The Annihilation of Foreverland

night.
    Until she came.
    He was in a field of soybeans. The rows ran over the hills like a sea of green. He walked them and picked the heads of f foxtail and stripped the seeds to chew on the bitter stalks. When the sun had peaked, someone appeared in the row ahead of him.
    Her hair was below the shoulders, a halo of cherry red. She walked toward him in a fluttering white summer dress. She took his hand and led him to a lone elm tree in the middle of the field. Her smell was like a dewy morning. Her laughter, pure joy.
    It was a dream. A long one. A safe one.
    He lay back on the grassy knoll. The grass tickled his shoulders. “If I take the needle, we’ll be together,” he said. “I won’t have to dream anymore.”
    “If you take the needle, you’ll never see me again.”
    “Why?”
    “I don’t know.” She looked off. The dappled shade mottled her complexion. “I just know that you must wait. You must resist.”
    “I don’t think I can anymore.”
    “You must. Not for you and me, but for everyone on the island and everyone that will come. This is bigger than us.”
    “But this is just a dream. Maybe I’m imagining this. Imagining you. Maybe none of this is true.”
    She ran her finger over the bridge of his nose, touched his lips. “It’s all a dream. We just need to wake up.”
    He took her hand and traced the blue veins on her wrist.
    “If any of this matters,” he whispered, “then why can’t I remember you?”
    “You will, Reed.”
    “But I don’t even know your name.”
    She took his hand and pressed it to her chest. Her pulse beat steadily into his palm. He slid his hand into her hair. The sun was low and the shadows hid her face as he drew her closer. Her cheek was warm against his.
    The sun set.
    Reed didn’t understand dreams. He might be delusional. All his bravado misguided. His suffering, useless.
    But it was all he had.
    When he woke, he returned to the beach.

    The water lapped against his ankles.
    He walked the length of the north shore until he reached the rocky outcroppings. He went no deeper into the water, just enough to keep his feet wet. He turned back, his footprints washed away.
    His life was like his footprints: no trace of his past. Everything he could remember he disregarded as chatter. None of it was true, there was no reason to give it space. He just walked and walked, one foot in front of the other. The footprints dissolved behind him.
    Up ahead, Danny was on the dune. He looked different. His chest was out, his gaze patiently set upon the horizon. He paid no attention to Reed’s approach.
    Reed plunked down and leaned back on his elbows. He was tempted to take his shirt off and let the sun warm him but didn’t want Danny to see what had become of him. His appetite had waned and it was beginning to show.
    Danny sat next to him. The wind scoured their shins with sand.
    And the waves rolled.
    “They’re healing us, Reed. Just like they promised.”
    He told him about Parker, how he looked, how he acted. He wasn’t dead, not a zombie. He was vibrant, happy to be alive.
    “You believe that?” Reed spoke just loud enough to be heard.
    Danny took a breath, started to answer. He picked up a shell, instead, rubbing the shiny backside with his thumb. He wanted to say yes, he believed it. They were doing exactly what they told us and there was the proof. Parker was alive. He’s alive! They’re not killing us.
    But are they healing us?
    It was what they all wanted to believe. And he saw it with his own eyes.
    He started to say yes again, but stood up. He walked to the water and threw the shell sidearm, skipping it on the thin water racing over the hardpacked sand. He remembered throwing flat rocks on a pond and counting the number of skips when he was a little kid. He was fishing with his dad.
    Someone’s dad.
    Someone’s memory.
    He’d come to the beach to bring good news: t hey were being saved.
    Reed shattered it with three words. Cut right to the heart of Danny’s doubt.
    He picked up another shell, this one as big as his hand, and carried it back to the dune. He rubbed the inside of the shell, the pearly white inside. Half a clam.
    Where was the other half?
    Danny picked up sand, let it sift between his fingers. It scattered in a gust of wind.
    “I remember hiking,” he said, grabbing another handful. “Hunting and fishing and fighting. Once, I got stuck on a trail without water for a day and nearly dehydrated before I got back. My ankle was twisted,