Stjerne
Legacy Name: Stjerne

One dream began with Peggy floating in the sky. A star winked at her and suddenly turned into a young man in fancy dress—complete with a mask and top hat. He removed his mask and bowed deeply. She noticed she was now dressed as monarch butterfly. She curtsied and took his hand. The pair walked to the dance floor which had little lights spinning slowing around. Suddenly, the young man dissolving into hundreds of little stars. Her eyes snapped open. When she realized it had all been a dream she was saddened.

One night Peggy saw a shooting star zooming across the sky. She didn’t know why but it made her sad. It was like it was running to get somewhere or to someone. An incredible loneliness washed over her that she couldn’t understand. She cried as she stared at the last visible spot the star had been. In her mind she felt foolish to be this upset over a star, but she couldn’t help it. She tried to reason that stars didn’t have feelings, but that did nothing to remove her angst.

Weeks later and Peggy was still brooding over the poor shooting star. Her brother started teasing her and making up ridiculous songs about sad stars. Her parents considered boarding up the window but safety concerns made that idea impractical. Her father had suggested her seeing a therapist, but her mum thought that was a little extreme. So for the moment they decided it would be best to just wait this “phase” out.

Months passed and since Peggy hadn’t expressed any concerns over the feelings that stars had, her parents believed she’d been able to move on. But she hadn’t. In fact, it had gotten worse. Peggy had been pouring over books from the school library—trying to find any information she could about stars. She spent hours perfecting her drawing skills and started drawing stars everywhere. She even drew them in her notebooks when she was supposed to be listen to the lessons. Her favourite thing to draw was dancing stars at a ball. And while it made her very sad she almost always drew a shooting star.

The winter and spring passed—bringing summer and the end of the school term. It also brought about the family camping trip that Peggy was forced to attend every year. It was always on her birthday, which alone was annoying and to make matters worse, she hated camping. The hard unyielding earth she had to sleep on, the nasty bugs that bit her, the smell of charred hot dogs—she hate everything about camping. Well, almost everything. The one and only thing Peggy ever liked about camping was the ability to see the night sky clearer than she could sitting in her window seat with the light pollution of the city.

Long after everyone had gone to bed, Peggy tipped toed out of her tent and wandered over to the hammock that her father had set up. Laying in the hammock, she looked up at her beloved sky. She wondered why she was so enthralled with the stars. As she watched them wink at her, she felt her skin getting warm and then she was suddenly lighting up. She jumped out of the hammock and started running towards the tent, but before she could get very far, she felt her feet leave the found. Holy cats! she thought, I’m floating!

She began to glow brighter and brighter as she continued to float upwards. Peggy started to scream, but no sound came out. She shut her eyes and tried to stop crying. She was only fourteen, why did she have to have this happen now? Fourteen years old to be exact, it had just hit 3 minutes past midnight when this had started happening. When she dared to open her eyes again, she felt for sure she must have had some kind of breakdown or was dreaming; because this couldn’t possibly be real. She was hovering above the earth. She was glowing so bright and intensely that she thought she was going to explode. And then, in instant, she did. But what happened wasn’t painful, it was freeing. Her human form fell off and her body was free. It took her several minutes to realize she was still alive. Looking around she noticed several stars were blinking at her rapidly and she understood what they were saying… the stars were talking to her.

“Welcome back Stjerne!” they all said. “We missed you so much!”

Then racing towards her, was one lone star, twinkling in delight. And it all raced back to her. It was 3 minutes after midnight, fourteen years ago. Natt, her beloved, and her were playing hide and seek. She had zoomed across the sky, chasing him. A meteor was nearby and she had gotten caught with its pull. She fell to the Earth. Natt was beside himself; he couldn’t save her. So he did the only thing he could; he asked Mother Nature to make Stjerne appear as a human until he could find a way to bring her back to him. Mother Nature agreed and concealed her form into a baby human and placed her on the steps of the home that contained the people who would become her family.

Natt found a way to speak to Stjerne in her dreams and visited as often as he could. Yet, he was sad. He missed her more than he could bear. Mother Nature had told him that the most magical day to return her to him, would be on her birthday as a human—the day she fell from the sky. Every year the human family brought her camping—not knowing why. Every year Natt and Mother Nature would try to use their powers to return Stjerne to the sky. It had taken fourteen years to accomplish this. Natt had never given up and he finally been reunited.

“Is that why stars wink as us, Mum?” Lene asked, “Because they are looking for other stars that fell to the earth?”

“Exactly, my darling,” her mother replied, “they are talking to their loved ones who are so very far away. You never know who might be a star in disguise. Why, you might even be one. Now, it’s time to sleep. Good night, my little star,” her mum replied, turning off the lights.

Lene left her bed and sat at the window. “I wonder if I am a star,” she whispered.

Story by Raven

Credits

Paddy

Ringo