The rain sluices down Hennepin Avenue and the bus to Utopia is nowhere in sight. On the other end of that bus line, a crescent-shaped harbor looks out upon a blue sea, all the layers of color from sand-filtered emerald in the shallows to aquamarine out from shore, to the ultramarine depths and the indigo abysses at the horizon. Ships sail into that harbor from the twelve points of the Compass Rose, archaic ships with billowing white sails and high poopdecks surmounted by castles, the ships of the time of Elizabeth and of Shakespeare, the ships of the Spanish Main.
Two teenaged boys listen to rap on their headphones, nodding along to the tinny words that Vera can hear from six feet away, their baggy pants damp with the rain. The Number Six arrives and they pick up the folds of denim like nineteenth-century skirts and run for it, splashing through the puddles.
Human beings will invent costumes that hobble and trip them.
E. P. Beaumont 
Love the world you paint with such wonderful descriptions! You blew me away here! 🙂
Wow. This was excellent!
Very visual here, great six!
Love the colours, pick up the folds of their denim and the last line – humour and truth
Beautiful description and a nice blending of fantasy and modern-day. The Compass Rose bothers me, though. A compass rose generally has a number of points that are a power of two. (4, 8, or 16.) Without the “the” it would make sense–the ships are coming from 3/4 of the possible directions if a 16 point compass was meant, which suggests the bay is on an outjutting part of the coast. With the “the,” it suggests a very odd compass.
Love the juxtaposition of old world and modern. And the boys lifting their baggy pants like Victorian gowns is a fantastic observation. Terrific six again!
Great descriptions, of both here and there! 🙂
I love the details that take someplace familiar into someplace alien.
That and I’m going to be laughing at all the boys in saggy pants at school as I imagine them in 19th century skirts.