Made of Stardust

“Am I-?” Ellie couldn’t bear to finish the horrible thought that was digging its talons into her mind, let alone say it out loud. 

“Yes.” The ethereal woman laid a sympathetic and supportive hand on her shoulder. Ellie found it difficult to look at her. The woman glowed with an otherworldly light, her pale skin seeming to shimmer with stars. Ellie swore she saw the big dipper dancing on the woman’s right cheek. Her hair flared white and blue, like the hottest of fires, as it billowed around her. Ellie wasn’t sure why the strange woman’s sudden appearance didn’t bother her. For some reason, her presence made perfect sense.

“And I-I can’t go back?” Ellie anxiously picked at her chipped blue nail polish as she resisted the urge to clutch the ragged stuffed cat hanging out of her sweatshirt’s pocket. She must have been holding it when she…

“No.” The woman’s voice was deep and warm and held an otherworldly echo, her voice lingering long after she finished speaking. 

“But what about everyone else? My friends, my family? My cat! Who’s going to take care of my cat?” She looked below her at the flurry of people frantically scrambling around. They were unknowingly moving with a futile urgency. The woman’s swirling mercury eyes met Ellie’s in the window’s reflection, impassive. 

“I’ll do anything! Please, I’m not ready to leave. I-I, I’ve barely started living. How can I already be dead? It’s not fair! I’m my parent’s only child. They’re all alone!” Ellie practically shook with anger. How could this happen to her? It’s never supposed to happen to you, only someone else. 

“Did you see Mrs. Robinson died in a car crash?”

 “No, how awful! But that will never happen to me, I’m a really careful driver.” 

“Did you see Allison is sick in the hospital?” 

“Poor thing, but I make sure to stay healthy.”

Teenagers are supposed to be invincible. Young, healthy, strong. How come she, Ellie Jacobson, wasn’t? It went against nature, a seventeen year old dying. 

Seventeen was one of those awful nothing ages. Her sweet sixteen had passed. She was supposed to be mature and act like “an adult” while largely lacking the agency to control her own life. Her childhood was racing to a close while the future loomed ahead, a blank tunnel teeming with a worrying array of possibilities. She would either make it through or be swallowed whole. No one looked forward to seventeen. And now, Ellie supposed she would be stuck at that worthless age forever. 

The woman, if she could be called that, let Ellie rant and rage against the dying of light. “It is not fair.” The woman agreed. “Nothing ever is. Everyone meets me in the end.”

“But so soon? I have so much left to do.”

“As does everyone else I welcome. No one is ready to see me. No one thinks it is truly their time. Your ending was written from the moment you were born. Nothing could have prevented this.” 

Ellie still was not satisfied. Teenagers are brimming with rage and indignation and she had plenty to spare. “I refuse to accept this. What if I don’t go with you?

“Then you will be alone for eternity, wandering lost in the darkness. Don't worry, child. All will be well. They are no longer your concern. Nothing here is.”

“Not my concern? Not my concern?! They were everything to me five minutes ago and now you just want me to forget?” Ellie wrenched herself from the woman’s side, fury and hurt confusion making her ball her hands into fists. Her eyes welled with tears which made her feel even more helpless. It wasn’t fair! Her story was just beginning. Next month was her eighteenth birthday. The whole world had been laid at her feet.

“No, you will never forget, but you must move on. Accept things as they are. There is nothing to be done. In time, your soul will heal.” A shooting star zipped across the woman’s brow. Ellie vaguely wondered if making a wish on it would count. If it did, what could she wish for? Her wishes and hopes were long gone. 

“Yeah, apparently I have an endless amount of time,” Ellie grumbled. “Will they-will they forget me?”

“No, your memory will impact thousands. Much good will be done in your name.” Ellie smiled tentatively at that.

“Can-I can I visit them?” 

“You can see them anytime you wish."

“Oh,” Ellie’s shoulders sagged in relief. “Do you have a name?” Ellie felt embarrassed that she hadn’t asked earlier. 

“You may call me whatever you like.”

“Ophelia.” Her English class had been reading Hamlet and she thought “Ophelia” was the most beautiful name she had ever heard. Of course, no single word could describe this woman. It would be like trying to encompass the entirety of the universe with a single phrase. Not just impossible but disrespectful. 

“That is a lovely name.” The woman nodded her head with a kind smile.

“Ophelia-will it hurt? Will I still be me?”

“No, your pain is over, child. You are free. You can be whomever you like.”

“I thought I would get better,” Ellie whispered, looking below. “They said I would get better.” 

“You did not.” The woman’s voice was gentle as she reached out her hand. “Come, I have much to show you.” Ellie stared at the outstretched hand whose veins seemed to flow with starlight. A dizzying array of swirling silvers, blues, oranges, yellows, reds and even violets, twirled in an impossible kaleidoscope.

“Okay,” Ellie whispered, glancing one last time at her family. She grasped Ophelia's hand which sent a buzz of energy through her and gasped as the woman’s light seeped over her skin. “I’m ready.” 

An overwhelming sense of peace washed over her. Ellie’s mind went from tumultuous waves, threatening to capsize her to smooth as glass, the water perfectly reflecting the clear sky and stars above. Ophelia smiled softly at Ellie and squeezed her hand. Ellie never took her eyes off the sea of stars above as she and Ophelia began to drift up and up into the vastness of eternity.