I was relaxing in my room the other night when the power went out. At first I thought it was a blown fuse, but when my roommate and I investigated it, we discovered that the whole neighborhood was blacked out, save for a few random streetlights scattered every few blocks. I didn’t know what to do, I was caught totally unprepared. My laptop only had 24% battery left and my phone was practically dead. I used my keychain Maglite to find an old, almost depleted, scented candle. I also remembered that I had a few glow sticks in my camping gear, so I grabbed a couple of those and blew out the candle. There was not much to do, and it was too dark to play cards, so my roommate and I went outside to take it all in. All the houses were dark. There were no lights on, there were no glowing television screens or computer monitors, there was no music blasting. It was like we went back in time. We cracked a few brews, smoked a few cigarettes, and just marveled at how quiet it was. It was like something from a dream, or like going back to visit your hometown after a few years… everything is the same, but oddly different. It’s just not right, like a perverted version of reality. But as we took the last few drags from our cigarettes, the power came back online. The streetlights started to flicker and brighten, the windows regained the blue glow from various TV screens, and the twenty-first century reawakened. We tossed our butts away and went back inside, back to electricity, the internet, and the mundane.
Critically Rated at 14/17
Written, Rated, and Reviewed by Brendan H. Young
criticallyrated 