The Girl Who Collected Stars

They said she was strange.

Every night, when the world dimmed and the streetlights flickered on, she climbed onto her roof with a glass jar and a flashlight that barely worked. She’d sit there, cross-legged, scanning the sky like someone waiting for a sign.

Nobody knew her name. The neighbors called her the star girl.

At first, people laughed. Then they got used to it — the small figure perched on the rooftop, her silhouette etched against the moonlight, waiting. Every few minutes, she’d reach up, twist her wrist in the air like she was plucking something invisible, then gently place it into her jar.

When I finally asked her what she was doing, she said, without looking down, “I’m collecting stars before they burn out.”

Her voice was soft, like wind through paper.

I thought she was joking, but there was something about the way she said it — calm, certain — that made me stop. “You mean you’re… pretending?”

She finally turned to me, smiling faintly. “You can’t pretend something that’s real to you.”

I didn’t know what to say. So I watched her. Every night, I’d see her up there with her jars — dozens of them, lined in rows like glowing secrets. Some were dull, others faintly flickering. Once, I saw one pulse brightly, then fade.

“Do they die?” I asked once.

She shrugged. “Everything does. But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try to hold it for a while.”

I started visiting more often.

She told me she’d been doing it since she was ten. That her grandmother used to tell her stories about how people leave little pieces of themselves in the sky when they dream — the bits that shine brightest just before they fade.

“When I was little,” she said, “I thought if I could catch them, I could keep people’s dreams safe.”

“Do you think that still?” I asked.

She looked up at the stars, her eyes reflecting their light. “Sometimes. Other times, I just like the quiet.”

One night, she handed me a jar. Inside was a faint glimmer — not bright, but steady. “This one’s yours,” she said.

I laughed. “I didn’t lose any dreams.”

She tilted her head. “You lose them all the time. You just don’t notice.”

When I held it, I swore I felt something warm hum against my palms — not light exactly, but memory. I thought of my childhood backyard, the smell of my mother’s cooking, the first time I rode a bike. It was like every soft thing I’d forgotten was glowing just for me.

“How did you—”

She shook her head. “Don’t ask. Just keep it somewhere you’ll see it when you forget who you are.”

Then one night, she stopped coming.

The roof was empty. The jars were gone. For a while, I thought maybe she’d moved away. Then, one morning, I walked by her house and saw it: thousands of tiny shards of glass glimmering in the grass, catching the sunrise.

It looked like the sky had fallen and shattered.

No one knew what happened to her. Some said she’d left. Others whispered that maybe she’d climbed too high, chasing the stars she loved too much.

But that night, when the darkness came, the sky was the brightest I’d ever seen.

Every star shimmered a little differently — softer, closer. And for the first time, I thought I understood. Maybe she hadn’t disappeared at all. Maybe she’d just let go of the jars, setting everything free — herself included.

Now, whenever I look up, I think of her sitting somewhere beyond sight, still collecting. Still keeping things safe.

And sometimes, when the world feels too heavy, I take out that same jar she gave me. It doesn’t glow anymore, but I still hold it close, just to remind myself of what she said that night:

“Everything fades, but not everything is lost.”