before you read

this story contains sequences of character deaths, extremely bittersweet moments and sinking ships.

Added : since this is my first book here, it's shabbily written, and the plot is a little cliche but the main objective is to show how love is an innate feeling unlike the shallow one which is common these days. Also, there will be a million errors, but I'll be editing this some day when I've a blank mind and enough time to do so! byeee x

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Can you wait till I swim across a frozen ocean for you?

- Tara [A Lot Like Moon & Stars]

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playlist

1. Breathe (Taylor Swift, Colbie Caillat)

2. Jump then Fall (Taylor Swift)

3. All Of The Stars (Ed Sheeran)

4. Infinity (One Direction)

5. Starlight (Muse)

6. Total Eclipse of Heart (Jill Andrews)

7. She's a Rebel (Green Day)

8. Your Guardian Angel (The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus)

9. The Fault In Our Stars (Troye Sivan)

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Story aesthetic : A Lot Like Moon & Stars

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i. prologue

D E N E B » the farthest

21 December, 2014.

Winter.

The season between autumn, and spring consists of the coldest months of the years - comprising of December, January, and February. A period of boundless inactivity, decay, and death. A period where you need a fuel to keep yourself warm, not even bothering if you are burnt alive in it.

I snuggle into my warm jacket, tapping my feet impatiently against the concrete-floor. It's hard - as hard as the concrete beneath my feet - to feel left alone every single moment, I think as I gaze at the stars through the window.

And yet, what I simply do is wait.

You know what is the worst part about waiting?

The worst part about waiting is that you are the one left behind. You are the one who has to stay and wait.

It is said that long ago - men used to go to the sea, and women would wait for them, standing at the edge of the water, scanning the horizon for the tiny ship in the spectrum of their labyrinth.

Now I wait for Tara. She has gone far, vanished into the sky. And I wait for her. Each second I wait feels like a year, an eternity. Each moment passing away is like glass - slow and transparent. And during this wait, I can hear myself shattering into pieces just like that glass. I can feel myself falling away like the leaves from an autumn tree. I can feel myself breaking and falling apart into so many pieces that it can never be fixed again to complete my whole.

My life has become a monotonous trail of monotonous events now. I sleep alone, wake up alone, survive alone. And all I do is play - until I am tired, until every single cell in my body exhales out exhaustion, and inhales in nothing but hollowness. It feels as if a fire is let loose in my gut that is beginning to spread, and my heart has embraced the lofty weight of a hundred yard wall which has been dropped right over my chest.

This wait is killing me.

Don't try to find me. I will never return. Her last words ring in my ears as I place my laptop against my folded thighs, and open its lid. I type down the letters which are the cause of my sunken eyes, sore throat, and torn up heart. Typing her name, Tara Dobriyal doesn't fill the blank void in my heart, because I know that they're still a blur of jumbled letters which I need to sort out. But I don't want to give up. All I want her is to return to me, and fill that blank void.

My heart beats rapidly fast in my chest, so fast that I could hear it hammer against my ribcage as I click on the first result of my search. It's her facebook page. I think that the wait is finally going to be over after I see her face flashing in front of me, on my the laptop screen.

The person I've spent my nights waking up, laughing and chatting. It is hard to register the fact that I had hardly known her for three months because every moment with her seemed as clear as crystal - and through each moment, I can see infinite moments lined up, waiting.

My hands begin to shake in a way, I cannot control as I scroll down the page. Everything stops. The bone-chilling winter winds stop, the air becomes bereft of oxygen so that my breathing stops. And most importantly, my heart stops. It stops beating, and for a second I doubt whether I am really alive when I feel my heart spasm violently, all over again.

RIP Tara Dobriyal.
Dated : 15/07/2012

All my condolences to the Dobriyal family for the unbearable loss of their daughter, Tara.
Dated : 14/07/2012

May your soul rest in peace, Tara.
Dated : 14/07/2012

I shut the lid of my laptop abruptly, and start shaking in a way that I cannot control. Tears let themselves free from my eyes and slide down my cheek in an unbroken stream that I cannot stop them. I feel this is too much and too little at the same time. It's confusing, and I am unable to grasp the information that has been bombarded upon me all of a sudden.

I feel everything slowly freeze around me, only one thing remaining constant. That's her picture sealed in my heart. She is smiling there. She has always been the always smiling kind. Smiling through her tears, through her fears, through everything that has been rolled over, on the journey of her life. She cannot die. She doesn't deserve to die.

No one deserves to die.

It is said that whenever you're in pain, or whenever you're in fear, your heart starts beating rapidly fast. But what I cannot fathom is whether my heart is beating as fast as a racing car because of pain or fear.

My brain continues to think about the two possible conjectures until it retracts back to those messages which had generated those two emotions. 14/07/2012, 15/07/2012. I recall the dates.

Was it possible to meet a girl after her death?

For a moment, I wonder if Tara was an illusion, a trick of the highest order that seemed so incredibly true to me and my heart. I begin to wonder whether the wait was useless - just like waiting for stars to shine under the daylight, or probably waiting for the rain to shower in this cold, wintery night.

"Can you wait till I swim across a frozen ocean for you?" She asked me.

Can I wait for that long? Wait till she swims across a frozen ocean to make her warmth reach the the other end so that she can make me feel alive again.

Can anyone wait for that long?

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