When I was a little girl in Scotland, my big brother, Jim, used to sit outside every night with me in our back garden. We??™d pull our chairs among the rose bushes and potted geraniums, enjoying their sweet fragrance and colorful beauty. He??™d point to the moon and tease me, telling me it was made of cheese and that all the dark patches were hordes of mice nibbling away at it. My brother showed me all the planets and told me stories about nebulas, black holes, and other wonders of outer space. One cold winter night, as we sat under a wool blanket sipping hot cocoa, a star shot across the sky, leaving a blazing trail. I jumped up and down, excited with childhood curiosity and wonder, pointing at the galaxiel creation. ???That??™s a shooting star,??? Jim explained. ???It??™s really a comet, but we call them shooting stars.???

???It looks like it??™s falling through the sky,??? I answered. Just then another star darted across the heavens, and then another, and another.

???You know what you do with falling stars, don??™t you???? Jim said.

I looked at him, my big brown eyes aglow.  ???No. What does it mean????

He started singing a song, ???Catch a falling star and put it in your pocket, never let it fade away. Catch a falling star and put it in your pocket, save it for a rainy day.???

???I want to catch a star!??? I shouted, tossed the blanket off me and ran about, knocking a few delicate petals off the roses to the ground. The meteor shower went on for a few more minutes, long enough for me to chase a few. ???I caught one! I caught one!???

???Hold it tight and put it in your pocket and then one day when you really need it, you can pull it out and have a pocket full of starlight.??? I cupped my hands around my fallen star and slipped it into my pocket, believing everything my big brother said. We stayed outside chasing stars until our mother called us in.

That was forty years ago, when life was simple and the only crisis we had was whether the tooth fairy was going to leave us some money or not. Though we still shared a special relationship, Jim eventually moved to another part of the country and I rarely saw him. Over time I forgot about the star and the magic of that night until one day, when I realized how badly I needed it.

I was traveling through Jordan with a group of twenty other tourists. The first few days we??™d gone to such sites as Petra, the Dead Sea and the River Jordan. This day we were going to see several of the desert castles, or qasrs, as the Jordanians called them. It was mid-summer and the desert temperature was a steady 120`F during the day. All the castles were long abandoned and most crumbled in ruins. They stood in the middle of nowhere, where not a plant, bush, tree, or even sagebrush grew. It was desolate and void of life, aside from a few lizards, scorpions and snakes. Each castle was made of mud and stones and had withstood the elements for over hundreds, or thousands, of years.

We went in and out of several castles, most located near or in small towns, but the last castle on our tour was particularly isolated. While most of the others on the bus were fed up looking at the ruins, I found them fascinating and explored each one from top to bottom. One tourist mumbled, ???Not another castle!??? He refused to get off the bus. I looked at him with disgust as I climbed off the bus and headed toward the qasr. It was a fifteen-minute walk in sweltering temperatures. Several people turned back to the bus after a few minutes, but I continued. Pebbles crunched under my feet and dust flew in my face as I plodded across the sun-baked earth.

I was in my element here. I went from room to room, taking pictures and exploring. I sat down on a large rock and read a book about the history of the castle. I tried to imagine the sheiks and sultans wandering about, feasting on roasted lamb, figs, dates, and drinking the finest wines. I pulled a drawing pad out of my bag and drew sketches of an urn lying on its side in the corner, chipped and sandblasted. Above it was a window with a mosaic frame and a few feet away sat the well and trough, where long ago camels sipped water and lay in the shade of a date palm. The guidebook said at one time these qasrs were like oasis, with trees, flowers, and fountains. Looking around, I found that hard to believe.

I was caught up in wonder and thought when I suddenly realized it was very quiet. I put everything back in my bag and walked around the castle. Nobody else was there. The sun was lower in the sky, not long from sinking below the horizon. I couldn??™t see the bus, but ran as fast as I could to where I thought it had been parked. I walked for half an hour before I realized, much to my horror, the bus had left without me. I was alone, stranded in the middle of the desert in a strange and distant land. I fell to the ground and started to cry. This couldn??™t be happening. What sort of tour company left without checking to make sure all the passengers were on board and why didn??™t any of my fellow tourists notice I was missing?

The sun fell below the horizon. I headed back to the castle where I??™d at least have some protection from the sun, wind, and whatever else threatening might be about. I??™d no sooner stepped through the arched doorway when darkness surrounded me. I climbed to the roof and huddled in a corner, pulling my knees up to my chest and wrapping my arms about them. I was terrified. I heard all sorts of noises, like slithering snakes, or giant lizards, and knew they were coming to find me. I started wondering if the place was haunted by the spirits of the sultans who??™d died here after being wounded in some great desert battle. Bats flew from the caves hidden in the sandstone mountains to the west. I heard their fluttering wings as they searched for a meal and pulled my shirt collar up around my neck.

After glancing at my watch and seeing it was now midnight, I began to relax. No wild animals had come to eat me, nor had I been attacked by poisonous asps. I stood up and took a deep breath. The air was dry and much cooler and made me wish I??™d brought a sweater with me. I picked up my bag and dumped it out on the wall. I was grateful I had put a bottle of water and a few snacks in it that morning before leaving the hotel. I sat down again and leaned my back against the wall. I wadded my bag up and lay my head on it. I must have dozed off because when I woke up, it was 3 A.M.

I couldn??™t go back to sleep, worrying about what would happen when the sun rose. Would they come back and get me? Would I have to wait for days until another bus came down the isolated highway, or would I die of thirst and starvation? What would become of me? Would they find my vulture-pecked carcass, with nothing left but my sun-whitened bones? I knew I??™d drive myself mad with my negative thoughts, so I got up and walked around the roof, careful of my step. Finding nothing of interest, I stood at the top of the steps leading down into the castle and looked up at the sky. I??™d never seen so many stars in my life. Since there were no city lights to dull my view, they put on a spectacular twinkling display for me. I felt a tear run down my cheek. I didn??™t want to die in the middle of a desert in some old castle. My tears turned into sobs of fear as I sat down in the corner again.

A gust of wind caressed my face and I looked up. I heard a song, carried on the gentle breeze, swirling around me. ???Catch a falling star and put it in your pocket, never let it fade away. Catch a falling star and put it in your pocket, save it for a rainy day.??? It was my brother??™s voice, singing a song from long ago. I remembered the falling star I??™d caught as a child. Feeling somewhat silly, I reached into my pocket and pulled it out, holding it in my cupped hands. My ???pocket full of starlight??™ warmed my heart and my chilled hands.

???Jim, I??™ve got it! I??™ve still got the falling star,??? I shouted. Nobody was around to hear me, so I shouted it over and over again, as loud as I could. Just then a star shot across the sky from one end of the heavens to the other. I followed it with my eyes. I tossed my falling star into the night air and smiled as it joined the other in its celestial journey. I knew, at that moment, I was going to be fine.

I lay down and fell asleep and woke up a few hours later to someone shaking my arm and calling my name. When I opened my eyes, there stood the bus driver and a few of the passengers. They pulled me up by my arms and practically carried me back to the bus. Nonstop apologies gushed forth for the next hour and attempts were made to take me to the nearest hospital. After assuring them I was fine, they let me relax in my bus seat.

???Weren??™t you afraid of scorpions????

???Were there ghosts in the castle?

???How did you survive????

Questions burst from my friend??™s mouths. I looked at them and started singing, ???Catch a falling star and put it in your pocket, never let it fade away. Catch a falling star and put it in your pocket, save it for a rainy day.???

They gave me the strangest looks. I heard whispering all around me. ???She??™s had too much sun!???

???I think she was more frightened than she thought, poor girl.???

I closed my eyes. I knew the starlight in my hand had been my faith, something I??™d needed to endure that lonely night at the desert castle. I chuckled to myself and silently said, ???Thanks Jim, for the precious gift you gave me so long ago. Thank you for the falling star.???

(c) 2004 Margo Fallis