Rejected by Aiden Miller

The first paper star comes out crooked.

I press the corner with my thumbnail, turn it over, press again, then slide it behind my pencil case where I don’t have to look at it. It is only paper. One bad star should not matter when there are already twenty-seven good ones in the jar, but my brain has decided Aiden Miller’s birthday gift needs quality control like I am shipping it to a museum.

My laptop plays music low from the corner of my desk. Mostly instrumentals, two songs I would deny liking, and one track I keep restarting because it has the same feeling as watching Aiden stand outside first period with one earbud in, black hoodie loose on his shoulders, eyes on something nobody else can see.

My phone lights up beside the paper strips.

[MAYA: Zoe, did you post the rehearsal pic yet?? 😭]

[JESS: caption crisis again 💀]

[MAYA: babe just post it, you looked pretty 🫶]

[ME: I’m thinking]

[JESS: dangerous activity 😔]

[MAYA: nothing too deep pls, I’m begging 😭]

I turn my phone face-down and pull my sketchbook over the glass jar before the screen goes dark.

Maya and Jess know I like Aiden. That is already bad enough. If they knew about the stars, they would start watching me watch him, and then the whole thing would stop feeling like mine.

The stars are blue, white, and pale silver. I did not choose the colors because of him. But Aiden wears black and gray almost every day, and somehow that makes every soft color near him look louder. Girls fix their hair when he walks past. Boys pretend they don’t care and still check his sneakers. Teachers say his name like he already belongs somewhere better than here.

Last month, I dropped my sketchbook outside history, and pages slid all over the floor. Most people stepped around them. Aiden picked up one page, looked at the hands I had drawn, and said, “Thumb’s too high.” Then he gave it back and walked away before I could decide if I was offended. I fixed every hand in that sketchbook that night.

Tomorrow he turns eighteen.

I write inside the next blue strip.

Happy birthday. —Z.

The words look normal until I remember he is supposed to read them. I fold fast, hiding the message under each crease, and press the paper into a star before my courage can leak out.

While the next song starts, I pick up my pencil and draw a tiny heart in the corner of my sketchbook without meaning to. My hand just does it, fully disloyal. I stare at the heart for three seconds, cheeks warm, then shade the bottom point sharper and add lines until it looks like a messy little star instead. Better. Less criminal. Still obvious to me.

Downstairs, something taps against a pot, and garlic starts moving through the house. I check the time and realize I have been at my desk for almost four hours. My back hurts, my room is too warm, and the same song has played so many times that even I am starting to judge me.

The pasta water is already boiling when I come downstairs. Dad stands at the stove in his faded gray T-shirt, sleeves pushed up, stirring sauce with one hand while the other holds the pot lid like he is conducting a very serious kitchen emergency.

“You’re early,” he says. “Usually I have to threaten to eat yours.”

“I got hungry.” I take two plates from the cabinet. “Also my room started feeling weird.”

“That’s your room asking you to go outside.”

“It’s dark.”

“Then it’s asking you to visit the rest of the house.”

I pull parmesan from the fridge and lean against the counter while he drains the pasta. A strip of blue paper is stuck to my sleeve. His eyes flick to it, then back to the pot.

“Busy project?”

“Kind of.”

“For school?”

“No.”

“For dance?”

“No.”

“For your secret paper empire?”

“Dad.”

He lifts the spoon. “I’m exploring all reasonable options.”

I bite my lip, but the smile gets out anyway. He plates the pasta, lets me bury both bowls in parmesan, and does not ask the question sitting right there between us. That is usually how he gets me. He leaves the door open and waits to see if I walk through it.

We sit at the table. His phone buzzes once near the salt shaker. He turns it face-down and nudges it farther away with one finger. I open Instagram and stare at the rehearsal photo still sitting in my drafts. I am mid-turn in the studio mirror, hair coming loose, one ribbon twisted around my wrist. The caption box is empty because everything sounds either boring or like I am trying to become the kind of person who says healing journey without blinking.

Dad looks over. “Stuck?”

“Trying not to sound like I’m trying.”

He studies the photo with actual seriousness. “What about, ‘counts in my head, chaos in my bones.’ Too much?”

I pause. The irritating thing is that it works. “That’s actually good.”

“I know. Frightening for both of us.”

I type it in and post before I can change my mind. Dad smiles into his pasta like he is pretending not to be proud of himself. My phone lights up almost immediately.

[MAYA: okay caption ate actually 🤍]

[JESS: your dad wrote that didn’t he 😭]

[ME: maybe]

[MAYA: tell him he has one fan 😌]

[JESS: two if he makes pasta again 🍝]

I lock the screen and put it down. Dad steals one noodle from my bowl even though he has his own, and I act offended because that is the rule. The kitchen window has gone dark, our reflections faint in the glass, and my socked foot is tucked under my leg even though he has told me since I was nine that chairs were invented for people with spines.

After dinner, I wash and he dries. Music drifts from my room, and Dad hums along badly, always half a beat late. When I splash water onto his shirt by accident, he looks down like I have ruined his trust in me.

“I feed you,” he says. “I support your secretive paper lifestyle. This is how you repay me.”

“It was one splash.”

“It had intent.”

I laugh, then see the strip of blue paper still clinging to my sleeve. Tomorrow comes back all at once. The hallway. The jar. Aiden’s face if I actually hand it to him. Dad reaches past me for the towel, wipes the counter, and turns on the small lamp by the window so the kitchen does not go fully dark.

When the last pan is away, I stay near the counter with my arms folded. The house is cooler now. Dad comes back from the living room with the gray throw and drops it over my shoulders.

“Thanks,” I say, pulling it close.

“Mhm.” He checks the clock. “I’m heading up soon. You okay?”

“Yeah. I just have to finish something.”

“For tomorrow?”

I look at the tile between my socks. “Maybe.”

He rests his hand on the top of my head, messes my hair enough to annoy me, then smooths it down.

“Night, Zo.”

He squeezes my shoulder once before he goes, and somehow that is worse than a question. Dad does not have to ask who the stars are for. The blue strip on my sleeve has already told on me.

Upstairs, the jar waits on my desk. I sit with the throw still around me and turn the playlist back on. The stars go in one by one, small and tight, until the glass fills with blue, white, and silver. My fingers ache. A pile of failed ones sits near the lamp. I tie a ribbon around the lid, untie it, and tie it again. The tag takes three tries. The first A is too sharp. The second looks like I practiced. The third is plain enough to survive.

Aiden.

That is all I write.

At midnight, my phone changes the date.

I open Instagram before I can talk myself out of it. His green dot is there.

Online.

My heart jumps so hard I put one hand over my chest like that can make it act normal. The keyboard glows too bright in the dark when I open his message box. The jar sits beside my wrist, stars pressed against glass, Aiden’s name hanging from the ribbon.

happy birthday

I stare at the words until they stop looking normal. Girls send birthday messages all the time. Girls who do not hide paper-star jars under sketchbooks send them. Girls who do not remember what Aiden wore on the first cold day of November send them. Girls who are not me probably press send and fall asleep.

My thumb hovers.

The green dot stays there.

I picture the message opening on his screen. No reply. A polite thanks. Worse, maybe. Aiden looking at the words and knowing exactly how much I meant by two lowercase words.

I delete it.

For a second, I just sit there with my phone in my hand, face warm like I sent it anyway. The playlist starts over, soft and low. I shut the app, turn off the lamp, and climb into bed with the gray throw pulled over my blanket.

In the dark, I decide I can be brave in the morning.

Then my phone lights up.

[AIDEN MILLER viewed your story.]