The Casimir Effect: A Short Story

By: Antonio J. Hopson

Narrated by: Chiquito Joaquim Crasto

Despite Carlos' mundane life, killing weeds for his father's rich customers, is billions of miles from the stars he observes in the night sky, or from the kids who sit in the canteen with their healthy sandwiches and bottled water.

His life is a billion miles from their reality, and the reality of a stable life in America as he dreams of becoming a citizen. While their families provide them with nice clothes, large houses and cars to travel to school in, Carlos makes do with gas-fumed rags of clothes and a gap between his front teeth. In order to cope, he immerses himself in thoughts of the universe, and learns of black holes, gravity and the beguiling Casimir Effect.

But deep down, the troubled Carlos only yearns to return to his simple beginnings and to see, once more, his mother and her chickens scratching around in the dust by her feet, to escape the drudgery of his life, and from pitying his sick father, who has no more dreams other than the next yard and the next tangle of weeds on his list.

©2016 Antonio Hopson (P)2017 Antonio Hopson