Catch a falling star
― Nikita Gill
The suburbs were quiet for a Friday night.
It was just after ten and I was reeling in the garden hose and thinking about tomorrow and my interview with Dag Johansen at Scanda Business Solutions.
It had finally occurred—my big break. This would be my first grasp at the brass ring—a manager’s position with a six-figure salary and no one else in the running.
“It’s yours for the taking,” Nils confided to me, trying hard to suppress his excitement—after all, he was the gatekeeper who got me in the door, nailing down the VP’s job himself along with a yearly salary just shy of a quarter million Euros.
“You know I was planning on taking the year off,” I protested, though it was half- hearted—I mean, a hundred thousand annually would solve my debt problems rather than postponing them as I was intending.
“It’s time to grow up, Shakespeare and forget about writing that best seller.”
Okay, Nils and I go back a long way—and to say he knew me would be an understatement—it was more like he had my number—a six-figure one to be precise.
So, here I was, tidying up my patch of crab grass and standing in my backyard staring up at stars.
I glanced furtively at the colored window squares of the neighboring houses—Nope, no one was at the curtains wondering if I were deranged.
In fact, no one was even up and about—except me, of course, prowling in my own backyard, pretending to put away the hose while guiltily stealing a peek at the stars.
Why Cyn put up with me was beyond my ken.
“I love your poems—you’re not like everyone else and what’s more, you have talent. I wish I could put into words how I feel.”
Her eyes were shining and the way she looked at me made me feel I was the Bard himself about to pen another sonnet—
Shall I compare thee to a summer’s night?
But here in the darkness, Nil's virtual face frowned at me in disapproval.
I didn't care because out under the stars the images that crowded my inner eye were given free rein.
I tried to blink away his rebuke, but the virtual face grew sterner and the mouth was moving.
Be a man. Don't always be pondering childish things.
I groaned inwardly. Where did that come from?
Shame welled up within me. How could Cyn love me or even respect me? Nils was so practical and worldly and here I was stuck in some form of arrested development—hell, even my language of love was dark and mysterious.
CRAAAAAK!
A splintering roar filled the night. The nearby houses came alive and emptied themselves of their occupants. Cyn was at my side grabbing onto my arm and pointing at our roof.
“Look,” she cried, “There’s a huge, smoking hole!”
I looked up and she was right. Up near the peak where the new forty year shingles had been laid last fall, there was a black gaping crater.
“What the hell,” Bernie Jenkins kept saying, over and over.
Bernie was a retired fireman and always had an answer for everything. “Phone the fire station,” he ordered Maude, his wife.
Within minutes, the fire trucks arrived and managed, with Bernie’s directing, to put ladders up to the roof.
Two firemen scrambled up and spent a long time staring into the splintered rafters. Then, they silently made their way back down.
“What was it, fellas?” asked the chief.
“You won’t believe it,” the younger one said, “but it’s a meteorite about the size of a microwave.”
“You sure it’s not a microwave?” asked Bernie—always the practical man.
“Naw, it’s a meteorite,” the young fireman answered. “I studied astrophysics in university and still go meteorite hunting on weekends.
“That one is a beaut—I’ll bet it’s worth over a hundred thousand bucks."
He turned to me, smiling. “You sure lucked out, Mister. I’ll take a hole in my roof anytime to collect on that payday.”
Cyn’s eyes glistened. “It’s a sign, Bert—See, now you don’t have to take that job.”
I could have kissed her right there and then. A lump rose in my throat and all I could do was nod.
I’d like to say I wrote that best seller, but of course, I didn’t.
I did manage to get a few of my poems published and I put out a small volume of verse.
As for Nils, he went on to become CEO and make his first million. I don’t feel jealous or resentful though.
Most nights, Cyn and I sit in our backyard talking and staring at stars.
Occasionally, I even read her my poems.
Her favorite? The one about a falling star.
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