Imagine it's 1988. Michael Jackson is King of Pop. He's still black and no one's wondering if he's wacko. You're a writer in Disneyland, pregnant with her third child. On your way out of seeing Captain Eo, you're handed a visor with flashing lights.
Flash forward to 2011. MJ is dead. You've published four books in five years. You're sitting by the banks of a mountain river with another writer, no books and no kids. You hand her the visor. Two severed wires, black and red, protrude like antennae from the flaccid elastic headband. Small yet significant feelers of support.
She takes the visor. Ignores it for weeks as she rides a creative roller-coaster and wants to get off, pukes over the rail.
Eventually, she remembers - the visor. Holds and examines the silver plastic. Is that the scent of make-up lingering on the cloth lining? Who is Captain Eo, anyway?
Googles. Okay. A male superhero played by a man who moves like a sentient ocean. Whose emblem is the inverted pink triangle...
And not for the first time she wonders about the King of Pop. What happened?
