Our lovely kitty woke me up in the middle of the night last night, something she regularly does as she is greedy. But she sometimes does it when she wants company and last night I couldn't complain - the sky was the clearest I've seen it for probably a year. Even with all the light pollution that the city usually throws up... I did consider getting dressed and walking up to the park to get a better view, see the real abundance of the heavens... But it was late and I knew Frankie wouldn't appreciate being woken up to go for a chilly walk, so I wrote instead. As I was writing, I was thinking about what could happen to reduce the light pollution...maybe the night was so clear due to the thinning of the ozone, maybe a distant solar flare twisted into a natural EMP taking everything out. Maybe it's aliens... Maybe it's just writing practice from a half dreaming mind - that way it doesn't have to make sense... :-)
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Jenna woke up. It was just shy of 2 am and she was all of a sudden, inexplicably wide awake. The flat was silent around her, just her grandmother’s clock ticking in the living room two open doors away. She reached out a hand to her left and found the large furry mass of the cat, Marmite, prooting awake beneath her touch. Jenna frowned, yawned and rolled over, feeling Marmite get up, spin round and curl up against her spine.
Five minutes later she was still laying awake, her eyes staring into the clutter of her bedroom and her mind full of things that she could be doing if she were up - like washing up that plate peeking out from the edge of a jumble of clothing. And maybe actually folding up and putting away that jumble of clothing. Jenna blinked and looked at the window, wondering if the nieghbours had left their garden light on again. But the light ghosting in through the curtain was cool and blue, silvering everything in the room.
Jenna eased her way out of bed and peeked through the curtain, feeling the cool breeze of Marmite walking past her bare legs before he jumped up on the window sill beside her.
“Look at that Marmite... So many stars.”
The sky was a deep distant blue and completely clear. The moon, although waning and half empty was bright enough to read by and the stars...the more she looked, the more stars she saw. There hadn’t been a night this clear since she’d been a child, not one that she hadn’t slept through anyway.
Jenna ran her hand across Marmite’s thick fur and smiled, suddenly energised and excited. She knew just where to go.
Her breath was pluming around her in a silver mist as she crested the top of the hill and approached the top of the pavillion at the edge of the park. With every step the stars had bred, the curtain of the night sky drawing back further to reveal more and more distant suns, each with their own solar systems, maybe even their own inhabitants gazing up at the clearest sky for forever and smiling with enchantment. And she was smiling as she leaned on the wall, gazing up at the heavens. As were the others who joined her, their faces glowing with simple joy, their heads wreathed in clouds of glowing breath.
They stood and stared, some pointing out the constellations to each other in whispers, not really noticing as behind them the street lights began to flicker out, easing the perfect sky further and further across the city. The orange glow receding to a few distant pin pricks of light that then blinked out.
Only when the chill started to gnaw through their feet did a few turn, still smiling, with the intention of heading home, turning to see the dark city spread before them. Perfectly silvered by the moon and glittering with the beginnings of a frost.
The dark city with not a light in sight.
The dark city and beyond that, the dark world.
