April 2026 "Inescapable Flow State" by Paula Rawlings

     The pinch behind my scapula transcends, infecting my shoulder, climbing up my neck, and settling in my ear bones, where a post-apocalyptic and dystopian playlist regulates my brain. I’ve been busy. It’s been a month since I’ve sat for hours at my desk, reaching my right arm forward and hunching over. It’s difficult to sit and write for more than one hour, but I’ve written 500 words so far. Adjusting my red pajamas riddled with white poke-a-dots and pulling at the neck of my unflattering yet cheery orange t-shirt, I tuck my right foot under the opposite thigh as I continue puking silly words about a man powering a battery by pedaling a stationary bike to make a video call on his laptop. I watch a YouTube video about it and begin imagining how a judge might adapt if an electronic disease, virus, or mutation, were to affect the physical and invisible elements of our current electronic system. Is there something in our world today that could, like plaque in arteries, the common cold, AIDS, Schizophrenia, or even rabies, find a way to manipulate our internet, cell phone transmissions, and radio waves?

     I hear my husband’s car pull up, and my one-hour bout of hyperfocus is interrupted. Man. Now I have to talk with my mouth. Moments later, the rumble of Sabrina’s Subaru interests the dogs more than my husband’s aggressive back scratches, and I read over my words and laugh. So stupid. I love it.

I conjure up a most profound welcome as they walk through the door, “Hey,” and close my laptop. 500 words. It’s better than nothing.

       My husband leans over me for an awkward squeezing of my head, but I don’t like hugging him while he’s wearing his uniform. It’s like hugging an attractive block of wood with a little give after hours of soaking in saltwater, covered in fabric, leather, and shiny, hurtful things. We go to the bedroom and change: him into mechanic-activity-worthy clothes, and me into, well, basically something quite similar to pajamas, so why am I changing? Anyway, he talks, I stare at his mouth as words spill from his lips, and I think about how an electronic disease might be able to jump distances and affect our off-grid system. What’s the saliva of electronic components? What might be the transmitting thing? The carrier?

       “Paula?”

       I’m caught off guard and look into my husband’s eyes. “Yes?”

       “I said, how was your day?”

       “Good. Good.” I nod. “And yours?”

       “Pretty good. I was saying, one inmate threw a pickle…”

      The electric fences surrounding all prisons around the world would fail. All the housing units around the world dependent on electricity would fail, and allegedly innocent murderers, rapists, and mediocre villains would escape. Would presiding judges be as valuable as pumping water? If this hypothetical electronic, electromagnetic pulse, and/or wavelength…whatever…were to infect all of our now known advanced technology, electricity would go extinct, like the Quetzalcoatlus, and probably the court system as we know it. Stationary bicycles would be worthless. I should scratch this idea.

        I walk out of the bedroom, and my husband’s words and body follow me about the house. 

        “You ready for the gym?” I ask Sabrina and Emily.

        “Oh, you guys are going to the gym?” my husband asks, and I give him a squishy squeeze.

        “Yep, I need to burn some energy and clear my mind,” I say.

    In the car, Sabrina opens Spotify and clicks play. My brain is wrapped in a downy blanket of speculation as we drive to the gym, and I forget to talk. The pinch in my shoulder and neck eases, settling me deeper into a post-apocalyptic haze on Highway 99.