One Word Prompts

Catch - To Catch a Falling Star

She lay in the field behind her house. The grass was long. The night was dark. Life was simple.

Stars stretched endlessly above her. In every direction, there were stars.

If she reached up, she could almost touch them. She closed her hand. If she was to look, she was sure she'd find little glowing gems in the palm of her hand.

She never did.

As long as she never looked, she could never see she was wrong. And she liked imagining the little glowing sparks in the palm of her hand. She didn't want to lose the ability to scoop them from the sky and hold them close to her heart.

It was childish. She would be the first to admit it. But it was also a kind of magic. And magic only worked if you believed.

She closed her eyes. The night was warm, even if the wind was cold. She wished that life could always be this simple.

Her worries were far away on nights like this, even if she could feel them nagging in the distance. Even if they tried to yell above the calm she'd drawn for herself.

If she hummed the old songs her father used to sing, she could drown out the concerns of tomorrow, even if it was just for one night. If she hummed them with enough heart, she could feel her father's arms wrapped around her, warm despite the wind.

It was another kind of magic, one she refused to analyze further, certain she would lose it entirely if she did.

She let herself fall back into the stars above her again, let them fill her with their silver light and calming glow. Tomorrow would come, no matter how she might wish to hold this moment. Tomorrow would be cruel and harsh and broken. It would push her and pull her and try to break her too. She didn't want to see the dawn on the horizon. She didn't look forward to the golden glow in the distance.

Perhaps it was foolish to wish for time to stop.

Perhaps it was useless to cling to each passing second with greater and greater desperation.

Perhaps there was no point in dreading what was to come.

And yet, no matter how she drew her circle, no matter how she held back those thoughts, they hounded after her. The chased her from the grassy hill to the farthest reaches of the night sky. Without rest, without end, they chased her.

Like wolves, they consumed her. Like a breaking wave, it pulled her under. Like an unmoving mountain, it remained unsurmountable.

The wind chilled her to the bone. She shivered in the dark, wondering how she ever got herself this far as it was. Wondering what the consequences would be just to continue lying here when the dawn did break. Wondering what would happen if she just submitted and let herself fall--to the wolves--beneath the waves--from that mountain.

She reached up, her hand skimming over the stars. She knew if she closed her hand, there would not be a single star caught within. She liked to imagine. She liked to dream. But she knew.

A star shot across the night sky. It flew directly behind her hand, disappearing in the part of the sky her palm blocked from view.

Or, perhaps, the dreamer in her suggested, it flew directly into her hand. It disappeared not behind her outstretched palm but landed there. If she looked, she'd find a little glowing gem. An impossible light.

In spite of all reason, all sense, perhaps she would find it, if she just looked.

Some might despair at that thought.

Some nights, she would have too.

Tonight though, she just held that fallen star to her chest, her eyes closed. She let that impossible light fill her tired body. Let that impossible hope fill her soul.

Perhaps it was foolish, but some nights, it was all she had.

Some nights, it was enough.

Tonight, it was enough.