Midnight at the Electric

In the year 2065, Adri leaves Miami, where she has always lived, to stay with an unknown relative, 107-year-old Lily Vega (Ortiz) from Canaan, Kansas. Adri is staying with Lily while completing a three-month Mars Colonist training program in Wichita, for which she has been preparing since she was in the sixth grade.

She arrives in Canaan in the middle of the night and harshly judges Lily’s SUV and angel-themed decorations. A friendly note on the door gives her directions to her bedroom, as Lily has gone to bed. In her room, she finds a postcard from 1920—145 years ago—from Lenore Allstock to Beth Godspeed. The postcard talks about someone named Galapagos.

Adri’s room feels unsettling, and she wonders what Lily will be like, reflecting on a roommate who once called her unlikeable. Adri had always been blunt and distant; she has given up trying to change.

Adri wakes before Lily and attempts to fix her car, a Theta, by printing out a circuit board on her Desk Factory. The part doesn’t work, which saddens her, as her Theta is her “most prized possession and possibly her best friend” (11).