Firmament

Two women lay motionless in a white-walled, six-by-six room.

The grated ceiling, six feet high, had a transparent, glass panel pulled shut. A clear-blue sat heavily on the glass, for an identical room rested above the two women. Two major details differentiated the stacked spaces. While the two women occupied the bottom one, water —still and serene—filled the top container. And as the partitioning grate to the women's cell acted as the ceiling, it functioned as the floor to their counterpart.

Remotely controlled, the glass partition started to roll back, leaving the grated ceiling and floor to hold the water back, and they did an extremely poor job from the get go, as thousands of tiny holes allowed slow passage. The condemned into minuscule drops and dribble through the metal, falling on the two women like a misty rain.

One of the women was in her late forties and wore a gold cross around her neck. The crucifix nestled into her armpit as she slept. Along with the necklace, she wore a simple, blue cotton dress that drowned the skin to her ankles. Traces of beauty and joy, like jagged scars, remained on the woman, but with the long dress and the complete lack of makeup and her pinned hair, she tried hard to hide them.

She stirred when a small drop landed on her forehead. The bead of water rolled diagonally down her face, across her left cheek, like the last remaining tear after a life of mourning. She

Gregory, Kelly and John Lindolf's toe-headed toddler, waddled near the pool's edge. He weaved on the cement tile like a drunken teenager actively contemplating a dare. His baby's gut hung over the front of his diaper, creating the illusion that he was in a constant forward fall, stumbling and tripping his way along. When he stopped, he had to balance on his heels, where he wavered for a second before tottering forward again.

The pool's water held a green-brown tint, and consisted of a layer of mulch and dead bugs. On the other side of where Gregory explored the murky border, a bloated, water-logged rat floated, held in place and nearly hidden by the thick layer of muck.

The boy leaned, maybe inquiring over the rotten stench of the water, and his bulging stomach keeled him too far over the side, and he lost his balance.

A pair of work-worn hands grabbed him from behind and lifted him with a practiced ease into the air. The kid giggled with glee, unaware of the potential danger he had nearly fallen into. "You're an airplane, Greg. Reach out your arms." Gregory stretched his arms, and the man wheeled the child like a stunt plane careening through open sky. He flew the kid to a seat five yards from the pool's edge and landed the boy. Gregory's full cheeks had blushed and rose, and he struggled to catch his breath from glee.

John sat beside his son. Apart from his work-ridden hands—calloused and scarred and thick—he had wiry arms, a thin frame, and a rugged handsomeness. His eyes narrowed as he squinted in the sunlight, and a line drew across his lips. "You can't play on the edge of the pool like that, kiddo. You'll fall in. And you see how nasty that water is. We'll never find you in there. You'll be lost forever, buddy." He grappled with the kid's stomach, enticing another string of giggling.

"Let him breathe. He's going to drown on his own laughter," said a female voice from the other side of the back patio. A woman, stood in shadow of the doorway. She wore a sunhat and sunglasses and a small, black bikini.

"Did you happen to grab me a beer?" the man asked, shaking his can to prove the lack of content.

Kelly stepped out of the dark doorway and into the bright midmorning. The sunlight, and the shadows cast from her hat, and her bathing suit intermingled and created a beauty like rain falling in a lake, on a sunny day—the diamond droplets reflecting the rays and shattering the surface like glass. She slapped her leg. "I forgot. Want me to go back in?"