Stars Live in The Sky

Chapter One

"Why is the sky blue?"

Her voice was soft and uncharacteristically quiet. Usually, she's running, jumping, and shouting at the top of her lungs. She was the type of person who demanded to be heard and would keep talking until you listened. I didn't mind, people always told me I was a good listener. Maybe that's why we got along so well.

"Because the oceans are blue. The light from the sun bounces off the water, and colors the sky." I explained.

Her head was already tilted back, staring at the endlessness above. I could see her pupils dilating in her bright green eyes as she searched for something that, in all likelihood, was never there in the first place. Amber hair fell in waves down her back, displaying her namesake for all to see.

She wore a charm bracelet around her wrist. It was silver, and simply crafted, but it was important to her. She only had one charm attached to it. A bright and shiny golden star. I asked once why she only had that one and no others. She never really answered me, just said it was something to bring good luck to her future. I never pressed her on it.

"But that doesn't feel right," She said, laying down on the freshly cut grass, the blades sticking to her skin in the terrible summer heat. "I mean, think about it. You're telling me that a giant ball of flaming gas millions of light years away is shining light on Earth. Fine, but you can't say that light is reflecting off thousands of miles of water and then making the sky blue. That shouldn't be possible, there's nothing up there! It's just clouds and atmosphere!"

"Sometimes the truth is stranger than fiction," I said, tentatively laying down beside her. We stared up at the cloudless sky, contemplating it. The sounds of summer could be heard all throughout our neighborhood. The O'Malleys were having a barbecue across the way, you could smell the burgers. Someone walking their dog passed by, and it whined at the scent. Flowers bloomed, bumblebees buzzed, and birds sang. If you listened, you could even hear Mrs. Phelps turn the pages of her book as she read in her lawn chair, just over the fence.

I didn't really care, though. I was too focused on the sound of her breathing. The rhythmic rise and fall of her chest was hypnotizing, I could listen to it forever. This situation was a rare one. I couldn't remember the last time she'd just sat for a while, in any capacity. Even in school, she could never sit still for long. Multiple times throughout a class she would get up to sharpen her pencil, help the teacher pass out papers, or go to the bathroom. If she went to the bathroom, she usually didn't come back.

"I want to go there."

"What?"

"I want to go there. I want to find out what's up there, just past the stratosphere. Haven't you ever felt like there's more? Like there's something out there, just waiting for you to find it?"

"Not really," I said, turning on my side to fiddle with a blade of grass the lawn mower missed. "I haven't had a very good experience with finding things. Usually, it turns out to be something I would rather have kept hidden."

"You're never going to be a good journalist with that outlook."

"You'd be surprised."

She kept her eyes on the sky for just a moment longer, then turned on her side to face me. Her hair mixed with the bright green grass and her dark green eyes stared into my blue ones. I remember wondering if she was searching my eyes too.

"Carson," she said. My name on her lips felt more addictive than any drug.

"Yeah?"

"Would you be sad if I left?"

It took me a moment to process her question. I lay there, the gears in my head turning but nothing coming from it. All I could do in the meantime was manage a weak and pathetic "Huh?"

"I'm saying that if I left. Today. Would you be sad? Would you care?"

When I finally understood what she was asking, I struggled to come up with an answer. She couldn't be serious, could she? She's not even sixteen, where on Earth would she possibly go? The heat. The heat from that giant, incredible, infuriating ball of gas was borderline unbearable now, my skin threatening to burst into flames any second.

She didn't move, didn't even blink. Her eyes kept searching my own, looking for whatever it was she couldn't find up there in the bright blue sky. It felt like she was reading my thoughts, almost as if my soul was one of those home improvement magazines my mother loved so much.

I'd like to say it wasn't my fault. That I dodged the question because I was nervous, or awkward, not because I was afraid of the answer. But it was my fault. She asked me a simple question with only two good answers: yes or no. I didn't realize exactly what she meant. I didn't realize what she was really saying.

I didn't think.

"That's a silly question, isn't it?" I said, embarrassed laughter escaping from my lungs. "I mean, wouldn't you miss me if I suddenly left?"

She sighed and rolled onto her back, once again looking up at the sky. She was quiet for a moment, and I was afraid she was hurt before she spoke again.

"No," She said, an air of finality to her words. "No, I don't think I would."

And with that, she stood up and left. I lay there for a while, just thinking, as the endless blue sky turned pink, then orange. Her words hung in the oxygen around me, turning my backyard into a den of pain and despair. I thought, surely she wasn't serious. She wouldn't miss me? We've known each other for years, how could she not miss me?

I thought about getting up and going after her, about what I would say, whether or not I should apologize or if she was the one with that responsibility. Even if I had hurt her, it was completely by accident. She shouldn't have said those words, not when she knew what they would do to me. She knew... didn't she?

She knew.

And she still said it. Didn't even wait for me to respond, just said it and walked away. Did she ever care about me? Or was I just a set of ears to listen to her crazy ramblings? Is that all I was to her?

The orange sky gave me a headache, and I put my arm over my eyes in an attempt to block it out. I tried to focus on my breathing, now ragged and panicked and did my best not to cry. I still did, in the end, but I tried, though.

I don't remember falling asleep or even going back inside, but I woke up hours later in the dark of my room. Dozens of glow in the dark stars shone down at me from my ceiling, their light faded after years of use. When I was younger, I would sometimes wake up around this time, and quietly play in the light of those stars. They were bright enough back then.

There was a tapping sound on my window. It was slow and consistent. Tap. Tap. Tap. On and on it went, stopping for a minute once or twice, but always returning. I knew that tap. It was her. Was she tormenting me now? Did she come and wake me up only to repeat what she said earlier? Maybe she wanted to make up?

Either way, I couldn't face her. I was still too upset, too hurt and mixed up inside. I couldn't look at her face. If I did, I might start crying again. I didn't want her to see me like that. Eventually, the tapping of pebbles stopped, and as a cloud covered the moonlight drifting through the window, I fell back asleep.

In retrospect, I should've understood what she meant.