Bunker

Flash Fiction - Please Vote for Me

Ladies and Gentlemen, our Society has died, and you know it. Remember how things were in the old days? The young couples that kept this place alive and fresh? The large balls overlooking the 18^th hole? All-nighters in Miss Epsilon’s cabanas with another man’s wife or another woman’s husband? I’ve never experienced these days myself, but I tried one of Marjorie’s signature piña coladas the day she retired from tending.

Now, we waste our days lazing on our couches, glued to endless scrolls. We yearn for a return to the bacchanalia.

Elect me President of the HOA, and I will personally ensure we enjoy that lifestyle again.

My enemies have tried their best to slander me. They say I’m thirty years younger than you all and thus have no reason to sympathize with your plight. They claim I’m going to favor my own company for building contracts, despite being a feisty robotics startup with no plans to develop real estate at this time.

Low blows, all of them. Before you fall victim to propaganda, please consider who I’m running against. Mr. Boot is outdated. He claims his legal background gives him an understanding of the local ecosystem, but when’s the last time he’s done more than regurgitate case law? Might as well replace him with a chatbot. And Miss Epsilon? Her anxiety gets in everyone’s way to the point that no one can do their jobs for fear of her nitpicks. She doesn’t need power; she needs medication. They can both jack off on their couches and die in private.

Meanwhile, I’m in touch with the next generation, our cabana employees and caddies and golf course managers. I share your concerns. They’re bums (who don’t even like golf) looking to make a couple cents over minimum, but they see our neighborhood for what it really is: a sanitized place for us to die. It’s up to me, hardworking club employees, and friends of mine willing to lend capital to get us out of this rut. I can bring us into a better future; just look at The Villages. Those folks have a real culture.

Let me spell out for you what a day in our Paradise is like.

I’ll meet my best friend and rival Mr. Boot in the morning on the terrace overlooking the 18^th. Androids programmed after the greatest golfers to ever live will square off for the morning Master’s. Mr. Boot will bet on Jack Nicholson yet sip an Arnold Palmer. I’ll order our morning mimosas and espresso martinis from the gynoids, and we’ll cheer as Nicholson’s opponent snaps his club in half and hurtles it into the animatronic alligator-infested waters. Mr. Boot will collect his payout (maybe we can do a drink crypto-credit system), then collect us refills. Holographic jungle birds will flicker onto the empty green as AI announcers foreshadow next morning’s storyline.

Once he’s buzzed, Mr. Boot will ask about money, just like he does at our HOA meetings now. I’ll hem and haw about him catching me off-guard, but the fact is I’ll never need my guard up. I’ll ask the AI about his budgetary question, the numbers will even before our eyes, and that will be that. We’ve escaped a board meeting. No one will need to move their asses to feel reassured that Paradise persists.

My afternoons will be spent preparing the hospitality of our fine cabanas. Miss Epsilon can oversee androids stocking shipments of laughing gas and horse tranquilizers in the minibars, next to the condoms and lube. She’ll marvel at how spotless everything becomes after a full night of partying. She’ll ask our android helpers about what happened the night before. Our staff will be chipper and smiling, but their memories will be too short to snitch. Do whatever you want with as many guests as you want, fearlessly, even if you want to fuck my droids.

I’ll help Miss Epsilon break in the cabanas. We’ll microdose horse tranquilizer, and I’ll inform her of its anxiety-cooling health benefits. The drugs will help her enter a pleasant trance. She’ll remember the feeling of the old days, but she won’t need to remember the old days themselves. Why bother? Your past is just background noise for our present.

Once she’s pacified, I’ll drive Miss Epsilon to the clubhouse for the main event: our feast. We’ll sample authentic French champagne at two, sip imported IPAs at happy hour, and swim through pools of flavored vodka reflecting our beautiful, blinding fireworks at eight. We’ll be so merry and drunk their booms will blend into our pounding drums and heartbeats.

Stories and memories will flow like liquor. You’ll finally have something to talk about. What you did in the cabanas this afternoon or which robot sunk a hole-in-one.

Don’t mind me. I’m content sipping my water in the corner; no need to boor into your little worlds. I’ll listen to all of your stories, even the ones that happened before our big renovation. I’ll jump in every once in a while to add richness to the unfolding conversation. And once that’s done, we can talk about how good the neighborhood is, how nice our new staff are, how fun the clubhouse is. I’ll be so polite as to leave before the orgy. I need my beauty sleep to keep working hard for you all, night after night. Besides, sex disgusts me.

When we’re all living like this, we will be liberated from depression. We can hear about people outside the club imprisoned in suffering, and we’ll pity them like orphans starving in an unknown country. But doesn’t pity dull us after a while, too? We’ll nix that topic of discussion to focus on the sublime. Joy and excitement and nostalgia. You will live freer than you’ve ever lived, and you’ll thank me for it in the middle of your ecstasy, and shame on you if you forget to do that. You’re going to love me. More than any HOA President. More than Nicholson and fentanyl. More than dying memories of the good old days.

Your time to act is running out. Vote for me. I’m counting on you.

I’m afraid I won’t answer questions in person like Mr. Boot and Miss Epsilon. My two very quiet employees and I have been slaving away for my company to find its big break. If any of you have a smart grandchild, especially in computer science, we’ll take them.