Maya Khankhoje has vivid childhood memories of falling asleep under the stars trying to identify the constellations.

“You’ll be able to take a good look at the Red Planet in the lawns of Exploration Place. Telescopes and giant screens have been set up for visitors…”

- Marie, turn your radio off, we have to get moving.

- Where? By that TV monitor?

- Did we drive all the way across town in this muggy weather to watch TV? Look, everyone’s leaving the building and running over there. Let's follow them.

Shawn and Marie and Heather, Marie's mother, made their way to the lawn, careful not to push but wary of anyone who might try to sneak in front of them.

That’s the line over there. It goes all the way to the back.

They sprinted to the back of the lawns of Exploration Place and dutifully stood in line. Shawn was groping Marie as usual making her giggle. Too hot for that, thought Heather, but maybe at their age she might not have minded the sticky skin and the acrid smell of sweat.

The line started moved ever so slowly, but at least it was doing something. The people in front of them were a large family, four, no, five girls and two boys and Mama and Papa. They had to be Amish. Only the Amish women would wear such funny bonnets and the kind of dresses rag dolls wore. Not that they made rag dolls any more, although maybe the Amish still did. The littlest one opened her mouth and a wad of chewing gum fell to the ground. As she was looking for it she stepped on the gooey stuff and looked so puzzled that Heather had to smile.

-Right under your shoe, honey, you stepped on it.

The little girl looked up, then down, then deftly pulled the chewing gum from under the sole of her sandal and stuck it once more in her mouth.

-No! Don't do that, it's dirty!

The little girl's mother turned at the sound of Heather's voice. She scooped the chewing gum out of her daughter's mouth and wrapped it in a piece of paper and dropped it in her straw bag. She didn't bother to thank Heather, not that Heather wanted to be thanked, since she somehow felt responsible.

The little girl turned to Heather again and gave her a shy smile.

-What's your name, honey?

-Awison.

-Awee…?

-Alison, piped in her older sister.

-And yours?

-Angel.

-Angel? That's a pretty name. And your other sister's?

- Alice.

-I guess that the teenager with the white bonnet is also your sister. Don't tell me her name also starts with an A?

-Her name is Amanda and my oldest sister's name is Anna.

-Wilson, come on, the line is moving!

That must be their brother. She wondered whether the other boy's name also started with a W. Who knows, Mama's name might be Althea and Papa's name Wilbur. Alliteration must be an Amish thing, like their aversion to technology. Funny they should have come to Exploration Place at all. She felt catty. Or maybe the town was just getting under her skin, good old Wichita, where Dorothy was lifted by a twister and dumped right smack into a corn field.

Marie and Shawn suddenly became aware of Heather’s presence.

-Mom, did you know that this event will not be repeated again in our lifetime? They say the next time Mars comes this close to the Earth will be in the year 2287. It's supposed to be 56 million kilometres away now and it hasn't been this close in five thousand years.

- Some say 60,000 years, piped in Shawn, who had got tired of trying to sneak his hand under Marie's blouse.

Heather shifted her weight from one foot to the other. Her varicose veins were acting up and sundown had not lessened the heat.

-Hey, Mom, they say there are now two telescopes for the public. We are almost there, hope you're not too tired. Look at the people, they are so patient, not like Montrealers who are always in a funky mood.

-Yes, Ma'am, this is Middle America, the Centre of the World and Mars has come down to pay us a visit!

Shawn had spoken again. Obviously he was also getting restless.

Suddenly the line broke up and half of the people started running towards the media van from which sprang a huge TV monitor, like a monstrous box-headed infant attached to its mother by its umbilical cord. The crowd seemed to be moving in all directions, the way tiny fish disperse in a river when you stick your hand in the water. She decided to play it safe and stay in the regular line. Whenever she changed lines, at the bank, or at the supermarket, the cashiers’ shift suddenly ended or they started counting their cash.

They finally got close to the telescopes and the TV monitor. Some people broke ranks again and returned to the building. Others went home. Bedlam reigned. A young man with russet hair and an official-looking badge tried to appease the crowds.

-Please be patient. We understand your frustration, but we first have to let these folks take a look and then you will get your chance.

-Sir, Sir! You let those people form a new line while we have been waiting here forever!

-That's not right! The righteous always pay for sinners!

Marie and Shawn exchanged looks.

-Shall we go home?

-Frankly, yes, we can all go home and watch the Red Planet on your flat screen, Shawn. Anyway, tomorrow I have to get up early and catch my plane back to Montreal.

The three of them got into Marie’s red car and wended their way past the crowds, past the parked cars, past the incoming cars waiting for a parking spot, past the outgoing cars that were blocking the exits, past the bridge, past the highway, past the shopping malls, past the cow pastures, past the corn fields, past the airplane factories, all the way home, back to that cardboard house sitting on a former cornfield in the middle of nowhere, in the centre of Middle America, in the middle of the Centre of the World.

Back at Exploration Place little Alison was getting cranky. Her mother picked her up and gently smoothed her corn-silk hair and started crooning an old song that she had learned from her own mother. Alison perked up and pointed at the sky over her mother's shoulder.

-What's that?

-What?

-That big orange bawoon.

-Why, that balloon is called Mars, Alison, a planet just like ours, just like God's Good Earth! Isn't it pretty? Do you know that no one alive today will ever see it this way again?

Alison’s soft snoring drowned out her mother’s wistful voice.

© Maya Khankhoje