(EXTRACT)

It was one of those afternoons that let Nick dream he might have conquered the major swells. Pretend his days could all be smooth and glassy. Dry himself in the sun, then get behind the wheel for the next adventure. His life as a road movie, UK remix, without dramatic tension, without the three act structure, the road movie where his relationship didn't break down disastrously, where the journey didn't degenerate from an optimistic odyssey into a grisly nightmare. A road movie with no mental hitchikers, no jilted lovers in pursuit, no mystery suitcase, no barricade of police cars, no exchanges of gunfire.

Nick didn't burn, either. Even the ultraviolet radiation that punched through the atmosphere like a nail gun couldn't touch him.

Shadows and sunlight made their slow crawl across the roof, always perfectly tesselated. Tjinder, Monobrow, Norman Bates and the others drifted off into other varieties of nothing or stayed sprawled like butterflies, pinned by the sun, eyes closed, giving time the chance to slither away unnoticed.

Nick shielded his eyes with his hand. Emaciated sycamores clustered around the perimeter of Millennium's domain like desperate refugees at a border, denied entry. Farther away, a dense ghetto of older trees had established itself in the only unfarmable hollow for miles.

Everything else was agricultural savannah, bleak with GM, ™ cereal. Two halves zipped together by a perfectly straight concrete road. In a distant field the sun caught wristwatches or glasses and flashed inadvertent signals from people otherwise too small to see.