Panama: a novel

I lie in bed and study the shadows on my ceiling, leafy and stretched oblong, not so different from the ones in Dayton.

I try to work out what I feel about this new place, think Ill never fall asleep.

Then the scent of Mothers Dayton soap in the sheets blurs me and Im anesthetized into deep, dark Panama night.

She is fifteen, ready for something anythingto happen.

What happens is Panama. The U.S. government has asked her father to help build the Canal.

The whole family will go, be a part of this historical event.

But Panama isnt as she imagines. Americans live in the Zone, which has been designed to look and feel just like an American town.

She wants more. She wants different. The fantasy is out there. Shell find it.