The angled geometry of the parking lot stretched beneath restless children, strapped into backseats of cars, their voices circling—”why and when?”—while stout, bouncing women, faces set in frozen concentration, steered wobbling carts toward the gaping maws of hungry trunks. We, Bodies dulled by errands, sank into vinyl seats, the thick heat pressing down like a smog-stained curtain.

Then a button press, a sliver of song, and Sissy, 7 and keen-eyed, turned and said: “Oh, you’re frowning now—why o why?” Why? Because the melody murmured of a man who found the girl, the one he had imagined forever—gentle, steady, real—and made her his wife. They settled close to town, time turned like a slow wheel, and one day, she came back from the doctor, radiant, changed. 2024—a Body was born, the world shifted slightly, something began. A mere fragment of sound, brimming with weight. Where is it coming? Where does it go? God was only kidding.

Then Leeroy, the cowboy of spinning vinyl, called out like a preacher:

“2024, folks. Oh yes.” And again, louder— “2024! Body! Body! Body!”—as if conjuring something sacred. It was good. And that was why we smiled, Sissy – we smiled because it’s good.

[email protected]