I loved him the way stars love their own fire: fiercely, completely, without question.
We burned bright together, a single radiant point in the vast dark. Our days were solar flares of laughter and touch; our nights were quiet fusion, two hearts generating light that felt endless. I thought we were eternal. I thought we were safe inside our own gravity.
Then came the collapse.
It wasn’t sudden. Stars don’t simply vanish; they swell first, growing hotter, heavier, more desperate. The arguments grew longer. The silences grew colder. I felt the core of us beginning to give way, pressure building where there had only ever been warmth.
One ordinary evening, the end arrived—not with a fight, but with a quiet sentence that landed like the first crack in a dying sun.
“I can’t do this anymore.”
And just like that, we went supernova.
The explosion was beautiful in the worst way. Everything we had built—promises, inside jokes, shared dreams—flared outward in a blinding wave of pain. I remember the heat of tears, the shockwave of disbelief, the terrifying roar of a future suddenly torn open. It felt like every atom of me was being ripped apart and hurled into the void.
For a long time, there was only darkness and debris.
I drifted through the aftermath, a scattered cloud of what used to be us. Some pieces burned up on re-entry: old playlists I couldn’t listen to, photos I hid in folders, the version of me who believed forever was guaranteed. Other pieces floated cold and sharp, cutting me on quiet nights when I wondered what I could have done differently.
I thought the destruction was the end of the story.
But the universe is kinder than we expect.
Years passed like cosmic dust settling. Slowly, almost secretly, gravity began its patient work again.
The scattered fragments of me—shattered dreams, bruised hope, raw honesty—started pulling toward one another. New bonds formed. Old light found new fuel. Passions I’d set aside reignited. Strengths I never knew I had condensed into solid ground beneath me. Self-love, once a faint ember, flared into a steady glow.
One day I looked inside and realized: the explosion hadn’t destroyed me.
It had scattered me far enough to become something larger.
Where there was once a single star, burning brightly but dependently, there are now entire galaxies turning quietly within me. Swirling arms of creativity. Clusters of courage. Nebulas of gentle, hard-won wisdom. Whole systems of joy that no longer rely on one sun to shine.
Sometimes, on clear nights, I still see the faint glow of what we were—a distant supernova remnant, beautiful from afar. I don’t turn away from it anymore. I simply nod, grateful for the light it gave, and even more grateful for the vast new skies it made room for.
The heartbreak didn’t end me.
It expanded me.
And now, I burn on my own—brighter, wider, and wonderfully, impossibly alive.