The Night Louis Went To Payson

 

 
            Louis had been thirteen years old for as long as anyone could remember.
            Louis liked to hang around in town, cloaked of course. He was largely unsupervised.
            Mr. and Mrs. Ferard Feather were harmless retirees. They ate dinner at 5PM and turned out the lights before the evening news. They had two cats, who slept with them. Frank and Jesse.
            Louis had heard an oogah horn somewhere. Maybe it was a generational knowing. Or he had been listening outside some house and heard a TV program about the old days. He thought it was an excellent sound bite.
            It was a beautiful Arizona night. The sky was deep with stars. The Saguaro stood silently, rapt. One owl mentioned a thing to another owl. Then it was as silent as silent can be.
            There was frost on the ground, but Louis doesn’t get cold. He had slept the day away and he was awake now.
            He took a little stroll into the residential part of town. It was that time of year when people put colored lights on the outside of their houses and on trees in their yards. Most of the houses had lights on inside and the inhabitants were doing whatever humans do all the time in those closed wooden boxes. It confused Louis. There was nothing of interest in those boxes as far as he was concerned. He knew because he had looked.
            He chose the house with darkened windows. Those were the best.
            He went to the window next to the bedroom. He could hear them sleeping in there.
            So, he sent out into the night a series of antique horn honks to the very best of his ability and as loudly as he could.
            Frank and Jesse left the bed for safer climes.
            Francie elbowed Ferard. “Ferd, wake up! Can you hear that?” she said.
            “Yes, Francie, I hear it. Rather stunning, isn’t it?” said sleepy Ferard.
            “Are you going to do something about it? Or shall I?” the wife inquired.
            Mr. Feather got out of bed, put on his heavy robe and some slippers and clumped off to the back door and went outside to see what all the racket was about. He had forgotten his glasses on the beside table, so he wasn’t seeing a whole lot.
            He went around to the side of the house where the bedroom window was.
            “OK, funny guy. Are you still out here?” he said.
            Louis was very happy. Someone had come outside. He sent a cloud of tiny orbs the size of peas out for the nice old man.
            “Very good,” said Ferard. “I wish I could do that.” And he really did wish he could do that.
            The tiny lights flew out into the desert. Louis giggled.
            “So you are still here. Why don’t you show yourself,” said Ferard.
            “You’ll probably scream. They all do,” said Louis.
            “I doubt it,” said the old man. “Go ahead, I’ve already seen everything else.”
            Louis cautiously uncloaked, waiting for the shocked intake of breath and maybe a throaty shriek. Nothing happened.
            There he stood. Over six feet tall, heavily built. Covered in soft brown hair, brown eyed, with a joker’s smirk on his young kisser. He was a good 8 inches taller than Mr. Feather.
            “Hi,” said Mr. Feather. “You woke my wife up and scared my cats.”
            “I wanted to see if I could get somebody to come out of their box,” said Louis.
            “Well, I did. What’s next? Do you have a name?” said the old guy in slippers and robe.
            “I don’t know what’s next,” said Louis. “Usually people run away. My name is Louis.”
            “Nice to meet you, Louis. You seem like a nice kid. Mostly. Tell you what. I’d like to go back to bed and sleep the rest of the night. That OK with you? My name is Feather, by the way.”
            “Sure. That’s OK with me, Feather,” said Louis.
            “Hey, kiddo. Could you make me one of those little lights to take in and show Francie?” said Ferard.
            “Yeah! Hey, cool, Feather! Yeah, I’ll do that!” said Louis. And he did. He made a pink one about as big as a Clementine orange. He made it shimmer, and told it to last all night before going poof.
            “Thanks, Louis. Francie is really going to like this!” said Mr. Ferard Feather. “Goodnight, Son!”
            “Goodnight, Feather. I won’t do it again!” said Louis. “Sleep tight!”
            Ferard went on around the corner of the house to the back door and let himself in. He carried the pink orb carefully in his left hand.
            Louis went on home.
            Of course, what Louis meant was that he wouldn’t do it to the Feather’s house again.

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