Viewing the stars through a cracked phone's screen

I shouldn’t be looking at them at this point, but, somehow, I have the feeling that this would be the last time I could, so I just had to do it to make up. The cold air had nothing to win against the flickering lights above me, but it still brushed against my face and for the first time I actually felt the tiredness seep into my bones. Along with the chilly night seeping into the young and old trees surrounding me,night had fallen before I even noticed. Whether it’s some weird premonition I’m putting onto myself, I just feel like it meant either the final turning point or the end. Optimism has never been my strong point. Perhaps a long awaited change of pace would benefit me and help me get out of this mind rut? “If that’s how you see things, you should’ve made up your mind like this for studying for your entrance exams.” is what my mom would say, obviously annoyed, as dad would laugh loudly in spite of the radio. When thought about it, why do people even admire stars that much? They’re too far away to be seen clearly. Something this small just makes me feel lonely to the point that I feel something twist in me with discomfort. So, nothing but small cold pointy dots in the sky. Still, staring at them like this makes me wonder why I couldn’t reach her back then, as close as she was to me. 

By “her” I don’t mean some mysterious crush, just a girl that sat next to me for nearly four years. I’m not sure why she even stuck in my mind so long when all I really remember is her average to a fault looks. Her hair had always been put into two tight braids, so tight I thought her head might fall off due to lack of blood flow. Her eyes were tiny but always either looking down or straight into space. Always looking like she just came out of the library after reading the thickest book they have, she’d do nothing but stare out the window almost every day, getting her fair share of scolding from our teacher. Other classmates had their fun by making up all kinds of nicknames for that poor girl, but I can’t blame them since all she did was either stare or glare at any person she met eyes with by chance or annoyance. 

What was so eye-catching then, you might ask? Ear-catching would be more precise, despite us speaking to one another for the first time in all those years of silent neighboring nearing its end. 

‘What do the stars look like to you?’ she had asked in a hushed, yet serious voice. This was so unexpected I had to stop what I was doing or else my hand would’ve definitely missed the shoe box and slammed into the cold hard metal instead.

‘The stars…?’ I mustered, carefully glancing at her unusually intense gaze. ‘I suppose they’re really pretty light-’

‘Oh, I see’ she slammed her box door tight shut and turned on her heel in a dramatic show of emotion. Way more than I was expecting out of someone named “The library rat that can’t read”.

‘But they’re cold!’ I called out after her.‘Cold and lonely and overrated for all the wrong reasons!’

I had to mask a flinch when she turned back and just as suddenly was right in front of my face.

‘So you do get it, huh!’ if I didn’t know better, I’d have said that she sounded almost cheerful then.

This was nearly half a year ago. Back then, I didn’t pay any mind to it and had continued with my life as usual. Eating breakfast with my father seamlessly tearing the silence of the calm morning to shreds, eating lunch with my rowdy friends, or silently pushing the food in lines on the plate during dinner, holed up in my room. Much to my bewilderment, the girl actually said “Hello” to me the next day. And the one after that, and the one following and so on, without fail. She was interesting to talk to, but especially listen to, so I didn’t mind chatting her up about astronomy during the lunch break while most of my friends ran out back to take a drag behind the bushes or stare at people passing down the street. As it turns out, I was dumber than the rumored “her”. Astronomy was her newest biggest passion and someone like me worked perfectly as a means for her to express herself. I didn’t know about Vega, nor the summer triangle, after all, so she patiently showed me picture after picture on her phone in between bites and would laugh at how loud I’d gasp with every fact she’d tell. I never once stopped to question her “facts” . Of course, back then, it was enough for her to talk and for me to listen, so I never interrupted her fervent rants. I was happy as long as she’d talk to me in a way that contrasted what I knew of the few interactions she had. 

Things shifted somewhat with every day nearing spring, just as these branches crunch in varying ways whenever I move to lie down more carefully. The season finally changed, leaves and trees springing back to life, ice and snow slowly but patiently melting away to reveal the vivid life behind. I was happy to leave my old worn out winter coat in the back of the closet after having pulled out the brand new jacket I had to seriously save up to get. I still wasn’t sure about the color, so I was somewhat both anxious of and anticipating a reaction from her. However, at the first sight of her face, all of my hopes and anxieties were shattered.

To say that she had this eerie blank look on her face would be an understatement. She had always been known about spacing out or drifting off the face of the Earth during class, as the teacher put it, but if they thought it was bad then, it got even worse. It began with her not even mumbling “I don’t know” when asked, but went as far as her stopping to respond to anyone at all. At first I felt some kind of twisted pride, hey you all, look at me talking to her normally during lunch, can any of you even attempt that? Can any of the teachers even say that she looks at them if she ever does speak to them? My nose was raised up so high I failed to notice what she was showing me on her phone screen or how stupidly difficult it must’ve been for her to show me anything on that completely smashed screen anyways. Her interests had shifted from astronomy to serial killers in the blink of one week of winter holiday. 

Nevertheless, I couldn’t get enough of that spark in her eyes as she described every gruesome detail of the case she had been analyzing and reading up on the night before. Stars, constellations, blood or slashed guts, what did it matter when I was the only one she spoke to like that. Even then, that happiness seemed to disappear with every sunny day. 

Until one day she just stared blankly at me when I asked what new chilling tale she has for me for the day. My smile faltered as the silence grew uncomfortable, but she just stared at me. I don’t need to remember what I followed up with to break it, when she just stared right past me as if I had never been there to begin with. 

Time passed after then and we still haven’t spoken a single word to each other. Come to think of it, was it also the time she started to bring dead animals to class? I’m not sure anymore, as it’s also the time she got suspended, almost right before our graduation ceremony. Dead birds do not fit well among scratched up textbooks and notebooks filled to the brim with ways to twist bones and break fingers. 

The cold air of the woods feels too good to remember what she had written me in that message in order for me to agree to meet up with her. Did the trees rustle this loud then too…? My head’s too fuzzy to remember. All I could think about for the longest while was how she had smiled at me after all. What else am I forgetting…? She was staring down at me under the same starry sky. Was she crying? Why didn’t I wipe her tears if she was? The stars just keep twinkling at me, cold and uncaring of my troubles. It’s getting hard to look with all those sparkling dots in the endless dark. I really wish I could’ve made her stay by my side and see it, this kind of beautifully dark cheese like sky, with me. On the other hand, while people say that everything is better with company, I really doubt that this starry sky would be good enough for the new her. Or that this gushing open wound in my neck would feel any better with her lying here with me, tearful, bloody, and knife still in hand. Although maybe then would her smile at least have been her real one.