To Catch a Firefly

by Emmy Sanders

“I’m gonna get out of this town one day, El.” He never was mine to keep. No matter how much I wish it.

“But we’re not done,” he says vehemently, stepping into my space. “We’ll never be done. Me and you, we don’t have an ending.”

I was ten years old when I met Lucky. I knew it then, and I know it now. He’s a firefly. Luminous and wild. He was never meant to be trapped. Not here and not with me. And in a few days, I’ll finally watch him fly away.

“Have you ever wanted someone so much,” I say slowly, “that it feels like your atoms are vibrating when you’re away from them? Like you’re half of a whole, and your body knows it. And until you’re in their arms again, every single piece of you is straining toward them because…because they’re your home. They’re part of you. Your beginning and your never-ending. How? How do I move on from that?”