gravity → POE DAMERON ✓

e i g h t e e n

𝘾𝙃𝘼𝙋𝙏𝙀𝙍 𝙀𝙄𝙂𝙃𝙏𝙀𝙀𝙉
—𝘪𝘵'𝘴 𝘯𝘰𝘵 𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘭—

SUDDENLY THERE WAS light, shining just beyond Bexley's closed eyelids. And though her eyes were closed, she could see the rays beaming down from the sky. The warmth radiated onto her skin and calmed the cold that had previously rested there; her heart beat a little bit faster, and finally caught up to its normal beat. The air was steady, and no sign of wind or breeze lingered. Everything was still, and no animals made a peep from where they hid in the bushes— not even the birds would sing as they watched the blonde girl sit up.

Her movements were graceful, but slight, as she took in the familiar scene around her. This had happened before, Bexley knew it deep within her warm heart. But how had she gotten back here, into this single moment? Maybe she was sleeping, or knocked out, or even dead. All of that didn't matter now; all that mattered was that here she was, and her mother was sitting in the grass in front of her, humming softly as she twirled her fingers carefully through single blades of grass. Bexley stiffened in her position, breathing heavily as she studied her mother's features as if they were golden. Her mother was here, right in front of her! Why couldn't she react?

"You know, your father and I used to come to this field all the time before you came along," Nova murmers, not looking up to meet her daughter's eyes. Instead, her gaze was still focused on the blades as they wound in her grasp— as if it were so peaceful she had gotten lost in the action. "We would bring a blanket every time, and lay here for hours until the sun went down; just to watch the stars come out."

"Why do you love the stars so much?" Came a young girl's reply. Bexley was perplexed, as the voice came from her lips. But this wasn't her— she was in a different time, in a different body. Her younger self's body, at a time when she was a child.

"Because no matter how long you stare at them, no matter how hard you try, you can never count them all," Nova replies. Her fingers finally find something other than the ground as she places her palms back on her lap and looks to Bexley's face. "When I couldn't sleep at night, my mother used to come into my room and tell me to close my eyes. But instead of nothing, to picture a sky full of twinkling stars that emerged in the night sky, and to try and count them all before I fell asleep. Needless to say, of course, I could never do it. But I fell asleep every time."

The sun, behind her mother's brilliant sitting figure, was beginning to fade on the horizon. It was falling below the tree line, and leaving the girl's view. Soon, the sky would go dark, and the moon would come out to shine once again. And with it would come the stars.

"You had nightmares when you were smaller," Nova continues on, finding peace in her daughter's eyes. "And when you cried, I'd cradle you up in my arms, and take you out onto the balcony and show you the sky. When you looked around . . . you didn't see me anymore. Bexley, your eyes never landed back on me before you fell asleep. You were content with the stars."