The Light on the Horizon

5

"Why do you keep doing that?," I asked.

Lewis put a hand to the back of his head, then pulled it away and looked at it as if he expected there to be something there.

"I had a really bad headache," he said, still staring at this hand. "Did you have a bad headache, too, Robbie?"

"No," I said. That was a lie, but I really, really didn't want to talk about it. I don't know why. I just didn't. It was important...and it wasn't.

"How long has it been since Mom and Da . . . since Mom and . . since Mom went away?"

"I dunno. A few days."

"And how long has it been since Cole went away?"

"I dunno. A few days."

Lewis looked around the kitchen like a kid lost in the supermarket.

"Why hasn't anybody called?"

"Oh, God, Lewis, what is it now?"

"Like Mom's work! Or school! Why hasn't school called?" Lewis went over to the wall phone with the long, curly cord that hangs almost to the floor, picked up the receiver and put it to his ear.

"It works," he said, and hung it back up. "Robbie, why hasn't anybody called?"

"How should I know? Mom probably already told them she was going away."

"And school?"

"Forget school. We don't have to go to school anymore."

"Why not? Why hasn't anybody from school called? They always call even when you're absent for only one day."

I wanted to tell him that it's something I just know. That it's like I know what my name is. School's somewhere we'll never have to go again and that no one is going to call.

Not ever. Not ever again.

But I didn't. I just told him it was time to eat.

That night I watched from my window as Lewis climbed the fence and landed on the other side in the field. He started to walk away with the same determination Cole had.

But then he gradually started to slow down and finally stopped.

He turned his head around and looked back at the house. For the longest time he just stood there in the long grass and the blowing leaves, looking back at the house.

Then he turned around and started to come back. But after a few steps, he stopped and looked over his shoulder towards the light glowing on the horizon.

He did that a number of times. Going in one direction and then turning and going in the other, like he couldn't make up his mind. Like when you can't decide what show to watch on TV and keep flipping from one channel to another and back again. 

But worse.

I laid down and closed my eyes. After a while I could heard the sound of the basketball hitting the backboard.