october 2005
http://cakehole.org/zedpm
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When you're old enough, your mother takes you to watch the fire rain. It's several minutes before the meteors start to streak across the sky, orange tails streaming and dissipating into nothing.
"This is where I first met your father," she says. She's never talked about him before, the man who gave you your name and your dark eyes, although you've heard stories. Stories of the stranger who stayed for a hundred days before he returned home, stories twisted and confuddled by age, stories Garren told you before he left for Earth—stories your mother is finally ready to tell you.
The light illuminates her face, smoothing the tight wrinkles from too many years and too much laughter. "It was a night like this," she murmurs, "when fire brighter than this rained through the sky. His friend told us to make a wish, and I did."
You slip your small hand into hers, squeezing gently to encourage her. "Did you wish for him to stay?"
Your mother smiles. "Yes. He was as kind and handsome as Garren's father, and we fell in love. He lived with us, helped us sow the fields and cut the timber, and one day he left." Her eyes trace the path of a meteor passing overhead. You've never seen her like this before, vulnerable, alone despite your presence at her side, and you hold on tighter.
"I'll find him," you say. "I'll follow Garren through the ring, and I'll find him, and I'll bring him back." The words sound childish in your ears; you're suddenly aware of how young you are, how impossible your task is, but you'll risk unknown worlds to make your mother smile.
She laughs, shaking her head. "Jack," she says lightly, "Jack." Her arm reaches around your shoulders and pulls you close. "When you're older. Stay for now, my son."
The fire rain stops; the sky is clear over the only home you've ever known.
