Under the old oak tree in her backyard, a Japanese lantern stood amid the loose piles of gravel and tangles of late summer flowers. Every evening, the light flickered on over the lost relics of her childhood, beaming over the old wooden shed where her bike lay rusted and into the clear windowpanes of her room. She counted the days by the lantern’s glow, marking the beginning of the night and the subsequent rise and fall of days and months and seasons. As the long, unhurried days of that summer passed, she would look out her window as she closed her shades and watch the manifestation of time’s relentless march. The moment of the lantern’s illumination seemed to come sooner every day, forcing the world to spin faster and sending the frightening precipice of the unknown rushing towards her.

She dreaded the changing of the leaves, and she cried the first time she saw a treetop that had bronzed in the chill of a late summer night. She knew he was going to leave her when the leaves turned, and that soon after she would be gone as well. Every night that summer, as she lay in bed wishing for time to slow down, the Japanese lantern shone into her room and sent her into fitful dreams of change and lost love.

On their last night together, they walked from his house to hers under the distant stars. He lived just four doors down and she knew the way over the moon-washed sidewalk well. She walked with her fingers entangled tightly in his as they approached her driveway. As she opened her door, she could see the light from the Japanese garden flooding over the trees.

They walked up her dark staircase for the last time and she quickly went to the window as they entered her room. She opened the glass to the rich, heady night sound of the late summer woods and gently lowered the shade against the smoldering burn of the lantern coming from the backyard. He sat on her bed in the half-light and she came to him without hesitation. He moved slowly and carefully inside of her, holding her close and rediscovering her all in an instant of soft skin and tangled hands and the sweet-smelling cloak of her hair over their faces. When it was over, they stayed in the same position they had found themselves in many time before. His arms wrapped tightly around her waist, holding her to him with his face buried in her chest and her lips pressed to his forehead. When she finally moved, slipping off his lap to sit beside him, she felt an ineffable sadness at the loss of something so intangible she did not know how to express it.

They lay together for hours as the moon rose high above the sleeping town. In the lonely and silent hours before dawn, her hands were on his back, kneading out the stress of his sore muscles and soothing his dry skin with lotion that smelled like her. His hands looped through the soft strands of her hair, and she cried because no one else knew how much she loved it when someone played with her hair. She gave him a present and a card, and as she reached up to kiss him after he finished reading she felt the hot drops of his tears fall onto her face. He cried for the first time in front of her and she felt her heart grow and shatter all at once.

Outside the curtains the lantern glowed on, but they were so wrapped up in each other that they barely remembered the passing of the time with each new moment. His head on her stomach and his feet on her pastel bookshelf next to a gold-framed picture of him. Her baggy tee shirt and puffy eyes as he kissed her cheeks. The small puddles of her tears that formed on his chest as she lay in her favorite spot on top of him. His fingers tracing his name on her back. The tears he pretended he wasn’t crying. His last funny yet uncouth comment, and her last resulting playful slap. The lonely sound of a coyote rising over the trees towards the slivered moon. The words, so easily exchanged.

Do you remember when-
Of course I remember.

The inability to accept that morning would come and they would no longer be a “we”, but two forlorn singulars an ocean apart.
I can’t believe-
I can’t either.

The clock in the center of town struck two. The Japanese lantern burned brighter.

The best day was when-
I loved the time we-


I loved it all.


How many miles is it? 3,500.

I can’t believe you will be gone.

The clock struck three. They ate pretzels from a plastic snack bag, sitting cross-legged on her bed like small children.

I have to be home by four.
I know.

I saw you every day for 17 months.
I’ll be gone for 8.

I can’t believe it.

I don’t want you to go.

4 o’clock approached quickly in the cool night air. The lantern’s glow seemed to spread through the darkness and began permeate the drawn shades. They lay together and he held her as close as he could, his hands moving through her hair and her face buried in his shoulder. She breathed him in deeply.

I have to go.

Two more minutes. Please.

The clock ticked on. The light outside grew brighter.

Finally he pulled himself away from her. His cheeks were wet. There were tears coursing down her face. He gathered the clothes of his that she had kept and the flashlights he had given her so she would not be scared on her walks home through the night from his house. They made their way through the empty darkness of the hallways gripping each other’s hands tightly.

It still doesn’t feel real.

I can’t believe you’re leaving.

She said goodbye to him on the uneven patio stones of her driveway, in the same spot in the shadow of her garage where he had first kissed her a year and a half ago.

I will always, in some way, love the boy who lived four houses down.
I am going to miss you so much.

He picked her up and she wrapped her limbs around him, kissing him with her eyes shut and holding him close. She pulled back to look at him. His eyes were red.

The clock struck four, and he knew that he had to let her go. He gently placed her on her feet and gave her one last kiss. His left hand grasped her right hand tightly.

Finally he turned and forceed himself to walk down the driveway, holding tightly to her hand for one beat too long until the distance tore him away. She watched him walk away and turned back to her door when it started to hurt too much. As she put her hand on the doorknob, she could see the harsh glow of the Japanese lantern though the blur of her tears.

Every evening, the Japanese lantern flickers on through the darkness and enters her room through her half-drawn shades, Some nights, it is a harsh light that she resents, and she feels a sharp pain at the passing of time. Other nights, it is a peaceful glow that softly brightens the spot on her bed where he used to lie. When she looks at the light and closes her eyes, she can see the murky outlines of her hopeful future begin to take shape. When she falls asleep, she dreams in bright colors of the places she will go and the love she knows she will feel again. The lantern burns on deep into the night, heralding the inexorable spin of the Earth as she turns further away from her past and into the future.