A cherry-red telephone box stood mountains over me. Northern lights like rainbow dragons danced inside of the box’s tinted glass. Their variegated display haunted and excited me. Their ultraviolet wings flared across the sunset sky. Left behind in the dragons’ wake were a million paper stars that tapered into weeping cinders, waiting to be sparked alive again.
And I held the lighter.
I found it.
An English telephone box.
My, if not humanity’s, salvation.
I rubbed my sleeve onto the window. I saw a black rotary dial that stood on top of an obsidian awning. Three empty posters were plastered above it, erased from their original purpose.
I thought functional telephone boxes were extinct. Thanks to the rampant rise of technology, people abandoned them in the early 2010s. At least, that was the case until the solar flare.
We were cut off from all communication. Families and friendships were shattered. Calamity struck the lands and seas. Planes and satellites rained down from the thundering sky.
I pressed my sun-kissed skin against the door. The hot glass ravaged my nerves. I bit down onto my raw teeth and pushed the door open.
I glossed my fingers over the canvas posters. The posters’ canvas texture scraped my fingertips.
I nudged the rotary dial. The dial’s plastic cover bent from the push of my finger. If by the slimmest chance the phone line worked, I could save the world or at least have a friend in this hellfire.
One by one, I drew each dial to the beginning. I held the phone up to my ear and my breath.
Click.
Click.
Click.
A small, quiet voice answered. “Hello?”
