nebula || jungjaehyun

⇢ stardust ⇠

12

stardust 

Kim Ahn Na races ahead of him, her short hair flying behind her. She taps the bell atop the handles and swerves on her bike. Her laughter fills the sultry air. 

Unlike her minute frame, which disappears beneath her clothes, her laugh is big. She is a dwarf planet, while her laughter is a solar system. It flares and illuminates everything nearby in colorful explosions. Stars dance before his eyes as the planet before him weaves to and fro, a comet rocketing through space. 

She's zero gravity, and she pulls him along with her. He used to think gravity was too much, and soon he'd collapse. But with her, he knows the intimacy of weightlessness. And the collapse doesn't matter: they will remain stardust. 

After several months of keeping each other company, Jaehyun knows with absolute certainty that he wants to be with Ahn Na. And the way her eyes crinkle when she glimpses at him from beneath her tiny eyelashes, he convinces himself that she wants to be with him too. 

She also proves a most effective patch: he hasn't touched a cigarette in months. Some days, he relies on nicotine gum and convenience store patches like they're oxygen and he's trapped underwater. Other times, he forgets entirely that he had the habit to begin with. 

The itch is always there. A constant thrumming against his parietal lobe. But it's not as loud. Like distant radio static. And when his personal moon is nearby, he can almost drown it out completely. 

And he realizes that drowning isn't so bad. 

He pumps his legs harder and overtakes her. His dimples a nigh-permanent fixture, he releases a laugh. It isn't loud like hers, but it feels weightless. It feels good. 

Breathless, like caught in space, they lay beside each other in the grass. He hears the rush of the river down the hill. The sky above him dazzles with stars. And he can't help but marvel at the similarity between the night sky and her eyes. 

"Go on a date with me." 

"What?" 

He props himself up on his elbow, resting his head in his hand. He smiles down at her. So small, so monumental--and he's the wolf, tamed and obedient. She even wears red today. 

"Go on a date with me." 

Her smile is the creation of a planet: dust, then collisions, then life-giving beauty. "Okay." 

"Really?" 

"Yes, silly." 

"Okay." 

"Okay." 

And his heart sails above the moon, into zero gravity, into the specks of stardust.