Scintillation ✓

Girl from the Stars

The day had been a very
rainy one. It was no longer
raining as she lay in bed—
though the curtains of her
room were closed and her view
of the outside was blocked,
she knew that the rain must've
stopped only because the
pitter-pattering sound of
the raindrops had long since
left. She had just gotten around
to finding a comfortable position
to sleep in when she remembered the stars...

The thought caused her to sit
up abruptly. Her sheets,
which had been tucked tightly,
were instantly untucked and her
mattress creaked from the sudden
movement. She couldn't believe she
had almost forgotten about it,
because she couldn't remember
the last time she hadn't wished
on a star before going to bed.
She wondered whether to trouble
herself with getting up, walking over
to the window and pulling the curtains
open, just to see the sky... But she
had to. She never missed a night.

So she got up; she swung her
legs over the side of her bed,
causing the mattress to creak
even more. Her bare feet touched
the cold floor as she took a few
steps towards the window.
Through the darkness, her hand
groped for the curtains and she
pulled them open to reveal a
window. The night was pitch
black, with not a single light in
sight. Since it had been raining
so much, she figured there would've
been too many clouds to be able to
catch a glimpse of any stars. She
was pleasantly surprised to see that
the clouds had completely cleared out.

But she was stunned into silence
when she saw the sky, for she
had never seen such beauty. She
loved the night sky and appreciated
it every day, but that night it was a
million times more beautiful than she
had ever seen. The stars were so bright
and so numerous. They twinkled as she
looked up at them and blurred together
each time she blinked. Her mouth was
open slightly, her lips parted in shock
as her eyes took in sight of the stars.

Then she began whispering her
wish under her breath; but just
as she did so, at that exact second,
she saw a star shooting across the
sky and disappearing. She thought
she had missed it, but the star
appeared again a little further away
before disappearing once more. Then
again, it reappeared, and this happened
a few times before she could no longer see it.

It left her breathless, as though the
wind had been knocked out of her.
Starry-eyed, she stayed there for a little
while longer, marvelling at the fact that
she had just experienced something so beautiful.
Her face was filled with wonder and her
glossy eyes just might have lit up even
brighter than the star she had just seen.

For the past few days, she had been feeling
out of place, anxious and much too
nervous. She had been experiencing a
suffocating loneliness that she wasn't
sure how to get over. She had so much
difficulty continuing onwards as she
struggled with introversion
and the unease was devouring her.

She definitely did not expect such a
thing to occur at a time like that, when
she had such little hope. It was only one
small star, one shooting star, a mere
coincidence, but it gave her back some
of the hope she thought she'd lost forever.
Things always happened for a reason and
she had simply not been seeing the signs enough.

It was a rare enough occurrence for
one to see a shooting star when just
glancing up at the sky for a moment.
Most of the time, when people saw
shooting stars, they barely had the chance
to formulate their wish in their minds
before the star had already disappeared
from view. However, she had wished on
the shooting star. She had been whispering her
wish at the exact moment she saw the star.

It was then that she knew she ought to
think of that very moment when she
had no hope left. It was proof that
wishes could appear when
one least expected them to come true.