And then, he heard a new sound. Not the laugh track. Not the yabba-dabba-doo.
Arthur hesitated. Then, with a dry chuckle, he selected: Fred Flintstone .
They were the ones you finally came home from.
Arthur looked at his own hand. It was pale, thin, and trembling. It was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.
“I’m scared,” he whispered, and for the first time since the download began, the voice was his own. Not Fred’s. Arthur’s.
The first few hours were paradise. Arthur, as Fred, relished the simple physics of Bedrock. He drove the foot-powered car, his massive legs pumping a hilarious rhythm. He shared a rack of ribs with Barney at the drive-in, the meat impossibly tender, the laughter real. He even endured a screaming match with his wife, Wilma, about the “clams” for a new bowling ball. It was a conflict devoid of real pain, a sitcom argument with a laugh track ready to smooth over the edges.