Stars in your skull
Pop was panicky and a wild eyed when he came in through the door of the convenience mart. He was peeking frantically back through the glass after he got himself inside and quietly closed the door. The cheerful entry bell had long since been ripped out.
“Okay Danny,” Pop said, not taking his eyes from the unseen view. “time to put stars in your skull. Do you remember how?”
Danny looked up from a ragged comic book and nodded. “Sure Pop, I can do it.” His little heart fluttered. He knew how but had only practiced it inside the tent they had set up in the old walk-in freezer of the Sav’n’Go. Never in the wild though. Not with those things close by.
He was pretty good at it, he thought. He didn’t tell his pop, but it made him feel like he was flying.
“Okay, I’m going to watch out front. I can’t be sure but I think I saw one coming. You sit down out of sight and be absolutely still. You keep those stars twinkling. Don’t let them go out. Just like we practiced, okay?”
“Okay, Pop!” Danny said helpfully as he plopped down in front of a ransacked shelf of tiny creams and shampoos. He closed his eyes and pictured an x-ray cross section of a skull he had seen in a science book at school. Back when there had been school. He brushed away the center of it with thick strokes of black until only void nestled in the crenellated circle of stark white against electric blacks and grays. He imagined it was chilly, but peaceful in there. In his mind he blew out a breath, the kind that sends dandelion seeds scattering. Inside the skull - his skull - tiny lights began winking into life and grew into bright constellations, then entire luminous galaxies. Each one twinkled at him and he smiled back at each in turn. His mind went blank as he felt his breath, sure and slow within the starry expanse he now drifted in.
He barely registered a clack of nails on concrete. A whimpering and then a gasp. A hollow crunching. A strange sucking gurgle.
Danny drifted in the space between his ears for many moments. He felt like he might be very good at this.
“Hey, are you okay?” That was Pop’s voice. How long had he been gone?
Danny opened his eyes slowly and looked toward the sound. His father stood there with a quizzical and concerned look on his face. Danny beamed back “Daddy! I made stars in my head just like you asked! It was so pretty!”
A long pause, then: “D-daddy? Kid, I just got here. I don’t remember how, but you looked like you’d gone catatonic so I thought I’d check on you. Stars? This is no time for make-believe. You know those things are still roaming around right? You know what they’ll do to you, right?”
Danny gawped for a moment, and screwed on a brave face to hide his chin all set to quiver.
“They… take memories, right daddy?”
“Kid, look, I’m just being a good samaritan here. Do you have a place to stay or other people with you? I’m not your daddy, is he lost?”
A sullen anchor dropped around Danny’s spine and dragged him slowly forward until he was hugging his knees. He looked sidelong up at his Pop’s face, and noticed at last the small rivulet of blood running down from one ear and pooling under his stubbled neck.
“Yeah… I think he’s gone.”
“Sorry to hear that, son. Good luck.”
