The Characters:
The theme of the story is: Those who fail to change, ensure their own peril. The theme also ties into the modern American problem of rampant and uncontrolled capitalistic situation - where if the country fails to change, the sattirical representation of the game's America will more likely to become reality than satire. The location within which the story takes place, gradually reveals, in a format of a Pseudo Radio Play, the back story, family affair and conflict between three key characters: Raymond Fletcher, his daughter, Anabelle Fletcher and Roy Sullivan.
Raymond Fletcher:
An egotistic, self centered magnate, born and raised in a remote town of
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Raymond did manage to build a relatively lucrative business from his Fletcher Typist series of typewriters. A feat which had granted him the ticket to the high life. Raymond got accustomed to the glamourous life of a magnate very quickly. The caviar and wine, the fame and recognition from his Fletcher brand and lucrative venues which the middle class could only dream of accessing were akin to a Drug for Raymond. He loved the attention. Raymond loved every second if it, but the wheel of progress and innovation and as the digital age had started rapidly replacing and in turn being replaced faster than the industry could settle, Raymond's typewriters turned to paperweight, before the all-mighty office computer terminal.
As quickly as Raymond's empire rose to power, it had crumbled before he could do anything about out. In presence of the behemoth which had risen and dwarfed Raymond's business, he had sold his assets before it could bring his total ruin, and with the remaining fortune in tow, Raymond was left forgotten.
Anabelle Duds (Fletcher):
Daughter of Raymond, dreams of nothing more than to live a quiet, peaceful and happy life with a whole family, yet finds herself recruited and immersed in her father's mini mall business, helping out with running the mall. Anabelle respects and lives by, and even preaches about family values, and thus she cannot find it in herself to leave her Father all by himself. Anabelle pleads with Raymond to leave this old dream of his and come live a safe, common and quiet life with her and her newlywed husband in the city. Every time Anabelle brings up the subject with her father, Roy finds a way to convince him to stay and keep going. Roy had even managed to guilt trip her into thinking that she would abandon her father if she had left.
Anabelle would have stayed too if the stress caused by the work at the mall as well as her worry about her father's mental health and future had finally resulted in her miscarrying a baby. Raymond proclaims that it was too early to have the baby anyways and that if he makes the mall work, life would be easy for her as well. Anabelle is confronted by her husband, pointing out that Raymond's blind to the harm he's bringing to the family and makes Anabelle confront the fact that if she kept going, she would never find peace and her father would drag her down into hell with his delusions.
Anabelle finds the strength to let go of her father entirely and leave the town with her husband without notice, right then and there, leaving Raymond behind. Anabelle, against her family values and principles, manages to let go of her father and his delusions, and at last attains the peace she had longed for.
Roy Sullivan:
A sleazy failure of a salesman who barely makes ends meet and lives out of his car. Roy finally gets a big break in his salesman career when he finds Raymond sulking in the wake of his typewriter business going belly up. After hearing him reminisce of the good old days when his home town boomed with life, Roy sells Raymond the idea of "selling the dream of good livin' to america" by rekindling that same feeling back into the town. To do so, he proposed building a landmark mega-mall, playing on his fond memories and nostalgia. Over some time, Roy continues to sell Raymond all kinds of useless upgrades and tech under the guise of it being the key to making his dream come to life. Roy milks Raymond for every penny he's got until Raymond has nothing left to be taken. Roy is greatly distrusted by Anabelle as she sees right through him like a book. Anabelle realizes his ploy and tries to convince her father to see the same, but every time ends up with Roy turning on his snakelike charms and convincing Raymonds by playing on his dream.
All the riches make Roy lose composure and he lets the news of a superhighway slip in front of Raymond. This reveals his true colors to Raymond and he gets severely assaulted. This gives Roy a ticket to wrapping withs whole scam with a nice bow and thus he serves Raymond with a hefty lawsuit. This ruins Raymond and Roy gets away with a hefty earning. Roy does not let go of the dream and attains everything he has ever wanted.