Astronaut

Sailing and swooping through the infinite blackness of the deepest catacombs of night, Sam glided through an empty field, the very field behind where his father’s old barn once proudly stood. The stress on his eyes was softened by the shimmering stars above him. The cool night’s dew silently spat on his bare shins as the boy’s feet hissed past countless blades of grass. As he ran, his eyes remained streamlined as his feet carried him to the place where he could hide away from the world.

At this spot where the stars seemed to shine brighter than anywhere else in town stood a bare apple tree. Its light pink apple blossoms had been long gone and when standing beside it, flat plains seemed to stretch out forever. When the wind blew, the field would quiver like a current in the sea and shimmer with a curious glow. And the silence hung in the air like the most captivating chandelier.

Climbing the bare tree, Sam saw the stars getting closer and closer to him, urging him to come nearer. From the top, where he was the closest to the sky as he could get, he reached out with both hands toward the night sky, feeling the tiny lights comforting him from a distance.

“He’s up there,” his mother said a week ago, looking up at the stars. “Daddy’s up there, watching over us.”

“Then I’ll become an astronaut and visit him!” Sam announced with a chocolate milk-smeared smile. His mother grinned back at him and wiped the stain off of her son’s lips.

And from the top of the highest branch on that fruitless apple tree, the boy stretched out two trembling hands toward the night sky.