.

They embraced. As energy flowed from Rose to Lily, Lily started to sob uncontrollably. She wanted to speak but her grasp of language was too primitive to express her feelings. New visions came into Lily's mind, visions even more fantastical than she had seen in the picture book in the library. Other planets, and stars, people, and animals flooded through her mind. She had no understanding of what she was seeing nor had words. Rose pulled away and noticed Lily's nakedness and began to smile.

"This is a free and liberating place, Lily," said Rose cheerfully. "But not that free."

Rose shut Lily's eyelids and as if by magic a similar sarong draped around Lily in perfect style. Lily could now hear the voices of other people, and the squawking from strange gray and white birds. She looked around and saw dozens of people, men, women, and children. Many walking arm in arm, some alone. The children screamed and laughed as they ran back and forth chasing the waves. It had been a long time since she had seen a child, especially a healthy one. In Lily's world, most women were too malnourished to menstruate. Women who managed to carry a child to term normally delivered a sickly creature, too small even to cry. In her clan babies were left to die, but the protein was too valuable to waste.

Lily and Rose sat on the beach for what seemed an eternity, though the sun never moved in the sky. Rose talked and Lily listened understanding little of anything Rose was saying. Lily was just absorbing the sound of her mother's voice again as if she was a baby in her womb. Occasionally Rose would stop and see if Lily was comprehending, and then just smiled. She knew Lily had a long way to go to be part of this world and had one fearful passage. Her heart broke for her daughter, as she remembered her passage. But she accepted that this was the way of the locket and she was happy that the locket had chosen Lily for its gift.

Suddenly, the sky darkened. People vanished from the beach mid-step. Rose faded. Lily leaped at the transparent mirage but fell into the sand. Suddenly with a single thunderous crash, the beach, the jungle everything was gone, Lily was back in the library. The crash was the boot of the rape gang, lead by the clan chief, that had come after Lily. They called for her. With each shout she coward smaller and smaller into the recess she had found. With each call, the gang grew more frustrated and Lily grew more and more frightened. She held onto the locket harder and harder, rubbed it between her hands, pleaded, prayed that it would take her back to the beach, back to her mother, anything or anywhere away from the horrors she knew awaited her if found.

Finally, after an hour, the gang felt it had completed its search. They did not know where Lily had gone but they were satisfied that she was not in the library, but they knew they did not want her to return here for safety. They started to topple the bookcases that they could and threw all the books from the shelves. Anything or anyone inside was trapped. One lit a book and threw it deep into the pile, and began to laugh. Soon they were all repeating the process until the smoke and the heat was too much to bear and they fled, barring the doors as they escaped.

Lily could see the flames, she felt the intense heat on her skin. She tried to hold her breath so that she would not cough, but it was too much. She struggled to get out of the inferno, another exit that the gang did not know about, higher ground that the flames would not reach, but it was all for not. She knew she could not get out. She held onto the locket and prayed, prayed that she would die before the flames reached her. She collapsed.

Lily opened her eyes to the beach and saw the gray and white birds, and Rose. Her eyes were burning and her lungs were heavy and hurt but she had no breath to cough. Rose comforted her, wiped the sweat from her forehead with the helm of her sarong, and cradled her until Lily was asleep. She knew Lily would sleep for a time, but then awake for an eternity in the locket, thus as it always was.

The fire blazed on for nearly a week. Rival clans were enraged against those who started the blaze for they wasted fuel that was keeping many clan fires lit, a book here, a book there. There had been enough books to keep the fires going forever, but now in one whoosh, they were gone. Lily's clan paid the price. The men were slaughtered, and the women parceled out as sex slaves.

In a far back corner, in a small recess of what had once been the Los Angeles Central Library amongst the rubble and ash lay an untarnished bright silver heart-shaped locket. The reverse read: "Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest." The locket waits to chose again.