The First Star

I was standing in the rain.

Not storm rain, not heavy, angry thunder rain—just that quiet, steady kind that seeps into everything without announcing itself. It hit my face like cold fingertips, slid into my collar, dripped from my sleeves. I didn’t care. I just stood there and let it wash over me because something in my chest had cracked open again. Once those memories push through, there’s no stopping them.

Rain always brings me back.

Snow too.

Any weather that softens the noise of the world pulls me straight into the past.

And suddenly I’m a kid again, walking home from school with my friends. Heavy school bags, itchy uniforms, hair tied too tight. Same sidewalk. Same intersection. Same telephone pole I could find blindfolded. Same laughter from the same girls who always knew my secrets before I did.

We were just kids.

But the things we felt didn’t feel like kid things.

Every day, they’d elbow me, shove me, whisper like they were dropping tiny bombs.

“There he is again.”

“The boy.”

Like that was enough. Like I didn’t already know exactly who they meant.

There he was—leaning on that old telephone pole a few blocks from my house. Same spot every morning, every afternoon. Like he had grown out of the pavement itself.

Back pressed against the wood, arms crossed or hands in pockets. One leg straight, the other bent, sneaker flat against the pole. Hair messy like he forgot to comb it. Shirt clean, pressed, no wrinkles. Eyes quiet but sharp. Like he was watching everything—but only one thing mattered.

And that one thing was me.

I knew it.

My friends knew it.

Anyone with eyes knew it.

Meanwhile, other boys threw themselves at me. Letters folded into hearts, flowers yanked from someone else’s garden, candy bought with their own money. Some even fought—actual fists—over who got to walk behind me, who got to carry my bag if I dropped it.

It should’ve made me feel special.

Mostly it just made me tired.

I threw everything away without opening it. Every letter. Every flower. Every gift. And they saw me do it. I didn’t want any of it.

But him…

I noticed him.

And that scared me so much I denied it for weeks.

The girls teased until I wanted to disappear into the sidewalk.

“Oh my God, look—he’s staring again!”

“He only sees you!”

“He doesn’t even blink when you walk by!”

I’d snap at them to shut up, but inside I was shaking. Face burning. Heart doing that stupid, uncontrollable flutter. I tried to walk slower without looking slow. Tried not to stare back even though I wanted to.

Weeks went by like that. A silent, delicate dance neither of us admitted to.

Then one cold afternoon, he finally spoke.

He pushed off the pole as I got close. Snow in his hair, breath white in the air. When he said “hi,” his voice cracked so badly I wanted to laugh and cry at once. I said hi back—too fast, too loud. We stood there until the world felt too small for just the two of us.

But from that moment, everything changed.

We talked every day after.

Shy at first.

Him stuttering, me babbling, both of us staring at the ground more than at each other.

We found our secret place. It became the center of everything.

We met there almost every night. Not for anything crazy—just to talk about nothing, hold hands like it was dangerous. His hands were always cold; he’d warm them on mine like I was something precious. Sometimes he slipped me little crumpled notes with shaky handwriting and tiny hearts. Sometimes a tangerine, because it was my favorite.

Those nights stitched something into me that never came out.

Then came the night everything broke.

He told me to meet him outside my house. Late. Too late for kids. I crept through the dark, holding my breath so the floor wouldn’t creak. The air outside was sharp, the street dead quiet.

He stood under the streetlight like he was waiting for a verdict. Snow sticking to his hair, his coat, his eyelashes. He looked older somehow. Broken in a way he shouldn’t have been.

When I walked up, he swallowed like the words might kill him.

“I’m leaving,” he said. “Tomorrow morning.”

Everything inside me stopped.

“My family is leaving the country. I’m not supposed to tell anyone. But I couldn’t leave without telling you.”

His hands shook when he grabbed mine. He kissed my hand quickly, like he wasn’t sure he was allowed. Then he pulled out a small silver ring—two little hands clasped together, like a promise. He said he’d walked through snow, store after store, until he found the one he wanted to give me for my birthday next week.

I couldn’t speak. Could barely breathe.

He said he’d miss me. Said it wasn’t goodbye. But we both felt the goodbye anyway.

Finally I managed to whisper:

“I’ll look at the biggest star. The first one that comes out every night. When I think of you. You do the same.”

He nodded fast.

“I promise.”

He walked away.

I stayed until he was gone.

Then I went to my room and cried all night.

After that, letters came. My friend brought the first one from the school mailroom, eyes wide. Then every week. I could spot his handwriting across the room. They became the best part of my week.

Then my own life flipped—my family sent me away too, for a “better life.”

No warning. No way to tell him.

Just silence. Heavy, endless silence.

Years blurred.

Decades.

Marriage.

Children.

A whole life built on top of the ache.

Then, twenty-five years later, I found out he was here. Same country. Different state. Close enough to feel impossible.

I flew to see him. Made up some stupid excuse to be there.

We met again.

He wasn’t a boy anymore. Tall, some gray, six feet, strong shoulders, a face carrying things I couldn’t name.

On the way to the beach, he reached for my hand without looking. I felt the same electricity. Like twenty-five years hadn’t touched it. For a second, the universe stopped.

I held on too long.

He did too.

Neither of us let go first.

We walked Venice Beach. Laughed. Talked about the past like it was a dream we both remembered exactly the same.

He told me he never forgot. That he missed me. That he still had my pictures. Things I wasn’t ready to hear but needed anyway.

I kept searching his eyes for the sixteen-year-old who walked through snow looking for the perfect ring. The one who held my hand like a vow. The one breaking under that streetlight.

Before I knew it, I said:

“I still have the ring.”

I carry it close to my heart like something holy, and I showed him.

Still looking at the ocean, he said it. Quiet. Careful. Like he’d been carrying it for years.

“I always look at our star. I look at it and think of you.”

My heart didn’t just hurt—it caved in.

Folded like it had been waiting its whole life for that sentence.

Every letter, every silence, every year wondering if he forgot…

He hadn’t.

He never had.

My voice came out broken:

“I do it too.”

I felt every single night I’d spent looking up, searching for something that felt like him.

“I still look at it. Every time.”

He closed his eyes for a second, like the words landed somewhere he kept locked.

And I knew.

He’d carried the same ache.

The same unfinished story.

The sun sank behind us, bleeding the sky red like the world was grieving too.

We knew we had to walk away.

But we stood still, caught between what was and what could never be again.

A sudden gust of wind rushed off the ocean, fierce and cold, as if the world itself refused to let us go. It whipped my hair across my face, pressed his coat against his chest, and for one impossible second pushed us closer: shoulders brushing, hands colliding, fingers catching like they remembered exactly how to lock. I felt his warmth cut through the chill, felt the years peel away, and tears filled my eyes faster than I could blink them back. One slipped down, hot against the wind, and I saw his eyes shining wet too—mirroring mine.

“I never stopped,” he whispered finally, voice low and trembling, almost lost to the wind.

“I know,” I said, my own voice breaking. “Me neither.”

We stood there, letting the tide pull at the sand and at us, letting the sky turn every shade of fire and rose above us. For the first time in decades, it felt like we were exactly where we were supposed to be. Not everything could go back, but some things didn’t need to change. Some love stayed alive in the quiet places inside you, carried like a secret star you never stop looking for.

I held the ring to my heart, feeling the cold metal press against my skin. He reached for my hand again, slower this time, more certain. Our fingers entwined, and I felt it—the same impossible, electric pull as when we were sixteen, standing under snow and streetlight, hearts too big for the world around us.

“I’ll still look at our star,” I whispered.

“I do too,” he said.

And for one heartbeat, one perfect, unbroken heartbeat, it was enough.

The years didn’t matter. The distance didn’t matter. All that mattered was this—the quiet, burning, unshakable ache that had waited patiently for us both, and finally, finally, it was home.