Final Journey

“Dad, dad, dad,” Hanali called out excitedly, still eliciting no response, “Dad, come on, you have to come see this.”
The stars overhead were looking incredible this night as Hanali reluctantly tore her eye away from her telescope to see just where that dad of hers was. Again he was missing the spectacle, choosing instead to be with them, a ragged bunch of adult misfits he had recently befriended at the Wild Inn, a ‘recreational facility’ as he liked to call it, so that she would not know of his true activities.
She though, even at fifteen, was no fool. She knew exactly what his ‘recreations’ entailed, whiskey, bourbon, vodka, anything that would steal his mind from the world around them. It had been that way ever since her mother had died two years earlier. Her passing had left a hole so deep in his heart that the only thing he had had found to fill it was an all-new love of the bottle.
Still though she loved him, unconditionally, he truly was a good man at heart, but just this once she wished he hadn’t brought his ‘buddies’ out here on their monthly trip to the white cliffs peninsula. It wasn’t the first time he had dragged them along to fill in the hours with gambling and more than their fair share of intoxicants. They played their poker while she gazed out at the stars, even though, as she sometimes remarked to herself, had she been up there playing with them she could all too easily rid them of their bankrolls and send them home running. She knew all their tells, knew how to read them easier than some of her favourite books, but that wasn’t how she was raised. Her mother had instilled in her a sense of right and wrong, and by going after their money in bitterness she may get what she wants, but there can, and always will be, consequences to her actions.
Instead all she really wanted was for her father to be out here with her now. To have a loving mentor by her side, and one who she could share her thoughts with, to have him smile at her and proudly listen as she bored him with her knowledge of the cosmos.
Tonight was such a beautiful night, the sky was perfect, there were no clouds, no breeze, no smoky haze. The stars were out in all their glory, shining like majestic gods down upon her. She smiled staring up at the Milky Way, the Southern Cross and Orion. As always, her imagination followed their sparkling lines and soaked in all the possibilities of just what might be out there.
That’s why she wanted her dad here with her; she wanted to share with him these thoughts, to discuss the idea of faraway life and imaginary adventures that could never be reached. He was a short-sighted man, as stubborn and unrelenting in his opinion as a boulder lodged firmly in the midst of a raging river. Slowly though, she knew a rock could be worn down by pressure, and it was his return arguments that made debating with him so much fun.
He had a stern view on god and a dead set belief earth was his only creation. There were no such things as aliens or magic, or far off mystical lands. There was the lord and his rule on this world alone. Hanali loved expressing her completely opposite opinions back at him, using science and logic as bases to prove the likelihood of something more beyond their world.
The universe was simply too massive to consider that only one tiny speck in its ocean had found the capacity to create life. There just had to be more out there, and forming in ways completely different to the life of earth. The universe composes itself of a great number of elements, and though water may be crucial to survival here, the same may not be necessary elsewhere. Gas giants could support an existence of hydrogen breathers, balls of rock lacking atmosphere could form the basis for vacuum sufficient bio-forms. The possibilities were endless out there and all one needed was to look at the true miracle of life on this planet to see that crazy things are indeed happening in the universe.
A chorus of heavy boisterous laughter drifted over from her father’s now aging Winnebago. The volume of the jeering had notably increased over the past half hour, and the awareness that he was now over his limit, and most likely not joining her as promised, tainted her mood considerably.
She sighed shaking her head, “Mum would not be happy.”
She moved the telescope gently aside and paced off, trying not to let her frustrations get the better of her, a small walk, she knew, would do her good. The night was warm enough to wear a simple pair of sneakers, a pair of shorts and her favourite t-shirt, a red and quite worn garment she loved to wear to prove to all those around her she was not by any means a girly girl. The t-shirt had a notable rip to the shoulder caused by a snag when tumbling out from a tree, as well as a couple of old grass stains on her lower back end.
A girl of nature and adventure, she made specific effort to ensure her ways of life were known to those around her. A stubbornness to her imaginative ideals granted to her through her own fathers ways. It was only natural that too shake off the annoyances of her dads fall from grace, Hanali looked to taking to her feet.
There wasn’t really too many places to wander off to out here, to the east and downhill was an old camping sight, she could see lights from trailers down there not nearly strong enough to ruin the spectacle in the sky. Off to the west, north and south lay a coastline far below her hill’s cliff tops, they certainly held no place for her to go, but still they were more appealing than anything civilised right now.