Catch a Glimmer of Your Star

Halloween Party

Basil did not want Sunny to see him cry.

He wiped his tears. Crying so much just made him a burden on others. He put on a smile when Sunny returned to the room, but Sunny saw through him instantly.

"What's wrong?" Sunny asked. "Please tell me if something's on your mind."

I guess I can't hide anything from you, Sunny.

"My parents just called," Basil replied slowly. "I didn't get much time to talk, but..."

"Did they say something?"

"My dad, he, he kind of explained why he didn't visit my grandma when she passed away," Basil spoke quietly.

Should I tell Sunny what my dad told me?

Sunny's always been a friend who let me confide to him all my problems, wishes, and dreams.

I'm afraid I'll just burden him more. Haven't I been enough of a burden already?

Sunny sat down by Basil's side with a reassuring smile. Basil's head was filled with doubt, yet when he gazed at Sunny he saw an eye shining with an understanding light. It told Basil that he was all ears for him.

Even though I'm such a bother to you...

You always looked at me like that back when we were both just kids.

Basil remembered how Sunny always used to listen to him with that comforting expression.

With that meaningful gaze, Sunny had listened to Basil speak about parents who were never there, about loneliness as the boy who was always left out by the other kids at school, about a grandmother who lost her strength to garden as she grew old, and about the bullies who had stomped to shreds a beloved pink flower he found growing in the schoolyard field.

The way you listened to me was a treasure that I held closest to my heart.

Basil's eyes grew misty as he let his words flow. "Dad told me that grandma almost let him die when he was young. She wouldn't take him to the doctor when he had a tuberculosis infection and he had to crawl to the hospital all by himself. That's why he didn't visit her on her deathbed."

The startled look in Sunny's eye prompted Basil to add his own feelings on the matter. "Grandma was never like that to me. She always took me to the doctor when I got sick. I don't know what made her change...or why she did that to my dad in the first place. I just don't understand anything."

Sunny wrapped an arm gently over Basil's shoulder and pulled him close, their heads touching.

A warm trickle of water rolled down Basil's cheek.

Sunny isn't the most talkative person...

Yet I've always loved how quietly you listened to me ramble about all my problems.

Sometimes you listen better by not saying anything.

They stayed alongside each other, arms wrapped around each other's shoulders.

Basil wasn't necessarily looking for answers or advice when he complained about his problems. He just wanted someone to listen to him, to feel his scared and anxious and uncertain feelings together with him. He knew it was selfish to ask someone to do that for him. But Sunny always understood that that was what he wanted.

Not words. Just someone who could absorb his feelings.

The rain falling outside grew to a light drizzle. The bright city lights that shone through the window were refracted by a thin veil of water into a calm shimmer.