Lights in the Night

"Bobby saw it, too!"

"Travis, that is enough," Mr. Whitehall warned. Travis’s account had worked the already unruly class into a frenzy. Horrified that he had roped me in, I sank down in my seat, wishing I could disappear.

"But, Mr. Whitehall," Travis continued, hoping to reap in all the rewards that came with being the center of attention.

Ignoring him, Mr. Whitehall turned to the chalkboard and began writing a series of algebra equations. "These questions were the ones most commonly missed on our last test. I want to go over them step by step."

Keeping my head low, I turned to a blank page in my notebook and directed my attention to numbers that might as well have been written in a foreign language. The rest of the class reluctantly followed suit.

"Hey," Travis, seated to my right, whispered, his eyes glaring. "I know you saw it, too."

Travis and I were roommates at St. James' School for Boys, a home for the troubled and the troublemakers. I fell into the first category. Travis, into the second.

I made no response.

For the rest of that class, Travis lapsed into uncharacteristic silence. The bell rang, and I rushed to my English class, dodging the other students. Travis, thankfully, was not in this class. Neither was he in the one after it. Two full hours of not having to hear him recount last night’s events. Not that I didn’t want to talk about it, but it seemed wrong somehow, like publishing love letters in the newspaper.

Walking into the cafeteria, I saw Travis taking full advantage of the wider audience.

"It was this huge, glowing red light," Travis explained to a group of students. I sat at the adjacent table, close enough to hear but not close enough to be included.

"You're full of crap," said Jason, St. James' resident contrarian.

Travis's face took on a reddish hue. "It was right outside the window, I swear."

"Well, I didn't see nothing," Jason said with a smug look.

"That's 'cause it was late last night. That damn light woke me up. Bobby was there, too."

Another boy at the table, Thomas, noticed me sitting close by. "Is it true?" he asked me. All eyes turned towards me. The cafeteria felt unnaturally small, the air turning warm and dense.

Okay, yes, Travis was telling the truth. But his account was lacking. Severely lacking. It was not just one big, red light. There were two of them. Small, no bigger than the cheap drones you can buy at Walmart. And they were dancing.

One swooped up and down while the other moved in perfect rhythm from left to right, soaring across the night sky. The graceful lights met in the middle and flew circles around each other, like two people waltzing. They rose high into the sky, shining so brightly they washed out the stars. Flying side by side, they swooped downward and past the trees bordering the school. The leaves rattled and flew into the air, joining the dance.

I laid in bed watching the display, afraid that the slightest movement would startle the lights, causing them to flee. My eyes broke away from the dance just long enough to notice Travis watching, too. He said nothing, mesmerized by the nighttime marvel.

As the pale light of dawn crept into the sky, the two lights finished their dance. Each made a quick bob, bowing to their partner. Then they flew away. Whether they went north or south or west, I cannot say. They disappeared so quickly they seemed to vanish. For all I knew, that's exactly what they did.

"Well, did you see it or not?" asked Jason, leaning on the table, his face inches from mine.

I shook my head.

"You saw it! I know you did," Travis exclaimed, pissed off that I would deny seeing something so spectacular.

I remained silent throughout lunch, not knowing why I lied. I just had this nagging feeling that the dance had been private. That I was not supposed to be watching, and telling even a single person would be wrong. An invasion of the lights' privacy.

I only had one more class with Travis that day. I sat at my usual desk near the front. As Travis walked by, he did not acknowledge my presence, but I felt the anger radiating off of him, saturating the entire room. A few kids whispered that Travis wanted to beat the crap out of me. I contemplated sleeping in the hallway that night. I hid in the bathrooms until an hour after Lights Out. Travis was fast asleep as I slipped into bed.

The following day was an unscheduled teacher work day. Students had the freedom to roam around campus, temporarily liberated from the burdens of school work. Only the ten-foot high fence reminded us that we were not completely free.

Walking near the front of the main building, I noticed two men in matching black suits enter the school. Child Services most likely. They sent people out to St. James' every month, ensuring that the students were being well cared for, or if the courts changed their minds and students were allowed to go back home. The possibility of returning home filled me with more dread than a potential beating from Travis.

The front door remained open behind the two men, and since my plans for the day were to avoid Travis at all costs, I entered the building, quietly closing the door. I followed the two men as they turned a corner, careful to stay several feet behind them. The men walked at a steady pace, their footsteps echoing in the empty hallway.

I froze as the men entered the principal's office. I did my best to stay out of trouble and never had to go to the principal's office except for a quarterly evaluation. Three teachers, including Mr. Whitehall, entered the office after them. Had they been waiting? Curiosity getting the better of me, I crouched beside the door and peered through the narrow window.

Principal Nelson sat behind her desk, hands clasped in front of her. She wore that patient look of hers that came from decades of working with troubled kids. The teachers sat in a row near the wall. The two suited men flanked the door.

"Now what exactly did this student claim to see?" asked one man, his voice gravelly.

All three teachers gave more or less the same account. Travis Nesmith claimed to see a large, red light floating in the sky late last night. The light remained outside for about an hour and then flew away.

The two men asked where they could find Travis. Somewhere on school grounds. Students were not permitted to leave except in special cases or emergencies. The two men thanked the teachers and exited the principal's office. I stood flat against the wall, hoping they didn’t see me.

"Damn, I hate principal's offices," said one man. He had a small scar on the right side of his face.

"Get in trouble a lot as a kid?" asked the other man, the one with a gravelly voice. He seemed to be fifteen or twenty years older than the first man, and he had gray streaks in his hair.

"No, just the thought of it..." They left through the rear entrance. I followed them as they made their way to the dorms. Travis was talking to a group near the picnic tables, but the men walked past him, heading for the trees.

"Do we really have to talk to this kid?" asked the younger man.

"No. It's an open and shut case. Just need to get the physical evidence."

They stopped next to the tree visible from my bedroom window. The younger man crouched down and took out a plastic bag from his pocket. "Think the higher ups will raise hell if we don't?" he asked, picking up a burnt leaf, the edges charred black.

The older man sighed. "I don't really care. They can..." He paused, noticing me standing off to the side. I froze as our eyes locked.

"Hey there, kiddo," said the older man. The younger one quickly picked up burnt leaves and placed them in his plastic bag. "Do you know another student here named Travis Nesmith?"

I nodded. The younger man stood, concealing the plastic bag in his jacket pocket. What did a bunch of leaves have to do with anything?

"Great! Now, has Travis been telling stories about strange lights in the night?"

I stared at the man. I was thirteen years old, as tall as this man's shoulder, yet he talked to me like I was in kindergarten. "Yes, sir," I responded anyway.

"And what exactly did Travis Nesmith say?" asked the younger man.

"He claimed to see a red light." I paused. The suited man said lights, not a light. They already knew it was more than one. So why were they asking questions they already knew the answers to?

"I didn't see anything," I quickly added.

The two men exchanged looks, the younger one scratching his scar. They moved their lips, but no sound came out. Were they whispering? No. It was quiet by the trees. I would have heard whispering. Instead, they were reading each other's lips. I wished I could have read lips, to be privy to their conservation.

"Travis lies a lot," I said, wanting to see their reactions. "He does it to get attention."

"So you think he was lying about those lights?" asked the older one, arching an eyebrow.

"Maybe. Why do you care about a bunch of strange lights?"

The two men smiled. "Just doing our jobs," replied the older man. They spoke again in their strange, silent way.

"Stay out of trouble, son," said the older man. He and his colleague walked back towards the main building and went inside. I stayed by the trees until I was sure they were gone.

The next morning, the local paper published an article about an unexpected meteor shower in our area. Multiple people witnessed the event. There was even a quote by some scientist saying that this meteor shower occurred at the same time as a period of intense solar flare activity, causing some meteors to appear red.

"I knew you were full of crap!" said Jason.

"It wasn't no damn meteor," Travis said through his teeth. "And it was just one of them, not a whole ton."

"That ain't what the scientist said," replied Jason.

"Well, screw him!"

I did my best not to smile at the outburst. Soon, word spread throughout the school. Travis's light was a meteor, nothing more. Travis never mentioned that light again.

Twenty years later, I can still remember those graceful lights dancing across the night sky. And those two suited men still come to mind. The leaves must have been burnt when the lights passed too close. Physical evidence. I never saw those men again, though every time I see a man in a dark suit, I check the right side of his face for a scar.

I never told anyone the truth of that night, not even my wife. I had witnessed an event that I was not supposed to, an interloper on a private moment.

I do not expect to see the lights again, but every once in a while, I catch myself looking up that the night sky. Hoping to see those beautiful dancing lights.

The End