Fallen Star

One summer's night, a young nobleman attending a large gala had grown tired of the festivities, and had went outside onto a balcony to rest his head . Now, this gentleman was a scholarly type, one accustomed to the shadows of candles, musty textbooks, and moldy wood tables than good food and wine. Although he was becoming a great intellectual, he was not a very good at casual chatting, and so a good friend of his, the son of a high ranking earl, suggested that he take a break from the pursuits of knowledge to improve his conversational skills by coming to the fiftieth anniversary of the local opera house. He didn't want to, but he didn't want to displease his good friend, whose company he valued very much.

Unfortunately, nothing about the large party really improved anything. The young man was currently pacing around the marble tiles, arms crossed, with his eyes only at the ground. "How in the world does he deal with such gatherings? They are very unproductive! All everyone does is eat, drink, dance, and drink some more! I see no opportunities for pleasant conversation! Truly, this entire thing was a waste of time..."

Still pacing, he kept mumbling to himself. It was a pesky habit of his that his friend tried to stop, but it was all he could do to keep him from exploding with anger. Formulas he had memorized, experiments he planned to conduct, page numbers he needed to read...anything to keep his mind off this annoying predicament. He hoped that his friend would finally finish his business here and take him home, but as he kept walking, he couldn't but hear something very peculiar. Footsteps. When he first heard them, he turned around to look at the white columns, and saw nothing. He kept going, looking at the entrance which connected the opera house with the balcony and the columns, which, besides the tiles and the balustrade, were the only items in sight. But he saw nothing still.

"...this can only be one person..." he muttered, trying to figure out where the sound was coming from. "Hey. Hey! Stop hiding! I'm tired of this entire thing. If I can just ask your men to take me home with your permission..."

However, he did not see a man come out of the columns, but a young woman with long hair and a scarlet dress. He suddenly remembered her, as she was the only girl who was nice enough to offer him a dance. She seemed a bit quiet and subdued, but she did thank him for the dance before she went off with another partner. Now that he thought about it, she had many dance partners tonight...

"...oh, miss. Hello there," he greeted. Well, if there was any good of a time as ever to talk to anyone, he guessed it was now.

But there was no answer.

"Excuse me, but I am speaking to you," he said, raising his voice. She didn't seem to notice, to his discontent, instead looking at something in the distance. He looked at the city buildings, not seeing anything particularly interesting. But something sparkled from the corner of his eyes. He turned his head upward, and widened his eyes as he saw them.

"Oh, wow. It's not often you have meteor showers this viewable..." he muttered after a long pause of admiration for the dancing lights. Even an intellectual like himself could appreciate nature's beauty every so often, or even more so than most, so he believed.

"...that's true," she finally replied, turning to the young man and smiling. "Forgive me, I didn't want to stop watching. Falling stars are amazing, aren't they?"

"Oh, yes," he replied, with a smile in return. She didn't seem as sad anymore, he noted. But who could be sad when nature's beauty was at work? "But it's odd though...because, in reality, falling stars aren't really stars at all."

"They're...not?"

"Nope. Actually, falling stars, shooting stars, or whatever you would like to call them are actually just pieces of debris floating in space which have fallen into the atmosphere. They're more appropriately called meteors," he replied, in his matter-of-fact way. It was elementary astronomy.

The young woman, on the other hand, had tilted her head a little, with her eyes and mouth widened in surprise. "So...So...are you telling me...falling stars are...just pieces of rock in space?"


"Hm. Basically," he replied with a shrug. He was hoping she understood all of this, as it sometimes went over people's heads. "True stars, on the other hand...well, we're not too sure what they're made of. But they're too far away for us to see if they fall. No one really knows if real stars can actually fall."

The meteor shower was still going on. The young lady kept looking back at that and listening to the man more and more frequently as he spoke. Her hand was clenched her chest as he finished, the other one swaying a bit and stroking her hair.

"I think I understand," she responded after a while.

"Oh, really? That's good--"

"-- so...there are real stars...and there are fake stars, the falling stars. The real stars, they will always shine in the sky. Their light will always be seen by us. They will always remain above and beyond our reach," she concluded, softly pounding her fist into her her other hand. "...but falling stars. Falling stars...are merely just debris that falls into our atmosphere...but how exactly do they make that beautiful light?"

"The atmosphere burns up the space debris," he replied.

She laughed a little, her gloved fingers covering her mouth. "Somehow, I felt the answer would be as such."

"...I beg your pardon?"

"Fallen stars...they are just...pieces of debris...from space, right? These debris just wander off throughout space, not knowing what to do. And suddenly, these debris see a large place. It looks really interesting, and the debris really wants to see what this place is about. But...as it approaches...as it learns more and more about the large place...the atmosphere takes over the piece of debris. Changes it so that the debris is not really a debris anymore, but a falling star," she explained, with her eyes on the star shower completely. "Falling stars...are really beautiful on the outside. But, in reality, they're actually suffering from their sudden change. What's worse, though, is that each falling star is so easily replaced by another falling star. Over, and over, and over again..."

The last few shooting stars struck, lit, and disappeared into the night sky. A cool breeze fell on the two, and the young woman shivered a little. But her eyes were still on the sky.

"...wasn't that...magnificent?" he asked, hesitating a little. He suddenly put his hand into hers. "...magnificent..."

"The falling stars? My, yes. It was quite the show. I hope I'll be able to see them again," she whispered, pushing the hand back away.

The boy put his rejected hand behind his head, feeling a little light headed. "...say. I...I'm going to get something warm. Would you like me to get some for you? You look pale."

"Oh...no thanks. I'm just fine, sir. You can go ahead, I'll come down soon," she replied.

The young man nodded, backed away, and walked past the marble columns to the door. He couldn't help but look back. She was still looking high into the night sky, still searching for something, it seemed.

He wondered if he'd ever see her again.