"Jay Lake - The Angle of My Dreams" - читать интересную книгу автора (Lake Jay)

* * *

Sunday morning I was up before the grackles. I grabbed the photograph with the list on the back and
the little eraser and put them in my pocket. Mrs. Doornie's protractor gleamed in the moonlight from the
window, so I grabbed it, too. Dressed in my blue jeans and my red sweater and my black Keds, I snuck
out for Chamberlain's hill.

Under the live oak on top of the hill, the sky was the color of a burned-down piece of charcoal, all black
and blue overhead, and kind of gray and orange in the east. It was cold enough to see my breath, and
my throat hurt a little. The cows complained somewhere off in the darkness, and the morning dew made
their pies stink something awful.

I left the protractor in my pocket, took the eraser in one hand and the picture with the list on the back in
my other hand, and closed my eyes real tight. The hill was the angle of my dreams. All I had to do was
run and never stop and I could soar all the way to Heaven and find those astronauts. Momma and
Daddy would there with them, everybody laughing at some stupid story Mrs. McAuliffe was telling about
the kids in her class.

My Keds smacked into the grass of the hill. My teeth clacked with each step. I knew there was nothing
between me and the bottom of the hill except some grass, so I was safe. I stuck my arms out real far,
straining fit to pop my elbows. My dreams told me what to do. My legs strained with a red-hot, sour
feeling, then there was no more ground.

I had forgotten how to fall back down again.

* * *

I soared through the dawn like a bird set free and nothing in my heart hurt any more for the first time
since I could remember. The cold air made my chest ache as I breathed, and my body creaked like the
barn in the wind. All I had to do was angle my hips and shoulders to turn, and I could bank and loop like
a fighter pilot.

I knew Heaven wasn't straight up, like they said at the Fontevrault Bible Church, because space was up
there where NASA kept their satellites. But Heaven had to be somewhere in the sky, because angels
have wings, so I kept out circling, looking for the way.

Caldwell County, Texas stretched below me, like a big map except every little piece was real like one of
them specially nice train sets. The sun had come up and everything was green and gold and beautiful. I
wanted to sing, but I didn't know any good songs for the sky.

"Ronnie!"

It was Granddaddy. I looked down. I had flown over our little farm, and there he was in the front yard
of the house, Bible in one hand while he shook his other fist.

"Get down here right now!"

I banked left, slipping over the housetop then back across the front yard the other way. This time
Granddaddy was thrusting the Bible up at me. "You're in danger of your mortal soul, boy," he shouted.
"Nobody mocks God's angels."