Beyond the Veil of Stars

by Robert Reed

  Mrs. Pete didn’t look strong like an athlete, but the lean face had a hardness, a sense of endurance. Sometimes she was nice, and sometimes Cornell like her. She and Pete were a little like parents, giving him Christmas gifts and birthday money while watching over him. Maybe they watched over him too much, scolding and praising as they felt necessary.

  The odd thing was, Mrs. Pete didn’t believe in aliens. Not at all. Not even this summer had changed her mind.

  It wasn’t something she said aloud. Cornell knew it from the way she rolled her eyes when Pete and Dad were talking. And it was the way Pete spoke of her, calling her, “Milady,” and then admitting, “Milady doesn’t approve of humanity’s greatest step.”

  “Doesn’t approve?” Dad would respond. “She doesn’t want us to make contact?”

  “She thinks it’s hysteria, these things people see.”

  Dad seemed to grow weak when he heard about complete doubters. “What does she think about the thousands of circles?”

  “Government experiments,” Pete would claim.

  “Oh, good lord, how?”

  “The military has some new weapon.” Pete would laugh at his wife’s paranoia, clucking his tongue and shaking his head. “From orbit, she says. The space station is zapping us.”

  Even Cornell knew that was a stupid idea. There weren’t any big armies anymore, and nobody had more than a few hundred nukes. Why would any government play with death beams? Watching Mrs. Pete walk past him again, he considered shouting out questions. But he didn’t. He couldn’t. Instead, he watched the warm August air making her sweat, her T-shirt dark on its front and back, and how she wiped her face with her wristband, with a practiced motion, her lean face intense, almost distant.

  Only she and Pete knew about Mom. Everyone else thought she died in a car crash. It wasn’t a hard secret to keep. People didn’t like asking, “How did your mom die?” Even Todd accepted the story without complaint doubting everything else in the world. But not that.

  One time—only once—Cornell asked Pete, “What does Mrs. Pete say about Mom? That the government stole her away?”

  He expected laughter, but instead there was silence, Pete dropping his head and glancing at Dad. And Dad, his face stony and simple, merely admitted, “I don’t know what she believes, son.”

  There was a long, uncomfortable silence.

  Then Dad added, “And I don’t care, either. Not at all. Not for the slenderest little instant.”

  She had to be nearly done walking.

  It was after ten o’clock, maybe near ten-fifteen. The Tuckers were watching the weather report, no doubt, and Mrs. Pete was sweating hard, breathing fast and hard, picking up her pace at the tail end of the workout. Cornell wondered what Todd and Lane were seeing. Should he sneak around back and find them? Then their mother appeared, as if on a signal, screaming their names a couple of times. She had a big voice, sharp and scary. Which was funny, because she was smaller than almost any grown woman Cornell had ever known.

  He heard the front door shut again, no more screaming.

  He happened to glance at the sky.

  Mrs. Pete’s watch beeped, and she stopped in front of him. He heard a couple of gasps, then a sniff. “Any saucers tonight?” She giggled, hands on her hips and her head tilting backward. Cornell glanced at her—a stupid, doubting woman—then he started to play a game that he’d mostly outgrown. Which star was Mom’s? He looked at them and looked at them, expecting nothing, his butt on the concrete curb and his bare elbows digging at the half-dead grass. Bright, bright stars glittered overhead, only a little thinned by city lights, and there was no warning, no sensation, not even a slight tremor when the Change took place. By chance, Cornell was gazing upward, not a thought in his head; and the sky became a different sky, in an instant, with no more effort than the blink of a single eye.

  4

  He began to scream.

  Cornell heard himself without realizing who it was, the scream far off and thin—something born deep inside his chest—and he scrambled backward into the evergreen bushes, panic seizing him. Needles cut at his face and bare arms. He turned and saw Mrs. Pete again. She stood in the street with her legs apart and hands half-raised and the mouth open, eyes unblinking. She could see it, too. He wasn’t insane, was he? Everything was suffused with a hyper-clarity—Mrs. Pete’s sweaty clothes; the backdrop of houses; that endless, tireless scream—and now he realized that he was the one screaming. He put a hand into his mouth to stop it. He bit at the hand, going silent; then he climbed to his feet and stepped onto the pavement, breathing deeply before looking at the sky again.

  A bluish haze was in the west and straight overhead, with swirls and streaks of white, the vista familiar enough to frustrate Cornell when he couldn’t think of its identity, too much happening too quickly for him to make the mental leap.

  Then Mrs. Pete said, “What is it?” She grabbed him by an arm and shook him. Her hand-weights were on the pavement, dropped and forgotten. Her face was numbed, eyes vague and empty. “What…?” Then she couldn’t speak, couldn’t even breathe, taking a backward step and looking up, catching the curb with her heel. Losing her balance, she fell backward, her thin butt absorbing the impact, the rest of her oblivious. Mrs. Pete just kept gazing at the sky, and it was her turn to scream. She was louder than Cornell, using all of herself, and the warm air started to tear into shreds as she said: “Ah! AH! AHHH!”

  Cornell realized what he was seeing. Or at least he knew what it resembled, senseless as that seemed. This was a new sky, but what he saw was ordinary, sort of, and it had to be some kind of elaborate illusion. Rare and temporary, no doubt. Yet every time he looked, there it was above him, bathing the cul-de-sac in its soft blue and white light.

  People began to come outdoors, singly and in groups.

  The Tuckers must have heard the screams. They wore bathrobes, watching in stern amazement while Mrs. Pete walked circles with her head reared back. Cautious but curious, they came out from under their porch roof, gazing up; and Mr. Tucker shouted, “I don’t see anything,” followed by his wife’s near-breathless admonition, “Well, then, go find your glasses!”

  Mrs. Underhill assumed the screams involved her boys, and she came out ready to punish. She was halfway to the island, building steam, when she noticed the upturned faces and looked for herself. Her legs nearly collapsed beneath her. A moan, a graceless turn, and she was running for her house, shouting at her husband, “Honey, you won’t believe it. Get out here.”

  Cornell glanced at his house, thinking of Dad. He was working in the basement, most likely, music playing and no idea what was happening.

  Mr. Lynn emerged from his house wearing trousers, nothing else, bare feet slapping on the concrete walk. The blond woman followed, a fancy bathrobe pulled around her and her hair looking as if it had been hit by a strong wind. She pulled on the robe’s belt, cinching it tighter. Mr. Lynn ignored her, gawking at the sky, stepping onto his lawn and lifting his hands as high as possible, trying to touch what he saw.

  Again Cornell thought of Dad, but he couldn’t make himself move.

  “What is it?” Mrs. Pete muttered. She came close and grabbed an arm, squeezing him. “Do you know what’s happening?”

  It was an illusion, he thought. What else was possible?

  Todd and Lane appeared, running out from between houses, and their father saw them. “What’ve you boys been doing?” Assuming they were at the heart of some trouble, he asked, “Can’t I trust you for a second?”

  Nobody paid attention to him.

  Lane said, “Did you see it?” He shot past his parents, straight to Cornell and happy enough to fly. “Did you see it? I did. I was looking up…when it happened—!”

  “So was I,” Todd claimed.

  “You were not,” his brother countered.

  “Was.”

  “You were watching windows, you shit.”

  Todd glanced uneasily at the blonde. “Was not.”

  “You w
ere.”

  “Liar.”

  “You’re the liar.”

  Cornell stepped away from them and everyone else, trying to sort out what he could see. He remembered the big inflated globe in their living room, the shapes of the continents and islands, then he thought to look north. Sure enough, there was a white splash bigger than the moon, and he knew, just knew, that he was looking at the North Pole, Arctic ice reflecting summer sun.

  A door shut somewhere, hard.

  Pete was marching across his front yard, saying with a loud voice, “On the news…there’s bulletins…” Then he thought to stop and look overhead, starting to tremble, arms at his side and his big body looking insubstantial. Weak. A sudden breeze could have rolled him over, he was that astonished.

  “What is it, Pete?”

  Mrs. Pete asked the question, joining him and reaching with both hands, sinking them into his meaty sides.

  “Just like they said,” Pete began. “Christ!”

  “What are they saying?” she asked.

  “The sky’s changed—”

  “I know,” she squealed. “But into what? And how?”

  Pete saw Cornell and gave him a half-wink, and he hugged Mrs. Pete—Cornell had never seen them hug—then took her head with both hands and lifted her gaze. “Don’t you recognize it? Tell me what it is.”

  Cornell had recognized it.

  “Tell me.”

  Then Cornell muttered, “It’s us.”

  “What’s us?” said Mrs. Pete.

  There was silence, people converging on Cornell. He swallowed, his throat dry and sore; then he said, “It’s the earth.”

  “The earth?” she echoed.

  And Pete said, “As if it’s been turned inside out.” He nodded and let go of his wife, suddenly laughing. “An illusion? I don’t know. But it is the earth, isn’t it? Cornell?”

  Turned inside out like a sock, yes. Bizarre as that seemed.

  The world had changed—poof—and nobody felt a thing.

  Mrs. Tucker mentioned Dad, and Mr. Underhill solemnly said, “He should see this.” There were nods, soft agreement, the tone almost respectful and almost as surprising as the sky. Even Mrs. Underhill, who called Dad odd or crazy on any other day, remarked with a loud voice, “He might understand this. Maybe. Maybe someone should ask him to come look.”

  Pete touched Cornell, smiling with relish. “Go on,” he suggested, “and hurry. Hurry.”

  Cornell ran, as much for himself as Dad. He was full of pent-up energy. He didn’t want to be inside an instant longer than necessary, through the front doors and the living room, pausing while in motion. On the fly, he heard music flowing from the basement. The Planets, he would later realize. A coincidence, meaningless and not even a large one, knowing Dad’s tastes. He shot through the kitchen, turning and starting downstairs, wood slats creaking beneath him, and he saw the bright fluorescent light in the basement’s far corner, shelves and worktables illuminated, Dad sitting exactly where Cornell expected to see him, perched on a high stool and wearing fancy jeweler’s glasses, examining one of the day’s bits of black glass.

  Suddenly Cornell couldn’t speak. He had crossed the slick concrete floor and stopped, the air full of potentials, and he found himself wrestling for the best words. This moment demanded perfection; anything else would diminish the impact. But all he could manage was a quiet moan, and the music paused, and Dad turned to him, the peaceful face wearing those stupid distorting glasses. Giant blue eyes gazed at him, curious and then alarmed. Dad set the sample on the tabletop and asked, “What?” Then when Cornell couldn’t respond, he climbed off the stool, asking, “What’s going on? What is it?”

  He thinks Mom is home, Cornell guessed. The face seemed pale under the blue lights, and simple, and of course he thought this was about Mom.

  “What’s happened, son?”

  “The sky,” the boy blurted. “It’s changed!”

  Dad seemed puzzled, but not much. Cornell might have said, “The dishwasher is broken,” for all the reaction he saw. Dad was wearing comfortable old trousers, standing with his rumpled legs apart, and he removed the jeweler’s glasses with a rock-steady hand, the other hand turning off the stereo as the music began to swell again. There was no other sound now but the slow inhalation of his breath, his mouth opening wider, and nothing to say.

  “I saw it,” Cornell told him. “I saw the sky change.”

  “When?” Dad whispered.

  “Now. Just now.”

  The man turned, putting the glasses down and setting the sample into the appropriate bag, the hint of a tremor showing in the long fingers.

  And Cornell said, “The world’s been turned inside out.”

  Inside out? The question seemed to float before Dad’s face, like a cartoon thought. At last he looked genuinely startled. He looked old. It was the first time Cornell noticed the wrinkles as more than an accent, spreading out from the eyes, and the hair a weak gray made thin by the light. Dad tilted his head, his mouth open and silent. There was some comprehensive failure of will or his intellect. Or youth, maybe. It was a shock for Cornell. He couldn’t move for a long moment; and finally Dad managed to say:

  “I should take a look, then, shouldn’t I?”

  Cornell nodded and took a couple steps, then looked back at him.

  Dad remained at the worktable, feeble in a hundred ways. He kept turning his head from side to side, acting as if he was lost inside his own basement.

  “Come on,” Cornell snapped. “They just changed the sky.”

  They?

  “Will you come on?” And now Cornell turned and charged the stairs, unable to wait, mounting them two at a time, and was gone.

  People were scattered about the island and the street, necks craned back and arms pointing. They were looking for landmarks. Some said, “It’s just amazing.” “How did it happen?” they kept asking; but nobody dared give answers. There was something childlike about everyone. Even the Tuckers seemed eight years old, shaking their heads and asking, “How? How? How?”

  Mr. Lynn had gone inside, reemerging with a shirt on and a boombox in one hand. He found the all-news AM station, everyone hearing the thin, almost weak voice of a reporter in Washington, D.C. Hundreds of people were gathering in front of the Capitol building, everyone staring skyward. They were excited, said the reporter. And puzzled. But surprisingly calm. Yet her voice sounded anything but calm, her voice breaking, nothing in her experience able to help her now.

  Car horns sounded in the distance, the summery buzz of insects louder and nearer. The crickets weren’t very impressed, thought Cornell. Had they stopped chirping when the sky changed?

  He looked up. And it occurred to him that even if the world had been turned inside out, it wasn’t as bright or clearly defined as he would have guessed. The North Pole should be brighter, shouldn’t it? He could tell which half of the earth was in daylight—the Pacific and eastern Asia—but the total light felt weak. Overhead, straight above, was the Indian Ocean and the winter hemisphere, cold and blue. Australia was a distinctive brown smear. And reversed, as if seen in a mirror. As if looking up was the same as looking down, the earth’s rock and steel made transparent. On the continent’s left was the line marking dawn, ocean blue bleeding into darkness. Dawn implied the sun, but Cornell couldn’t see it. Which made zero sense. As if anything else was reasonable…

  “Here he comes,” Mrs. Tucker announced, sounding relieved.

  “Need help?” asked her husband. “Anything?”

  It was Dad. He was carrying the white telescope in both hands, taking the porch steps one at a time. “Thank you, no,” he said, eyes down. Then he said, “Pete? Get the tripod, will you? You know where.”

  Pete broke into a shuffling run. “Got it.”

  Dad hadn’t looked up. Even on the sidewalk, on flat easy ground, he wouldn’t let his gaze rise, taking no chances and perhaps holding to the suspense a little longer. To his doubting neighbors, he looked cool and objecti
ve. A professional. All the decades of preaching, claiming that aliens were everywhere; and for this moment, he simply refused to join in with the astonishment, doing his job as if it were merely work.

  Approaching Cornell, he said, “Help me?” He looked at the boy’s face, saying, “Let’s put it on the grass, right here.”

  They set the telescope on the island, waiting for the tripod.

  Dad grinned at everyone, and only then did he tilt his head back, squinting through the glare of streetlamps. Everyone was silent. Nathan Novak was the center of attention, and they waited to see how he’d respond to this impossibility. Would he jump up and down? Scream? What? Yet Dad refused to do anything, just a hint of a smile showing around his mouth. Finally, very softly, he cleared his throat and said, “I knew they’d give us a sign, when they wanted to be noticed. But I never imagined this.” A brief breathless laugh, then he added, “Isn’t it amazing?”

  People who thought him crazy an hour ago were nodding.

  “Notice,” Dad said, “our horizon. It hasn’t changed, has it?”

  What did he mean? Mr. Underhill, tall as his wife was tiny, got up on the island and looked in every direction, trying to see what Dad saw.

  “Of course, the air and city lights might obscure things,” said Dad. “But if there was an upswing, if the earth were physically turned inside out…wouldn’t we see Denver over there? And Chicago over there?”

  The voice was calm, but the hands trembled and the face looked damp, tears mixing with his sweat. Dad took a breath, then told his audience, “It could be an illusion. Something’s bending light, photons…perhaps…?”

  “Who’s doing it?” asked Mrs. Tucker.

  Mr. Lynn’s date—dressed again, minus shoes and socks—offered, “Aliens, maybe?”

  “Do you think so?” the old woman pressed.

  “Who else could?” asked Mr. Underhill.

  And Dad said, “Maybe yes, maybe no.” He was the voice of reason, of skepticism. “Perhaps there is some natural phenomena at work.”