The Apparent Junction of Earth and Sky

The Apparent Junction of Earth and Sky, Part I

He sang along to "Laid"by James, hitting the high notes without any hesitation as he cruised down the coastal highway. His window was down, his left arm hanging out in the air. He would spread his fingers from time to time,letting the wind blow through them. The car was going about eighty,but the roads were completely empty. Sometimes he worried about the safety of the bridges out there; nobody had worked on them in at least ten years. The thick supporting structures were subject to the constant force of the ocean's waves. Somewhere below them, he was sure that the concrete was beginning to crack.

But what did it matter? The sun was shining.

His cousin sat in the passenger seat with a cigarette in his hand. The sixteen-year-old nodded his head to the beat of the song, which changed over to "Never Let You Go" by Third Eye Blind. For a split second, he wondered if those guys were still alive. It had been ten years since he heard any new music. Before long, he imagined that people would start getting recording studios back online. All the songs before were about heartbreak and life's problems; people would have less to sing about now. Maybe the world was a happier place without new music. People could run away from their problems now and they didn't have to look back.

He stopped thinking about dead musicians when his cousin handed him the cigarette. He took a drag and coughed a little. It was rare for him to smoke. But this was a special day. They were hundreds of miles away from the settlement.They drove through the Everglades on their way south; he sometimes heard rumors back home about groups of people living there. They didn't see any signs, though, and so he was confident in his assumption that they were actually hundreds of miles away from any other people. It comforted him.

They parked on the bridge, pulling over to the side of the road against the railing.Their feet were propped up on the metal, both of them sitting on top of the car. They passed another cigarette back and forth. In front of them, the sun was beginning to kiss the water. The boy's skin was glowing orange, his eyes hidden behind cheap sunglasses.

"Do you miss any of them?" Ciaran asked.

The question took him by surprise, mostly because neither of them had spoken a word since the Everglades. They often went hours without talking. They only had each other. It had been that way for seven years now. They didn't really need words anymore. Brendan could read Ciaran and was likewise unable to keep much hidden from his cousin.

"Don't think about 'em too much, to be honest," Brendan admitted, passing the cigarette back to Ciaran. "Do you?"

Ciaran shrugged. He took the final drag and tossed the butt over the edge of the bridge. The sun was setting fast.

"Things are better now," he said. "I know I was a little kid when everything happened, but I know it's better."

He only knew it was better because Brendan said it all the time. The boy was six when it happened and there were ten very long years between then and this moment on the bridge.

There was a long pause.Brendan could tell the boy was about to say something, so he kept his mouth shut. One song ended on his phone and "Lost In the Light"by The Bahamas came on. He started to tap his foot lightly against the bridge railing. Ciaran finally spoke.

"Do you think there's a chance she got away?"

Brendan looked slowly over at him. Ciaran only stared out at the water, the sun now half gone, the water decorated with a stripe of golden light.

"You think about that often?" Brendan asked.

Ciaran shrugged. He thought about it often.

"She didn't get away,"Brendan said.