Bandits

NASA Headquarters, "Greatest Images of NASA
(NASA-HQ-GRIN)," via Wikimedia Commons

I pull a handle, and there’s a loose mechanical racket
from gap-toothed gears and sticky kicker paddles as I
wait to see where the reels stop. Cherry, cherry, and...
lemon—not a winner. That’s just money, though. I’ve
got more important things to bet on, and I am feeling
lucky, a bit of Saint John the Conqueroo tucked away
in a pocket. Let’s spin the dial on a combination lock
that has Class M stars marking n numbers; we are so
close to unlocking infinity, when a bolt settles true in
a notch on the disc-shaped galaxy within, I can feel it
tick like a heartbeat. I’m ready to steal the sky. Those
are the stakes, after all: not a gamble for nickels with
odds set by the house, but picking a lock on treasure
so vast it’s as large as the Milky Way, as large as love.