14 THE CEDARVILLE REVIEW sheltered underneath during a pop-up storm. I tried not to be afraid, even though I knew it wouldn’t keep us safe from the lightning. I could practically feel the electricity balling up on my fingertips, the way the air heated and cooled at random, gusty increments, stirring up a stench of rotten seafood. Now, the boardwalk is rubble. I step forward towards the counter and notice that they’re cleaning the blender. Three girls are back there, all college-aged like me, each of them not standing still for more than a zeptosecond. The one who waited on me, with the buckeye eyes, is the one cleaning the blender. I assume this is why it’s taking so long. She can’t make a frappe without a blender. I keep an eye on my rosesweatered neighbor. She’s been here for almost as long as I have, right? I turn to the windows, which obviously face the tarmac. Clouds have packed the horizon to the brim, seamless. This morning, the sky was cotton and blue-mottled, filling in white on the car ride to the airport, royal icing flooding exposed cracks. It’s the one day Florida hasn’t lived up to its Sunshine State title. Still, I know the sun is up there. It’s the kind of cloudy day that makes you want to squint. My plane’s polished top flashes under the invisible sun like a bald man’s head. I think about hurricanes, how they ripped away the Dairy Queen. How they coerced construction workers to dump truckfuls of imported sand over the pre-existing sand,
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