Four Seconds

The ranger met them at the gate of the national park at nine and gave everybody a red lamp.

“White light is bad for your eyes at night,” she said. “Red isn't.”

Esme's little brother wanted one thing: the Swan. He had drawn it at school, a long neck and two wings, and carried the drawing in his coat all week.

The ranger was a good guide. She had a green light that made a thin line up into the sky, and when she drew with it, the stars became a shape. She drew a horse, then a chair. The shapes were old symbols, she said. The same stars come back to the same position every winter.

But one grey cloud sat over the Swan and stayed there.

They waited. The cloud moved a little and came back. At eleven o'clock the ranger turned off her green light.

“I'm sorry,” she said. “Come back in October.”

They walked to the cars in a line of small red lights.

Then Esme's brother stopped and pointed with his whole arm.

The cloud had opened. The Swan was there: a long neck, two wings, exactly like his drawing. The ranger lifted her green light and drew it once, slowly, and nobody spoke.

Then the cloud closed.

In the car her brother fell asleep. Esme sat in the back with her red lamp on, the only source of light, and counted the seconds again. Four seconds. It was enough.