FSE

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If there was ever an instance were real life were badly photoshopped, Camp Loosewater would be a shining example. A polished highschool, disgusting in length and ridiculously polished and furbished, stood lifeless in all of its surreal wonder. I'm talking tennis courts, outdoor pools, a glass-sided gymnasium. All as fresh as wet paint and itching to be populating with teenagers.

But the sinister fact was this: no one was here, and whilst the greens of the tennis court were stark in colour, they contrasted the much more barren, dirty landscape on which is had been built on.

It looked unnatural. Ryan half expected a time-traveller to run up to his car window and yell: "Great scaly snakes! The machine worked! But it worked too well!" Then he'd yank the coyote by the scruff of his neck (You have such an imagination, my boy) and stare cross-eyed at him, "You need to help me get this school back into the future!"

"I'll do my best, doc." Ryan mumbled, and he felt himself smile and tried to stifle it. Smiling felt as ill-placed as the school looked.

The fluffy white ears on officer Dickson picked up, and after recalling that Ryan sometimes talked to himself, he unlocked the car door and piled himself out with haste. Ryan was soon to follow - or be led, I should say. The silent-cop pulled him to the school's entrance by the chain of his handcuffs and sat him down hard by the front entrance of the school: a looming billboard with a prare that Ryan's autocorrected to, 'don't save us, savour us. There's nothing here to be saved.'

"I've been thinking about it," Dickson said, peering down at the coyote. "Murder would be your best option. Cold and simple. No cannibalism, no dad-killing. All you'd need to tell anyone is that a local homeless crack-addict asked you one-too-many times for drugs. You snapped, and presto we have a corpse."

Ryan stared at the ground. "I wouldn't do that."

"But these other kids here don't need to know that."

The silent officer spat in the soil, and it soaked and dried back to crusty nothingness. "Jesus, Dickson, can we get going now? This heat's killing me."

Dickson uncuffed the coyote and - with a moments hesitation - ruffled the fur on his head. Soft fur, as most coyotes have at that age. "Take care, kid."

The cop waited around a minute, looking for any sign of response, but Ryan was locked in a staring contest with the soil.

It took all of ten minutes for the sound of the car's distant engine to be indistinguishable from the dry wind, and Ryan looked up in the amazement of how silent it all was.

His own sounds were magnified. A head scratch was more a skull scratch, a sneeze a gunshot. He felt scared to talk to himself, in case in really now the only living thing from here to the horizon. Even the cop car had finally dipped under the Earth's curve and had escaped the desert's perfect flatness.

He turned his back to the school just to pretend for a second that it was him who was the tallest thing out there. How cool. Like an outlaw with a punishment worse than death, no horse, no hat, and not a six-shooter on him - and it dawned on him with an exciting pleasure that he was an outlaw in some way. But the crime wasn't no cattle-wrangling... and there that self-hatred was, returning after its one-minute holiday.

Do you find perspective claustrophobic? Lets leave our fresh-faced protagonist for a second, and let him gain his wits. Don't worry, I'm sure he'll be fine without our supervision.

In the meantime, here's another headcase, and his name is Kyle. He's an arctic fox whose also in the complete wrong setting, another photoshop in an already surreal town.

He's a cool dude, he likes hugs. Hasn't lost his virginity quite yet, but that's pretty stock-standard for a guy who celebrated his 17th year of age just last week. Also the norm for a guy with a fond interest in other guys. A fond, insecure interest - No, I swear, I like girls! He just... he's a handsome guy, I'm allowed to say that! He'd drool at seeing a guy shirtless without really knowing why. A golden-age, dad-ish humour: If you asked him why he always wore sunnies, he'd joke that it helps 'cool' him down.

What pissed Kyle off the most was when Benji offered to go easy on him.

"Righto, Kylio." Benji laughed, slapping the basketball in faultless fashion. "I won't go easy on you. But a bets a bet, if I win this, you have to kill yourself."

That was a common bet for the black fox to make. It kept Kyle up at night: they'd known each other for their entire lives, and he'd still joke about that...

Kyle knew he was worse with the ball, and a head shorter than Benji, but confidence was his downfall. "I'd gonna smash you into the ground, you just wait. But if I win-"

"If you win?!" Benji scoffed and held the ball in an arm. "Kyle, you've never won anything against me. Not when we were kids, not as teens,"

When I was a kid, you mean...

and not as 17-year-olds. Happy birthday, by the way."

"You literally blew out my candles on the day."

"So how's this, if today... for whatever reason, you get that ball into that hoop more times than I do." He rubbed the black fur-stubble on his chin. Benji liked his fur wild and refused to let Kyle shave him. "I'll do anything."

Kyle blinked. "Anything?"

"Yes." Benji smirked. "Are you blushing?"

"Zip it."

He threw him the ball. "Alright then hotshot, lets hope there's a noose just lying around.

It was a simple throw, but it bounced off the side of Kyle's head. It would've gotten him in the nose but his attention had suddenly snapped him to face the gym's rear window.

There was someone there... peering in with their paws cupping around their eyes... with the sunlight shining in all Kyle could see was their silhouette, shadowy ears pulled back by curiosity. Then they flicked up and the figure waved to him, causing a long shadow to flick around the length of the court.

Benji yawned. "You told me that Luke would leave us alone for the day."

"I don't think that's Luke..." Longer ears, a bit taller, thinner than a wolf and what muscle it had was lean and well spread out.

Kyle lifted a hand and waved back.

The figure walked around the length of building and approached one of the side doors, throughout its walk becoming less of silhouette and more of a canine.

"Oh crud, he's coming around. Ahh, um,"

"Calm down." Benji patted him on the back.

"He totally saw us."

"You're just a guy shooting some hoops before dinner. Ain't nothing wrong with that."

Kyle felt his chest tighten, "Oh jeez, what do I tell him..."

Then Benji's dark paw was lifting his head up to face him. He felt Benji's other paw on his shoulder, being as comforting as the black fox gave credit of being. "Nothing. You're doing nothing wrong." Ryan looked up into his eyes, and Benji's wink made him smile. "Now chuck me that ball, I want something to do while you meet this dude."

Ryan felt warm. The heat made him hot, but his insides tickled with the orange glow of company. There's someone else out here! And a teenager too! Not some adult waiting to shove paperwork in his face or tell him rules.

He would've kept up that happiness as he opened the doors into the airconditioned court, if he didn't witness the fox throw the basketball to no one at all, like a pass to pure oxygen... and it bounced across the empty court and joined all the other basketballs that occupied that corner.