When I was eight my cousin told me stars were just giant fireflies that got too close to the moon. They were trapped there forever holding up lights in the sky because their little bodies couldn’t burn that bright. I held onto this belief, told all my friends this wonderful discovery laughed when they said it wasn’t true. Some told me of their old sibling’s stories of fireballs in the sky and chunks of the moon. How unbelievable, fireballs in the sky? We all scoffed at the idea.

When I was ten I sat in a plastic seat while the teacher droned on of gas and fire, supernovas and The Big Bang Theory. His pants were too short and his ankles showed and it annoyed me that he couldn’t tell us all the constellations. He made the stars seem dim as if they really were just ***** of gas, dust and fire. I looked at the science and took it in as if it were an orphaned bird. I scoffed at the kid in me screaming for fireflies.

When I was twelve I cried a lot. I walked the middle school hallways timidly as if I was a deer during hunting season. They singled us out, the ones who felt it all while being emotionally stepped on. They could pinpoint us as easily as knowing one’s own address. And yet we didn’t group together nor become friends, we all feared the rejection that was so often served to us. We all wished upon silly things like candles, dandelions, falling feathers, and stars. We always believed in the stars. I scoffed at the cruelty of it all.

When I was 17 I began to believe again. Small fingers tugged on mine asking what stars were really made of and I said fireflies holding chunks of the moon. A reflex reaction to a question I so often ignored and stored in the science category of my brain. Silently chastising myself for letting her believe me, she wouldn’t believe in fireflies forever. I scoffed at myself for forgetting I was once small fingers tugging, asking for stars.