“But if it’s never been done before,” Finn said, “how do we know it’s safe?”
The boys glanced back and forth between themselves. Philby said, “It’s like taking pictures, that’s all. How can it not be safe?”
“It pays,” Maybeck said harshly. “That’s all I care about. My aunt could use the extra money.”
“Your aunt?” Finn said, before he took the time to think that his question might sound rude.
“Yeah,” Maybeck said. “I live with my aunt. My parents…They aren’t around.”
Finn felt awful for having asked. Maybeck grew silent. He seemed less tough all of a sudden.
“Sorry,” Finn said, “for asking.”
“Not your problem,” Maybeck said in a softer voice. “My aunt’s cool. She tried to get me in a toothpaste ad, but I lost out. Then this thing came up. Brad told me that if I’d gotten that ad I’d never have been asked to be a host. They want nothing but fresh faces.”
“So you got lucky,” Finn said.
“We all got lucky,” Maybeck agreed. “A DHI in the Magic Kingdom? We’re going to be famous.”
“We’re going to be ghosts,” Philby corrected. “Electronic ghosts, provided that this technology actually works.”
“Don’t say stuff like that,” Maybeck pleaded. “Of course it works.”
“Of course,” Philby said. “My bad.” But he sounded less than convinced.
3
“I don’t get it,” Dillard said as he gripped Finn’s ankles for sit-ups. There were about forty kids on the crabgrass doing various forms of exercise out behind the school, in a field enclosed by a corroded chain-link fence. The South Florida climate ate metal down to rust and turned wood to sponge. Only concrete had a fighting chance. The kids, spread around the field in clumps, tried to make it look like they were exercising. Dirt stuck to Finn’s arms and the back of his neck. He looked up at the ocean-blue sky full of billowing white clouds.
“The other DHIs,” Finn explained. “The Disney Hosts…I’ve got to hook up with them before I go back.”
“You know how stupid that sounds?”
“Yeah, but I don’t care. No matter what, I’ve got to find out if they’ve had similar…dreams.”
Dillard glanced up and immediately let go of Finn’s ankles. Finn went head over heels backward. He found himself looking at an upside-down version of a girl named Amanda Lockhart, who had transferred to the school in late September, a few weeks earlier. She had exotic-looking eyes, a deep, natural tan, and a few freckles on her cheeks. She was stretching along with a dozen other girls. Finn wasn’t big on girls, but something about Amanda grabbed and held his attention.
Dillard clasped his ankles again. Finn struggled back up to sitting.
He squeezed out a couple more sit-ups. “It’s experimental,” he explained. “The DHI technology. Not exactly photography, not exactly computer graphics.”
“You’re going psycho on me,” Dillard complained.
Finn said, “When I woke up, the moon was right where it belonged. You want to explain that?”
“I’m sorry to have to tell you this,” Dillard said, “but I think they fried your brain.”
“I don’t know any of their full names. Willa, Charlene, Maybeck, and Philby. Maybeck and Philby will be easier to find than the girls, because those are their last names, unusual names at that. There was this guy at MGM who ran things. He would know who everyone is, though I’m not sure he’d tell me.”
Dillard gave Finn a puzzled look. “I feel sorry for you, man. You’ve lost it.”
“The new girl: Amanda. Doesn’t her mother or father work over at MGM? Did you hear about that?” Many of the students’ parents had something to do with one of the parks.
“Amanda is a girl,” Dillard reminded Finn. “Have you lost your mind?” Dillard thought of girls as a separate life-form.
“Yeah,” Finn said. “Maybe I have.”
4
The monorail zoomed past a sea of green trees, heading for a stop at the Grand Floridian Hotel. “This is pretty cool of you, Amanda,” Finn said. He wore a Tampa Devil Rays baseball cap and a pair of his father’s old sunglasses, which looked too big for his face. Some disguise. Amanda wore hip huggers and a shirt that exposed her belly button.
“We’re taking photographs?” she asked.
“They’re friends of mine, you see?”
“Sort of.” Then she confessed, “No, not really.”
“I don’t know their full names, so I don’t know how to find them. If I can get photographs of their DHIs and show them around some of the other schools, then maybe someone will recognize them. I’m not sure what else to do.”