Saturday night after the first week of school, I receive a text from an unknown number. I open my phone and read the one word message. "Astraea." Feeling a bit unsafe, I choose to delete the text without replying, and ignore it. Moments later as I am drifting to sleep, I hear my phone vibrate again. I silently mutter a string of curses as I feel for my phone.
"Sorry. I didn't realize that only saying your name could be kind of creepy. This is Silas. AKA new boy." I read.
Instead of a simple hello, or saying that it's okay, I reply with. "How the hell did you get my number? Are you stalking me?" I realize it is a bit dramatic, but I shouldn't be texting him anyways.
"No, I have my ways. ;)" he replies quickly. "I just wanted to learn more about your name. I love it." As I read the last message, I hear my mother walking towards my door and quickly lock my phone. She steps in and I pretend to be asleep.
"Astraea. I thought I saw a light in here is everything okay?" She asks with suspicion. Groaning in reply, I act as if I am too tired to answer. She leaves without shutting the door. I wait for her to walk back to her own room and roll my eyes at her back.
My mom has always been too overprotective and strict. I was never allowed to have sleepovers or go to any boy-girl parties even as a child. I consider it a miracle I have any social life at all with her constantly hovering over my shoulder and reading all of my messages.
Shutting the door, I turn down the light on my phone and go to text back. I see that he left another message, and it throws me off guard.
"It's obvious that you hate me, or maybe that is your personality, but if I did something to make you like that I want to fix it. You seem like a nice person to anyone else and I know I am nice, so we could be nice together ;)." I know I was being too harsh. Just because I don't want to develop feelings, or have my friends question my sanity about texting an outcast.
I scoff at my foolishness, and realize that all of the things I have been doing for several years was to maintain my popularity. I decide to do something spontaneous for once.
Without thinking about it further, I text him back, "Hey. I do not hate you, I think I was just intimidated..." I lock my phone as soon as I see he reads it and regret texting him immediately.
"Intimidated...really? Not what I was expecting. Im sorry my manliness threw off your first impression of me."
"Oh please, what manliness? Half of the guys at our school would bet all of their money that you are gay." I reply following his flirtatious style of texting.
Our conversation for the next few hours is a tennis match, wit and humor bouncing between us intensifying with each strike. I don't know what I am getting into, but I will not let it affect me tonight. Not when I have not had a better time in years. Not when texting him makes me shiver from the adrenaline.
I don't realize how late it is, until I am barely unable to keep my eyes open. The time as I text Silas slips by as beach sand slipping through the fingers of a child raking their fingers through the warm grains. "Did you realize it is already 2 AM?" I ask interrupting our flirting.
"Yeah I looked a few minutes ago, but I didn't want to say anything. I guess we should go to sleep." He says, and I imagine him sighing as he hits send. "...or we could keep texting and pretend it is 2 in the afternoon."
"Let's go with the second one." I reply. "It means star in Latin by the way."
"What are you talking about?"
"You asked about my name when you first texted me, Astraea, it means star in Latin."
"Well I knew that, but why?"
"It's not the perfect fairy-tale story that I am sure you are thinking of." I honestly state. The background behind my name is a story I don't like to recall, but for some strange reason, I felt as though I could trust him with anything. Before he had a chance to reply, I began the story.
"I was conceived because my mother was raped. My mom was in an abusive relationship at nineteen, she wanted to wait until marriage for anything sexual, but he forced himself on her. She wanted to abort me so that she wouldn't have a constant reminder of that monster, my father."
"Wow... I don't know what to say. I still don't understand how you got your name though."
"My mother's parents wouldn't let her abort me, but she snuck out and tried to anyways. On her way to the hospital to abort me, she was distracted by a falling star. There is a Greek myth about falling stars that if you have done something wrong, a star will fall. After receiving that 'sign',she decided not to have an abortion and named me after that star that lost its position in the sky because of her mistakes."
He reads the message, but he doesn't reply for several minutes. I become impatient and I begin to close the app until I see the three little dots that shows he is texting back.
"I have never heard anything so beautiful. Astraea, there is nothing dull or common about you. Everything about you is extraordinary. I think I have fallen in love. Not so much with you...yet...but with your amazing story."
I blush at his words, and change the subject. "How about we play twenty-one questions so we can learn more about each other." I text while getting up and walking out to the balcony to watch the Stars. "You go first."
"Okay. What is your favorite thing to do?" He asks
"Stargazing." As I send it I look up to the Stars and whisper a greeting as if the Stars are distant friends. "My turn. What is your obsession with trying to make people smile or laugh?"
"When I was thirteen, I was told I have severe depression, which made me break down and cry at the most random times. I felt out of control. I felt like a spoiled bratty child, but I couldn't stop the feeling. My parents made me start going to a support group where I made some friends. One day I had heard a joke that made me smile, and so I shared it with my friends. Their reaction made me feel infinite, better than when I heard the joke myself for the first time. So I resorted to trying to make people laugh more often. Seeing others happy and laughing makes me feel as though I am back in control of my own life. Don't say anything to anyone though you are the first person I have told... I know it sounds stupid."
"It's not stupid. It's beautiful. The fact that making others feel good helps you is amazing."
Our conversation continues for hours with random, pointless questions, until he texts "Texting you is great, but I feel that in order to really get to know someone, you have to be able to see their expressions and hear their laugh. Maybe next weekend we can catch up face to face." I re-read this message for several minutes thinking of all the possibilities. What if someone sees us together. What if it turns out to be really awkward. What if my mom finds out I hang out with a guy. I push all negative thoughts out of my mind and focus on trying to be a better person.
I say a farewell to the Stars and return to my room to lie down. "I'd love to."
***
So what do you guys think? Is Silas right for Astraea? Should they hang out? Does it seem like Astraea is using him to mold herself into a better person? Do you like the name Astraea? Let me know your thoughts in the comments and do me a favor and click the little star for me. ;)
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Look to the Stars
Teen Fiction"We look up to the Stars with sweaty, interlocked hands, not knowing that their distance is as unfathomable as our futures. Listening to his heart beat in his chest, I whisper 'I love you.' Oblivious that it would be the last time I would hear him s...
