“Don’t park there,” Dad said as he set boxes of fresh popcorn beside the machine. “You don’t want anything obscuring the customers’ view of the snack bar. I read that on the internet.”

“I’ll move it when the movie starts.”

Dad put his hands on his hips. “People buy half of their snacks

before

the movie starts.”

Johnny wanted to point out that half the snacks they sold on an average night amounted to about twelve bucks’ worth. It was on the tip of his tongue, but he let it go. At least his dad was making sense. When he’d dropped him off that afternoon, Dad had been sure it was nineteen seventy-six, and was contemplating decorating the drive-in to commemorate the nation’s bicentennial.

“You watching the news?” Johnny asked. “The virus broke out in Wilkes-Barre. Something like two thousand people have it.”

“Is that the swine flu? Or the bird one?”

Maybe Dad wasn’t having such a good evening after all. “No, Pop. The new one, the nodding virus.”

Dad took it in like it was the first time he’d heard about it. “How many dead?”

“Hard to say. It doesn’t kill you, it paralyzes you. You can’t move.”

Johnny would be less scared of the virus if it killed you outright. The thought of being aware of what was going on, able to breathe, even eat if someone fed you, but not able to move…Johnny didn’t even want to think about it.

“You remember seeing

Spaceballs

here?” Dad asked.

“I remember, Pop.” Here we go, off on a ride down memory lane.

Johnny was so tired. So sick of giving up four nights a week for nothing. He spent all day walking on that greasy floor, listening to people’s complaints about their fucking fish sandwiches while his back ached. He resented having to waste all his time off so his father could live out his dream and reminisce about how much better the world was when everyone loved to watch movies through their dirty windshields while mosquitoes ate them alive.

Dad looked at the big white screen. On the day he’d brought Johnny out here to tell him he had Alzheimer’s—and that he was buying this beat-up drive-in as some sort of big carpe-diem fuck you to the universe—the screen had been peeling away in squares, exposing the rusting steel latticework underneath. Now it was bright white and flawless.

“The day after this place closed, the marquee out front said, ‘The End. Thanks for thirty years.’” Dad shook his head. “It broke my heart, to think your kids would never get to go to the drive-in.”

“Tiffany moved the kids to Baltimore before they were old enough to go to the drive-in,” Johnny said, bitterness leaking into his tone. He wanted to go home, crawl under a blanket with a six of Pabst and watch porn until he fell asleep.

A truckload of teen-agers pulled through the gate. Johnny headed off to collect their admissions. If they were super-lucky, the kids would smoke some weed and get the munchies. They could sell some hot dogs for a change.

• • • •

In the car on the way home, the radio played some Springsteen then gave way to the news. Johnny wasn’t in the mood to hear any more about the outbreak, so he stabbed one of the preset buttons and caught a Charm City Devils song in progress.

The sound of their success only reminded him of his own faded rock star dreams. He turned the radio off.

Dad stared out the side window, watching the street lights pass like they were the most fascinating things in the world.

It was past time to put him in a home, but Johnny just couldn’t bring himself to do it. He was having such a ball, running his drive-in. It was killing Johnny, though, getting home at one in the morning, then his alarm going off at six.

And the place was bleeding money.

“How much did we gross tonight? Forty-something dollars?” Johnny asked.

“Something like that.”

Johnny waited for his dad to offer some excuse, some airy-fairy optimistic spin on the two of them working their asses off for forty-three bucks, minus utilities, minus the film rental fee, minus taxes, minus gas, minus five hundred and sixty-three dollars a month in interest on the loan.

“If this virus thing gets any worse, people will stop going to the indoor theaters, cause they’ll be afraid of the germs. They’ll start coming to the drive-in instead.”

“The virus is in

Wilkes-Barre

. If it gets any worse, people will

have

it, and they won’t be able to go anywhere.” The thought sent an electric dread through Johnny. “Come on, Dad. We gave it a good try. It’s just not working.”

Even if he could convince his dad to sell the drive-in, who would buy it? Especially now. Maybe after the virus scare blew over he could at least get three thousand an acre for the land and pay off part of the loan. He’d have to use his savings to pay off the rest, which meant his new, post-rock star dream—opening up his own bar and grill—was never going to happen.

Johnny cruised to a stop at a red light at Aker Street, waiting, silently beseeching his father to see through the fog in his brain and agree it was time to put this business out of its misery.

“First movie I ever saw there was a monster flick.

Them

, it was called. Giant ants. I don’t remember the second feature. They put real butter in the popcorn then.”

Johnny felt like he needed to scream. “Yeah, yeah. Everything was great, back in the old days.”

This time Dad caught the sarcasm. He looked at Johnny. “You know why I keep saying things were better back then? Because they were. That’s the thing. Things really were better.”

“I’ll give you that, Dad. Back then, they gave you a pension. Health insurance. You got paid a decent salary. How much were you pulling down, your last year at the Goodyear plant? Fifty-five? That’s seventeen grand more than I make

now

.” Johnny slapped the steering wheel so hard his palm stung. He was forty-one years old, and even getting promoted to manager of Burger King was out of reach, because he didn’t have a college degree. “‘Would you like to get a large for only fifty cents more?’ I’m so sick of saying that, Dad. You have no idea how sick I am of saying that.”

Johnny took a deep breath. He shouldn’t be talking to his dad like this, but he was tired and angry. And scared. “I’m sorry, Dad.” He touched his Dad’s shoulder. “You never raised your voice to me. Never once, the whole time I was growing up. I’ve got no right to raise my voice to you.”

Around the curve, in front of the old brick schoolhouse—which was now a plumbing supply warehouse—red lights were flashing. Two police cars and an ambulance were parked beside a Taurus wrapped around a telephone pole.

Johnny slowed to a crawl as they passed. The driver was still in the car. “That’s Arnie Marino. He works at the post office.”

Paramedics were easing him out from behind the wheel. His nose was bloody, and it looked like he was resisting them, trying to stay in the car.

Johnny realized he wasn’t fighting them, he was jerking, having a seizure.

“Poor bastard,” Johnny said under his breath. He sped up, knowing if he watched any longer he’d look like a rubbernecker, not someone slowing down in the name of safety.

The poor guy. He’d been jerking like a puppet on strings, almost like—

Johnny missed their turn. His hands felt numb on the wheel, like blocks of wood.

Arnie Marino’s head, especially, had been jerking up and down. Nodding.

Johnny took a big breath, tried to relax as he took the next left to double back around. It could have just been a seizure. Or there were other things that would look the same as the virus.