Glimmer

Eighteenth Glimmer: Mist

Eighteenth Glimmer: Mist

.~*~.+.~*~.

Once upon April midday, the Heavens released a Star as bright as a newborn flame. Upon the birth of the newborn Star, the Earth embraced the gift of fire, and the petals bloomed in full. Come twilight, the rain arrived, uniting with the blooming fire.

.~*~.+.~*~.

We walked in silence. All I could hear was his heartbeat and mine.

"Do you hate me?" he asked.

I paused before speaking. "Hate is a strong word," I answered. "I don't."

"Did you ever hate me?"

I smirked. "I only remember bits and pieces, but I sure know I didn't."

He smirked. "I bet you forgot the fatal strikes you gave me back then."

I folded my arms. "I clearly remembered those."

"And you said you did not hate me," he muttered.

I shrugged. "It's just our nature, Deneb. We're opposites. It's natural for me to contradict everything you say or do. And it's natural for you to oppose me in everything."

I finally understood why I had that strange feeling on the first day I met him, which I mistook for hate.

"Have you always known?" I asked. "That I'm that girl?"

He shrugged. "I wasn't allowed to disclose everything I knew. I wasn't allowed to tell you things you ought to discover for yourself."

Silence reigned before he spoke again.

"But you guessed it right," he said. "I brought you to the Pleiades, hoping to awaken your Glimmer."

"I thought you always lived in the Pleiades."

He shook his head. "I was born in Milky Way during my previous incarnation," he said, "but like you, I was born and am living in the modern world."

I folded my arms. "Really? I thought you said you eat, sleep, and live in the clouds," I said, smirking.

"I was trying to familiarize you with the life of the Ancient Stars."

"Ancient? You mean, the Stars now do not live that way anymore? Like, sleeping in the clouds..."

He nodded. "They are just like us," he said. "I told you, Stars are also human beings. They just have the Glimmer that allowed them to things beyond what those without it cannot."

"Oh."

"As the world evolved, life in the Pleiades also did to go on with the flow. There are some who still keep the traditional ways, but the younger generation prefer to live normally like those without the Glimmer," he continued. "We are not so different from them, Hiraya."

"And we can live normally as though we do not have the Glimmer?" I asked.

He suddenly smirked. "I think it depends on how well you can control your fire."

I scowled at him. "Then why did you awaken my Glimmer in the first place?"

"For your information, Hiraya, your Glimmer had already been showing you signs of awakening since you were fourteen," he said. "And it came in full bloom when you..."

"When I what?"

His face turned beet red.

"What?" I asked, pulling his shirt.