Life Among the Voids

Somewhere on the lake, far down the highway, a gunshot echoed across the water. Birds took off from the trees, their fluttering silhouettes dark against the sunset, and then both my parents were gone. I was completely alone in this world, with no one to shield me from the oncoming voids of death and old age.Sometimes, when I don’t recognize the ghost looking back at me in the mirror, I think of the fireworks on the lake. I think of the whistling right before the explosion, spider webs of light streaking across the sky, the water coated in a thin film of ash and memory. I think of my brother in his hoodie, staring up a night sky that was alive with the burning remains of freedom. He was the fireworks, and I was the ground: bathed in his light, in awe, lucky to be burned by his embers.I think of the ghosts I always assumed were waiting in the woods to haunt someone, too, and I realize that I can relate to them. I haunt the trees around our house, the furniture in our bedroom, the dishes in our kitchen. I stand on the back steps and stare at the trees, and I’m no longer a human, not quite a memory, but somewhere in between, some limbo that I share with Harvey and all his flaws. He’s a gas giant, glowing red and hot in the emptiness, and I am the cold, rocky world that can’t quite escape his gravity. I’m happy here. I’m okay with falling slowly toward the surface, the fiery death of a satellite.I've thought about going back to the lake, but after that year, there were no more fireworks. Eventually, the whole park closed and everyone went home and never came back. All that’s left are the stars overhead, the distant band of the milky way, explosions of white hot heat so far away now that we’ll never know them again.