My friend Brandon and I are the coolest people in the neighborhood. His kid brother is the third, which is why we didn’t invite anyone else to our trampoline camping night. Also, experiences with gravity and giant trampolines has taught that more than three people sleeping on a trampoline results in too much unintentional and unconscious contact during unpleasant hours of cold mornings. Three is a good number for these things.
I spot another falling star. We've spotted hundreds during tonight’s meteor shower. This one shatters on its way to earth causing a silent cascade of sparkling light.
The back yard which houses the trampoline is fenced and private. The starlight makes the grass look mysterious. There is no moon and the air is still warm. A perfect night for star gazing.
A flash of light frightens us out of our dozing conversation. Seconds pass and I still can’t determine the source, and my eyes still haven’t adjusted back to the darkness. We’re all scared, and the adrenaline in our blood is making it difficult to speak evenly. Still, someone offers their theory: lightening. We search the sky but see nothing but stars. There isn’t a cloud in sight from horizon to horizon.
On the fifteenth second after the flash we hear a disturbing sound louder and deeper than thunder, but definitely not thunder.
We don’t say a thing. We sink ever so slightly more closely together in the trough of the trampoline canvas. Faces down and mostly covered, we wish we weren’t special enough to hear that, see that.
The air is cold now.
Finally, someone dares to speak while the other two scan the dark lining of the fence for fear of unknown eavesdropping predators. Anything is possible now.
Our hushed voices find enough confidence to spend the next few hours postulating the source of the mystery.
We all agreed that the entire sky was lit, so it was impossible for us to determine its location. The booming sound was so loud. Its delay in reaching our campsite suggested a location far away.
Brandon and his brother weren't Boy Scouts. So, being the only Boy Scout present, I offer my knowledge that thunder takes one second to travel a mile after a lightening strike. After speaking, I remember that I didn’t learn that from scouting adventures, but from an unpopular girl at school recess. I keep that part to myself. Not caring how wrong this theory could be, we use it to conclude that the sound originated from at least fifteen miles away, narrowing the location to somewhere in the city centre, in the suburbs, or on the other side of the foothills in the middle of nowhere.
Then Brandon’s kid brother offers a far more profound analysis on the history and evolution of sonic science and other dealings with physics, which he shouldn’t know at such a young age, confirming my earlier suspicions about the credibility of an education through the Boy Scout program.
Theories of aliens and UFOs, secret government projects of nuclear proportions, etc., keep me frenzied. I want to go inside the house now because it’s cold.