This Summer Belongs To The Stars

Trevor and Susie knew they were old and past it. Fifty years married to each other, travelling the world together, they never regretted their adrenal junkie lifestyle. The only thing they did miss out on was their chance to become parents and then grandparents. It just wasn’t to be. Susie was told she couldn’t conceive. By the time they had lived their dreams and wanted to settle down, life had caught up to them.

They had considered adopting, however whenever they would have conversations about such matters, an exciting opportunity to travel or skydive or feed sharks in the ocean, became their top priority. They weren’t cut out for the parent thing; it wasn’t fair on them.

The Summer came around. The middle of June was in full swing and the beating sun rose high in sky. This was the first Summer where the couple felt like they could relax, finally retire from their adventures. For the first time, since their marriage, Trevor and Susie planned to spend their Summer outside on their patio sunbathing, doing absolutely nothing.

“Where did you put the deck chairs?” Trevor called out from the back porch.

“Deck chairs?” Susie cried back, pouring herself a glass of water, staring at him stumble around outside the window.

“No, the sunscreen! Yes, Sue, the deck chairs, where are they?”

Susie turned the tap off aggressively with force. She took a sip from the top and poked her head out the back door. “No need for the sarcasm.”

“Sorry love, but tell me, where did you put them last?”

“Trevor, those deck chairs are over thirty years old, they’ve probably all been eaten by termites by now.”

Trevor let out a big sigh. “Let me check the shed.”

Inside their battered shed lay every project Trevor had started over decades. A woodcutting bench sat in the corner, boxes piled high, covering the only window and many moths who had sat for years. The further Trevor looked, the more he knew it was a bad idea. Boxes and wood panels kept tumbling down and banging into his bad knee. He’d only just had surgery done on it.

“Trevor, get out of there! It doesn’t matter!” Susie’s muffled voice called.

Eventually, when Trevor got his breath back, and placed everything where it had been, he shut the door to the shed, making sure the padlock was locked so nothing could tumble out again, he met with Susie who was leaning on the benches, propped up against the house, all hidden from the sun.

“We can just use these; it doesn’t really matter.”

Trevor looked at the two benches in front of him and huffed. At the time, he was proud of making them. He was always very hands on, never let anything go to waste.

“I suppose so. Anyway, I’m getting a beer, want anything from the fridge?”

Susie had already placed her sunglasses on her head, put her Summer floppy hat on and was sitting on one of the benches, resting her feet on a tree stump Trevor had left behind as a footrest.

“Just a lemonade, if you don’t mind.”

A few moments later, the couple were sitting side by side, legs propped up, sipping their drinks, away from the harsh sun glare.

“This is the life; this is what I imagined retirement would look like.” Susie said, sipping her lemonade.

With her sunglasses on, the world looked tinted and her floppy hat made it difficult for her to see to the side of her.

“Trevor?” She had to twist her body to look the other way, however, her husband, who had been drinking his beer gulp by gulp, had disappeared. He had completely vanished, into thin air.

“Trevor? Where are you? You’re not in that shed again…”

The shed’s padlock was firmly closed, just as Trevor had left it, his beer sat on the ground in the baking heat.

“Trevor?” She called again, fear caught in her throat as she walked back into the house, taking both hat and sunglasses off.

She couldn’t call the police; it had only been a few minutes, and besides they would only put it down to being the rambles of an old lady living in the countryside. Susie waited and waited, going about her day as she would normally. Then the night dawned.

She had been wild in her youth, staying up until the early hours of the morning, drinking cocktails. Those days were behind her. She wasn’t sad, she wanted a quieter life for herself, to sit in front of the television of a night-time, however, this was her and Trevor’s thing. Tonight was different and lonely; she couldn’t bring herself to watch anything, and all she wanted to do was to sleep. Tomorrow was another day as they say.

Since they were married, Trevor hadn’t left Susie’s side for more than a few hours. Fifty years to wind each other up, and now she just lay in her double bed, in the darkness, alone. Closing her eyes tightly, hoping she would fall asleep quickly, was the only thing keeping her going.

It sounded like the cow shed opposite the house had caved in on itself. A bang so loud Susie woke with a start, her head throbbing from how quickly she sat up. There it was again, that ungodly sound that felt like the entire house was shaking. She was half asleep and hurricane season had just begun; however, she could have sworn the weather report said no hurricanes or storms were expected.

Susie jumped out of bed as fast she could with her bad back, slipped on her slippers and hurried to the window. Luckily, the shed was intact, standing as it had for decades. There were no clouds in the sky, the weather felt sticky. Everything was how it had been when she went to bed.

She glanced at her alarm clock by the side of her bed, 2.55am. She’d been asleep for hours. Something in the corner of her eye made her look towards the window. From out of the shed stepped a figure, carrying what looked like something with grey legs. The more Susie squinted at the figure, walking towards the house with urgency, it became clear it was Trevor.

Hastily, Susie dashed downstairs, her hands flapping with a mixture of nerves and happiness. Unbolting the front door, she could see Trevor’s outline getting closer. She flung the front door open, to find him on the steps trying to catch his breath back, dressed in a white hospital gown, carrying something Susie couldn’t believe.

“Trevor!” She gasped. “I thought I’d never see you again!” Susie put her arms out to embrace her husband, but all he could do was break down and stare at her.

Tightly bundled in his arms was something living. This thing must have only been the size of a puppy. Wrapped in a swaddling cloth, four limbs popped out, all grey in colour, all floppy and skinny.

“Get in, quickly!” Susie worried, ushering him into the house.

The couple moved into their large farmhouse kitchen. In the middle, there was a wooden table. Without any discussion, Trevor spread the thing out, letting them lie across the swaddling cloth. Susie gasped at the sight of it lying there. On the table, wriggling around, lay a creature Susie could only describe as an Extra- Terrestrial.

They had the most oval head imaginable. Large black eyes that shrunk into their head. Their frame was tiny, their stomach a beachball, with fingers like chopsticks. Like a human baby, it cooed and purred.

“What in the Lord’s name has happened!” Susie cried.

“Please, Susie, before I explain, what I’m about to tell you sounds far-fetched, but everything I say is the truth.”

He looked exhausted as if he been awake for a month. His skin drained of life, his already limp body felt like it could collapse at any moment. He took a seat next to the thing, to catch his breath back.

“Whatever this or it is, we can do this together.” Susie felt her heart pounding, anymore chaos and she was afraid she would hurt herself. “But please, go on.”

“I was sat on the bench, drinking beer when I was transported. I didn’t know where you’d gone. I was calling for you, then realised I was alone. I found myself in strange room. All black, with no natural light, just stripes of white. Then, they appeared from a hidden door in the wall. They were all grey, like him but larger, all with strange voices and languages. I tried crying out but they didn’t listen. Then, this was the most surreal part…”

“As if it couldn’t get any stranger!” Susie spat.

“They grabbed hold of my head, brainwaves passed through my mind and I suddenly understood all that was being said. They wheeled this baby out to me on a metal tray, handed him to me, like a new mother, and told me to look after it like my own. I could call him anything but they said I must be a parent to him, teach him how to be a human.”

“That was it then? They sent you home, just like that. No advice, or why they had chosen you? No reason why they wanted him to learn to become a human?”

Trevor shook his head. “Nothing of the sort, however, they looked nervous.”

“Trevor, you don’t think they’ll come back to invade us?” Susie asked with troubling eyes. “That’s all we need! All I wanted was a quiet Summer, I guess our lives are one crazy adventure, there’s no stopping it.”

“So, it seems love…” He huffed staring at the child squirming on the table. “So, it seems.”

Susie adjusted to the alien child upon her table. It was an insane situation and yet this strange baby creature couldn’t help but make her smile.

“Peter.” She said.

“Peter?” Trevor replied.

“A name, for the child, after both our fathers. It was the name we first agreed on, once.”

Trevor smiled back, placed his hand on her back and kissed her cheek. “Peter it is.”

“Oh Trevor! In a way, I’m glad your back like this, at least I know you’re not dead, I didn’t know what to do!”

He kissed her firmly. “Oh Susie, you can’t get rid of me that easily! This Summer is not what we planned…”

“But perhaps, it’s what we need…” Susie agreed.

The couple watched the baby gurgle, playing with his tiny grey toes that resembled tiny knives. He didn’t cry or whine, he was rather happy for something that had been taken to another planet.

“I wonder what his parents were like?” Susie pondered.

“I feel asking too many questions will not do us any good.” Trevor answered scooping the child up.

Peter marvelled into his eyes. Trevor could have sworn he saw the entire universe inside them and perhaps he could, whatever they had done to his mind, made him understand the species.

The next few days were strange to say the least. They felt as if they were a new couple again, full of life, the life they imagined all those years ago. To protect his identity, Trevor shoved a baseball cap upon his bald head, wrapped Peter in a blanket and off they both drove to the shops for baby supplies. A bassinet, a highchair, clothes to wipe him with, once they were back home at the farm, and laid all the equipment on the table, it looked as if they could open their own store.

Peter was an angel, as good as gold. He slept soundly in his crib, let Trevor clean him up. He let Susie spoon feed him soup, even though at first the texture felt strange on his tongue, he ate every ounce up. It was July. The height of Summer when the sun felt almost unbearable. Unlike a human baby, Peter didn’t mind the heat, he giggled when Susie balanced him on her lap while the couple watched quiz shows on television.

She laughed when Peter laughed. “What would we do without you now?”

“It really feels he was sent here especially to keep us both happy.” Trevor acknowledged, crouching before him even with his bad knee, to tickle his fingers.

“I think he’s making us both younger too.” Trevor joked.

Susie felt different, physically. Whether it was because they were so occupied, or if Peter was making them both younger, they couldn’t tell. Apart from his grey appearance, everything about him just screamed human baby, and the more time they spent with him, the more it was becoming noticeable.

It was one Thursday night, one minute past 2 in the morning. The couple, cuddled up in bed, heard the distant sound of a cry. Both woken by the noise, they burst out of bed and hurried to the crib. Trevor rushed to turn the main light on, while his wife darted for Peter. She gasped, her face covering her mouth.

“Trevor!” She cried.

When Trevor walked to the crib, there was no greyness on Peter. There before him lay a skin-coloured baby, crying just as a baby should.

“How did that happen...”. He started to say.

It was mid-July; the heat was still intense despite it being nightfall. Out of the window, the couple both saw what would have been unbelievable before the Summer started. Round and flat, a flying saucer that resembled some kind of kitchen equipment, with flashing white lights, hovered just above their roof.

They both stared and nodded. Susie grabbed the child from the crib, and hobbled down the stairs, opening their front door into the farmyard, where the hovercraft blew in the wind. The doors to the spaceship were open slightly. They could recognise him anywhere. While he had grown quite significantly, the couple knew Peter standing there. The baby Susie now held, was in fact a human child.

“What is going on?” Trevor shouted back; his head wind swept from the saucer spinning in motionless circles.

It was only him who could hear the reply, for he was the one chosen, he was the one whose mind was attuned with their kind.

“You and your wife have done a fine job looking after me, but now I must travel back to my planet to teach my kind what I know. I will tell them that humans are complicated creatures but to trust them in all they do. The love between you both is strong, and my kind tells me you were trying for a child for so long. This is a gift from us to you. This child, Susie holds is made from your DNA, he is special and he is yours. Care for him as you did for me. Thank You and Goodbye.”

Trevor was overcome with emotion, his head throbbing from the force. Susie huddled over to comfort him, asking what was wrong and, in that moment, Trevor repeated word for word what Peter had said. Susie fell back in tears, watching the final glimpses of him leave. He was there for a moment then one moment later he was at one with the stars.

The couple sat upon the dusty path, below the burning night’s sky, holding their boy close to their chest.

As a shooting star flew past them both, they whispered into his ears: “You are special my love, never forget that.”