UNDER THE STARS
THE SETTING: It is just after midnight on Wednesday morning. Hoss and Adam have been traveling from Placerville and find they are just too tired to continue on the rest of the way home. They are both laying on their bedrolls, covered with a blanket. There is a chill in the air, so both Hoss and Adam are wearing their clothes, boots, hats and coats. Hoss is laying on his back with his arms behind his head, where Adam is laying on his left side, facing Hoss. These are the positions they will stay in the entire time this story takes place.
“Hey Adam?”
“Huh?”
“You asleep?”
“Yeah“.
“If you’re asleep, how come you answered me?”
“Because I’m talented that way.”
“You ain’t that talented.”
“What do you want?”
“I can’t sleep.”
“I told you not to drink coffee so late, didn’t I?”
“Yeah you did, but I was cold.”
“I was cold to, but I didn’t have any.”
“How come?”
“Because I wanted to sleep, that’s how come.”
“Boy you sure get mean when you’re tired.”
“I’m not being mean.”
“Yes you are older brother.”
“No I’m not.”
“Yes you are.”
“All right, I’m mean. Now will you please let me get some sleep?”
“Yeah I guess you are tired at that. We’ve sure had a long week, ain’t we?”
“Yeah we have at that.”
“You go to sleep Adam and I’ll just count the stars in the sky. Maybe that
will get me to sleep. It used to when I was a kid.”
“You do that.”
“Let’s see, one, two three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven,
twelve, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, sixteen…..”
“Hoss?”
“Yeah Adam.”
“Can you count to yourself?”
“It doesn’t work if I count to myself. I only get tired if I count out loud.”
“Can you count out loud a little quieter then?”
“Well I guess I could try.”
“Would you please?”
“Yeah. Hey Adam?”
“What?”
“You ever wish upon a star?”
“When I was a boy I did.”
“Yeah me too. What’d you wish for?”
“That was a long time ago Hoss.”
“Yeah but you got to remember what you wished for. Did you ever wish for
your mama back?”
“Yeah, I did.”
“That’s what I used to wish for most. To have my mama back. You ever wish
for anything else?”
“Yeah.”
“What?”
“A million dollars.”
“A million dollars?”
“Yeah so Pa and I wouldn’t have to go without food and I would have a bed
to sleep in. Also so Pa wouldn’t have to worry about finding another job,
and worry about where our next meal was coming from.”
“You know what I used to wish for?”
“What?”
“A little brother.”
“Well you got him.”
“Yeah but once I got him, I wasn’t sure I wanted to keep him.”
“Why?”
“Well because I had to share his mama. Before he was born, I had Marie all
to myself. I mean she loved you too, and you loved her, but you were older
and you didn’t need her like I did. I used to sit on her lap and she’d read
to me. She treated me like I was her own son.”
“Yeah I remember.”
“Is that how my mama treated you?”
“Yeah just like that.”
“What was my mama like Adam?”
“I don’t remember too much Hoss. It’s been a long time ago.”
“Do you remember her voice?”
“Some.”
“Was it a beautiful voice Adam?”
“Yeah Hoss, it was beautiful.”
“How beautiful, Adam?”
“I can’t recall her ever speaking a single word without a smile on her face,
and every word she spoke, was spoken with love.”
“I wish I could have known her. I‘d give anything just to hear her voice.
Just once.”
“I know.”
“I know you know. Do you ever think about how life would been if your mama
hadn’t died?”
“Yeah.”
“How do you think it would be?”
“Well, there would be more Adam’s, but no Hoss or Little Joe.”
“I guess you’re right. If your mama had lived, Little Joe and I wouldn’t
be here.”
“That’s right.”
“If my mama had lived, Little Joe wouldn’t be here.”
“That’s right.”
“I guess it’s true what Pa says, ain’t it Adam?”
“What’s that?”
“That things happen for a reason.”
“Yeah.”
“I’m scared Adam thinking about it.”
“Why?”
“Because if your mama died for me to be born, and my mama died for Little
Joe to be born, you don’t suppose Pa’s gonna marry again and give us another
little brother because Marie died do you?”
“I hope not.”
“Yeah me too. One little brother is enough.”
“What are you talking about? You only have one little brother. I have two
and one of you isn’t too little.”
“Yeah I guess you’ve had to put up with a lot from us being the oldest,
haven’t you?”
“Yeah.”
“Adam, would you have rather been an only child?”
“Sometimes.”
“Sometimes huh?”
“Yeah sometimes, but most of the time I’m glad I’m not.”
“Adam?”
“Huh?”
“You ain’t falling asleep are you?”
“That’s my intention.”
“I wanted to ask you a question. It’s a real important question I’ve wanted
to ask you for a long time. Ever since I was a boy.”
“Huh?”
“You awake?”
“Uh huh.”
“Adam, what’s it like to be like you and Little Joe?”
“What do you mean?”
“What’s it like to be handsome?”
(Silence)
“Did you hear me Adam? You aren’t asleep are you?”
“I heard you. I’m not asleep.”
“Why didn’t you answer me then?”
“Because I’m trying to think of the best way to answer that question.”
“Just answer me honestly Adam. That’s what I want.”
“All right, I’ll answer you honestly. I have never thought of myself as
being handsome. Joe yes. Me no.”
“No you wouldn’t. That’s the kind of person you are, but you are handsome
Adam. You are handsome in a real man sort of way. Joe is handsome in a pretty
way.”
“Real man sort of way?”
“Yeah. That’s how I would describe you.”
“Then why don’t women flock to me like they do Joe?”
“Well Adam in all honesty, Joe has the type of personality where he can
approach women and they feel comfortable about approaching him.”
“You saying I have a repulsive personality?”
“No, it’s just you, you have a certain something about you that draws women
to you, but they know that you aren’t the type of man that is approachable.
They know that you have to be the one to make the first move.”
“Oh.”
“It’s like you are waiting for that special someone to come into your life
and she’s who you are waiting for.”
“That would be true.”
“What’s she like Adam?”
“Who?”
“Your special someone?”
“I’ll know her when I see her.”
“I never saw you look at anybody the way you looked at Miss Regina. I know
you were engaged to that Ruth lady, but I never saw you with her. Your special
woman, will you look at her just like you did Miss Regina?”
“Yeah.”
“You really loved her, didn’t you?”
“Yeah.”
“I know you did. It’s too bad people have to be different from one another,
ain’t it?”
“It would be a dull world Hoss if everybody were the same.”
“I know. I was really looking forward to your maybe marrying Miss Regina
and bringing her home to live with us.”
“You were?”
“Dang right I was. That gal could cook. She could give old Hop Sing a run
for his money.”
“The problem is Hoss that it would been I who would have been living with
her people, not the other way around.”
“Yeah I guess that’s what would have happened.”
“I have just figured something out about you Hoss.”
“Huh?”
“Yeah, most men can’t wait until the wedding night when they can show their
bride how much they love them in that special way that married people do.
You on the other hand would be spending your wedding night in the kitchen,
and your bride would be preparing food for you to eat.”
“Ain’t nothing’ wrong with that older brother.”
“If you say so.”
“Hey Adam, you never did answer my question. What’s it like to be handsome?”
“Hoss I’ve given that question some thought since you asked it. You wanted
me to be honest with you and I’m going to be. All right?”
“That’s what I want.”
“There’s an old saying that goes, “Handsome is as handsome does.”
“Huh?”
“Let me put it to you in another way. There’s beauty in most everything
we see. There’s beauty in the bright, white stars against the blackness
of the night sky. There’s the beauty of the full moon and there’s the beauty
of it’s moonbeams silhouetting the mountains. The beauty of the moonbeams
dancing on the waters of Lake Tahoe. There’s the beauty of the birds we
see each day and the beautiful songs they sing for us. There is the beauty
of a human face, and so on an so forth, but there is one beauty I haven’t
mentioned and it’s the most important beauty of them all.”
“What’s that?”
“It’s the beauty of one’s soul. It’s what make a person who they are. It’s
not the outer beauty on a person that matters, but the inner-beauty of one’s
soul. Truth be known Hoss, next to your mother, you have the most beautiful
soul I have ever had the pleasure of knowing.”
“Really Adam?”
“Really Hoss.”
“My soul is like my mama’s?”
“Just like it.”
“I guess I am handsome then, huh Adam?”
“I would say of all three of us brothers, you are the most handsome one
of all, because you have the most beautiful soul of all.”
“I never before in my life ever felt special until right now.”
“You’ve always been special to me.”
“And you to me.”
“Do you ever think about your special girl Hoss and what she’d be like?”
“All the time.”
“What would she be like?”
“Well she’d have to be a great cook I’ll say that much.”
“I have the feeling big brother that knowing you it wouldn’t matter if she
were or not, as long as you loved her.”
“Yeah I guess so. We could always come over to eat Hop Sing’s cooking each
day.”
“I’m sure he’d love that. I could just see you bringing your wife and all
the Little Hoss‘s over to each meal. Boy the Chinese profanities that Hop
Sing would say, huh?”
“Yeah, he sure can get mad, can’t he?”
“Yeah he sure can, but most of the time we give him reason.”
“Yeah.”
“Yeah.”
“Hey Adam, do you think Pa will ever marry again?”
“I think if the right woman came along he would.”
“Then we could end up with another little brother, couldn’t we?”
“Or a little sister.”
“A sister?”
“Yeah it happens sometimes.”
“So you do think he’ll marry again?”
“I don’t know for sure, but it’s possible.”
“Let’s just hope he marries somebody old so she can’t have more kids.”
“Yeah or make them sleep in separate rooms.”
“Yeah. Can you imagine telling Pa he can’t you know?”
“Not me. I’m not telling him.”
“We’ll get Joe to.”
“Yeah, Joe will do it.”
“Yeah he’ll do anything to stay the youngest.”
“I don’t blame him. It’s pretty nice being the youngest.”
“Yeah. You remember Adam how spoiled Joe was as a kid because he was the
youngest?”
“Yeah.”
“When I was a kid, I wanted to give him away to somebody passing by so I
could be the youngest again.”
“Why didn’t you?”
“Well I thought maybe Pa and Marie might miss him some.”
“It’s funny how little kids think, isn’t it?”
“Yeah it is. I wouldn’t dream of life without Joe now.”
“Yeah I know. He grows under your skin don’t he?”
“Yeah. Hey Adam, you think The Ponderosa will be here forever?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because nothing lasts forever Hoss.”
“Yeah but we worked so hard to build it.”
“Yeah you know that and I know that, because we worked alongside Pa to build
it, but future generations may not care as much as we do.”
“Well that tells me Pa is going to marry again, because no generations from
me, Joe or you would ever sell it that’s for dang sure.”
“Well if it does happen, it definitely won’t happen in our lifetime.”
“Yeah but it’s still sad to think that all we worked for may someday not
be here.”
“It’ll always be here Hoss, just not in the same way.”
“Yeah I guess so. Hey Adam?”
“Huh?”
“You ever think about the future? I mean not our getting married or anything
like that, but of what it’ll be like say one hundred and fifty years from
now?”
“Sometimes.”
“Do you think that man will still ride horses?”
“For pleasure.”
“Huh?”
“I think horses will be something one rides because they want to, and not
because they have to. I think that someday we’ll all travel much faster
than what a horse can travel.”
“You mean like a train?”
“Well sort of, but not a train. Something much smaller. I think that someday
we’ll be able to travel hundreds of miles in a day.”
“Hundreds of miles in a day? Adam, boy you are more tired than I thought.
Hundreds of miles. Ain’t never gonna happen I can tell you that.”
“Maybe even thousands of miles a day.”
“Thousands of miles? Adam you must be delirious from lack of sleep. How
in the world could anybody travel thousands of miles a day?”
“There’s the sky. I think someday someone will come up with a way to travel
through it.”
“Really?”
“I don’t know, it’s just something I think about when I’m riding alone in
the middle of nowhere.”
“I always wondered what you thought about when you’re all alone like that.”
“I know what you think about?”
“Food.”
“Yeah.”
“Right now I could go for a steak, fried potatoes, two eggs over easy, toast,
pancakes, canned peaches, bacon, sausage, homemade biscuits and some of
Hop Sing’s good coffee to wash it all down with.”
“No more coffee for you.”
“Hey Adam, don’t this remind you of when we were boys, and Pa would let
us camp out under the stars in our yard?”
“Yeah and how Little Joe used to cry, because Pa and Marie said he was too
young to sleep out with us?”
“Yeah. Remember how he’s sneak out and see us?”
“Yeah.”
“He’d always end up curled up next to you asleep in the morning.”
“Yeah.”
“We used to be just like this. Me on my back looking up at the stars. You
on your side trying to sleep.”
“Yeah.”
“Then we’d both be so tired from talking all night long. I remember I had
a few chores to do back then and then I’d sleep the rest of the day.”
“That’s because you were young. I was too tired to stand and I had a full
days worth of chores ahead of me. I used to get the lecture from Pa. He‘d
always say, “Didn‘t I tell you two to get some sleep so you wouldn‘t be
dragging all day long, or did you just forget young man that you had chores
to do?”
“Yeah Pa was always good with those lectures, wasn’t he Adam?
“None better.”
“I remember you used to tell me about my mama back then on our campouts.
She was still real fresh in your mind back then, and I remember what you
told me.”
“What’d I tell you?”
“Oh about how you and Pa met her and how she nursed you back to health.
How Pa was different in those days before he met my mama. There’s one thing
you never told me though Adam that I’ve always wanted to know, and that’s
how my mama died through your eyes.”
“You really want to know that?”
“Yeah, I really do. I know it’s gonna hurt me to hear the words, but I really
want to know.”
“I won’t do that to you Hoss. I think there are some things we should never
know. I don’t think it’s how Inger would have wanted you to remember her.”
“I won’t remember her that way Adam. I promise.”
“No Hoss, you will. Once I say the words, you’ll never forget them, and
you’ll think of those words first whenever you think of her. It’ll be the
last thing you think about before you fall asleep at night, and when you’re
alone during the day. It’ll replace all the wonderful, loving thoughts you
have of her now. No Hoss. I love her that much not to do that to her memory,
and I care about you that much not to tell you. I know of what I speak,
because I wish I had never been told my mother died in childbirth.
It would have been much easier for me had I just thought she died when I
was a baby. I can never think of my mother now without first thinking she
died giving me life. I always have to work past that in my mind to get to
the part where I knew she loved and wanted me. There is one thing though
that I will tell you about your mother’s dying, and it’s the honest truth,
and it is through my own eyes, and what I saw that day.”
“I‘m ready?”
“It’s that she died a hero. Without giving any thought for her own safety,
she chose to protect those she loved. She always did what was the best for
others without ever thinking about herself. That’s what made her the special
woman she was.”
“My mama really died a hero Adam?”
“In my eyes she did.”
“That makes her death kind of special, don’t it Adam?”
“Yeah it does at that. How many people can ever say they died a hero no
matter how long they lived?”
“Thank you Adam.”
“For what?”
“For not telling me what you saw?”
“You‘re welcome.”
“Adam, we’re pretty lucky ain’t we?”
“How so?”
“Well I mean we got Pa and we got each other, and we got Little Joe. We
had to go through a lot of hurt to get here, but we survived didn’t we?”
“Yeah we survived.”
“I think that’s one reason we are the close family we are, because at times
we had to pull together.”
“Yeah.”
“Adam, can I say something to you without you laughing at me?”
“Sure.”
“You promise you won’t laugh?”
“I promise.”
“I love you, Adam.”
“I love you too, Hoss.”
“Hey Adam?”
“Yeah.”
“I’m gonna let you go to sleep now. I ain’t gonna bother you no more, so
you just drift off to sleep all right?”
“I can’t.”
“Why not?”
“Because in case you haven’t noticed, it’s morning.”
“Yeah, yeah that sun is coming out ain’t it?”
“Yeah ain’t it?”
“Hey older brother, I guess I did to you what I used to do when we were
kids on those nights we slept under the stars, huh?”
“Yeah you sure did.”
“Yeah I sure did.”
“Hey Adam?”
“What?”
“I’ll never forget this night for as long as I live.”
“Why?”
“It was special just you and me under the stars talking like we used to
when we were much younger. I’d almost forgot about those times, but I’ll
never forget this night. I’m gonna tell my grandchildren all about this
night someday. I promise you that.”
“It meant that much to you?”
“Yeah.”
“I’ll promise to tell my grandchildren as well about it.”
“Was it special to you too Adam?”
“Yeah it was, but then you’ve always been special to me.”
(Silence)
“Hoss?
(Silence)
“Hoss you awake?”
(No answer, just snoring).
“Well big brother, you did it to me again, didn’t you? Made it so we talked
all night and now I’m too tired to move. Well I guess it was worth it for
the memories. You know if you think about it, what’s it gonna hurt if we
sleep a few hours? It just means we’ll get home a few hours later is all.
When we wake up, I look forward to having a cup of coffee with you and taking
our sweet time and just talking over old times. There’s no rush to get home.
They are expecting us until tomorrow anyway. By the way big brother, it’s
your turn to make the coffee. Good night, or shall I say, good morning Hoss.
(Silence)