It cost another twenty dollars, but Ron didn’t care. He sailed right into the theater. It was completely dark inside, and he bumped into several chairs and people before he could find an empty seat for himself.

For four hours he watched exactly what the signs outside had promised. Blood and fighting. Beautiful girls and handsome men. War and all sorts of thrilling adventures. One of the films starred two guys named Redman and Newford, or something like that. They were terrific.

People got up and left and other people came in. Ron ignored them, his eyes locked on the screen. He watched people shoot each other, make love, fight wars that were much more exciting and fun than the warfare in South America. He saw doctors, policemen, killers, and each girl was better-looking than the last one.

Somebody stepped on his foot.

“Oh! Sorry.”

Ron looked up at the person who had done it. She came into the aisle and sat in the seat next to his. In the changing, colored light from the movie screen, Ron could see that she was about his own age. And kind of pretty.

“I’m awful sorry. Hope I didn’t hurt your foot.”

“No, it’s all right.”

She didn’t say anything else, and Ron went back to watching the screen. But he kept glancing at her. She was very pretty. And dressed sharp, too. He wanted to talk to her, to say something, anything, just to start a conversation. But his tongue was frozen. He didn’t know where to begin.

He was watching her now, not the movie. She was looking straight ahead, at the screen, and smiling slightly.

She doesn’t even know I’m sitting next to her. Ron felt miserable.

Then all of a sudden she turned to him. “Live’n th’ City?”

Ron’s throat was so dry it took him three tries to say, “Uh . . . no. I’m from Vermont.”

“Oh. From yer clothes, I thoughtcha lived here.” She spoke fast, blurring her words together. Ron had to listen hard to understand her, especially with the movie’s sound track blaring at them quadraphonically.

“No . . . no . . . I’m just here . . . for a few days.”

She nodded and smiled at him.

“Um . . . where are you from?”

“Noo Yawk.”

“I mean, after vacation time. Where do you live then?”

She said, “Right here. I live’n th’ City alla time.”

“But you can’t!” Ron said. “The City’s closed down after this weekend. Nobody lives here after Labor Day.”

“Don’t let ’em kid ya,” she answered.

By the time the movie was over, Ron learned that the girl’s name was Sylvia Meyer. She kept insisting that she lived in New York City—in Manhattan—all the time.

“I never been Outside,” Sylvia told him as they walked slowly out of the movie theater. “I was born here.”

The blinking, bleary-eyed people pushing out of the theater merged into the faster-moving noisy crowd on the street. It was still bright and muggy outside, even though the Dome blocked off any direct sunshine. Cars growled and honked in the streets. People hurried along, their faces grim.