Manhasset Badger was the son of a great pioneer. They lived in an American village, too small to have a name. When Manhasset was a baby his mother would sit him on the window ledge after she had fed and bathed him and he would look up at the stars. He was warm, clean and satiated and in his relaxation the night sky would inspire the most wonderful thoughts and schemes.
When Manhasset was a young boy he would climb up to the window ledge of his own accord and crouch there, looking up and thinking. Eventually he grew too big to safely sit in the window ledge. His father and he made a sturdy wooden rocker and Manhasset would sit out on the porch in the rocker like a man in the twilight of his years.
Things changed. He had always seen the sky's night magic, but now he could hear the magic of the night too. There were certain animals that come out only in the night. One such animal was the badger. The badger had got it's name from the white stripe down it's snout, it's pitiful shuffling in autumn leaves, and the hiss and grimace it makes as it dies in the snare. Manhasset took his name from his family who got it from laying these traps.
Manhasset grew out his years in that rocker on the porch. The nights magic was wonderful and cruel and lights flickered on a thousand retinas, and a hissing would flush through the low rush of wind and leaf.
By the time Manhasset became a man, his father had died and the hissing stopped. His mother became short tempered and one night left and didn't return. Manhasset began to hear voices in the night and was mysteriously drawn toward the trees. He left the cabin and wandered through the night, guided by the stars that bent down to whisper in his ears. During the day he slept where he fell.
On the seventh day at four in the morning, Manhasset was jolted back to reality. He stood on the peak of box hill, looking out to the sun rising above the sea. Manhasset Badger never looked out on the night sky again.
THE END.