August 12 had to be one of the hottest nights that entire summer. And of course it was the night she chose to stay outside. She lay sprawled out on her rough, shingled roof, clad in an old pair of orange cut-off shorts and an overused black sports bra. She could feel the salty sweat dripping from every pore in her body; but she didn't mind. She was used to it. And she was anticipating the meteor shower that was forecast that night.
But as the hours dragged on, she could feel her brain giving in to the comforting lull of the locusts' buzz and the cool breeze that tickled her nose. But she was stubborn, and she resisted- she came to watch meteors, so she would. She began to become bored lying outside, her sweat plastering her skin to the scratchy roof.
She sat up and looked up and down the street of her small, quaint town. The streetlights hummed with electricity and every house had a perfectly groomed lawn with gardens that looked like nothing more than disheveled rainbows in the dark. It was so beautiful. And she loathed all of it. It's perfection and serenity made everything seem unimportant-pale-in comparison.
All she wanted was to get as far away as possible from it; she could easily picture herself just walking out of her front door, leaving a note for her parents and feeling no regrets. But that wasn't all she wanted. She wanted to get away from the entire world- she wanted to travel the stars, see all the galaxies in the ever expanding universe! But she knew it was only possible with the intervention of one peaceful, kind-natured and loving man; One man who knew everything and loved everything. A man who she was beginning to lose faith in as the night continued on.
Lost in her thoughts about planets and stars, her eyelids became droopy and she started to drift out of consciousness. Then there was a flash of hot, white light. Her eyes shot open and she sat straight up.
It was a meteor!she thought to herself I just missed it... dammit!Her childish excitement died down again. But then it came back when something else happened.
A loud noise erupted from nowhere echoing down the dark, quiet street, sounding something like a muffled vacuum becoming louder and louder by the second. Surprised by the peculiarity of the situation, she coaxed her nervous legs to scoot to the edge of the roof to get a better look at the neatly trimmed lawn below her where the sound seemed to be coming from. Sure enough, she saw something materializing there. All that was there was a brilliant, blue box- but it made her heart leap with joy.
"It's... him..." she whispered to herself in awe. Her entire brain felt like mush. There was no other explanation for the feeling she felt. It was mush. Everything.
Her heart beat pulsed through her fingers and toes and she regained control of her limbs. She flew back through her window she used to get onto her roof, concentrating on being silent; she flashed down the stairs, listening to the creak of the old wood covered by worn, once-white wall-to-wall carpeting. Within seconds she arrived in the kitchen where she got just two things: a bowl of creamy vanilla custard and a platter of hot, crispy, fried fish fingers. She arranged the food as quickly as she could, while still trying to make sure it looked presentable.
She made sure to be extremely careful and quiet while opening the door with one hand and wrestling a bowl of fish fingers and custard with the other. She heard the click of the lock releasing from the wall. She stepped outside and stepped onto her concrete porch, taking slow steps to her lawn. Although it was so hot, she suddenly felt cold and exposed walking on the cool stone showing her midriff. When she got to the steps, she saw a scrawny man in suspenders and a bow tie, sitting in the grass; his head down, and taking deep, slow breathe; he was crying. He leaned against his blue box. When he finally noticed her presence after what felt like hours of standing and watching, he looked up at her quite startled and almost a bit embarrassed, the girl thought. Tears had made his eyes puffy and his cheeks flushed. His hair was a long and was mostly combed over to one side of his head, gelled neatly so it had a sort of "poof" effect.
The young girl didn't know what to do. She just stared at him as he stared back.
Although she had gone over the meeting hundreds of times in her head, this is not at all what she had imagined. She was terrified and excited and wasn't sure what to say. She realized how strange and indecent she must have looked to him, holding a cold bowl of custard to her fleshy, exposed belly. She was suddenly aware of the tightness of her shorts. She was aware of her messy, greasy hair.
She was suddenly aware that she would have to talk to him at some point. Nothing came to her mind. She couldn't talk about the weather: he hated small talk. She couldn't ask why he was crying, at least not yet: that seemed to rude. She racked her brain for the perfect way to start a conversation with her hero. What do I say? What do I say?
She didn't decide to speak. Her mouth and her brain had been conspiring against her; her lips and tongue prepared themselves to talk without her consent. And she then she said what she had been aching to for to long:
"...Doctor?..."