Sometimes I thought you were just selfish, Natalia. A completely spoiled and stuck-up woman who wanted what you wanted rather that what everyone else did. I never did ask you why you were the way you were. I never asked you why you looked the way you did. I would always instead ask the same, or at least generally the same, questions when you would pull away the way you had. First, they began like this: What do you want? Do you want the best food, the best music, the best of me? What do you want me to do? Burn down the homes of those that bother you? What will it take to see that I don't want the world to go on without you? Eventually, they became more drawn out and less angry and more hurt. Something like: Did you ever stop and think about how I was or what I did with myself? I would gladly give up misery and uncaring thought for you.

I usually answered myself on them. No, no you didn't. Not one bit did you care. There was nothing in your fiber that would have even tried to. From the time she began appearing in my life, again I suppose, the whole world felt heavy. Breathing became an almost laborious act. Yet, I still want to know why you had these sudden changes in character. For just split moments. For certain moments you showed care and compassion. They were beautiful, to say the least. One of those days, when I asked what she was waiting for in staying by me, she broke.

One particular evening, she asked me what I was doing that night. I shrugged and mumbled something about procrastinating. So, I had a nice full schedule to work with. Maybe she wanted to rest somewhere. Or maybe she just wanted to be out late, but she followed me back to my apartment. There was one thing that never really felt right though. I never heard her breathe.

I can't tell you exactly when I took to drinking, but all I can say is that I never expected it really get me anywhere at all. All those nights of just beer or some other drink I can't remember really never did jack shit for me. Yet, I did it anyway. Why? I can't tell you. She never really touched her glass. Just let it sit there, mocking my empty ones. All it did was show just how pathetic I was. I can't remember when I stopped downing glasses of whatever it was. I can't remember what time it was or when she finally spoke to me. I can't tell you anything. Except that it did happen.

She'd come by whenever I asked or whenever she felt like it. Spur of the moment, I guess. Usually it'd go the same way though: I'd lament, crash and burn, then pass out. She'd still be there in the morning and when I would awake, she would rise and leave.

"Aren't you full?" she'd sometimes say. "Don't you want to get up tomorrow?" she'd say on other occasions.

I drank anyway. I was probably the most depressing thing she's ever seen. I knew that. I'll always know that. There was an evening though that made me stop. Just stop altogether for good. I dropped at glass onto the table and let it spill with whatever was left in it. My head fell into my hands. I peered through my fingers. I cringed.

I could feel them. Those painfully stoic eyes. Just staring. Nothing else, but staring. They hurt, you know. Even when you couldn't see them, they hurt. I refused to see. I stayed lurched over. Suddenly, the table was utterly fascinating; the empty glass staining the wood was of my up most interest. Make her stop. Someone, just make her stop it. My head hurt and my eyes were burning. What was this? Some sort of mind trick she was playing on me? Natalia, what are you? I heard a ruffle of fabric. Crossing her legs maybe?

"I wish you had never died."

The words were slow and icy, but most of all, they were dead serious. I think my jaw fell and my eyes widened. I can't remember. But I can tell this: my head rose and turned uneasily to her. There she was, perfectly still, unfazed by what just came from her mouth. I stared straight into those eyes. They're too beautiful to be so cruel. It was at that moment that I came became much more aware of my breathing. I was. I swallowed and my hand came to my neck. Even through the fear induced sweat, my pulse greeted back, almost joyously as if to say "Oh, no, Toris, you're very much alive". It was lying. I was dead by that point in time.

"Close your eyes," she said once. I must have asked why. "I'll show you."

Reluctantly, I did. I sat there like an idiot, thinking she was trying to walk out on me. I stiffened at her cold fingers on my eyes. They felt like they were going to burn through my lids at the frigid temperature. My mind went blank and my senses dulled until vanishing completely. I don't understand but, perhaps a second later, I felt the cold ground underneath my back. The icicle-like fingers were gone, yet the overall air was crisp. I opened my eyes. The dark sky greeted me back. I stared at it for a good twenty or thirty seconds. No way. Really? No freaking way. I was outside. On my back. During nighttime. It was a little after noon a minute ago! I moved my fingers. It felt like chilled plants. I felt the shape. Clover? Oh, God. My upper body bolted up and forward.

Yes, I was in fact outside, on a hill, in a clover patch, in the middle of nowhere. Awesome. My breathing became erratic. The thought of Natalia, whom had been sitting very poised next to me the entire time, hadn't even come within a mile of my brain. She may have been amused or annoyed, but mostly patient. She had the decency to let it all sink in slowly and numbingly that I had gone from one place to the next by closing my eyes. I pulled some of the grass from the ground.

"This doesn't happen," I almost screamed. "This just doesn't happen!"

"Why?" my capturer said very slowly. She was probably mocking me. "Why not?"

"Because!" I pulled my legs to my chest. "It just doesn't… doesn't make sense!"

"Why does it have to though?" She nonchalantly placed a clover on my knee. "Why does it have to have an explanation? Why can't it just be? The plant is real, isn't?" I picked it up in my fingers and nodded. "Well then, it's real. This is, that is," she brushed the last comment in with a gesture to the scenery. "Let the world be real. Let reality be rewritten."

"Let the stars fall down?" I was choking on the air.

The grin was obvious in her voice. "Oh? You see it too?"

The sky was bright now. Not with the sun or with city lights, but small bright orbs falling from the sky. Glittering, glowing stars slowly descending from up above. I stared, watching the magic happen. They were gold, pinkish, and silver. I tried to stand, failing the first three or five attempts, but eventually balanced on two feet. I exhaled, my breath catching into the air and into the stars. The lights danced off of everything, the ground, her hair. Everything. When I looked back at her, her eyes now looked like they actually had life to them. She seemed content.

"What is this?" I asked, reaching my hands up. They were hot and cold at the same time. She stood up. "This isn't possible either, you know."

I think she smirked at me. She was probably just thinking about how stupid I was. My fingers tried to grasp one. Nothing but the same strange feeling. They just glowed and vanished. Her hair changed colors with each step she took. It was beautiful. She gave a little twirl. I don't think she meant it to be intentional, but she looked like she was dancing. Probably not. She was too proud to dance around in a field with me. That's what I thought.

"What do you think they are?" she asked, pulling her hair from her face as it pooled over her eyes with the backs of her hands.

"They look like stars," I told her.

"Then they are."

"You can't just decide it just like that."

"Sure you can." She came closer to me. "You can if you feel like. No one's going to tell you what they are, so why not decide for yourself?"

I smiled. I know I did. The only thing I wanted to do then was lie down on the ground again and let the sky fall down, like this. Forget everything. Forget the people I didn't like, the places I never got to go to, the papers I never wrote, the tests I may have failed, the classes I didn't want to see anymore, the future I had forgotten to think about. Forget the world and everyone else in it. Just me, the stars, and the girl who probably hated my guts. But, you know, I didn't care. Not one bit. It was just too good to be true and I was going to take what I was given. Real or not.

I can't tell you how long I spent there with her. I can't tell you how long I smiled. Hell, I can't even tell you where I was. But, there were lights and multi-colored grasses with the air hardly feeling cold at all. There was an exchange of looks with a grin from me and a puzzled stare from her. There was a bow and a reluctant acceptance. There were spins, twirls, hands holding one another. Maybe, for a moment, there was more than one smile. Just for a moment. But it was more beautiful than new snow. When the sky began to grow dark, her hands fell onto my face.

"Have a good night," she whispered to me.

Before my senses fell into oblivion, I returned a, "Good night, Natalia."

I woke up on my couch, sprawled across it as if I had been there the entire night. My heart quickened. No. I didn't want it to be fake. I didn't want it to have never happened. I leaped off onto the floor. I had my shoes on. Good sign! I tripped through the room and out the door. I pushed past some kid carrying a stack of books, ignoring his bitter swears that he called after me. All I could think about was her. Her and the stars. Her, the stars, and dancing in them. I leaped down the stars. Please, please have been real. I could still feel her hands in mine. My heart stopped upon reaching outside.

There she was, sitting on a bench, just as she had been before. Her dress was even the same purple one she had been wearing. She fixed her headband before turning to me. My breath was a mess, so was my hair. I wanted to throw myself into her lap and hold her at that moment. Just to make sure she was the real thing, a real person that wasn't just made up in my head. But I didn't move. I wish I had now. It would have made things clearer than they are. I feel like I'm chasing a ghost or a car that can never be caught. Instead, she stood up, gave me a nod, and left. And there I stood, frozen to the spot. Someone called to me from some floor above me. They wanted to know if I was alright standing outside this early in the morning. They didn't even mention you, Natalia. Did they even know you had just been there? Did they even know that I would have given up my arm just to see you walk back to me and stay?

Hey everyone! If you follow me on Tumblr you would know that this extremely late... OTL

I'm very sorry it's short! The next bit will be much longer, trust me!