• • • • •
The sun is setting and the sky is growing dark, and my dad has yet to come home. Tickles is splayed out on the floor, alternating between asleep and moaning, and awake and panting. Since we’re on the second floor, it’s boiling, and my shirt has stuck to my sweating body.
I’m looking out my window and taking a break from my Montana UFO Sightings book. “Tickles, this is a fascinating sunset. I’d call it, uh, Colored Coals Below the Surface. It’s all these red, orange, and fiery colors bubbling out from the horizon.”
Tickles doesn’t even raise his head. I look back at my bed and how I’m almost done reading my new book, and I think how I could also just be leaving the movie theater with my new girlfriend, if only I had had the guts to go in.
I bend over, pick Tickles up, and place him on the bed with me. He looks groggy and tired, walks in a circle once, and then moves to the edge of the bed and kind of slides off and sits back down on the floor. So much for cuddling with the dog.
Back on my bed, I pick up the book, which was left open on the bedsheets. “Tickles, some of the sightings are fascinating.
“For instance, a guy in Butte once saw seven discs hover above a dormant volcano. This is what he said. ‘I was walking my dog, when out of nowhere Sam starts barking, and I look up and see these seven flat, saucerlike discs hovering above the M.’ That’s what they call the volcano mountain because it has a big M made of white rocks on it. ‘The whole event lasted about ten seconds, but I was able to take a picture. Only one before they all vanished. They didn’t even fly away. It was almost like they just became invisible. Sam looks up at the mountain every time we go for our walks now.’
“What do you think of that? What would you do if you saw a UFO? Huh, buddy?” I’m not looking at Tickles, for fear that he’s sleeping and I’ll feel like a big idiot. “The picture is included. You want to see it?” Tickles doesn’t say anything, so I just study it. Sure enough, seven creepy thin discs are hovering around this lone mountain peak on the edge of Butte.
The silence in the room builds, and the darkness grows as the daylight dims, but the small nightstand light is doing its best to keep me in a cone of ember light.
Tickles is snoring now and occasionally flicking his back leg, and I’m thankful for his company. I flip back to the table of contents to find another story I liked. “Oh yeah, Tickles. This is a good one.
“There was this school yard in Helena, Montana. This was about ten years ago. The kids were at recess with some teachers when what appeared to be an orb on fire flew right above them and landed with a crash not too far away. They show pictures of the crash site in the book, but the report says there was nothing at the site but some liquid ooze on the ground and busted-up trees. They called officials, who went to the site. The officials weren’t sure what it was, but it wasn’t a meteor, because there were no fragmentary space rocks left behind. Whatever crash-landed either disintegrated or up and left. Isn’t that crazy? But don’t you see? This is all validation for my own search. My mom’s right, we’re not alone.”
Tickles’s snoring has gotten louder, and I can’t bring myself to keep talking to a sleeping dog. But I’m not alone as the darkness finishes taking over the daylight.
* * *
I go for a walk because I am hot and sweaty and want to escape the hot box that is my bedroom. Tickles was sleeping away, and I said, “Walk?” But he didn’t even lift his head. I said it again, but the only thing he did was flick his ear in a way that I interpreted as, Leave me alone. So I figured the little guy needed his sleep.
The street seems abandoned as I leave my house. I look at Geoffrey’s house and notice that it now appears stagnant, which isn’t the case when he’s home. The only thing that feels alive to me at this moment is the sky.
I walk up the dirt road to the forest. The same one I always bring Tickles on. But the silence is just too thick tonight. I want to call Seth because I haven’t heard from him in a while, but I am hoping he’ll call me so that I don’t have to bother him on vacation. Even though I know it’s my turn.
It’s almost ten in Montana, so it’s almost nine in Seattle. I figure that’s a decent time to call. I know we’re friends, but even still, I can’t quite convince myself that I’m not being an intruder on Seth’s time. But I’m also conflicted, because I suspect he’s feeling the same way.
Ugh.
“Just dial,” I tell myself. My palms feel sticky, and it’s not because of the lingering heat.
Maybe tonight will be the night the UFO reappears? If so, I shouldn’t be distracting myself with a phone call.
I’ll call him later.
After about twenty minutes I find myself on the rock I fell asleep on.
I stand on top of the rock and look all around the quiet forest. I have a sudden urge to yell and let my lungs expand. But I don’t know what to yell. But the urge is still there, so I yell out, “Ahhhhhhhhh!”
After I stop, the quiet quickly settles back in. I stare up at the stars, and suddenly I have a whole bunch to say. So I say it all, but I don’t yell it. I just whisper it. Sometimes I feel like the universe hears a whisper more loudly than a yell. “Where are you? I hope you’re safe. I hope you’re happy. I hope you come back for me. I’m waiting for the day when you come back. You know where to find me. . . . And I still want to know why.”
I stare up at the big black sky and see the tiny stars twinkle, and I wait.
And wait.
The blackness above echoes back at me. Expanding. I feel like my words are coming back at me—as if they don’t have anywhere else to go. As if there’s no one up there to hear them. As if my mom isn’t up there at all.
Without really thinking about it, I pull out my phone and call.
“Charlie!” he answers.
I feel so confused that I suddenly want to cry. Seth answered my call. But why did I ever think he wouldn’t?
“Charlie? Hello? You there?”
Not sure what’s going on in my mind at the moment, but I’m caught in a swirl of thoughts.
“I’m hanging up unless you say something,” says Seth.
“Hi,” I manage to say.
“There you are.” He laughs. “I’m so glad you called.”
“You are?” I ask, surprised. I sit on the rock. “So how’s your trip?”
The blackness of the sky is less overwhelming. The tiny stars shine a little more brightly. Interesting how sometimes all it takes is a hello to break the feeling of insignificance.