A Light in the Glass

“A little higher,” Thomas said, guiding his mother’s hand toward the dark above the cottage roof. “There. Just left of the crooked chimney.”

She squinted into the night. Her finger wavered, searching the patch of sky he had named. “I can see the chimney.”

“The star is beside it. The bright one. It has a faint blue edge.”

“Blue?”

“Only a little.” Thomas leaned against her shoulder so he could look along the same line. The familiar star hung over the roof ridge, where it had watched their cottage for as long as he could remember. Its light seemed thin tonight, a pinprick behind a veil.

His mother lowered her hand. “Tell me what else is there.”

Thomas described the three smaller stars trailing away from it, then the scattered lights farther north. He gave each its place, careful and exact, while she listened with a pleased little smile. She had always loved the sky. Even now, when the stars blurred together for her, she liked to find them by his words.

When he finished, she rested her cheek against his hair. “You make it easy to see.”

He looked up again. The star above the cottage had dimmed. He was certain of it. The rest of the sky held steady, but that one looked weaker than it had the night before.

“Mother, do you think it’s fading?”

Her smile stayed gentle. “Stars fade. That’s what people say.”

“People say a lot of things.”

“Thomas.” She brushed his hair back from his forehead. “I’m glad you’re here to tell me about it.”

That answer settled his worry into something firmer. He would find a way to keep the star bright for her. Not forever, perhaps. Just long enough for her to see it again.

After she went inside, Thomas crossed the village to the astronomer’s tower. The old man was still awake, as he usually was, at a narrow desk crowded with paper charts. He looked up when Thomas knocked and took in the boy’s face before asking what had happened.

“The star above our roof is getting dimmer,” Thomas said. “Can you make it brighter?”

The astronomer put down his pencil. “I can look at it with you.”

Thomas followed him up the tower stairs. At the top, the old man opened a narrow door onto a little platform. He checked the sky through a brass instrument, then let Thomas look. The star trembled at the edge of the lens, distant and small.

“It is fainter than it was,” the astronomer said.

“Can you fix it?”