Stardust
Cast
Organizations
Locations
My love flew off across the galaxy.
The final line of the song echoed in Nera's head long after the show had ended, mingling with the buzz of her drink. The staff of the Mystique swept up around her, their voices carrying the hush of the late hour and the giggles that came from running on fumes. They occasionally shot Nera a confused glance, but she'd tipped the bartender well enough that he let her stay past closing. The band had mostly packed up and Rane would be by soon. Assuming she accepted Nera's invite (she always did).
But that would be then. Now, Nera downed the last sips of her cocktail. Love & War, one of the signature drinks of the restaurant/bar/nightclub. It felt fitting. The sector was on the brink of war, and here she was meeting with a past love. The spicy-floral mix was hardly unique - she'd had similar ones in a dozen bars across the galaxy - but there was a uniquely Mithoran taste to it. A hint of citrus just before the heat kicked in. The final sip packed a punch with all the chilli powder that'd sunk to the bottom.
Coming home always felt strange. The past she barely thought of fought her present for control of her thoughts. Present Nera the free travelling forger of weird jewelry, facing down Old Nera the young adult trapped in a town she'd outgrown. Of all the places she'd ever left behind, this was the only one she ever returned to, and she wrestled the ghost of her past every time.
Unable to sit still, she left her empty glass on the bar and browsed the posters on the nearby wall. The Mystique was older than Nera, and its history was told in the names carved into the bartop, the spots worn into the stage, and the walls covered in framed flyers from past events. She recognized some as ones she'd attended, years ago. It took a few minutes to find the one advertising Rane's first show. The photo showed her in an asymmetrical dress, back when her hair was long and she only had one piercing. She'd worn a necklace Nera had made her - a polished river stone wrapped in wire. Pretty basic compared to what Nera could do now, but it'd taken her weeks to make at the time.
Nera had been so proud of Rane, so insistent that this was only the start to an incredible career. Nera hadn't realized then that Rane didn't want an incredible career, and didn't want to be anything more than a local artist.
A pair of footsteps slowed as they got closer. “Will you ever give prior warning before you show up,” Rane said, “or is a note halfway through my set the best you can do?”
Rane looked much as she did on stage tonight. Her sparkling sapphire dress matched the gemstones in her brow and contrasted with the faded pink of her hair. A hairclip would keep the overgrown parts out of her face. Nera had the perfect one, if only she'd brought it. “I like the handwritten notes,” she said, “They add a little... mystique.”
Rane's groan at the dumb joke came packaged with a smile. A genuine one, not the put-on she wore while performing. A good start to the conversation. Nera just had to keep hold of who she was, and not fall into who she used to be.
“It was a great set,” Nera said, “You hit those high notes like it's easy.”
“It wasn't that great. Energy was lagging toward the end, and—”
“Take the damn compliment, you dork.”
Rane's laugh this time was accompanied by a blush warming the cool undertones of her cheeks. She never was good at accepting praise. “Those earrings a new piece of yours? They look good.”
Nera's hand went to the spiral dangling from her ear, adorned with asteroid dust suspended in resin. “They're different from my usual. I'm trying out processes that use less heat.” Not that she had much of a choice. The fucked up life support engine at her new home couldn't produce the power she needed to run her furnace at full force.
Rane leaned closer. The tips of her fingertips brushed Nera's jawline as she examined the earring closer. “Different, maybe, but I'd recognize your work anywhere.”
Nera could smell Rane's perfume, mixed with the sweat of the night and the lotion Rane always wore. Memories joined the alcohol making Nera's head swim. Taking turns dropping wishing flowers into the river. Walking each other home after staying out too late. The taste of wine on Rane's lips. How easy it was to fall back in love with her presence in a matter of minutes.
Rane released Nera and stepped back to a more respectable distance. “I remember when you could barely put together a pair of studs. I still have that necklace you made for me,” she pointed to the poster Nera was still next to. “It's sadly in pieces now. I'd let Mattias borrow it for a date, and before he was out the door he'd somehow snagged it on his bag. He apologized so much he missed the train and Jona had to drive him to—” she must have caught a look of confusion, as she interrupted herself to ask, “Do you remember Mattias? Tyr's younger brother?”
The name sounded familiar, but Nera couldn't pull the details from her memory. Those were Old Nera's connections. She brushed the question aside. “I don't know how you don't get bored, staying in one place your whole life.”
Rane crossed her arms and leaned her shoulder against the wall. “Some people can get excitement and interest without planet hopping every six months.”
“I stay for more than six months.”
“Are you still on Janus?”
“Well...”
Rane raised her sapphire-studded brow at that. The conversation veered to dangerous places and Nera had to bring it back on course.
“We both know I could never last long there. They're way too stuffy with their whole ‘law is god’ nonsense.” Nera waved a hand as if shooing away a fly. “The new place I'm at is absolute trash, it's amazing. It's on this little asteroid near Janus, completely falling apart, but they managed to convince the Protectorate to fund them. Now all these suits are running around, but they're the nerdy ones always talking about data and calculations and shit. It's adorable.”
“And it'll be six months before they're also too something and you leave?” Oh no.
“At least I'm going out and experiencing the galaxy.” The words raced out of her mouth before she could stop them.
“And complaining about it.” Rane uncrossed her arms to begin counting on her fingers the places Nera had escaped to. “Devali? Too many flowers. Xeros was too dark, as I recall.” One, two.
“I only needed to suffer through one Devalian pollen storm to know I hated it there, and Xeros messed with my sleep too much.”
“There was also Nisora.” A third.
“My work didn't sell well.” Nera's head spun, either from the drink or from having all her excuses laid bare. Why did she really leave? Same reason every time. The shiny lustre of the new wore off and she got bored.
“Then Janus, now the new place.” Four, five. “Add three, maybe four other stations and rest stops? All in... seven years? But you'll never come back to Mithorous.”
“There's nothing for me here!” Nera regretted it as soon as she said it.
A tired sadness colored Rane's eyes. She dropped her hands in defeat. “Of course. Because the whole planet is just like the one town you grew up in.”
“That's not what I meant.”
And there it was again. That old monster. They picked at each other's decisions until one of them snapped. They dug in their heals and drove deeper into the rut they both were stuck in. No matter how much time had passed, no matter how convinced Nera was that this time would be different. It never was.
“Everything alright Rane?” the bartender returned to ask, likely drawn to the raised voices.
“Yes,” Rane answered, pasting on her performer's smile. The one that satisfied people who didn't know her. “Just catching up with an old friend.”
He nodded, but the way he eyed Nera said he wasn't convinced. “Your mom recovering well?”
“She is, thank you for asking.”
“Good, good. Glad to hear it. Listen, we're going to be closing up...”
“Of course, we'll take this outside.”
Rane's smile faded as soon as the bartender could no longer see it. Nera followed her across the Mystique and toward the staff exit. All the chairs were stacked and the tables naked of their tablecloths with an autonomous vacuum circling around them.
“Is your mom alright?” Nera asked once they were away from the droning. She hadn't known anything was wrong with Rane's mom in the first place.
“She had a minor surgery a few months ago. Everyone's been so kind. She's gotten more care packages than we know what to do with.”
Rane's mom was an elementary school teacher, well loved by everyone except the brattiest of kids. She'd sent Nera to the corner more than once. Nera couldn't provide any help with recovery, and it sounded like it wasn't needed anyways, but who didn't like getting custom-made jewelry? By the time they reached the exit, a design already formed in Nera's mind.
Night weather bludgeoned them as they stepped outside. The smell of oaku fruits punctuated the late summer humidity. Few lights still shone in the buildings around them, and the street lights weren't enough to drown out the sight of the Milky Way stretched across the sky. All three moons were visible, nearly in alignment. An astronomical advertisement for the upcoming Three Moon Festival.
A van idled nearby full of Rane's band members waiting for her to join them. The driver looked familiar, someone Nera probably knew once but couldn't recall how.
They probably remembered the Old Nera, before the tattoos of every planet she'd lived on. Before a Devalian shrub took root in her furnace, and the Xerosian eternal night gifted her insomnia, and she failed to entice rebellious Nisorans to her art. Every new planet let her start over, bolstered by lessons learned but untethered by expectations. Mithorous was an anchor, tying her to someone she wasn't anymore.
Seven years ago, they were nineteen and sat in the backyard of Nera's parent's house. Nera was bursting at the seams with excitement. She'd planned everything out: They'd leave for Devali in a month, where the flowers would be amazing inspiration. Nera already had an apartment rented in her name, and nearby was both a creator's space with all the equipment she'd need and a music studio where Rane could do professional recordings of her music. It'd be perfect.
With so much out there to experience, how could they possibly stay in one place? Mithorous was big and diverse, but there were other planets to see. She'd never stopped to think she might be wrong until she saw the heartbroken expression on Rane's face.
“You're leaving?”
“I thought you'd come with me.”
“You thought wrong!”
They didn't have to live in that moment anymore. This was Nera's last chance to cut them both free.
“Rane,” Nera took Rane's hand and the two faced each other in the midnight street. “I didn't come here to pick these old fights with you. The opposite, kind of. I don't know how much of it you get here, but people out there?” She waved at the sky. “They're scared. It's looking like war from every angle. There's no playbook for where we go from here, but it's going to be bad. Whatever's going to happen, I want to face it knowing we have each other's backs. Even if you're here on Mithorous and I'm... elsewhere.”
“What are you saying? You want to forget what happened between us?”
“Not forget, move on from. Stop digging ourselves into these holes and having the same argument over and over again.”
Rane's eyes looked anywhere but at Nera's. The ground, Nera's hand still holding hers, Nera's shoulders where a strapless shirt left her tattoos exposed. With a deep breath, she turned her face to the sky. Nera's heart sank deeper the longer the silence ticked by. Her palms began sweating and she fought to keep steady. All the confidence she'd built over the years was gone. Old Nera has fully taken over.
“You have no idea how much it hurt when you left,” Rane said, still staring at the stars. “I know you don't, because you never apologized. Not once. All those times we talked about our future together—”
“If an apology is what you want, then—”
“I don't need an apology anymore. We were kids and it's been years.” She turned to Nera. “But the past, our past, isn't something you can leave behind like every other place you get sick of. It's a permanent part of both our lives. It's time you accepted that.”
The spins returned and Nera couldn't blame the alcohol this time. It wasn't supposed to go this way. “Accept... what? That you hate me?”
“Accept the consequences of leaving. I could never hate you, but the woman I'd thought I'd spend my life with suddenly announced she was leaving the planet in a month. It shattered me. You can't come back once a year and expect things will always be the same as they were before that.”
A realization snaked through Nera's mind, something about how the real anchor was the mistakes she never rectified along the way. It wouldn't grow into something comprehensible tonight. Not with the giant boulder pinning her stomach to her feet. She swallowed back tears and reclaimed some of her mind for Present Nera. Shoulders back, head high, confident.
If only the words that crossed her lips next weren't the stupidest ones she'd said all night.
“Is this a way for you to keep playing Stardust without being a liar?”
Rane locked eyes with her. “You may have inspired it, but that song was never yours.”
Rane pulled her hand free and climbed into the waiting van. Nera stood rooted in place as they drove away. The taillights burned an after image into her eyes.
I'm just staring up to see the light trails you leave when you fly away from me...
How strange to be on the other side of the song this time.
This is gorgeous and heartbreaking. I hate every decision that they made and how they were thinking it was a mistake even as they said it. Great writing from such a real place.
Learn about the World of Wizard's Peak.
And this takes the award for the best comment I've received all WE ❤
Speculative-Fiction Writing