Inevitable Darkness

A shooting star leaves a glistening streak across the sky as it makes its way into the unknown. Anyone unlucky to look up at this may be blinded by fury at its light. How it mocks our doomed future. Back then someone may have looked at this shooting star and made a wish. That's what one does when witnessing such a thing, right? First created by the Greek astronomer, Ptolemy, who said that shooting stars were a gift from the Gods looking down at Earth. Make a wish and they just might hear you and it'll come true. More present superstitions include ones in Chile where someone should pick up a stone in the presence of a shooting star. Or how about in the Philippines that say a knot should be tied in a handkerchief. The funny thing though is that a shooting star isn't a star at all. They are pieces of rock that hit the Earth's atmosphere from space causing it to glow.

Eden looks up at this shooting star and thinks about how terrible people have gotten. How this situation has made society turn sour. Normally people would spit on the ground and curse up at the sky if a shooting star made itself present. She'd even seen innocent human beings get beat and shunned for defending the stars. It's not their fault that they're all dying. Eden imagines the stories her grandmother would tell when the sky would be full of stars in the night. How their glow would light up the whole world. She tries hard to picture it, but with the skimpy few that dot the sky tonight, it's hard to think how full it used to be. She's seen pictures, but it's not the same. From her spot on the roof, Eden decides to make a wish despite the possible consequences if she were caught by her father.

She wishes for the peace and happiness that once was.

"Eden!" her mother calls. She pokes her head out the window and squints up at the roof. "Come down there. It's time for dinner."

Dread washes over her body. Another silent dinner filled with waiting outbursts from her parents. Eden gets up and swings through her bedroom window. Her parents are already seated at the table eating, and Eden takes her seat. She glances over at the television and wishes she could turn it on. Anything to get rid of the silence that was slowing drowning her. It became suffocating sometimes. But ever since the television has been permitted from use, this is what every dinner felt like.

NASA has confirmed there are less than 500 stars in our galaxy. One by one they were dying. Exploding like beautiful fireworks in space. It was never heard of, unexplainable, and extremely terrifying. What did this mean for our world? How long until the sun died?

It made everyone uneasy. The news was trying to keep people as assured as possible, but mass hysteria ensued. Things started closing for good, and people became distant from each other. It was like everyone thought they were going to die. Eden didn't understand why all of this was happening. Weren't we all stars ourselves? The same things that made a star made up human beings. We both were floating through life looking for our purpose. Who was to say that she wasn't supposed to be born a goat, a fish, or even a rock on the ground? Why was she born the person she was? Why was there even life on earth if things were going to just die in the end? These were things that flowed through Eden's mind constantly. Things must be happening for some reason. It's the why that nobody seems to have an answer for.

After a few struggling bites of food and skilled dodging of questions from her parents, Eden heads up to her room. Holed up on her bed with a book laid out in front of her, she reads until her eyes droop, and her yawns become more frequent. Eden can hear the soft arguments from her parents in the next room. It was the same old thing that they always fought about: her future. She was supposed to graduate this year, but now with the supposed end of the world, what was that going to look like? Eden gets out of bed and climbs up onto the roof. She always found comfort up there. It was just her, and the vast open sky above her. She got to be alone without the worries of a possible end to her life. Up there she could dream, she could even wish. Eden stared up at the sky for a long time hoping to spot another shooting star, and waiting for the darkness that would soon swallow the world.

Three more days pass. Eden wakes up feeling the warmth of the sun wrap her in a hug. There was no need to get up, it was the weekend, but today Eden decided not to be lazy. She throws the covers off of her and gets ready. The air in the house seems to grow heavier the closer she got to the first floor. As Eden rounded the corner in the kitchen, she found her mom with her head down. Eden called out to her, and she looked up. Her nose was running and her eyes were shiny. They looked like star themselves. There was a sudden feeling of knowing what she was crying about.

Eden runs out of the house before her mom can say anything. She didn't want to hear it, there was no use. It was going to happen, all the stars would die. It was inevitable. There was no sign of them stopping, in fact, more stars were dying in rapid succession. It was terrifyingly beautiful. Imagine what that looked like in space. A lonely star stuck in the void of black, nothing in its way, nothing to bother it as it lived out its life.

Eden takes out her phone and the first person she thinks to call is her best friend Douglas. He was always there for her and right now she needed someone to assure her everything was going to be ok even if it wasn't.

My parent won't let me leave the house.

Anger floods through her and there was an instant she almost threw her phone in the street. Another ping from her phone.

I'll meet you tonight at our spot.

Her spot, our spot. The roof was a place that made everyone feel calm. Many things have happened in that spot on her roof, many memories she hopes to remember for a long time.

Nighttime could not have come any sooner. Eden waits on the roof for Douglas as soon as the sun went down. She still hasn't talked to her mother after she ran out of the house. She ate dinner quickly so she could escape. Hours roll by and all Eden can do is stare up at the night sky. There is only one visible star in the sky. She wonders if it's the last one. What will happen after it goes out?

The house creaks as Douglas heaves himself onto the roof. He plops himself down next to Eden and asks her what was wrong. She tells him the things that have been bothering her, the fights her parents have, thoughts on the future. He sits in silence and lets Eden rant, which she appreciates. The star twinkles above them, holding on until they can finish this moment. Eden catches her breath and looks at Douglas. At that moment everything felt so surreal, so beautiful. She leans in and kisses him on the mouth. The star above them sighs in relief and explodes into a brilliant supernova. The last star that held on until the end. Its light winks out from the night sky.

The world goes black.