I've been looking for Thomas for half-an-hour now and he is still nowhere to be found.
I find Laylee putting more sodas into the cooler and rush up to her, "Laylee! Where's your
brother?" I ask. "Oh, he went home," she says, "asked me to handle the party. But don't
worry, you can stay." She smiles and continues to pull sodas out of their cardboard cases.
I raise an eyebrow at her and open my mouth to ask what she means by, 'he went home',
but decide against it. Instead, I take one of the sodas from the cooler and open it, walking
toward the horse stalls at the bottom of the hill the house is perched on.
I walk into the barn and jump slightly, finding Russel studying a big brown horse in the
stall farthest from me. He hears me and turns, then smiles, "Hey," he says, "come to see
the horses?" I smile at the brown beauty and walk over, petting her nose softly. I look at
the other horses and remark, "They sure are beautiful." Russel nods, "Ya." He smiles and
says, "I've got three. We brought 'em here from my old house." I smile, "I've got two horses
and a pony." Russel laughs, "Oh man, I love ponies." I laugh. Russel runs his hand through his
brown hair and I can see gold in his eyes as the sun shines in through the doorway. I lean
against a stall, "So, Russel, what brings you to our little town?" Russel laughs, "I would hardly
call this place little, with the size of everyone's backyard, including my own." I smile and nod in
agreement. "My cousin, Charlie," he pauses, "do you know him?" I think about it for a moment
and then reply, "Yea, I think I have AP English with him." He nods, "Anyway, he and his family
live here, and my parents decided that since we moved to America to be closer to family in the
first place, we might as well actually live close to them, rather than on the other side of the
state. I nod, "That makes sense." He nods too, and looks back at the brown horse. I look away
from him and watch as the horse pushes its nose into Russel's hand. "You lived here your whole
life?" Russel asks, looking away from the horse. I look back at him, my arms crossed over my
chest, as I start to nod, but then say, "Oh, wait, no, actually. I lived in New York until my third
birthday," I laugh, "but I hardly remember that." My eyes sparkle as I say, "The only memory I
still have is this one sweet old black man...he worked in candy store, or a toy store, or
something of the sort. Every time I went there, he would ask me, "And how were the lights last
night, little lady?" And I would reply, "As bright as the apple is big." Then he would laugh and
give me a lollipop or a Pixie stick." I smile at the recollection, "But my mom tells me I loved
the Big Apple. She says every night I would go out and look at the lights of the city and the stars,
and then ask her if there were people in the city in the sky that were looking down at the lights
of New York, like I was looking up at their city." Russel smiles. He looks out of the barn, a full
moon shining bright in the dark country sky. "When I look at the sky," he says, "I think about
how incredible it is that someone on the other side of the world..." he smiles, "that someone in
Britain is also looking at it, seeing exactly the same thing, despite the fact that we are miles and
worlds apart." I smile and look at the moon, too. "There's someone in New York staring at that
moon, too," Russel adds. I nod, "Indeed there is." He smiles at me and looks back at the
sparkling globe in the sky, the one that so many people in so many different lives are all also
watching at this exact moment.
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