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It was 03:00am and chilly for October, but nobody by the shores of the lake seemed to mind what the temperature was. The weather report for once had been accurate, and the night sky was crisp and clear, the stars so bright it almost hurt to stare at them.

Ken Fletcher sat on a point of land that jutted out into the calm lake waters, sitting with the others who were fortunate enough to live here, listening to their laughs and whispers, waiting with them, waiting for them. A warbling cry from a loon out on the far shores made Fletcher shiver, and he pulled a blanket over his lap.

"Look!" came the voice of a young girl. "I saw one, right there!"

Fletcher tilted his head back, looked at the wide expanse of stars, and then…

"Right there!"

"Did you see it?"

"My God, it was like fireworks!"

Fletcher held his hands together, checked his illuminated watch. Right on time, and he sat with the group of people as the Leonid meteor showers kicked in, supposedly the best in a hundred years. Fletcher shifted his weight on the quilt he was sitting on, as the people around him stirred and laughed and pointed out the meteors streaking over head. One young boy – Jason, was that his name? – sat next to him and said, "Mister Fletcher?"

"Yes?"

"What's the difference between a meteor and a meteorite?"

"Well, Jason, a meteor is what you see when it burns through the Earth's atmosphere. A meteorite is when it doesn't burn all the way up and it lands on the ground."

"Oh. Thanks." And another voice in the darkness, "See, I told you he'd know. I told you."

More ooohs and aaaahs. He tilted his head back again, watched the streaks of the meteor trails overhead. Other meteors he had seen before, when he was younger, they were such a quicksilver flash, a blink of an eye and you were never sure if you had actually seen it. But the meteors churning their way through the atmosphere at this early hour, they were leaving thick, bright tails that dazzled the eyes.

He took a breath, smelled the lake water and the pine forests about them. There was no sound of traffic, no drone of overhead aircraft, no dome of orange light on the horizon that marked a mall or highway strip or housing stretch. Just the laughs and exclamations from the small collection of happy neighbours, watching the overhead sky show.

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