A Starlit Sky

Reese sat alone at his workbench. Everyone else had already gone home, they’d even turned the lights off when they left, leaving him alone with the simple red glow from his desk lamp. A quick glance out the window revealed a starry night sky with streetlamps dotting the far-off horizon, it really was a beautiful night for a Friday. Reese closed the blinds.

Ben had invited the office out for drinks to celebrate the start of the weekend almost four hours ago now, Reese wondered what they were all doing now. Were they still out there celebrating or were they at home asleep in bed. Either way, he envied them.

Of course, Reese had brought this late night on himself. There was never a need to stay so late, well never an official need at least. He knew that his supervisors had begun to rely on him at this point. All the extra hours spent at the office perfecting the blueprints and designs. If he stopped now, would they even finish the project in time?

The door to the workshop opened with a loud clang and Theresa walked in pushing her cart. She was the late night janitor assigned to this section of the building even if it was a recent assignment. Over the last month her and Reese hadn’t talked very much despite her cleaning in the room with him there every night.

“You’re still here?” she asked.

“No one else will finish the designs in time if I weren’t.”

“You should take some time off when all this is done, you’ve spent more time here than you’re own home.”

“Why would you even be worried about my health?”

Theresa frowned at that, her usual cheerful smile slipping for a second. “If that’s how you want to do things, then fine.”

Reese didn’t bother to look up from his desk. “Fine.”

Theresa began to tidy up loose papers and the small bins around the different workbenches. “I’m going to start working then. Is that alright with you?”

“Go ahead.”

For a while they worked together in silence. Reese scribbling over an already too-scribbled page and Theresa cleaning the workshop. It was almost nice to have Theresa in the workshop, she made it feel like everyone hadn’t left yet. That Reese wasn’t entirely alone just yet in the office.

“What are you working on?”

Reese jumped at the sound of her voice. “Oh, ummm… yeah. We’re working to cut down production costs on the new private aircraft. Make it more accessible to the common consumer, not that they have any reason needing something like this. It’s a waste of my time to be working on this.”

“That’s it?” Theresa said incredulously. “That’s all you have to say?”

“What else would I say? It’s a job, those are my requirements, and I feel like the resources allotted to this project are wasted.”

“I don’t understand why you spend so much time working here then. You have no passion but you stay hours past when everyone else leaves. Why?”

“Because that’s what I was taught to do.”

Theresa seemed to grow disinterested with probing Reese for information so she left to go clean again. He almost felt a twinge of sadness that he didn’t have someone to talk to anymore. Almost at least, he went back to work.

The rest of the night passed uneventfully. Reese made no headway in his schematics and Theresa finished cleaning. She left around a half-hour before he did to go home.

Soon it was Monday again. The weekend had passed as uneventfully as any other weekend. Reese had spent most of the time at his desk at home, thinking of solutions to the project. How to get the airplane to still work while cutting production costs. All his efforts had been just as fruitless as they were at work though.

The day went by in a blur. Reese went to work and immediately went back to his desk to try and figure out the design flaws. His coworkers however, worked and chatted all around him while he tried to concentrate on his own. It was already hard enough to make headway on the project, it was even harder with the constant talk.

By the time that lunch came, Reese already felt burnt out. He’d pull another late night in the office and catch up. If only the rest of his coworkers would do the same. Maybe it was a good thing that they left though, he always got the most work done at night or when they all left for lunch.

“Hey, Reese!” Ben called out from the door. “We’re all going out to lunch down the road, you coming?”

Reese just shook his head. There was work to be done and he had no time to eat or rest. The rest of his coworkers left in a flurry of activity and soon Reese was alone. He let out a breath of relief and got to work.

Stars lit the night sky from outside Reese’s window and the workshop was bathed in the dim glow of the moon. All the other lights except for Reese’s desk lamp had already been turned off.

Aaron walked over to Reese where he sat with only his desk lamp for company. “You really should go home on time, Reese.”

“If I do, we won’t finish our project on time.”

“Your life isn’t your work.”

“It’s not like I have anything else to do.”

Aaron looked at him apprehensively. “Reese. Go home, get some rest, you look fit to die. The project isn’t going anywhere.”

Reese sighed and put down his pencil, he turned to face Aaron for the first time. “That’s exactly why I can’t leave. If the project isn’t going anywhere, then neither am I.”

“You won’t get anywhere working yourself to death.”

“You won’t get anywhere talking me to death.”

“Very well then,” said Aaron.

He put on his coat and walked out the door. It shut with a resounding bang. Reese was finally alone in the office.

The next couple hours went by in a frenzy of work and thoughts. In no time at all, the moon had risen far into the night sky and begun to set again. He closed the blinds and ignored the night sky to turn to his work.

Soon enough, the door opened again with a clang and Theresa walked in as usual, pushing her cart. “Here again as usual I see.”

“Here again as usual.”

“You don’t mind if I get started?”

“No.”

As usual, they worked together in silence. Reese still hadn’t made any headway into the designs. All the numbers were swimming around in front of his eyes and he felt ready to sleep the week away. But the project had to be finished on time. He shook his head and started on a new sheet of paper.

Theresa walked over as she finished up. “You haven’t made any progress?”

Reese ignored her to keep working. He had started a new diagram to try and see what kind of tweaks could be done to fix the last one’s flaws. There wasn’t time for idle talk.

Theresa swiveled his chair around so he was looking at her, his hand almost kept writing out equations in the air until Theresa grabbed it with her own. She looked him dead in the eyes and said nothing.

“What do you want?” Reese asked.

“I want you to answer me like a human being. Not like you’re a robot.”

“Okay.”

“Good.” Theresa let the faintest bit of a smile cross her face. “So let’s start from the beginning again. You haven’t made much progress?”

Reese looked her dead in the eye. “No. Not at all. Nothing. Nil. Is that a satisfactory answer?”

“Yes, except for all the sarcasm.” Theresa let go of his hand. “Is that all you do? Be sarcastic and work?”

“It’s all you know me to do.”

“Maybe you need a break.” Theresa pulled open the blinds. “Or at least some more light.”

“And what would more light do for me?”

“Well for one, you might not look as pale as a corpse for once. And for two, the stars are pretty, don’t you think so?”

“I’ve never thought about it.”

“When I was a girl, I would look up at the stars and dream of flying among them. Weaving in and out of such beautiful lights. I always wanted to be a pilot because of it.”

She looked Reese in the eyes with such sincerity, he couldn’t help but feel for her. He immediately swashed those feelings but they still lingered right in the back of his head.

“Why aren’t you a pilot then?” he asked.

“Because my eyes aren’t good enough, because I didn’t pass the health exams due to a bad heart, and because no one ever helped me try to get there. That’s why.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Why? It’s not your fault, now is it?”

“I guess not.”

Theresa finished the rest of her work and eventually left with a tentative goodbye to Reese. He was left alone at his desk. Reese looked up through the window Theresa had opened for him and looked at the stars for the first time in a while.

Tuesday was the worst day yet. He couldn’t get anywhere. He’d already drawn redundant copies of all the blueprints, he’d already tried everything he could think of to make the designs for a lightweight personal aircraft work. It just didn’t. There was no way to make a plane that was for everyone.

He rebuffed all of Ben’s offers for company until he was alone at the office and that day, rather than working, he sulked. There was nothing to be done at this point, it was impossible.

Theresa came as usual with a cheery smile into the workshop. She scoffed at the dim interior and opened all the blinds to let in the night skies silver starlight. After that, she seemed satisfied with the lighting of the workshop.

Reese simply watched her through all of it. He felt like he should say something but he didn’t know what.

She caught him staring and gave him a tentative smile. “You always work in such darkness! I don’t know how you stand it. I love the stars.”

He tried to smile back but it turned out into something that resembled a grimace more than anything. “I can tell.”

“Is that supposed to be your smile?” She laughed. “We’ll have to work on that one!”

“You seem to be in a cheerful mood tonight.”

“I am! It’s been a good day so far. Plus, I finally got you to actually talk with me.”

“Have I not before?”

“Not as much as you are now. Not even close.”

“I’m glad we’re talking now then.”

“Are you now? I’m glad I finally melted your icy heart then.”

Theresa smiled at him again. Then she got to working on the office. It was dirtier than usual today because they’d taken in parts from scrapped test planes that hadn’t worked to examine them so she had a lot to work on.

The two of them chatted together throughout the night and Reese even helped her out a bit too. She taught him how to clean while he told her about how designing airplanes went. It was nice, Reese felt warm in a way he hadn’t felt in a very long time.

As the night dragged on, they fell into silence again until Theresa asked, “If you could have any one wish, what would it be?”

Reese shrugged. “I don’t know, to finish the project I guess.”

“That’s it? That’s what you’d wish for? I guess it fits you. I’d wish to be able to fly a plane. At least once.”

“You never let go of that dream to be a pilot, did you?”

“Never.”

“Maybe you could fly one of the planes here? As a test flight?”

“They’d never let me. My only chance now would be if you somehow got those personal planes price down but from how it looks, that won’t be likely to happen, will it?”

“No. I don’t think so. I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay. I’m fine. Let’s finish cleaning.”

The next day passed as quickly as the last. Reese was annoyed as ever by his coworkers constant chattering and lack of progress, he was annoyed by Ben’s offer to eat lunch, and he was annoyed by Ben trying to talk him into going home at the end of the day. All in all, a usual day for the workshop’s employees.

That night he kept working in the empty workshop until well into the night with no sign of Theresa coming in that day. Reese worked in only the dim light of his old worn-out lamp and kept all the blinds closed leaving most of the workshop in darkness.

As the night dragged on, Reese couldn’t help but feel like he was missing something. After a while he couldn’t even bring himself to work on the schematics and just sat in his chair looking at the door. He didn’t want to go home but he didn’t want to be here. Something was wrong with the office.

As the night dragged on with nothing being done, Reese grew more and more frustrated. He snapped his pencil on one of the blueprints and tore a hole in it, he kicked the leg of his desk causing a bolt to come out, and he almost tripped over a chair hidden in darkness on his way back from the bathroom. It passed the time he usually left the workshop but Reese stayed, he felt like something was unfinished but he just didn’t know what it was.

It wasn’t until Reese was almost ready to head home himself that Theresa finally came. She rushed into the workshop with the door’s familiar clang as she entered. Theresa looked flustered, her hair was frizzy and her eyeliner streaked its way down her face.

“You’re still here?” she asked. “I’m surprised to see you here so late.”

Reese couldn’t help but feel a peculiar warmth in his chest at seeing her. “Yes. I had unfinished business to take care of.”

“Well it looks like you’re all set with that unfinished business then, I guess I’ll be cleaning alone tonight.”

Theresa pushed her cart past him and began to unload it onto the nearest workbench. Reese just stood at the door, he looked at her and then to the door and then back again.

“What made you so late?” he asked.

“It’s none of your concern.” she snapped.

Reese paused awkwardly, not sure of what to do. “Okay.”

“Well, if that’s all, then I have a workshop to clean if you don’t mind.” Theresa began to walk away from him down one of the aisles. “Why don’t you go home.”

Before Reese quite knew what he was doing himself, he had grabbed Theresa’s arm keeping her close. Embarrassed, he quickly let go and stepped back unsure of what to say. She just looked at him.

“Would you like any help?” he finally asked.

“Sure.”

For the next hour, they cleaned together in silence. Reese began to enjoy the steady rhythm that they had going. It was peaceful.

His cleaning was finally interrupted when Theresa gave a muffled sob from across the room. He turned to look at her but she quickly turned around to hide her face from view.

“Theresa!” Reese walked over to her but stopped a couple feet away, hesitant to go any closer. “Theresa, what’s wrong? Are you hurt?”

“No.”

“What’s wrong then?”

“Why do you care!” she shouted at him. “You’ve never cared before have you? Any conversation we’ve had has always been one sided with me doing the only talking. Why would you care about me now?”

“I don’t know. You’ve never cried before.”

“Have you ever cared about anything?” she screamed.

It seemed like the room froze in time. Theresa wiped tears from her eyes and stared down at Reese. He tried to hold her gaze before looking at his feet. His own eyes felt wet now.

“I have.” he said quietly. “I have cared about something before.”

“I didn’t,” Theresa stuttered, “I didn’t mean it.”

“No. You did. It’s fine. I haven’t cared about anything for a long time.”

Reese sat down heavily in his chair and felt tears of his own to start to flow. Theresa sat next to him and together they share their own sadness.

“It’s the day my father died today. His anniversary, I guess,” Theresa finally said. “He had been a pilot. I’d never respected anyone else more in the world than him. I wanted to be just like him.”

“What happened?”

“He died. A crash. After that, my mom would have nothing of my aspirations to be a pilot. Everything else burnt out pretty quick after that. Me and her stopped talking, I never went to college, I never had any dreams. Now I’m here. I just wanted to be close to planes again.”

Reese put his hand on her shoulder and they sat together for a time. “Here, follow me.”

He led her upstairs using his own master key until they were on the roof. Outside, the night sky was truly terrific. They were so high up, it felt like he could reach out and touch the moon. All around them, stars glittered like jewels.

“I took a field trip here as a kid, I got away from the group to come up here and it’s why I work here today. I guess I forgot the view after all this time though.”

“It’s beautiful.”

“It is.”

The two of them spent a long time up on the roof that night. And when they came down, Reese felt ready to figure out the solution to the lightweight aircraft. Not to finish the project, but for Theresa, and everyone else that might have dreams.