she had always wanted to be an astronaut.
since she was little, she had dreamed of wearing a the white layered material spacesuit and shooting off into the sky.
five
four
three
two
one
liftoff
she wanted to step on the moon; to travel further than any astronaut ever had before in the history of the universe, to have her name in the history books
as a little girl, she had glow in the dark star stickers on her ceiling. every night she went to bed counting each one, and counting down the days she had until she could fulfill her dreams. she added more and more stars as the years passed, until her entire ceiling was filled with various sized five pointed figures.
he had been with her since day one, sharing the same exact dream.
"kookie!" she shouted, running towards the playground they always played at.
"i told you to stop calling me that!" he pouted, crossing his child-length arms as he sat on the swing.
she ran to him and sat in the swing next to him. "yeah, but i like calling you that!" she smiled, showing her missing two front teeth.
"hey, hey kookie! my mom got me a toy spaceship!" she said, showing him. "wanna play?"
he nodded excitedly, as they began to imagine themselves as astronauts, soaring through space, waiting in excitement for whatever adventures were in store.
as the years passed, he began to change. he slowly stopped talking about space, or mentioning anything space related. he would keep to himself most of the time without really talking to her unless she initiated the conversation.
eventually, when they entered high school, they didn't speak to each other at all.
he only noticed her around school. she didn't have any friends, but he never made any attempt to change that, and his heart never felt a pang of guilt when he saw her eating lunch alone.
but he always notices the little things about her, and he's been noticing the things about her ever since they were little. how her backpack had a small, red rocket ship keychain strapped onto the larger pocket. how her physics notebook had a star sticker on the top left corner and a comet sticker on the bottom right corner of it. he never failed to notice how her eyes lit up whenever their physics teacher talked about the forces in space.
he was mentally at her side, but not physically.
but one day, she didn't show up to school.
he thought it was odd. she had never missed a day of school before; not even in preschool. was she sick? he couldn't stop wondering about what could've happened to her.
"yo, jungkookie, you okay?" his friend, jimin, whispered next to him.
"oh, yeah." he said, brushing off the topic and bringing his attention back to the teacher.
but the only thing on his mind was that empty seat across the room.
▽△
she came back to school a week later.
he was shocked. her eyes had lost it's shine. she looked a lot paler, and the once cheery aura she carried with her was reduced to nothing.
