The Same Stuff as Stars

ONE

Wishing on a Star

When she heard the first yelp, Angel was at the sink washing the supper dishes. She thought the sound had come from the couple in the upstairs apartment beginning their nightly fight. She was late washing up, having waited supper, hoping that since it was Friday, Verna would get home in time for the three of them to sit around the table and eat together like a family.

It was when the yelp turned into crying that she realized where it was coming from. “Bernie!” Angel raced down the hall to the living room, not even stopping to wipe the suds off her hands. Bernie sat on the rug, whimpering and staring at the couch. Flames were dancing up from a worn cushion. “What are you doing?” she yelled, slapping the open box of kitchen matches from his hand. The matches scattered over the rug. “You want to kill us all?”

“I just wanted to see if it would really burn,” he said, still whimpering.

She raced back to the kitchen and grabbed the dishpan, not stopping to take out the dishes before she ran back to the fire. Angel sloshed the dirty dishwater over the flame. It sizzled angrily and died. She stood watching the steam, her heart pounding. When she could speak, it was a yell. “I swear, Bernie Morgan, how old are you?”

“Seven,” he muttered.

“Well, you act like you’re two.” She knelt, putting the dishpan down, so she could pick up the matches and put them back in the box. Her hands were shaking. “Now I’m going to put these away, and don’t you ever touch them again, you hear me?” She stood up. “You can bring the dishpan to the kitchen for me.”

He followed her down the hall, rattling the dishes against the side of the plastic pan. “Don’t tell Mama,” he said.

“It won’t matter if I tell Mama or not. The minute she comes in here she’s going to smell smoke and know something happened. I swear you’re going to run me crazy if you don’t kill us both first.” On tiptoe, she put the matchbox on the highest shelf she could reach. Bernie plumped the dishpan down on the floor. “Where do you think you’re going?” she asked his retreating back.

“To watch TV. You’re too mean to talk to.”

She put the dishpan back into the sink and marched down the hall. Snatching the remote out of his hand, she threw it on the sodden couch. The whole room stank.

“Quit it!” he said.

“Do you think you can just sit there on the floor watching TV like nothing happened? Come on.” She grabbed Bernie’s hand, dragging him to his feet. “We’ll go out and wait for Mama to come back, and then you can just tell her yourself what a fool thing you did.”

He set his feet and tried to wriggle his hand out of her grasp, but Angel was wiry, and the boy was no match for her. Still, by the time she had dragged him out the heavy front door and onto the porch, her fury was spent. He was always into things. She should have been watching more closely. That’s what Mama would say when she came home. Just where were you, Miss Angel Morgan, while your brother was trying to burn down the house? Huh? Where were you?

And where are you right now, Verna? Did you forget tomorrow is Saturday and we have to make an early start? Angel let go of Bernie’s hand and went over and sat down on the edge of the porch, her feet on the top step. It was nicer outside than in the hot, smelly apartment. The night had absorbed some of the stickiness of the summer day. “Sit down, Bernie,” she said gently, and patted the spot next to her. He stayed where he was. She could almost feel the stiffness in his little body. He was still angry with her and scared by what he had done.

In the strained stillness between them, she could hear the hum and honk of city traffic a few blocks away. Their own street was quiet and dark. Someone—she would have suspected Bernie if she’d thought he could throw a rock that far—had broken the single streetlight weeks before, and the city had yet to replace the bulb. Burlington didn’t seem to worry about fixing things in this neighborhood—just about poking around trying to catch drug users. The large houses, most, like theirs, divided into two or more decaying apartments, squatted like old women, staring at each other, fat and sullen, across the narrow, potholed street. She hated this place, but it was better than some they’d lived in, certainly better than foster care.

Then she saw the star. Just one, through the cloudy night sky, but blinking like a friend above the house across the way. It was like a sign. Like a promise that things were going to get better.

“Look, Bernie,” she said. “With the streetlight out, the star looks really bright.”

“So?”

“So wish. Wish on the star, Bernie.”

“I don’t want to.”

“You got to.”

“How come?”

“’Cause I told you to, okay?”

“You can’t make me. You’re not my boss.”

“Bernie, we got to do it.” She craned her neck around to look at him. He was standing where she’d left him, his small back pressed against the screen door. “How else are we going to get Daddy home?”

“I don’t want him to come home.”

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nbsp; “Yes, you do. C’mon, Bernie. Wish. ‘Star light, star bright, first star I see tonight. I wish I may, I wish I might, have the wish I wish tonight.’ Now, go on....I wish Daddy would soon—”

“I wish that stupid guy would never never never come home.”

“Bernie!” She jumped to her feet, hands on her thin hips. “Take that back! You don’t wish any such thing!”

“Do, too. I hate him. I never want to see him again.”