TINY TALE: Once Upon A Star

The girl attempted to count the stars in vain, she had planned to continue yesterday’s count but the stars changed overnight. “The sky is always changing” she thought.



The leaves in the hill shivered from autumn’s breeze, suddenly the wind brought a new presence. The girl looked towards south and noticed a figure beneath the tree.
She approached the stature to discover that it was a boy, yet his face was obscured by the darkness and she could not perceived his face with clarity.

“Are you here often?” the boy asked.

“Just for every night of my life” the girl replied coyly.

Both seat in silence looking at the stars. Suddenly, a blue speckle sparkled in the sky.

“That’s Spica!” The girl said and continued to describe the sky and beauty of the stars as the boy listened in silence.

Since then the stargazing became a routine for both. For once both find a company that understood each other fascination of the sky, and the beauty of the night’s abandonment.

***

One night, the girl elicited a letter, enveloped in pink, from inside the mailbox.
A slip of a half-folded note paper was placed inside; she disclosed the letter and read it in her mind:

“Meet me where Spica lies…”

A sincere smile adorned on her face. She dressed herself in thick sweater and rushed to the meeting point; Stargazers’ Hill was the nickname.

Once she arrived the hill side was illuminated by the night’s glow. Stars scattered ubiquitously in the sky like diamonds floating upon an endless river. The night seemed brighter than usual.

The brilliant moonlight cast a silhouette of the boy and as the girl approached the silhouette smiled.

She seated herself beside him, reposing herself against him, nestling closer hoping their shared warmth would protect them from the invading twilight chill.

However that night the temperature dropped and a strange stillness hung in the air.
“Maybe this is the last time we will ever meet…”

The girl wide-eyed and pale faced shot an inquisitive look.

“I’m leaving….”

As the girl averted her gaze towards the same sky the boy is averting, a tear escaped and streamed down her cheeks. The boy gently wiped the tears away and repeated his reassuring words, “Wherever we are, we are always looking at the same sky”

The girl knew it was true, yet the idea of parting with him was hard to bear.

“Why are you leaving?”

For once, the boy faced the girl and as the moon casted a glow upon his face, the girl was finally able to clearly saw his face.

His pale skin contrasted with his thick raven hair. His red lips adorned his face. The boy’s eyes, as she observed was of a strange color, a bleached grayish blue, a lifeless, glassy stare. His eyes resembled the star, a grey rock exuding a peculiar glow. That night the girl realized that he was blind.

“I was six when I aspired to be an astronomer, and I was eight when I lost my sight.”

“Ever since then I had looked at an empty, black sky. But that night when I first meet you, it was as if you had revived my passion, it returned my hope. You’re like a guiding star that gave direction. Whenever you’re not around and your light was nowhere to be seen I feel like I’m blind again.”

“Now you retuned the ever glow in my heart, and I felt like I want to return to chase my dream again.”

The girl’s heart drummed in her ears. She had never seen herself as a star.
The girl sat quietly drowning in the boy’s eyes unaware that his face was closing towards hers.

As he gently placed his lips on her, the girl was taken by surprise. She closed her eyes hoping the moment would be eternal.

But as the sun broke through the morning clouds, the night died away and their meeting ended.

The boy embraced her

“I’ll gaze up at the sky each night and find the brightest star.”

As he finished his last words, the boy bade farewell and trudged down the hill.

“I’ll wait for you here!” The girl shouted from the top of the hill, but the boy kept his silence.

***

The next night, the girl returned to the same hill. There laid a piece of half-folded note:

I gaze up at the sky each night
and find the brightest star.
It's always waiting there for me
so close, but yet so far.
The star winks in the evening sky
and reaches out to me.
It magically appears each night
for all the world to see.
I've wished upon this special star
my whole life through, it seems.
I've closed my eyes and made my wish
of hopes, and plans, and dreams.
And then, one day I got my wish
for I finally met you.
You are that someone special
who's made all my dreams come true.
So now whenever we're apart
I find that same bright star.
It makes me feel so close to you
no matter where you are.

***
Every night when she returned she would find a piece of note about a poem of stars.
But then came a final poem from him:

I’ve returned to the sky
And placed myself amongst the star
From the cluster of stardust
I’ll keep a watch
So don’t stand still
Stop waiting still
Just be reminded that wherever you are
You’re always under my sky
And be guided to where Spica lies…”

At first the girl stood pondering at the queer line: “returned to the stars…?”

Then a man dressed in black appeared.

“I’m sorry but are you Audrey?”

The girl nodded.

The man introduced himself as the father of Troy, the boy she had always met.

“Troy was hospitalized. His illness worsened. Every night he had beckoned me to deliver this message to you. He wanted to tell you how fortunate he felt to have met you. You had given him a hope to fight for his life and he did so till…his very end…”

“The very end…?”

And the thought struck her. She had remembered a quote he said once, “When people passed away they return to the sky as stars, where heaven lies. That’s why it always shines so beautiful, because all of the souls that had died with a glow kept its light and hope and forever shines.”

The girl collapsed; tear flowing freely down her cheeks; a beautiful, tear-stomped girl gazing at the one star that will forever kept its glow.