A/N: I'm baccckkkkkkk. I know it's been close to 4 months since I updated this one-shot series but in my defense I didn't expect my life to take the turn it did in 2020 and that was before starting a major fic called My Life, My Kingdom, My War which I will shamelessly plug here, or, you know, a pandemic. Anyway, this one is going to be a sort-of song-fic based on the Russian song Smuglyanka. The inspiration for doing something like this comes from my friend and fellow Star vs. writer LordCornwalis whose works I would highly recommend you go read if you're not yet familiar with. His most recent chapter had a lovely homage to another excellent Russian song from the same time period and it just seemed like a good idea. It will also be my first foray into first person so fingers crossed this actually works But you didn't come to hear me blather on, you came to read! So then… let me spin you a tale.
I couldn't sleep, the warm summer air making it impossible to get comfortable. Tossing and turning, I finally opened my eyes to see a pale pink spreading over the horizon signaling dawn and decided now was as good a time as any to get up. Walking over to my window on the second floor of my family's modest home, I could see into the neighboring family's garden. They had come to our little village recently as refugees, fleeing the war in to the west which every day seemed to creep closer to our beloved corner of the world. To my surprise, it appeared that I wasn't the only one awake at this ungodly hour as I heard the distinctive creak of a door opening. Walking into the now rising sunshine was a girl I had never seen before, with golden hair as bright as the wheat ripening in the fields. As she began to gather grapes among the small batch of vines in the yard, I instantly became smitten with her. I grew red, I grew pale, I began to sweat. All I could think of in that moment was wanting to shout out to her "Let's meet together ever dawn this summer down by the river!"
Over the coming days I would find any excuse to run into the girl who I learned was named Star Butterfly. We would walk together through markets and along the riverbanks and beneath thick stands of maple trees, their green and curly leaves shading us. One day I could take it no longer and during one walk underneath those maples I carved our names together, Marco and Star, into a tree and said, "Star, I stand here in front of you, in love and embarrassed. This war is getting worse every day and I don't know how much longer we'll be safe. So while we still have each other, let's make the most of it."
My heart felt like it was being crushed when I saw the sympathy in Star's eyes. "I'm sorry Marco. I can't come with you. There's a resistance group gathering in the woods, ready to fight this war even if our home is overrun! I already let this war claim one home from me, I won't let it take another. A lot of others from the village left their homes this morning. If you want to run and hide so be it. But if you want to join us, the road deep in the forest will always be waiting." There, under those same curly and green maple leaves where we had walked together, where I had carved our names and where I thought our love would be carved on each other's hearts, we parted.
Star left with the other resistance fighters that day. They went deep into the forest and hid from the enemy, determined to carry on the war no matter how hopeless the situation seemed. In time, her words came to pass and our little village was overrun. Many ran, including my family and I. We became new settlers in an unfamiliar village, just as Star and her family had once been newcomers to ours. If anyone had asked me I would have been the first to admit that I was hurt, aggrieved, that Star hadn't asked me to come with her that day. That if I wanted to join the resistance it would be my choice to fight, rather than my choice to be with her, or her choice to bring me with her. Many nights I stared up at the ceiling in my room and thought of her. The way her laugh was so infectious, the way her eyes sparkled with the same brightness as the stream, and of those same eyes filled with sadness that day under the maple trees. Deep down, I knew she loved me, I had to find her again!
I packed some supplies and kissed my parents goodbye as I too ran into a forest and joined a different band of resistance fighters. We carried on, moving from place to place, sometimes meeting up with different groups and working together if we were al in the same area. Suddenly one day I was tending a fire when a pair of boots stopped in front of me. I looked up and there she was! Smiling as if heaven had sent me down to her. I rose and she seized me in a hug shouting for everyone to hear, "My good Marco, my dearest Marco, my love, my Marco!"
Amidst the delirium of my happiness at Star's embrace, I looked up and realized that, just as it had been that day, it was summer and we were embracing beneath maple trees, leaves curly and green. And this time when I asked her if she would accept my love, she said yes beneath the maple trees, we kissed beneath those maples and were married there too. And many years later, when the war had been won and we had returned to my old village, now our new home, I took my children by the hand and showed them a maple tree, leaves curly and green, carved with the name of my love.
A/N: And that's a wrap on that. Less than a thousand words which I know is short but to be fair the chorus takes up a surprising amount of this song. If you want to listen to it in the original Russian by the way it is beautiful and you just need to search the chapter title on Youtube. I hope you enjoyed and that my first foray into song-fics, first person, and writing a chapter with Russian lyrics translated into English didn't come out too badly. If it did, my bad, hopefully next time is better. Please feel free to leave a fav or follow and I do take requests if you want to leave suggestions in the reviews of PM me.