THE END : Somewhere, Somewhen

The school bell rang.

Students burst into the hallway like sunlight through clouds—laughing, yelling, waving their arms in the careless way only the young can.

___ leaned back in his chair at the end of the day, watching the world through the window of the teacher’s lounge. A cup of lukewarm tea sat untouched beside him. The staff talked in soft murmurs, papers shuffled, phones buzzed.

Routine. Predictable. Peaceful.

It had been three years since he saw her by chance on that street.

He’d never seen her again.

Sometimes he wondered if she recognized him. If she had turned the corner and stopped, heart racing, hand trembling with memories.

Or if she had walked away without a second thought.

He never chased the answer.

Some things, he decided, were meant to be left uncertain.

⸻

That weekend, he visited the observatory again.

Not the broken one from the city—but a new place, smaller, run by volunteers. He taught astronomy workshops to children here sometimes, letting them point out stars they’d only seen in pictures.

Tonight, the dome ceiling opened slowly, revealing a clear, real sky. No artificial projections. No blinking lights. Just stars—distant, cold, eternal.

He stood there alone, head tilted back.

Somewhere out there, she was under the same sky.

Living.

Breathing.

He didn’t know where or who she was now.

But maybe that was okay.

⸻

A small voice interrupted him.

“Sensei?”

He turned.

A little girl with a telescope bigger than her arms stood by the railing. “Which one’s the North Star again?”

He knelt beside her and gently adjusted the telescope.

“That one,” he said. “It doesn’t move. Even when the others do.”

“Why?”

“Because even when everything else changes… that one stays.”

She nodded thoughtfully and went back to peering through the lens.

He stood, looking up once more.

He didn’t know if she remembered him.

But he remembered her.

And in the quiet between stars, he carried her name like a constellation only he could see.

Still shining.

Somewhere, somewhen

                               THE END ?