the society for the elimination of labor

They are beneath the billboard at night. It is a reverse microscope, a giant yellow expanse designed to be taken for granted. To people driving, the billboard says: “Working towards a work-free America.” To anyone who hangs out below it, the thick black pillars of letters are not words; there is too much meaning in their size and texture to be words. The Society for the Elimination of Labor. The casino glows in the distance.
“I read this old book about Martian bees. This guy really believed in them, like, super intelligent bees. On Mars.” The lights in front of the billboard are immense, angled onto the text as if it were a landing pad, waiting for an arrival. Moths dirty the air.
“Did you bring cigarettes?” The girl asks him.
“He went off about how people are prejudiced against bees, and that people have clammy gross flesh and it makes more sense for bees to be intelligent, because they’re hard and shiny.” He is pulling out crumpled cigarettes while saying this, looking out dispassionately at the highway, trying to be as cool as possible.
“I’m glad people aren’t hard and shiny,” she says. He lights her cigarette. There is no wind and it is hot. The lights from the casino make the sky into a ceiling.
“Do you know what a fetish is?”
“I think its Japanese.”
“I heard Mr. Blumfeld has one.
“Cool.”
She looks at her watch. “When is your brother coming?”
“Who knows. My brother is a drunk.” They have been waiting to be picked up for almost an hour. His brother is actually, at this moment, drunk- 20 minutes away at his girlfriend’s house, playing poker while she tries to sleep upstairs because she has an early shift at the hospital.
The boy beneath the billboard imagines having sex with the girl. He flinches a bit when she looks over at him. “You’ll probably run the casino then, when you’re older.” Everyone finds ways to slip the casino into conversations with him. The boy gets good grades. His father runs the casino, and buys him nice jeans. The boy goes to school in town instead of on the reservation.
“Fuck that.” He says. “I want to play guitar.”

English class has just ended and the two of them are walking with their teacher Mr. Blumfeld. Mr. Blumfeld is wearing a pink polo shirt and his chest hair is spilling out. His hair is eighties feathered windblown. He made money as a male model, a failed poet, his wife is a model, never met a writer without a beautiful wife he said, I met Allen Ginsberg once. Now they live on a hill, golden retriever, she is fatter than her modeling shot on the mantel, he is a self-proclaimed protracted adolescent, full of angst, must be something in the cafeteria food he says. They sit down in the cafeteria; none of the other teachers eat the cafeteria food, just the alleged fetishizer Mr. Blumfeld.
“We have too much media,” He says, opening the newspaper. “When the world was word of mouth, religious repetition was filtered through everyone who repeated it.”
The girl opens a baloney sandwich that her Dad made for her, the baloney is stacked a mile high. “Now, celebrity magazines get the circulation of the early bible every week: a few twenty somethings make up stories about paparazzi photographs, and bam, the printing press chants it 3 million times, automatically. We can’t help but repeat it, it has the same effect on us as 3 million elders praising God.” Mr. Blumfeld looks funny sitting on these cafeteria chairs, hunched over, unable to make eye contact with anyone he speaks to. Eventually he always gets in trouble with the community standards. He is a member of The Society for the Elimination of Labor. The group’s support is erupting. They advocate the full conversion to an education/entertainment economy; the complete elimination of manufacturing. Easy enough for your damned communist teacher to say, said the girls Dad. But Mr. Blumfeld believes the opposite. This plan is capitalism at its cruelest he says, and we must embrace it because it is inevitable, the only way for America to survive, we are the world’s nerve and pleasure center. A bell rings, and everyone in the cafeteria competes for the coolest way to stand up, Mr. Blumfeld included.

The boy and girl are walking through the casino, shuffling through an ocean of beeps and jingles, dozens of the same song from slightly different places, out of sync. The carpet is lush, a loud design, quality fibers. Security guards nod to the boy, security-like. The casino is the boys living room. This is the place that he spends his childhood disregarding, the vessel for his parents imperfection. His jeans are very good quality. They step off the main gambling floor, through a hallway with a fake stone floor, and through the reception into his fathers office. The girl has been close to his right arm all the time. The boy carries a force field, he is a futuristic prince.
“I need to take Sara home again Dad.” His tone is practicing adulthood, a light reprimand for his father. His father is leaning against his desk with his legs crossed.
“Where’s your worthless brother?” The boy shrugs as slightly as possible. “All right, here.” He shuffles through his pocket, pulling out a large ring of keys and beepers. “Go get somebody on the floor to take you in the Tahoe. Go see if Darren’s out there.” He hands the keys over. “Tell them I said its fine. Come back if you can’t find someone.”
“Thanks Dad.” Sara never says a word in the interaction. When they get in the hall, the boy lightly grabs her hand and pulls left, away from the main casino floor and towards the parking lot.
“Where are you going?”
“I’m taking you home.” She doesn’t ask anymore questions. They emerge from the casino like convicts, the last second that their guilt is still theoretical. The Tahoe’s locks beep and open. They climb up into the seats, way up, the driver’s seat is adjusted for legs his fathers massive legs. Electronic drones tilt the seat forward, raise it up, fitting the futuristic prince. The engine turns over and lights pour on. She doesn’t ask him if he knows how to drive. He would’ve said “Indians drive their cribs.” They shift into gear and pull out of the parking lot. Right onto the reservation road, towards the highway. “I learned what a fetish is,” Sara says. “ It means he only likes Asian girls.” She rolls down the window, smiling. She picks up a big mac wrapper, and hastily chucks it out the window. She reaches down for a drink cup, and hurls it. She starts laughing, picking up more McDonald’s garbage and throwing it out the window. The boy starts laughing too.