34.

“Ryan,” Walt Rostow says to me in a dream, his face coming in close and expanding, as if I’m seeing it in a fun-house mirror. His lips slowly pull back. Cheshire Cat teeth are underneath.

“Ryan,” he says, “what a shitty story you’re telling us. You don’t get it, do you? This isn’t about you or your father or your mother. This isn’t about irony or drawing lines. We don’t care about any of that. We don’t have time for that. Get with the fucking program, man. We’ve got to stop the Commies. It’s the domino theory, man. If Vietnam falls, then Asia goes, and pretty soon the rest of the world goes. It’s containment. Didn’t you pay attention in social studies class?

“Did you really believe that?”

“Oh, Ryan, it’s just a dream. I’m just a figment of your imagination.”

Cackling, he steps into the car of the Tilt-A-Whirl and spins off into the darkness.

“No one cares, Ryan,” he screams at me as he spins back into sight, his Cheshire Cat teeth luminescent. “We took our money and ran. ‘Tippecanoe and Tyler Too,’ baby.”

“Then it was about money?” I yell as he spins this way and that before disappearing back into the dark.

I wait for him to come back into sight, but he doesn’t come, at least not this time he doesn’t.

“Was it just about the money?” I ask over and over and never get an answer.