2013

“You know what, Kai. I had a dream.”

It was one of our usual night at our flat during the end of our second year. I was lying on the couch, reading Sartre’s Nausea when Krystal started talking. She was lying on the carpet under the couch, beside Taemin who was asleep. I took a glance at her, she was staring blankly at the ceiling while her fingers played with Taemin’s hair.

“What dream?” I asked as I continued to read the passage that I left off.

“That I am a shooting star,” she said.

I raised my eyebrows, feeling the absurdity in her answer. I closed the book and turned by body, pressing my cheek against the pillow to see her better. I reached out to her, touching her arm as I stared at her eyes. “What do you mean?”

Krystal looked straight into my eyes. “Say, have you ever seen a shooting star, Kai?”

I nodded. “Once in Nice.”

“It falls really fast isn’t it? But you never forget about how beautiful it is, even after you’ve seen another sky full of stars.”

I traced her right arm with my fingers until I caught hers. Loosely, I held them in my hand. “Because it’s rare. For some people it's once-in-a-lifetime chance to see shooting star with eyes.”

“True,” Krystal held my hand and pressed it against her cheek, “that’s why I want to become a shooting star.”

“Why?”

“I like the idea of passing by someone’s life in a millisecond, but leaving behind a deep memory that he’s going to remember even after he has reincarnated for the nth times on earth,” she told me.

I frowned at the ambiguity of her words. “Are you saying that you’re going to leave us?”

Krystal gave me a meaningful smile. A short one, but I could always recall it every time I remembered this conversation.

It was a bitter smile; darker than joy, but happier than sorrow.

“Nah, I never said that. But who knows; maybe I am your shooting star or you’re all mine,” she replied as she placed our entwined hands loosely above her chest and closed her eyelids.

I stared at her until I fell asleep that night.