Week 10 Story: The Starlit Lovers

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     Once upon a time, there was a young woman who lived near a forest. Every week, she would go into the forest to pick a special purple fruit for her table. Once night, as she was about to head home, she looked up to the night sky and noticed that it was full of stars. As she looked a little while longer, she seemed to notice that one star was a bit brighter than the other, and maybe even closer to Earth. 

     She thought it might just be a planet, as sometimes they were visible from Earth. She continued home and fell asleep wondering if that star was indeed a planet, or maybe something more. She dreamed of the star, and in her dream, the star turned into a handsome young man. The mans eyes were as brilliant as the star itself, and she soon fell in love. When she woke up the next morning, she decided that she needed to go back to the forest and examine the star again. So, she waited until mid afternoon and headed to the forest.

     Not too long after she arrived in the forest, she began to see the stars appearing in the sky. She sat and watched until the brightest star reappeared in the same spot it had been in the night before. She noticed that the star seemed to almost be winking at her, and she wished in her mind that the star would, in fact, be the man from her dream. A few seconds after making her wish, she heard a voice coming from nowhere. The voice said that as long as she was living on Earth, he would not be able to join her, and that she would not be able to join him in the sky. She began to cry and walked home.

     She lay in bed that night, wondering if there was anything she would be able to do to bring her and her love together. She stayed awake the entire night, thinking of things that might work. Eventually, she decided that her life was no longer worth living here on Earth, and began to plan out her own death. Later that day, she met an old witch, and asked her if she knew of any way to die. The witch refused to give her the information she desired, but instead, offered a new idea. The witch offered to turn her into a star, and the young girl was elated. She immediately took the offer, and prepared herself for the magic that was about to transform her.

     As night began to fall, the bright star reappeared, looking for his love down on Earth. He began to grow worried as he could not seem to find her. Right as he was about to give up, he noticed a brighter light shining beside him. He looked over and saw the love of his life, no longer on Earth as a human, but in the sky as a beautiful star. Together they continue to light up the night sky every night, and can sometimes be seen in constellations, holding hands and looking into each other's eyes. The end.

Authors Note: My story is based off of a story titled "A Maiden Who Loved a Star" from a book titled  "When the Storm God Rides: Tejas and Other Indian Legends" written by the Tejas Indians from the early 20th century. In the original version, a young maiden goes out to pick purple fruit and notices a star that it shining brighter than the others and seems to be closer to Earth than the other stars. She goes back every night to see the star and dreams about it becoming a man. She learns that the two can never be together if he is in the sky and she is on Earth. She then asks a witch how to die so she can be with her lover, but is instead turned into a tree, where the sky man reaches out and touches her in her new form. As he touches her, he turns to dust and falls all over the tree. The dust then turns into purple flowers that grow on the tree, and the two spent the rest of forever together. My story is very similar, except that instead of turning into a tree, the main character turns into a star and the two lovers are seen in constellations instead of purple plants.