Rhapsody

constellations: sagitta

 
the seventh night.
10:42 p.m.

we keep meeting there.

i always forget to ask for your name.

a small smile.

i'm arrow.

really?

i look up, and he's grinning wildly.

yes. why?

nothing.

there's obviously something,
but i let it go.

i don't like my name.

why not?

he's astonished.

it's depressing:
an arrow is what kills a person.

it doesn't have to be literal.
it could be...
a love-arrow!
from cupid.
don't girls like that stuff?

i wince.

don't even mention cupid to me.
i've got a bone to pick with that
guy...

why?

stop asking me that.
you're nosy.

he's grinning again.

come with me.

i go with him.

and he shows me sagitta, the arrow.

it's nearly the smallest of
all the constellations
but it can still be seen
from nearly
everywhere
on earth
except the antarctic circle.

there's basically only one star
in it that
you can make out,
because they're all so faint.
alpha sagittae.
it supposedly forms
the feathers of the shaft
of the arrow.

can you see it?

yeah, i can.

he glanced at her from the corner of his eye.
she was lying.
she was looking,
but he could tell that she wasn't seeing.

not in the way that
counted.