Sunset
My life changed that day on the hill. The sunset was so intense it seemed the sun had set the world on fire. We were kids, all of us, playing at being grown-ups, singing, dancing, talking about boys and having the time of our lives. I didn’t know it was to be my last day of childhood, that I would grow ten years older that day.
The sun dipped in the sky, shadowing our faces as we smiled at the oncoming dusk. It was a glorious summer evening, the cicadas chirped at full blast, while the birds trilled hidden among the trees that lined the craggy rock at the top of the hill, Venus the Evening Star shone her way into the royal blue sky. We honored her that day, we honored our girlhood, our womanhood and all the feminine beauty around us.
I was happy, we were happy, and as we trudged down the hill by the light of our flashlights I felt and inkling, a feeling, that the fiery sunset had been telling me something, but I didn’t understand the message.
I waved goodbye to them—Linda, Janice and Grace—as they got in the car. I would be walking home, even though they always offered me a ride. It was part of the ritual: the climb up the hill, the sunset at its summit, the hike down in the dark and the offer and decline of a ride. Perhaps if I’d gotten in the car with them they would be here now.
The police found their abandoned vehicle three days later, ten miles outside of town, no sign of the girls. In the ten years since there have been no phone calls, no letters, no bodies, not one clue to their fates.
I sit alone in the sunset, and as the sun dips below the horizon I ask him if he sees them and if they are all right, but he doesn’t answer; and when Venus comes out I ask her if she saw what happened, but as the darkness surrounds me, the silence comes, and the questions remain.
