Skyscrapers generally tower over all other buildings in the area.  That seems to be the point.  Buildings tall enough to “scrape the sky”.  What is the point then of building a skyscraper that comes up short?  Well, in a city that’s slow to adapt, its only fitting.  The laughing stock of the skyscraper world, it only makes sense that it resides in a city that only finds fame in jokes now.

In the back of the 10^th floor restaurant, in the little brother of skyscrapers, the dishwasher is making plans.  Not for escape, like so many others has.  Exodus has come and gone, but he has no plans on leaving.  “We can rebuild.  We can change the fate and course of this place.  This place can be great again.  We don’t have to keep moving in a circle all the damn time.”  His co-workers were used to rants like this.  They always just nodded in agreement, then one of the cooks would start talking about whatever random girl they were chasing after, or their latest drug induced escapade.  With a look of resignation, the dishwasher reverted back to his work, lamenting to himself that there may never be the necessary motivation to move forward.

The rundown monorail was always a bit of a sore subject in this area.  Costly and ineffective, the relic was very representative of what the city had become.  Failure to adapt led to the demise of a once great city, and their attempt at mass transportation was just another reminder of that sad fact.  The conductor sits alone up front, chain smoking during his whole shift.  Addicted to some of the most unsavory vices, the conductor had long ago given up his dreams.  A future that had once risen above his downtrodden home, he was now only left to wonder what could have been.  The fires in the “Paris of the West” may have been put out, but no one bothered to rebuild the ashes.  Such is life.  

Fiction packet 3

The story I found most interesting from this packet was The Falling Girl.  The details the author uses to describe the setting are so rich and really set the scene.  The second paragraph really reminds you of how it would look to be looking down on a city from a skyscraper.  It puts an image into your mind of how the cars look on the streets below, and how everything looks so small and peaceful from up above, even if you know the opposite to be true.

The story truly takes an interesting turn.  It seems for a little while as though Marta, the main character, is about to kill herself, and that the story is about to get really depressing.  So it comes as a bit of a surprise when all of the dialogue between Marta and the "beautiful people" is actually rather light hearted.  It seems as if even though she jumped from the top of a skyscraper, it won't lead to her death.  It really comes as a bit of a surprise in the middle of the story.

The ending is thoroughly confusing to me.  I think that she and all of the other women jumping did in fact commit suicide.  That part is rather depressing.  It seems as though as she fell, it took a long time for her to reach the bottom, and that she was actually decaying on the way down.  What a depressing way to end the story right?  my guess would be she was all bones when she hit the ground.  Hence the lack of a thud that the husband noticed.