Families -- Fiction; Mass media -- Audiences -- Fiction; Science fiction; Short stories
Mrs. Briggs, still fascinated by the view, said, "Well, go get a drink,
then."
Timmy walked over the edge, screamed as he fell.
Mrs. Briggs could only stare, stunned.
George uttered a cry and ran to the cliffs rim.
Tourists nearby ran up, looked down with George.
A hundred feet below on the slope at a point where it dropped off to
nothing, a horrified Timmy was crouched clutching a small tree.
"Hold on!" George called encouragingly.
A few minutes later someone had found a long rope in a gyrocar trunk
and roped it about George's middle. They let him over the edge gently,
dropped him down the slope slowly.
"Hang on, Timmy!" George yelled, running a tongue over dry lips and
momentarily closing his eyes to the dizzying depths. "Don't let the
little rocks coming down worry you."
A while later, a dust-streaked Timmy was back on the ledge in his
mother's arms, sobbing.
George, his shirt wet with sweat, and struggling out of the rope,
panted: "Whatever came over you, Timmy?"
"It was so real I thought it was the Elroom. I was just going out to
the kitchen to get a drink of water."
"And I--I told him to go," Mrs. Briggs said, horrified. "It was that
real to me, too."
* * * * *
FOR SALE
ELROOM, complete. Like new. Reasonable. Or will trade for
new Cadillac 8-passenger, twin-turbo gyro, red preferred.
George Briggs, 7228 Rose Terrace. Phone CARberry 7-9087.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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