“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” I let out a deep sigh as my eyes took in the wide expanse of the twilight-colored sky, marveling at how beautiful something so simple could be.

“Yeah, it’s pretty cool.” I could tell from his tone that he was unimpressed and was only here because I had wanted to come.

“Jax?” I turned to face Jackson, calling him by my nickname for him. He turned his head to face me. “Yeah, Clo?” he replied with his nickname for me. I heard him picking at the grass underneath his hands.

“What do you want to be when you grow up?”

“Hmm. I don’t know. I’m only ten.”

“Come on,” I insisted. “If you could be anything you wanted, what would it be?”

He stared at the sky in silence for a few seconds. Then from the corner of my eye, I saw a smirk appear on his face.

“What?” I asked suspiciously.

“I know what I want to be.”

“Okay. What?” I was feeling a bit impatient.

He turned back to look at me and grinned. “A kid.” He laughed at his own joke and then he threw a handful of grass on my face.

“Hey!” I spat out a few pieces of grass that had landed in my mouth. “Why did you have to do that?” I screeched, feeling a mixture of annoyance and delight as I ripped up a handful of grass and threw it back at him.

“Because it’s fun.” He laughed as he rolled away from me, avoiding the pieces of grass and dirt that landed in front of him. I tried to chase him down, but he kept his distance, dodging my every attempt to grab him.

After a few minutes of the unsuccessful cat-and-mouse chase, I finally had to stop to catch my breath. We stared at each other, both laughing and panting.

“You’re way too fast for me.” I shook my head, annoyed that not only had he gotten a bit faster than me in the past few years, he’d also grown a few inches taller and stronger.

“That’s because I have superhero powers!” He put his fisted hands on his hips and looked up to his right, mimicking a Superman stance.

I rolled my eyes. “You wish. It’s only because you’re a boy and you grow faster than me. Aunt Betty said that’s normal.”

“You’re just saying that because you’re jealous you don’t have my superhero speed and can’t catch up to me.”

“No, I’m not jealous.” I pouted. “I just don’t know why you had to throw grass in my mouth. I thought we’re friends.” I huffed and turned away from him, making sure he knew I was mad at him—even though I really wasn’t.

“Come on, don’t be like that,” he cajoled.

“Be like what?” I turned to him. “I don’t know about you, but I don’t really like to eat grass.”

“Well, I didn’t see you eat any, if that helps.” He flashed me one of his innocent-but-not-so-innocent smiles. “Besides, I’m only trying to answer your question.”

I frowned, completely forgetting what I had asked him. “And what question was that?”

“What I wanted to be when I grew up.” His face struggled to keep the laughter at bay.

“You want to throw grass into people’s faces when you grow up?” I challenged, knowing he was trying to be a smart-ass.

“No,” he countered, “just yours.” He then bent down, grabbed another fist full of grass, and aimed it at me. But this time, I was ready for him and turned away just in time.

“Well, I hope you enjoy being a kid all your life. That sounds so boring to have to go to school forever,” I teased him.

“But I’d be the smartest kid in my class,” he retorted. “That sounds pretty cool.”

I rolled my eyes, but couldn’t help giggling when I pictured an old, adult Jackson sitting in the small school desks with other fourth graders.

“Why do you wanna know that, anyway?” he asked, sounding more serious as he sat back down on the grass. “You know it’s going to, like, take forever before we grow up.”

I smiled at his comment and sat next to him. I envied Jax. In many ways, his life seemed so simple and carefree compared to mine. I liked that he always had a way of reminding me that I was still just a kid.

“Well, I’m turning ten next week, and I’ve been thinking a lot about the future.”

“Oh. So what do you want to be when you grow up?”

“I want a job where I can travel to all parts of the world.” I smiled at the thought.

“You do?” He looked at me and I could tell that wasn’t what he’d expected me to say and it wasn’t something he’d ever thought about.

“Yeah, I think it would be amazing. There are so many places in the world I want to see, but have only read about in the Reader’s Digest and Discover magazines that Uncle Tom gets me every year.”

“Really?” His face twisted into a frown. “I don’t know much about that stuff.” He paused, thinking to himself. “So what’s one place in the world you’d want to go to the most?”

I looked out across the lake and thought about it. “If I had to pick only one, the one thing I want to see most is an aurora borealis.”

“A roar-what?”

I giggled. “An aurora borealis. Some people call it the Northern Lights.”

“What is that?” He looked at me with interest.

“I’ve only seen pictures but it looks magical. It’s a natural phenomenon that happens in the sky in places that are in high altitudes. I don’t really understand the science behind it, but I have tried to read a lot about it. An aurora borealis occurs at night, and when it happens, the sky is suddenly lit up and filled with bright reds, greens, yellows, and blues across the sky, and they’re swirling around like they’re dancing in a lava lamp. It sounds so cool to me.”

“That does sound really cool.” Jackson looked up into the sky. “So where do you go to see an aurora—the Northern Lights?”

“Aurora borealis. I think there’re a lot of places you can go, like Canada, Alaska, Norway, and Iceland. But the place that I saw in a magazine that looked so cool was this town called Kakslauttanen, Finland.”

“Ka-what?” Jackson stared at me in confusion. “How do you even remember these names or know how to pronounce it?”

I grinned, knowing how much of a nerd I must have sounded to him. “I kept that page of the magazine and have it in my desk in my room. I look at it sometimes when I want to daydream.”

“Oh. So what’s so special about this Kaka-whatever place?”

“Well, from the article I saw, they have a resort there where you stay in these private room-size glass igloos in the middle of a national park, and you can look out from anywhere in your room and watch the Northern Lights overhead as they swirl around all night.” I let out a wistful sigh. “It just sounds so amazing, doesn’t it?”

“Yeah, that really sounds cool.”

For several minutes, we sat there next to each other in silence as we looked out onto the lake, enjoying each other’s company without saying a word—it was a level of comfort that I only felt with him.

Then I felt a pang of guilt as I thought about my mom. “I also want to be able to take care of my mom when I grow up.”

“You will,” he assured me with a smile. He turned and met my gaze. Even though it was dark, his emerald eyes seemed to twinkle as he looked at me. Like his smile, they were warm, inviting, genuine. They always seemed to be able to comfort me when I needed it.

“Thanks.” I tried to return his smile.

“So how is she lately?”

I shrugged. It wasn’t something Jackson and I talked about very often—mostly because it wasn’t something I wanted to talk about very often. I missed her and wished things were different, but no matter what I did, I always seemed to feel guilty where she was involved. I felt guilty when I thought about her because I was just reminded that I wasn’t there for her when she was sick. I felt guilty when I tried not to think of her, too, because I felt like a bad daughter for trying to enjoy my life without her.

“She’s about the same,” I finally said. “Aunt Betty says she has rebounds, so she’s been in and out of the places that are supposed to help her.”