Monday, December 15, 2025

Short story – “A Collapse We Can Dance To”

“A Collapse We Can Dance To”

In the disturbingly near future

Jodi stopped her cart and listened for a few moments.  Turning to her wife Emily, she asked, “Did this song just have something about ‘sledding pine trees?’ As if the trees were on sleds going downhill?”

Emily dropped a bag of carrots into the cart.  She shrugged and said, “Hey, if you tell AI to write a new Christmas song, it just grabs everything – snowmen, presents, reindeer, mistletoe, and, um, a partridge in a pear tree – and jams it all together.  Resulting in an incoherent mess where pine trees enjoy sledding.”

Jodi sighed, and starting walking again.

“I’ll say this,” Emily said, “at least it’s different.  You’ve never had to work some place like this where you want to blow your brains out after listening to different versions of the same ten songs hour after hour after hour.” Emily listened for a moment and started swaying.  “At least it’s got a good beat.”

Jodi snorted.  “It heralds the collapse of society, but at least we can dance to it.”

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