Cancer
A flash fiction by Zachariah Wahrer
I rode out to the place where the cancer is growing. It’s an open sore, full of disease and rot. It’s a place where piles of rocks and trash, the excrement of progress, overflow onto the beautiful desert.
I stopped along the road, taking in a vista that at one point must have been quite striking. The mountains on the horizon are full of snow, unmarred, at least from this distance, by the sprawl. I am at the boundary line, able to see the true nature of what this whole valley once was, and how it was slowly subducted by organisms that replicate beyond any reasonable limit.
I take a deep breath, smelling the diesel fumes of passing trucks. I long to breathe the clean air that once existed, to be free of the miasma of smog surrounding me. A car roars by, the sound of its exhaust asserting a dominance louder than a lion or bear ever could.
Beside me, a man installs fake grass, using spikes to attach enormous sheets of the stuff into the dirt. No one will ever be fooled by this lie. Even if it was less garish, that grass could never grow here. Apparently, the plants destroyed to put in this simulation were not good enough. In this place, fake is better. In this place, fake is real.
I ride down a new road, seeking an escape from the desolation. The pavement ends ahead of me, ceasing in the middle of the desert. No doubt there is some planner of this cancer who will put in more of the cheaply made boxes that are the hallmark of this city. He will profit from the disease, creating things not needed for people who do not need them.
I turn around and work my way back to my section of cancer. In here, the fake grass isn’t so bad. The green is lush and pretty. It stands in stark contrast to the ugly browns and tans of the desolate landscape. I go into my box, happy. I am content in this place. As one of the billions of cancer cells, how could I not be…
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