When she was younger, she had always quietly scoffed when she read about a character who felt as if they were floating among the stars. Yes, it sounded mysterious and poetic, but they were only balls of gas, burning thousands of light years away.

That was before she understood. These little Illuminators Of The Night were not just pretty things to look at in a dark sky, they were pockets of life, tucked away in the blanket of the universe.

Now, as she walked down The Beach with just their light to guide her, she felt as if she would drift away if she stared long enough. Become detached from the greedy hands of gravity, and join the embers in the sky.

This had been her beach for as long as she could remember. She remembered walking down it collecting sea glass with her grandmother when she was little, learning to surf here with her mother when she was older. But ever since her grandmother had moved on and her house had been sold, she hadn't been back in a very long while.

Yet here she was again, fate having brought her back. The winds were too gusty though, the waves crashing a bit too loudly, with almost enough rhythm, but not quite. She had seen this twice before, with her grandmother and then her sister. Her mother had told her once, on a gloomy night when secrets make their appearance and everything is made known in the dark, the only reason she was not yet an orphan was because the stars were waiting to claim her first, Mother coming soon after.

When she had first decided to come back to The Beach, she had only meant to prepare herself, to become comfortable with her fate. But now that she was here, shoes abandoned somewhere behind her, the wet sand sticking to her feet with every step and the darkness taming the warm summer air, she understood. For the second time that night, she understood. She understood that the waves were done waiting, and the Undying Lanterns were getting impatient.

So she walked, listening to the fizz of the water as it retreated into the tide, the crash as if that of a hammer on the ocean floor, the soft patter of her feet as she walked across the damp stardust, and the little splash as the tide reached up for her toes. She looked around, noticing the dying embers of a bonfire, casting almost-shadows on the trees lining The Beach. She looked far ahead, catching glimpses of light, this time worldly, of restaurants and hotels welcoming late night visitors.

Now she cast her gaze across the water, admiring the reflection of the moon on the ripples, the gentle silhouette of a small fisherman's boat anchored for the night. Though in the darkness she could see only the outline, all other features swallowed up by the stage of the stars, her imagination joined hands with it and ran. Pictures were painted in her mind of what the little vessel had seen, who it had met and what exotic waters it had sliced in two.

She stopped, deciding that yes. Yes, now she was ready. Now she was ready to say goodbye, and join her loved ones in the sky. Although she knew it really wasn't her decision to make, she allowed herself this last moment of ignorance, to pretend that just this once she had a say in the universe.

She curled her toes, feeling the masses of rocks and minerals beaten and weathered into tiny grains. She bent down and picked up a handful, feeling it run through her fingers like liquid gold. She let her gaze wander one last time over the once familiar places, and sighed. She shut her eyes tight, threw up her hands, and ran. She might have let out a scream if it wouldn't have broken the peace that had fallen. She listened to the churning seas die down and felt the battering winds fly off as she gave in, and gave up her time in this world.

She had been preparing her whole life on this earth to leave it, and now it was finally time. She'd had a good run, a long one too. She had enjoyed her self mostly, but of course gone through all other not-as-pleasant states of human emotion. She had loved and lost, laughed and cried, and ultimately had fulfilled her purpose of living life as it was meant to be. There may have been things she would have liked to experience before, but these were not the things that crossed her mind as she looked back over her years on this planet. Whether she was forgotten or not was left to other people, and now it was time to return to her loved ones that had watched down on her all her life.

She hadn't meant to become a Sea Child so soon, but the stars wanted what the stars wanted, and she wasn't one to argue. She whispered her final goodbyes, and hoped her neighbor would remember to feed Silo. She let the waves claim her body as her soul joined the Family of the Cosmos.