Tell yourself as much as you want to that you don't believe in aliens, UFOs, or extraterrestrials, but until you've spent one night camping out in the desert near the airfield outside of Roswell, New Mexico, sleeping under an open sky so immense and glittering that the ground beneath you seems like little more than a speck of dust drifting through an auditorium, l won't believe you I certainly wasn't a "believer.' was in fifth grade, and our teacher took our whole class camping. Where he got the idea of Roswell, I'll never know. I knew this and that about Roswell, and considering what I knew I wouldn't have opted to camp there if it was up to me My classmate Dillon, of course, disagreed. "The government doesn't want us to know he whispered, "because the aliens want to give us special powers, and if we got special powers, well then, the government wouldn't be able to control our brains." We were in the back seat of the school bus, heading south "That's a bunch of bunk, said Dylan from the seat across the aisle Yes, there were two boys in my class with names that sounded the same, Dillon and Dylan. They were also both the best at playing sports and the two biggest boys in our class and they both considered me, small as I was, a best friend. Strange as it was, that's just how it was with Dillon and Dylan and me Dillon said, "I bet you're just scared Dylan said, "I bet you're just gullible. There aren't any such things as aliens I remembered a TV show Dillon had once told me about. It was about a little girl who had woken up one night to find a ray of light brighter than the sun streaming through her window. She tried to scream, but she couldn't move her lips-her entire body was paralyzed The ray of light lifted her right up out her bed, floated her through her window, and carried her into a flying saucer circling soundlessly outside her house. didn't sleep for at least a week after Dillon told me that. Jesse?" said Dillon "Jesse?" said Dylan. "Hello? Earth to Jesse "Huh?" I said Well, what do you think?" said both Dillon and Dylan at once Aliens?" I said. "No way. I'm too old to believe in that kind of stuff. We hiked the whole afternoon and cooked a big chili stew over a bonfire for dinner After dinner, Dillon, Dylan, and l climbed up on top of a ridge to watch the sun set while the rest of our class remained down below, digesting dinner. Along with the fading sunlight