The Life and Times of Johnny Plotpoint

"I don't care much about money," Johnny said. "I just like the ride." Actually, he couldn't remember ever riding it before that day. Lane looked up from the cash register, but Johnny had walked over to the magazine rack.

He picked up a copy of Astounding Science Fiction and flipped through it. There was a picture of a giant man on the front lifting what looked to be a pyramid with a handle on the top. Four smaller men were looking on in horror as the shirtless giant destroyed the landscape.

"You like them magazines?" Lane asked, putting Johnny's soup and fruit in a bag.

Johnny didn't quite know what to say. There was something intriguing about the magazine, but he couldn't really say if he liked it or not. He couldn't remember ever having read one.

"It's alright," Lane said, "There's nothing wrong with liking them pulp magazines." He pulled an issue of the same magazine out of his back pocket. It was greasy and dog-eared, but still intact. "I read these all the time. There's some great stuff in here - about computers and the future. There's even a story in here about a man who doesn't exist starting a revolution." He leafed through the magazine stopping at one of the stories and reading for a second.

"You ever think about writing for them?" Johnny heard himself ask, without really knowing why - somehow, he just felt like he had to ask.

"Me?" Lane looked up from his magazine. "No. I'm not a writer. I'm just a garage mechanic." He paused for a second, looking down at his boots, then back up at Johnny. "Well, I have written a couple of stories, but they aren't any good."

"How do you know?" Johnny asked. He pulled some more money - fifty-three cents, exactly - from his pocket and put it on the counter to cover the cost of the magazine. Lane rang up the magazine and put it in Johnny's bag.

"I guess I don't," he said.

Johnny grabbed his bag and started for the door. "Give it a shot, Lane. What have you got to lose?" He walked out the door without waiting for Lane to reply.

Lane looked down at the magazine again, then out at the parking lot where Johnny's bike had been. He was gone.

* * * * * * * * * * * * *

Some time later. The parking lot of a coffee shop in Toledo, Ohio.

Johnny heeled the kickstand down on his Indian and pocketed the keys. He pulled off his sunglasses and hung them loosely on the snap of his leather jacket. He ran his fingers through his shoulder-length black hair, pulled a pack of smokes out of his pocket and flipped open his Zippo brand windproof lighter with a quick motion, catching the flame on the end of a cigarette hanging loosely between lips unchapped by countless hours of sun and wind. He smiled and looked into the side mirror of his bike. Perfect white teeth smiled back from a face covered in a perpetual three days growth of beard.