“Have you ever seen a rose without thorns?”
“Yeah, obviously.”
“No, I mean, obviously you’ve seen one before, but can you remember it?”
“…”
“Yeah, I think so.”
“Well, I can’t. The only roses I can remember are the ones I get pricked by.”
“Ah.”
She looked at him. They had been looking at the stars from the top of his car roof, but now she was observing his face. He looked absent, as if any thoughts that had been there crawled out of his ears and into the soil below.
“Why are you always like this?”
“Like what?”
His eyes remained fixed to the sky.
“You know.”
“I don’t know. Like, what? You want me to think really hard about if I can remember a rose without thorns?”
He thought for a bit.
“Yeah, I can.”
“Enough about the roses, please.”
It was quiet for a while. The desert sky, away from the bustle of the city, looked beautiful. The stars shone as if they were happy someone took the time to come and see them.
“The streetlights are beautiful from up here. It’s like a sea of stars.”
He finally looked at her. Apparently, she wasn’t looking at the sky, her gaze instead steered towards the cityscape below. Her steely expression didn’t seem to match her words. Although the sea below was beautiful, it was supposed to be and so it was. She preferred it that way.
“Oh, I see what you mean.”
“Do you?”
“…”
“I think so.”
“You think so.”
He looked back at the night sky. The stars above promised him all sorts of things. Those things were so far and out of reach that it kept things simple. He preferred it that way.
She turned her gaze towards him, while he kept his eyes where he liked them best.
“Do you love me?”
“…”
“Yeah, I think so.”
“Of course you do.”
“Yeah.”
“Why can’t you just say you know so?”
“Because I think so.”
She started crying. He didn’t stir. A few minutes passed and she managed to pull herself together.
“You know what. I think I want you to take me home.”
“…”
“I’m sorry.”
They silently slid off the car roof. He grabbed the blanket they had laid on top and packed it into the trunk. She got into the passenger seat and waited. Closing the trunk, he opened the driver side door. He sat down beside her. He then reached for the keys in his pocket, grabbed them, and turned on the car.
He sat there for a second, there wasn’t any particular rush. He looked at his stars and noticed they were harder to see. She looked at hers too; they were bright as ever. His hand moved to turn up the car radio slightly. A tune now hummed in the background, but it was quiet and no one was listening. He reversed, put the car in drive, then veered to the left and onto the desert road. It was dark out, but the headlights lit the way just fine.
“I just… I don’t get you.”
“…”
“Me too.”
“It isn’t fair to me, you know?”
“…”
“Yeah, I know.”
The drive was going to take a while. He liked to go deep into the desert to get the best view of the sky he could get. She liked it too but for different reasons.
They continued in silence for a while. The desert road eventually came to an end and seamlessly transitioned onto the city street. He kept the headlights on although there were street lamps which now lit the way. The street lamps were dispersed in a manner that failed to illuminate the whole street, instead only piercing the darkness with intermittent patches of orange light. Cars headed down these streets were constantly in flux, light to dark, dark to light. In this car, the flux limited itself to the passenger seat.
In the midst of one of the patches of dark, she started to cry again. He said and did nothing. She pulled herself together.
Light. “I thought we could make things work.”
Dark. “…”
Light. “Like…” , she was a bit choked up at this point, “I know things aren’t perfect between us but…”
Dark. “I – I really don’t know what to tell you.”
Light. “I know you don’t.”
They continued on their way back to her house. He knew the way by heart. They stopped at a traffic light. Only a couple more blocks and they would be at her place.
The traffic lights in addition to the increased prominence of the street lamps fully lit this portion of the city. A little red man by the crosswalk had a timer next to him, and it was ticking down at a steady pace. He took note of this, but was in no rush. This was the last time he’d get to see her. Probably. She was also looking at the timer, but her heart was racing; she couldn’t wait for it to hit zero. He looked up to the sky and noticed the stars were gone. Try as he might, they had apparently vanished into thin air. He pondered if they had ever been there to begin with.
“You never even loved me.” The red man walked towards a seven.
“…” 6.
“I tried to.” 5.
“Like hell you did.” 4.
“…” 3.
“There were times. Times where I thought I did.” 2.
“All you do is fucking think. I thought this – I think that – just shut up, please.” 1.
So he did.
The timer hit zero, and the light turned green. She breathed a sigh of relief. They continued on, passing two more intersections. Fortunately for her, both the lights were green.
They didn’t have much time left, but there also wasn’t much left to say. She looked out her window, flashing black and orange, back and forth. She held back tears, but wasn’t about to cry in front of him again. He stared forward, seemingly transfixed by the road. He had thoughts, of course, but they weren’t particularly sad, aside from the stars disappearing. Finally, they crept into her neighborhood and down the street. They passed house after house until he eventually spotted hers. It was a little bit harder to find than usual tonight because the street lamp was out.
In the darkness, he pulled up beside her house and put his foot on the brake. He knew that this wouldn’t take very long.
“Bye.”
“…”
She slammed the door shut.
“Bye.”
She walked to her front door. He watched. Grabbing the keys from her pocket, she clambered about in the dark looking for the right one. Prevailing, she placed it into the keyhole and twisted. A faint light streamed from the inside of her house. Although her head was down, the light reflected back at him a spark that ran down her eye, to her cheek, and then promptly to the ground. She headed inside without looking back. He thought that spark had looked as if a bit of stardust had escaped from the stars above. This could have just been his imagination.
Left all alone, he wasn’t in any particular rush to head back home. He put the car in park, opened the sunroof, and reclined his seat back. The cold night air flooded his senses and made him painfully aware of his existence. He focused his attention elsewhere. Scouring the night sky, he tried his best to search for even a single star. Though, his best wasn’t enough, and none appeared.
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