“It’s a misplaced yet common belief that there are millions of stars when we look up at the night sky,” she told him. “There are trillions, in fact, but we can only see about twenty-five hundred when we’re somewhere like this, and much less if we’re in the city.
“Still,” she gave disbelief a well-deserved moment of silence, “it seems there are so many more.”
She gazed up in awe, the subject she spoke of staring back, illuminating her face like a polished pearl earring. Like freshly squeezed lemon juice over the hack-spit-bottom of a full moon emptied end-over-end into a coupe glass rinsed with courage and youth. Soft and slow-spinning. Calm and smooth.
They stood with their arms around each other’s waists in a clearing on a quiet mountaintop in the middle of nowhere. They felt more somewhere than they ever had before.
They inhaled pine pitch and woodsmoke while oxygen at last had a moment to skim the daily news. They exhaled wonder and thunder as carbon dioxide took full advantage of its night off. Coo grabbed the paper from Ox; Ox wouldn’t let it go—they both blew heavy as it lighted into flames.
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“So, you’re telling me twenty-five hundred people could stand right here, and each of them wish on a different star,” he said, looking at her the way she looked at the sky. “They could each have their own.” His face resembled a watch that hadn’t been dialed in correctly—a timepiece that could never keep up, that only lagged behind the astral passage of proper time.
“This is true,” she giggled, “if they all could fit here, silly. But think about the trillions of stars visible from earth, especially if you use a telescope. It’s virtually never-ending. Two hundred sextillion, as far as we can gather. Don’t get any bright ideas now.” She cracked a crooked smile. “It would take four billion times the current human population of this planet one wish each—each on a different star—to account for them all.” Her smirk faded to a pout. “No one ever thinks about the stars’ side in all of this.”
“Well, the stars are dead, aren’t they?” he thought aloud. “Haven’t they died millions—billions?—of years ago, and their light is just now reaching us here on earth?”
“If you want to be depressing—yeah, I suppose.” She glanced at him, then down, then up again. Her eyes moved quicker than the speed of light; he didn’t even have a chance to see all that ancient illumination glitter back at him from the mirrors of her wide open opal eyes. “But they’re still here, right? I mean, you can see them…
“All I know is: I’ve never seen something dead look so beautiful.” Her face gleamed like a thousand shining diamonds; like a galaxy of waxed sand.
He supposed he had to agree. He conceded to look up, though he’d rather continue looking at something beautiful and alive.
Ghost Town Theatre 