The half seashell compact had been stolen from his mother, round silver ribs protruding around the palm sized looking glass. It was the bulge in his pocket as he mimicked sleep, the baseball glove printed comforter drawn under one arm to his left earlobe. Feigned deep breath was the only response to a cooed, muted, “Goodnight darling.” and the dragged click of a collapsed, closed door hinge.

One, two, three, the self-propelled increase of his heartbeat, three matched flickers of opening eyes, three raps of branches on the rain gutter outside his window. The room was ardently quiet, inky blue nightshades revolving in the nightlight. He denigned the dinosaur slippers as his feet suspended over shag carpet, lightly stepping over the under-the-bed shadows. He knew the black holes of night navigation. A side step by the dresser, the longer but illuminated route around the closet, quick aversions of the moving wind chimes hanging automobiles and airplanes. By the window he halted, drawing back the sheer, blue blinds to glimpse the outside and the lawn.

“One, two, three.” Three bright blinks of mirror caught in flashlight. The shell was out, a gauzy layer of powder settling around it’s opening, the glass showing his neighborhood and quiet street. He had settled his signal into the huge blank aisle of city space, and waited. Minutes passes, until a glimmer caught from the south east edge of his vision. Hand fumbling for a tube made telescope, he leaned out the window squinting through spiraled cardboard. The light puckered again in the distance. His tense, terse breath evened as it flickered a final time. The boy drew the drapes in decided accomplishment, ambling expertly through the flecked dark and lightness, burying himself once more in blankets, leaning his weight on the compact encased in skin and mattress.