Before the Stars Forget Me

“The darker the night, the brighter the stars.”

— Fyodor Dostoevsky

It’s July 2020. Probably. I think?

NEO-WISE. Crackle. To-night. Pop. I can just barely make out the radio.

I’ve been chasing this comet for years – tracking its arc, scribbling down updates in the margins of old calendars, writing updates for readers who never looked it up. NEOWISE was always one of those distant promises, like spotting a ghost on a midnight train – gone before you’re sure it was even there. I thought, maybe, I’d be ready when it finally arrived.

Yet the world fell ill. The coronavirus struck at the worst possible time. Now, the once animated world was gone, replaced by a hushed silence, subdued by lockdowns and loneliness. I couldn’t say I hated it; I loved the silence, but being stuck alone in my two-room apartment in downtown New York was unnerving, to say the least. The once rushed, crowded city life was no more.

But somewhere above it all, NEOWISE will blaze a trail in the dark. A once-in-a-lifetime comet – visible just past 3 a.m., before vanishing once again, for 6,800 years.

I wrote about these things, these moments, that demanded the world's immediate attention. Things that made it seem like heaven had descended upon us. Things that seemed bigger-than-life. Eclipses. Cosmic coincidences. Thunderstorms that lit up the sky. Waterfalls more beautiful than any photograph could portray. My job was somewhere between that of an astronomy educator and an essayist.

I thought tonight would be like the others. To my right sat my nightly coffee, and to my left, a small yet energetic vintage lamp. The room was silent, and the moon shone as bright as it ever had. But the right words never came.

No, that’s not it. That’s not it either.

Underline. Flip the page. Cross it out. Let’s try again.

Words were appearing, but not the way it was before. They weren’t right. It used to come easier.

Back then, the nights were my sanctuary. The world would be quiet just enough for me to hear my own thoughts. The serene moonlight seeped through my window with a playful, refreshing breeze. I’d write until the sky turned a beautiful, bright pink.

Always with a cup of coffee. Just one, strong and black, in my navy-chipped mug, a gift from someone I loved, once. Always filled to just five centimeters below the lip, as if leaving space left more room for my thoughts. I never drank it for the caffeine; writing was more than enough to keep me up. It was more for a ritual – the curling steam of the coffee seemed to form along with the first sentence that I was to write about. The first sip was the click of a key in a lock. The door to night opened, and the past and future both disappeared. I could finally begin.

I was working on something important until everything went still. A novel – my first one. It was my moon landing. All those years of essays, digital drafts, half-finished reports, and I finally thought I had it. Something finally worth binding on paper. I had the title scribbled on the back of an old metro ticket – faded blue ink, barely legible, but somehow that made it feel more permanent. I remember the outline thumbtacked above my desk, curling at the edges like an old leaf, full of crossed-out ideas and rewritten theories.

My brain is still full of endless thoughts and ideas, yet now, none of them seem to make it onto the paper. The abstract concepts float around my mind, posed as colors, emotions, and feelings. I reach for my thoughts, but they drift just out of reach, flitting around, just like the butterflies I used to chase in my mother’s garden. Yet, as they run away, they’re waiting. Waiting to be caught. Waiting to be admired. Waiting to embrace the world and have the world embrace it. I want to catch them, to tell them “I found you,” to pin them down with words, but still, they evade me. This didn’t usually happen. Sure, I was familiar with this feeling during the morning, but at night, the fleeting thoughts shouldn’t exist.

Something inside me is slipping.

I can’t seem to grasp the time quite well, and every day feels like a hazy dream. The only time I can think and remember clearly is when my pen is out at night. I don’t remember the last time I saw my family or friends.

This…may be my last letter. Or maybe it’s the first thing I’ve written in years.

I used to only feel alive at night. I thought it was a curse back then, to be wired backward, to sleep through the sun and wake with the stars. But maybe my body always knew something that I didn’t. Maybe the night was preparing me for this.

Maybe I was always meant to flicker here. NEOWISE will peak tonight. I can feel it, even here. They say it will streak the sky at 3:08 a.m. A white fire across the black, waiting night sky. The kind of moment you won’t forget. I remember reading about NEOWISE when I was twelve—how it would come only once in my lifetime. I circled the date in red ink and whispered a promise to the stars that I’d be there to see it.

In this in-between place, where the heart forgets its beat, I still see them–the stars. Brighter than they’ve ever burned. Like my unfinished novel, the stars suddenly shone, begging to be let out.

Suddenly, the world went black.

The world is waking up. I can feel it in echoes I shouldn’t be able to hear.

I wish and pray with all my might to go back to the night. But my subconscious understands.

A soft rustle, as if a blanket was adjusted. “I’m sorry,” I hear someone say. A distant murmur. A soft, repeated beeping. A woman cries, her voice muffled, like I’m underwater. Then a hushed silence. I try to talk, but no words come out of my mouth, just like how all my words fell shy of formulating even just a single sentence that night. I can’t even move.

The world went black again. As if my wish was granted, I was back at my desk – just like always – an old 1989 Parker 75 Fountain Pen in hand, the world still asleep. In front of me was the manuscript for my novel. It felt like time bent inwards, folding me back into one of my daily night writing sessions.

Out of the corner of my eye, I catch a glimpse of the rising sun coloring the sky with that pinkish, violet mix that I loathed, soon to turn into the golden hue like that of a freshly cracked egg. Then, I see it. NEOWISE. It’s fading, but I’ve already ingrained the view into my brain. The moment I see it, I understand. Fully this time, if such a thing still applies. I find myself, like every other night, wishing that the night would last just a little longer.

I thought I’d be ready when it came. I just didn’t know it would be the last thing I’d ever witness.

Because when the comet slowly floats back out of Earth’s view, so will I.

If anyone reads this, if that’s even possible, know that I was here.

In a bed I couldn’t rise from, in a body that forgot how to wake, with machines humming softly in the dark.

They called it a coma.

I called it night.