Sketch the Stars

PROLOGUE

Ain't no rest for the wicked

--

If I could sleep for ages, I would. There is never a moment my cold, achy bones don't wish for a moment to rest. The snow weighs my worn coat against my shoulders, and I struggle to resist slumping over. The sketch book feels much heavier in my hands now than it did when my mother first gave it to me on my tenth birthday. I'm twelve now; she died not long ago. I suppose she was still upset about my father. He left for the war, but he didn't return. Perhaps he's still fighting for my safety. I wouldn't know.

I wonder how I still have my life, but she hasn't hers. it's almost crazy how these circumstances have come. Mother used to tell me that I was too mature for my age. I suppose I am. I feel fifty, not twelve. Maybe I am not twelve. Maybe I am thirteen, or fifty. I do not know. The moon has stayed in the sky longer than I could count. Sometimes, the moon cries. It lets its tears fall slowly at first, but as time goes on, its speed increases and the dust comes down in a frenzy, surrounding me in gray and white dust that almost resembles ashes.

I have drawn the moon's tears before. I like to imagine the moon is crying for the sun. It is sad and lonely, much like I am. It misses the sun like I miss my mother, and father, though I don't remember Father much. Mother used to tell me that I have his brown hair- and his smile. I can't agree, but then again, I can't disagree, either. Only she would know.

I have tried to draw him. I sat in the ever present moonlight, drawing what I imagined him to look like. I did not like it, so I tore it from my sketch book, crumbled it, and shoved it into the snow. I was once told white represented purity, life, and perfection. I can't help but associate it with death and loss. After all, I lost my mother in the snow. Her blood stained my shirt, and the snow refuses to clean it.

Sometimes I hear whispers. They aren't like the wind's whispers; something similar to whistles. No, they're like conversing ghosts. I sometimes imagine it's my mother talking to me, following me around, keeping me afloat. Other times I believe I'm going insane and that I should let the snow bury me like I let it bury my mother.

Now, however, I truly believe I need to screw my snow-covered head back on correctly. The stars are shining still, pure and untouched. The snow is still cold, crunching beneath my boots. I am still breathing, ragged air seeping into my lungs. I hear what sounds like my mother's voice now. Her voice was calming. She would rock me in the old wooden chair, her arms surrounding me. I wish she was not gone.

Though I am twelve, I am mature. I know that my wish will not come true. The stars may be untouched, but they are not genies. I know will not be granted any wishes tonight.

I consider letting the tears gathering in my eyes fall down my cheeks, but I decide against it. If they fall, it is likely they will freeze on my face and no amount of warm grasps, breathes, or thoughts will be able to remove them. Not while my heart remains with my mother, surrounded by snow and ice, where nobody will ever see it again.

For a moment, my thoughts turn bitter. My father is lucky. He is off, fighting with dignity, if not dead due to a great sacrifice, while I am stuck here, walking miles in an empty field littered with mountains of snow.

Gravity thought I needed a hug at that moment. Perhaps gravity thinks the snow will numb my pain, but my pain is not a physical one. It is mental, and the snow will not melt into my eyes, flow into my brain and freeze there. I wish it would, but it will not. My pain is everlasting. My pain is the snow on the ground; never fading. My pain is the night; dark and relentless.

My mother would touch my head softly and remind me of my age, telling me I am much too young for such thoughts. Maybe I am not twelve any longer. I do not feel twelve. I feel ageless, like the stars. I am not a star, though. I am much too impure. I have been scarred by the moon's tears. I have been scorched by the biting cold. I have been killed by my mother. She didn't mean to, but that does not matter. Her death was the main attraction, and I was the collateral damage. My soul is not with me. It is in my sketch book, surrounded by drawings of my mother in her final moments, of stars shining so brightly in the sky despite the war the snow has started against me, of the moon's tears. Drawings of me, when I was happy; alive.