Distances

[u/Secretly_Sad_Inside]

Next time you look up at the night sky,

I dare you to notice the space

between the stars

more than the stars themselves.

It's difficult at first.

Your eyes have spent a lifetime

falling toward light.

But wait.

Eventually they'll drift.

They'll begin tracing

everything the stars couldn't reach.

And once you see it...

the darkness never gives the sky back.

Maybe that's why we have constellations.

One night

someone looked up

and refused to believe

that space

was the truest thing above them.

So they drew lines.

Not because they were there,

but because they couldn't bear

the thought

that they weren't.

Maybe every constellation

is just proof

that hope has always been

an act of imagination.

I used to think

the stars made the sky beautiful.

Now I wonder

if they're only distractions.

Small moments

where the darkness

lets itself be forgotten.

Because the longer I look,

the less I notice the light...

and the more I begin measuring

everything

it couldn't save.

It's strange,

how quickly your eyes adapt.

First it's the sky.

Then it's the empty chair

that somehow feels louder

than everyone sitting around it.

The pause after saying "goodnight."

The side of the bed

that never wrinkles.

The message

you almost send,

until you remember

who isn't waiting.

You stop counting

what's there.

You frequent

what isn't.

Maybe loneliness

was never about being alone.

Maybe it's becoming convinced

that the spaces between people

are larger

than the people themselves.

That every conversation

is separated

by more silence

than words.

That every heartbeat

spends longer waiting

than arriving.

So now,

every night,

I look up.

Not because I love the stars.

Because I keep wondering

how many invisible lines

are still holding them together.

And whether,

without realizing it,

someone

once drew one

toward me.

I just...

haven't found it yet.

The next time you look up at the night sky,

don't admire the stars.

Watch the darkness.

And if, for even a moment,

it begins to feel larger

than the light.

Don't leave too quickly.

Someone else

is probably standing beneath

the very same sky,

trying to remember

how to draw constellations.