Painting my own sky

A sky full of stars, starring them was his favorite part of the day. Charles a 7-year-old boy who spends most of his evenings sitting by the window and talking to the stars he named. Charles took out his school bags and started talking to one of the stars that he named Arthur while he is working on his homework “ Arthur do you know that even though we can see each other we are very far, in my class today my teacher was telling us about the solar system in which she spoke about how far stars and other planets are from us, do you know that moon is near to us than you are to me” while telling the school tales he opened a book named stars in the sky which he borrowed from the library. For the rest of the hour, he told the tale of a boy who has the ability to fly among stars and how he met a star and played with him. And then suddenly as the clouds covered those stars, he couldn’t see Arthur any more he called out his name a couple of times until the clouds passed away and he got a proper vision of Arthur. he continued narrating the rest of the story and in the meanwhile, Arthur’s mother prepared dinner and called him into the dining hall. He put his book aside waved Arthur bye and ran swiftly into the dining room. As he ran into the dining hall, he heard the clouds rumble and rain pattered against windows and a heavy wind rushed through it. His mother quickly closed the windows and closed the curtains and left to kitchen to bring in the food that been kept in the oven just a while ago. Charles ran towards the window and searched for Arthur but couldn’t find him anymore.

A drop of rain fell on his cheek and 23-year-old Arthur realized it's about to rain while he was waiting for cab and starring at the sky and lost in his thoughts, he ran into the store behind him which gathered half a dozen people in the next few minutes. Even at 15 minutes past 11:00 pm on Wednesday New York seemed to be quite busy. The rain started to pick up its speed soon enough which gathered a lot of people in the next few minutes. The heavy rain resulted in the traffic jam and the vehicles got stuck at the places they were, “ I wish I could go 40 years back when life was lot simple” said a 60-year-old women who stood right behind him, “ yeah but at least the cabs are faster than before” said her husband who is standing right beside her handing her the sub they picked up a few minutes earlier. “We should have left earlier, my mom’s going to kill me if I am late,” said a 16-year-old British girl in her accent to her boyfriend who digs his head in his smartphone probably trying to avoid this conversation.

Close the curtain shouted Charles's mother from the kitchen while removing food from the oven. He quickly closed the curtain and ran towards the table and sat on his favorite chair before his brother could pick it. “Eat it before it gets cold,” said his mother serving mashed potatoes. Charles preferred eating his dinner quite while his brother complained about the homework, he has got that day. “you are lucky, enjoy before you reach high school life is hell there” said his brother while stuffing his mashed potatoes into his mouth. Charles dint respond to his brother’s sarcasm and finished his dinner as soon as he could. “where are you going so soon” asked his mother “to my room I have homework to finish” said Charles running towards his room. He sat near the window starred at the sky while his brother fell asleep. It’s almost 30 minutes past 12 and he could hear footsteps in the hallway and soon those sounds turned into his mother moaning. It's not new for him, he saw different men for breakfast after his father left them when he was 5 years old. He starred at the sky after the rain settled. After 20 minutes of searching in his telescope, he finally found Arthur. “Can you see my dad, if you do tell him to come back tell him that I miss him?” said Charles to Arthur while sobbing his tears.

 “Excuse me,” said the 60-year-old woman from behind and walked past him to get the cab, “Rodney st,” she said and got into the cab. Charles stopped the next cab and said, “Vinegar hill house” and got into it. In spite of the rain, he reached the restaurant in 15 minutes which usually takes 10 minutes. By the time he reached there the rain settled. Sarah was already waiting for him for the past 30 minutes, “sorry for being late, blame the rain” he said. “I wish I could” chuckled Sarah while painting a kiss on his lips. They ordered wine and some food, “So have you decided yet?” said Sarah looking at her Instagram, “I don’t know it's not that easy it never was” said Charles starring at the fork which is placed right beside his plate. “common for once can you please give it a try, he is your father Afterall” said Sarah having her first sip of wine. Charles looked down staring into his food that was just served.

After a while, the sounds stopped, and Charles went into the drawing-room without making any noise and quietly took a paper from his book along with a pen from his brothers’ bag. And came back to his room.

Dear father,

I miss you every day, please come back. I will never do anything that will hurt you. I will tell your mother not to invite those strange men late at night if you don’t like them.

Waiting for you like every day.

Lots of love,

Your dear son,

Charles.

Charles writes a letter and post’s them every day while he is returning from school.

“Will you for me,” said Sarah holding his hand. “yes, of course, I will,” said Charles and looked at his watch, oh it's already 1:00am we have to leave its almost time to feed ema (Charles daughter) some milk. He took the card and paid the bill. They took a cab and reached home. While Sarah went to give the baby ema milk Charles sat by the window and spoke to Arthur “I know the sky has never been the way I want but its time for me to paint it the way I want, I am going to meet him tomorrow no matter what”.