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Art Baker had always loved the stars. Them, and the moon, and the seemingly endless expanse of the night sky. It lay somewhere out there, so unfathomable and so far beyond his reach. There was this clear, silvery light that emanated from them when the sky was clear enough to see them. A bright, mystical twinkling within the darkness of the night sky that had drawn his gaze toward the heights more than once in his early childhood and held it there until, as one might say, he had lost himself in it once or twice. There were the constellations, which some people who were skilled in recognizing the swarm of shining points believed they could see. It had been his uncle who first drew his attention to one of them-years ago, on a particularly clear summer night, on the porch. He was pretty sure it had been Orion.
Something that didn't surprise him too much when he remembered the man. His uncle may never have been a melancholic person, but he was so devoted to his business that even at a moment like this, he didn't seem able to completely detach himself from it. Even as he gazed at the stars, the undertaker seemed unable to let go completely of what inspired him- little did the boy know that part of it would rub off on him. He did not yet suspect the mixture of emotions with which he would later look up at that night sky, nor what significance it would one day have for him. At that moment, he did not suspect that he was perhaps more similar to his uncle in some ways than he might have believed.
At that time, he was not yet aware of all this-astonished and fascinated at the same time, he had done little more than listen to the man's descriptions, while doing his best to keep track of the constellation. With his head tilted back and his eyes slightly narrowed from the effort, he had searched the sky for it- perhaps also because he didn't want to disappoint his uncle. Until today, he wasn't sure if he had actually managed to recognize anything, and yet he had listened to his counterpart's words with quiet fascination and nodded to them, as if he had. If his uncle had noticed that he might not have been telling the whole truth, he hadn't commented on it.
Some time later, perhaps a few months, he had made his way to the library in his hometown-and borrowed a book about the constellations. It was curiosity, fascination that had seized him, and perhaps it was also a kind of zeal, a determination left behind by the echo of a memory from a certain evening. A determination to learn more. Back then, when it was still open. And yet it was neither their brilliance nor their formations that fascinated him so much. Not only that, he loved them and admired them, but they were not the reason for the strange kind of connection he felt when he saw them.
It was the touch of infinity that clung to them that truly fascinated him. The feeling of permanence, of eternity, that emanated from them. They had existed for what felt like an eternity, and they would continue to exist for what felt like another eternity. They had already outlived countless people-radiant, pure, unharmed. They would outlive another couple of countless people in the future. A lonely, uncomfortable thought-and yet, in some way he couldn't quite explain to himself, it was comforting.
And it took the death of his uncle- with all of it´s unfortunate irony for someone who had never touched a cigarette in his life, had succumbed to lung cancer of all things- for him to consciously come to this conclusion. Strictly speaking, it was on the evening after the funeral that he had consciously registered that feeling, that train of thought, for the first time. He was still a child, and he mourned- he hadn't been as close to his uncle as he was to his parents, his grandmother, or his brother, and death was not something foreign to him. His uncle, too, was no stranger to death-he had been involved, almost tangled with it, in a certain way. He had buried more than a dozen people- this time, it was him, who was getting buried. In a way, death was something that was strangely familiar to him, something that seemed to run through his family. And yet at the same time, there was something strangely foreign about it, something strangely repulsive.
It was a unique kind of fascination, and yet-something about it horrified his childish self just the same . Something about it, he seemed unable to fully process- perhaps later, perhaps when he grew older and learned to accept death simply for what it was. But for the moment, it had intimidated him. For the moment, he had mourned. And as he lay awake in his bed late that night, and tried to come to terms with the day and the fact that the man he knew from his childhood was now simply gone, he had looked out of the window, directly into the night sky, whose velvety dark blue color was gradually being replaced by a darker, almost black hue.
Perhaps he had remembered a night several years ago that he had carried with him somewhere in his subconscious ever since. Perhaps he had hoped that the sight would give him some comfort, make him feel less alone in the small room where his brother was already asleep and he was the only one still awake. It would give him the feeling that, despite the fact that hardly more than a small handful of pain remained of him, his brother was still with him. In his memory. In the night sky.
It was true that his uncle was gone. He knew he was. It was true that the earth had reclaimed his body- or rather, what was left of it. More or less-if one could say that about someone who had chosen cremation. And yet he found it difficult to believe that everything of his uncle was truly gone. The sight of the sky, the memory that lingered in his mind like a summer breeze, made it seem too hard to believe. As he gazed at the sky, he thought he could smell the dry grass that had been in the air that evening. He thought he could actually feel the summer air rush through his hair, and he felt his uncle's presence near him, his hand on his shoulder.
It was more of a feeling than something that could actually be defined, and it was not something that could be easily put into words. But his uncle seemed to be there. Here in room, almost next to him. Out there in the night sky among the stars. Perhaps he was now one of them. Perhaps he was looking down at him at that very moment, and perhaps, he thought, his uncle was thinking of his nephew just as he was thinking of him. He wondered if his uncle was lonely up there, and because he could feel the now familiar burning sensation in his eyes once again, he told himself that he wasn´t . It took a while for him to fall asleep- his consciousness still seemed to have difficulty letting go of the wakefulness of the day and slipping into a comforting slumber. But eventually, with his tired eyes still fixed on the window, he did.
He was no longer a child when his brother became the next to go, too young. Still too young for such a death, which one would think mainly affected men of grandfatherly age. And the sorrow he had given his mother in life seemed to fade in the face of what his death triggered in her. Art felt it too- how could he not , when it was the person he had known his whole life, with whom he had spent hours as a child, who had finally been taken from him?
It was different from when his uncle had died. It wasn't that feeling of intense but fleeting grief-not that his grief for his uncle had ever completely disappeared. It lay somewhere, buried beneath the surface, a kind of crusted wound that occasionally reopened. And yet the grief for his brother was different. It was a deeper, more biting kind of grief- the kind he knew would eat away at him, linger. When he looked up at the night sky that evening, he believed it had gained another star. He didn't wonder if his brother would be lonely- this time he knew for sure that he wouldn't be. He knew that an uncle was with him , that they would continue together. He knew that they were looking down on him. And one day, he would be with them again.
He was grown, when he set out on the annual march with ninety-nine others. A bleak, painful situation in which death would be their constant companion. An undertaking that could possibly be described as suicidal, but his family was poor, and he was their son, and he would always support them wherever he could. It was simply what he had to do.
And besides, there was something else that made it worth continuing to walk. Something that made it worth being here, even though his feet hurt with every step and he could feel the thin soles of his old shoes getting thinner and thinner. As it wore away, it would probably disappear completely by the end. Nevertheless, it was worth continuing to walk. For his family. And for the people he had met on the march. A group of only a few people, but they made all of it seem a little more bearable, if only or a couple of a few, fleeting moments. A group consisting of boys who were just as young, just as reckless, and perhaps all in their own way just as desperate as he was. A group that did not make his pain go away, did not soften any of it , and did not really manage to make the time flow faster. But they made what was happening around them seem just a little less terrible.
There was Hank with his dark hair, his chewing gum, and a mouth that was equally cheeky and confident, and in its own way almost ridiculously lovable. Ray and Peter, who had found each other and who, in all their teasing and joking, seemed to cling to each other in that stormy, deep water. Abraham, who must have joined them sometime later, and despite his cheeky mouth, with his perhaps a little too boisterous, perhaps a little too earnest manner, fit into the group as if he had been there from the beginning. Just like Pearson. Pearson with his pennies, and the stories abiut his little brother, and the pair of pants that was too big, too wide for him. And then there was Collie Parker. It was Abraham who approached him first. Abraham, who seemed to gradually draw him into the group. Collie, who at first glance seemed somewhat solitary, perhaps even withdrawn. Colkie, who in a certain way reminded him of his beloved stars.
Collie, who at first glance seemed just as unattainable and elusive, just as fascinating, just as radiant as they were, and to whom he seemed to feel a connection almost from the start. Collie, who had never really been closed off or dismissive. Collie, with too much of a need for justice. Collie, who had felt too much from the start, more than was good for him-and perhaps that was why it was so strangely easy to feel connected to him, so strangely easy to sometimes feel like seeing a part of herself reflected in him. It was a hopeless situation, and yet it was amazing how it was precisely that situation that seemed to bring them even closer together.
How that situation led to their group growing closer together. How it could be that the boys, whom he had known for only a few days, had found their way into his heart so quickly. They couldn't all survive. Sooner or later, they would have to let each other go, he would have to let her go. A knowledge that seemed to fade into oblivion at one moment or another, and yet he seemed to have always been aware of it somewhere deep inside. And yet, no amount of knowledge could prepare him for how it felt to hold Hank's trembling, bleeding, and aching body in his arms, knowing he was the first one he had ever lost. Nothing could prepare him for the feeling of despair, of helplessness, as Ray pulled him away from the dying boy, leaving him behind as little more than a pale silhouette that would soon become a memory. The strange feeling of emptiness, the indescribable feeling that something, someone, was simply missing, that had made their group complete, when one member of the Mogrens was no longer with them.
Nothing could prepare him for how it felt to see a bullet pierce Collie's body-a failed attempt at resistance, while most of the others were still trying to comprehend what had happened.A hope that was immediately stolen from them, that they were immediately robbed of- just as Collie was robbed of his life. A bullet that somehow pierced his skin with ease- a bullet, that put an abrupt end to a rebellion that had never even really started in the first place.
It was Abraham who was the next to go. Abraham, with whom he had formed such a close bond. Abraham, who had become a constant companion at his side, a friend. So, they had all become friends. He had known that they could not all survive. He had known that he would have to survive them if he wanted to win. But that did not mean that he was prepared to see them die.
In the early morning sky, the stars were only faintly visible. And just as faint was the comfort they gave him this time. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he was sure that it was there, that it was trying to wrap itself around the festering wound inside him like a bandage, like a balm. He knew that they were still with him. He knew that they saw him, that they looked down on him. He knew that they were together and that they were well. He just wished it didn't hurt so damn much. He just wished they weren't so far away from him. Suddenly, it seemed like a whole million light years separated them.
He was grown, and their numbers were steadily dwindling. The young people around them were dying- death clung to them like a pervasive stench. It was reflected in their empty, deceitful eyes, in their pain-contorted faces, which seemed to have taken hold of them all. They faded like leaves in the sun, wilting like flowers that had not been watered enough. Their faces were old-they all seemed to have aged several decades, for the gaunt, emaciated faces staring back at him seemed to have little in common with the boys he once knew. And yet it was them. They were there-they who were not yet gone. Ray and Pete, the only friends he had left, and who were clinging to exhaustion like the smell of a pungent, unpleasant perfume.
He doubted that he was doing much better than them-he knew that he was not doing better than them. The soles of his shoes had come loose. Rough, hard concrete rubbed against the soles of his feet, irritating the sensitive skin even more than it had when he was still wearing his shoes. The dawn was accompanied by unpleasant, dull colors. The dark blue gave way to a pale violet, which would soon give way to the familiar orange tones. The stars were no longer visible-they had not yet found their place at the beginning of the new day. For now, they existed only as shimmering points in his memory, and even though he knew they would return as soon as darkness fell again- assuming he would live long enough to see it.
And yet, suddenly, he felt strangely lonely. He shouldn't have felt lonely; after all, he wasn't alone. The others were with him. Ray was with him. His friend, who had become one of his closest confidants somewhere between the song and the last miles, was with him. Pete was with him. He wasn't alone; he was with his friends. And yet there was a strange gnawing feeling somewhere inside him, as if something- or someone-was longing for him. It was an empty feeling, as if he had suddenly become aware that he was missing something, that he longed to be with someone. He longed for those he had already lost. He longed for his friends. He longed for the stars, which somewhere in his subconscious seemed to have become almost indifferent to their souls. And a part of him, one that perhaps already sensed that it was coming to an end for him, that his time would soon be up, wondered if he would ever see them again in this life.
It must have been earlier- he was long past the point where he could still delude himself into thinking he had kept track of time- when he began to feel... strange. His arms felt strangely numb, frighteningly distant from him, as if they no longer really belonged to his body. His legs and feet felt strange too- they no longer stung him, not like they had a few hours ago, when it felt as if all his nerve endings were on fire. The pain seemed to have subsided in an almost miraculous way, leaving behind only a dull tingling sensation, like a foot that had gone numb from being in an uncomfortable position for too long.He supposed, he could almost feel glad about it- if it weren't for the fact that these circumstances made it much more difficult to control his legs. All the muscles in them seemed to be losing strength, suddenly bending under his weight, while his balance, like his pain, seemed to gradually evaporate. He felt, much more than he was aware of, how his movements, his steps, were becoming clumsier. He felt the ground begin to move, to sway, as if it were turning into a rotten, old bridge where every step counted if he wanted to avoid breaking through and plunging into the floods below.
The numbness that had first spread through his arms and legs seemed to be spreading like rust. It seemed to gradually take possession of every cell in his body, pulling him into a strange kind of twilight world where he felt as if he were standing next to himself, completely outside his own body. He didn't know what it meant. He didn't know exactly what was going on, but he knew, almost with certainty couldn't be good. He forced himself to swallow the thought, forced himself not to give in to the growing unease, the growing panic that was gradually welling up inside him. He forced himself to keep going. To concentrate on his steps.
He thought of the others, of his friends who might be watching him right now, urging him to go just a little further. But the uneasiness, that eerie yet unshakeable feeling that bordered on certainty, remained. The certainty that this went further than he dared to assume. That the dew meant more than he wanted to believe, and that more awaited him there, in the place from which it had emerged. It was the moment when the heart pains began for the first time. It was a sudden, intense pain, worse than anything he had ever felt before. If he had been able to, he would have screamed- but his mouth and tongue seemed to be paralyzed. His throat contracted painfully, cramping up without a single sound escaping.
For a moment, his field of vision seemed to fade into almost complete darkness, while he felt as if something was tearing inside his head. The pain swept away all his thoughts, all his other feelings, and seemed to drag him into a merciless vortex, into an abyss where there was nothing else but the ever lingering pain. Only the agonizing, hammering pain that seemed to consume him convinced him that his moment must have finally come- and it was so terribly dark. He had hoped so much that it wouldn't be so frighteningly dark. He couldn't see the stars, he couldn't see anything at all. The darkness enveloped him, robbed him of all orientation, left him mindless, wandering aimlessly, detached from himself-and then his vision cleared again. He blinked, irritated. There was still a throbbing in his head. This wasn´t a normal headache. This was something far worse, something more sinister. something that surpassed any migraine he had ever experienced in his life.
His vision was beginning to blur , and almost seemed to fade away completely at the edges. But despite this, the brightness of the day remained. He saw the endless road that still lay ahead of him. He saw the landscape that surrounded them, saw the suffocating masses that seemed to surround them on all sides, pressing close together so they could keep an eye on the runners. They waited impatiently to see the next one of them go, betting idly on what the outcome of it all would be. Art blinked at them irritably, took note of them, registered them- and immediately forgot them again, as if their sight reminded him of something that slowly rippled through his memory because he could no longer grasp it. He felt something warm running down his face. A warm, viscous liquid that he didn't quite know where it came from. A warm liquid, and he didn't know what it was. He knew exactly what it was.
The metallic, coppery taste that spread through his mouth told him what he needed to know. He didn't have much time left. He looked around for his friends, his disoriented gaze fixed on the little comfort, the little orientation that remained to him in these confusing moments. A little longer. Just a little further, and he would be able to accompany them. The stars were calling him. Those he had already lost were calling him, and he would go to them if that was what it took-but he wasn't ready to go, not quite yet. He tried to tell himself it was okay if he had to go. That there was little else left but this quiet, oppressive acceptance with which a star had to face his fate. But there was still this gnawing, restless panic inside him that wouldn't let him rest, that drove him on
This panic, which could not be alleviated even by the thought of being reunited with the others when he died. For a moment, he did not want to be reunited with them. He did not want to return to his stars, he did not want to float weightlessly through the atmosphere, in a strange place he did not know. He did not want to leave anything behind in this world. It didn't bother him that his soul would continue to exist among the stars. He didn't want it to have to be separated from his body, which would remain here, enclosed by the dark, damp earth. It wasn't fair. Curley had been the frist one of them to realise this, and the echoes of the screams of this by, who had been way too young to even be on the walk, pierced his memory once more. It wasn't okay-how could it ever be okay to die? His steps carried him onward, and his heart pounded against his ribs with the last of his remaining strength.
" Walk a little bit longer. Just walk a little bit longer, Art."
" I- can't. I can't, I'm sorry."
It must have been around noon when exhaustion won the battle. It was the pleading in the voices of his friends that awakened in him the desire to continue walking with them, to be able to stay with them. They touched something deep inside him and made him wish that somewhere, deep inside, there was still a spark of strength left. He wished he didn't have to leave them. He would stay, he would go with them if he could. But the fatigue that settled over him seemed to contain the weariness of a whole series of years. It slowed his movements. With every step, he seemed to carry twice his weight, every further movement seeming to be torture for the overworked muscles of his still far too young body. This is where the march ended for him. Once upon a time, the thought would have frightened him- just a few hours ago, it would have reawakened the cold, naked panic inside him, the desire to run, to fight against exhaustion. The feeling that there was simply something inside him that was not yet ready to let go. That didn't want to go, didn't want to go out, didn't want to wander aimlessly among the stars.
The panic was gone. He knew that it was coming to an end for him, and yet at that moment he felt little more than a strange kind of calm- perhaps it was the serenity of a dying man, which had been described in so many books she had once held in her hands. Ray was with him. Pete was with him. He could feel their presence, could feel them supporting him, standing by him. It was okay. A small, terrifyingly young part of him still clung to the the last flicker of despair, to the silent, useless wish that it wouldn´t have to be this way. But it was okay. His friends were with him- what more could he wish for than to pass away surrounded by people he loved, and who loved him in return? He wasn't alone, and maybe that was more than he had dared to hope for in the last few hours. His eyes burned. His vision blurred a little more, and this time he wasn't sure if it was really just exhaustion. He blinked.
One last time, he turned to his friends- a request, a plea on his lips. His grandmother. He removed the cross he had been wearing around his neck, and clumsily placed it in Ray´s hand- . She should have it back. Another plea- he didn´t seem to be able to keep it to himself. he didn´t want them to watch. He wanted them to promise, they wouldn´t watch. He didn't want them to see what was happening. He didn't want them to look back and see him like this- bleeding, dead, lying on the cold concrete. He didn't want them to have to watch as the bullet tore through his body. He didn't want to cause them any more pain than they already had to endure. He squeezed the shoulders of the other two boys- a weak, much too small gesture, and yet at that moment it seemed to be all he could give them. A small, inconspicuous gesture, and yet it seemed to mean so much more than that.
“Another time, another place.”
He let them go. They didn't turn around, didn't look back at the lonely figure who remained behind them on the almost oppressively empty street, while one of the soldiers climbed down from the truck. One might think he was made of tin- his face seemed to expressionless. It would have been impossible to read it, even if he had actually tried to do so. Instead of a human face, a mask seemed to stare back at him- cold, unyielding, marked by little more than a professional kind of calm. None of this meant anything to him. For him, it was simply another job that had to be done. One of forty-nine. Art didn't move. Didn't flinch when his second warning sounded, and then his final warning. He no longer recoiled from the barrel of the gun as it was pointed at him with sobering finality, a fate that could no longer be negotiated. He had hated the noise throughout the entire march. Throughout the entire march, it was that first loud bang that seemed to pierce him to the core and shake him from within that he had feared the most. Even that was now only a faint echo, a quiet whisper of the earlier panic.
In a way, it was a strange kind of dignity that he felt in his situation. The dignity of someone who had recognized his fate and finally managed to make peace with it. It was okay. It could no longer frighten him. Everything would be fine. It was daytime when he registered somewhere in the background how the soldier's finger rested on the trigger, as the last seconds of his life flowed away. He heard a soft click- such an inconspicuous sound that it seemed almost inconceivable that it was the sound that would seal his fate. And he couldn't help but feel a certain sadness that his stars would remain hidden from him in his final moments-but still, it was okay. He couldn't see them, but he knew they were still there, they were still with him. Soon he would be reunited with them all. He would see them all again. He would be with them, continue with them, and he would look down on his friends who were still alive. He would watch over them. It was a strange calm, a peaceful feeling that spread through him as he watched the silhouettes of his friends recede into the distance. One that was still clouded by a little melancholy, by a certain sadness. And yet, one that even the bang that shattered the silence of the day could not completely dispel.
He was going home.