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She said, “The stars are beautiful tonight.”
“Yes,” he replied, softly. “They are.”
“It is rare for us to see a sight quite like this one.” He made a noise of agreement. “It makes me think of childhood, back to those whimsical days of wishing upon shooting stars. I had almost forgotten what it was like to hope and dream.”
“You can still dream.”
“I could but alas, with age and experience has come cursed cynicism,” she replied with a ghost of a smile.
“You speak as if you’re old.”
“You’d be surprised.”
“Well...” he exhaled slowly through his nose, thinking. “You are perfectly capable. You don’t need the stars to have your wishes granted.”
“I supposed not,” she laughed gently, finally looking at him. “You know, for a long time, I’ve wished I could do instead of wish. I wished to be a better version of myself, a ‘me’ that did more than daydream about a better tomorrow. I feel as if I haven’t done enough to be that ‘me’.”
“I don’t agree,” he smiled. “It’s hard to see the footprints you leave when you are facing forward.”
She looked at him with a wondrous expression on her face. “Sometimes I feel like you can see into my heart.” She paused for a moment as if a great internal struggle had befallen her before continuing. “I-I do have a wish.”
“Oh?”
“Well, two wishes. The first you know of.”
“Yes, to reunite with your brother.”
“Yes,” she smiled, warmly. “It’s been all I’ve thought about until now. Now, someone else has been on my mind.”
“Who is it?”
“You.”
“Ah.”
“Ah?”
“We are of one mind now."
She asked, "Did I make you wait?”
“No,” he shook his head. “We’ve been walking the same path. You just stopped momentarily to smell the cecelias.”
She smiled. “All the same, thank you for waiting for me.”
“Think nothing of it.” He reached over and she took his hand, interlacing her fingers in his own.
“But still, I hesitated all this time because I fear that our path will eventually diverge.”
“It may be inevitable but that won’t change anything. My heart only knows yours.”
Tears seeped into the corner of her eyes. “And mine yours.” She wiped her face with the back of her hand, looking up into the stars speckled across the skies. “I have so much to do. I still have a ways to go before I can be with you.”
“I don’t mind,” he said. “I’ll walk with you for now.”
“If your feet tire, then you’ll tell me.”
“If that happens, we can sit down and look at the stars for a moment.”
They stand there hand in hand, admiring the vastness of the universe together. She asked almost inaudibly, “Do you think they’ll be as beautiful then as they are now?”
“Even more so,” he replied, without a shred of doubt in his heart.