The Star Collector

August had a bedroom with a skylight.

This was wonderful for star-watching but not ideal for sleeping, because every time a cloud drifted across the moon, the shadows moved across his ceiling, and every time they moved, August woke up.

On the night of the summer solstice — the longest, most sky-filled night of the year — August gave up on sleeping and just stared up through the skylight at the stars.

He counted seven. Then twenty. Then so many he lost track.

And then one of them moved.

Just slightly. Just a shift, left-to-right, like someone adjusting a lamp. August sat up.

The star moved again.

August opened his skylight — it was on a hinge, just wide enough — stood on his bed, and stuck his head out into the warm summer night.

The star was closer now. Much closer. It wasn't a star at all, he realised. It was a lantern. A small, round, gold-white lantern, carried by the oldest man August had ever seen. He was slight and very tall, with white hair that drifted like cloud wisps, and he was walking — somehow — across the sky, his feet making no sound on the darkness.

"Excuse me," said August.

The old man stopped. He looked down at August with eyes so pale they were almost colourless.

"Ah," he said. "An awake one."

"Who are you?" August asked.

"I am the Keeper," said the old man. "Of the wishes."

He said it so simply, as though this were an obvious job, like postman or baker.

"What wishes?" August asked.

The Keeper held up his lantern. Up close, August could see it was not quite a lantern — it was a glass sphere, and inside it, something was moving. Swirling like smoke, but golden. Warm.

"Every wish ever made," said the Keeper, "by every child who ever looked up and wished on a star — it comes to me. I sort them and hang them." He gestured at the sky. "That is what the stars are, mostly. Sorted wishes. Each one waiting."

August stared.

"Waiting for what?"

"To be answered," said the Keeper simply. "Some are answered quickly. Some take years. But they wait up here, out of the way, where the wishing-person doesn't have to carry them around all the time. Wishes are heavy things. Better to give them to the sky."

August looked at the stars differently now. He tried to imagine what each one held.

A new puppy.

For Mum to stop being sad.

To make one good friend this year — just one.

"Can I help?" he asked. He didn't know why he asked. It just seemed like the right thing.

The Keeper looked at him for a long moment. His lantern swirled gently.

"I could use an assistant tonight," he said. "It is the longest night. There are more wishes than usual."

"How do I get up there?"

The Keeper held out his hand.

August took it, and stepped through the skylight and onto the sky.

The sky felt like nothing August could have described. Solid, somehow, but also not — like walking on water that was somehow also air. Each step left a brief shimmer, like disturbed snow.

"Your job," the Keeper told him, "is to carry these and hang them in the right place."

He handed August a small velvet pouch.

Inside were wishes. August could tell without being told — he could feel them, each a slightly different weight, a slightly different warmth. Some pulsed with urgency. Some were steady and quiet and had clearly been there a long time.

"How do I know where they go?" August asked.

"Each wish finds its own place," said the Keeper. "Trust your hands."

So August walked across the sky with the Keeper, reaching into the velvet pouch and placing each wish where his hands seemed to want to put it. Some went in clusters — small groupings that dimmed and then brightened as he touched them, like they recognised something in him. Some went on their own, separate, particular.

One wish was very heavy. Much heavier than the others.

August held it in both hands. It pulsed warm and slow.

"What is this one?" he asked.

The Keeper looked at it. "That one," he said quietly, "is a child's wish for their very ill grandmother to get better."

August held it very carefully.

"Is it going to be answered?" he asked.

The Keeper was quiet for a moment. "I don't know," he said honestly. "Not all wishes come true the way they're asked. But every wish is heard. Every single one."

August thought about this. He thought about what it meant — to be heard, even when the answer isn't yes. To know someone received your message, even if they couldn't send back what you hoped for.

He placed the wish very gently in a spot near the heart of the sky, where the stars were thickest and the light was warmest.

"Good place," said the Keeper softly.

They worked until the sky began to lighten in the east — a slow grey bloom that widened into rose and gold.

"You should go back," said the Keeper. "Before the day begins."

August looked at the sky around him — the thousands of steady points of light, all those wishes, waiting.

"I never knew," he said.

"Most people don't," said the Keeper. "But some children guess. The ones who look up long enough."

He offered August his hand again.

August stepped back through the skylight. He pulled it closed behind him.

He lay down.

He was asleep before his head fully reached the pillow.

He dreamed of the heavy wish — of the grandmother getting better, or being held, or both — and in the dream it didn't feel sad at all.

It felt like the word enough, said warmly by someone you love.

When he woke, the skylight was full of morning, and the stars were gone.

But they were still up there, he knew. All of them. Waiting. Keeping the wishes safe.

He looked up at the bright blue sky and thought of everyone, everywhere, who had looked up last night and wished on something they thought was only light.

He smiled.

You don't know, he thought, but someone hung your wish very carefully.

The End.