An impactful four pages from Palwick, set in a near-future USA in which a mother takes a trip on a Greyhound bus, to visit her incarcerated son.
With him separated from her in prison, she is also missing her daughter, who ‘lucked out’ in winning a lottery to get a place on a generation starship. Such is society, that spending the rest of your life on board the starship is far better than life back at home. The mother is concerned that the luck she’s been having, in getting a video transmission from her daughter just in time to show her son in prison ($100 to pay for the visit!), having an empty seat next to her on the bus isn’t going to last…
