It was nights like these that Icarus and I enjoyed—cloudless skies that revealed the expansive universe above our roofs. It was perfect for stargazing and late-night conversations, from the most mundane topics to philosophical ones. 

We'd meet on his rooftop after midnight, laying on old towels he stored away in his closet. They had been towels he stole from his mother's donation box, a sentimental keepsake of his late canine companion that he didn't want to part with. His mother thought throwing them out would help them move on from their beloved pet, but Icarus couldn't bear the thought of losing anything else. 

The scent of his childhood pet and the fur had been long gone after our midnight escapades, but it still brought a nostalgic smile to his face every time he pulled it out. 

The roofs had a shallow angle, making them the perfect place to stargaze. It had been our getaway for over a decade, and despite the struggle of climbing through my small bedroom window and precariously stepping over the one-foot gap between our roofs, it was a struggle I would endure for as long as he allowed. 

It was the one place in which I could truly grasp the world around me and beyond. A feeling in which the vastness of the universe above reflected the complexities of life as a whole. No matter how small, each one of those millions of stars had an impact. A reminder that no matter that if I were a moon as far away as one of those stars to Icarus, I'd still present a significant impact in his life.

On other days, I thanked the stars for being on the same minuscule-sized piece of rock with him instead of another speck of dust in the skies above us. Compared to the infinite worlds and lives, the odds of being Icarus' friend must have amounted to something far beyond us.

Fate, he had once called it, a word that I'd hung onto. 

It was here that my favorite memories of Icarus remained on the roof under the stars. Long nights of sharing impossible tales of ancient deities hung amongst the stars, stories that captivated Icarus, no matter how absurd they sounded in my mind. I shared with him the myths of Orion and Callisto, or tales of Canis Major, and the facts of the moons of planets and stars alike ours. I'd spent days and years researching star charts and books of the planets just to share with him, each more archaic than the previous. It had been to the point of borrowing dozens of library books that no one else had read, tucked away in deserted corridors of the public libraries that would have been forgotten if it had not been for me perusing the dusty shelves. 

And yet, Icarus held onto every word, every detail of what I said on that silly tattered towel. It hadn't mattered that I'd fibbed details when he asked questions I had no answers to or whether I mispronounced their names. 

All that mattered was that Icarus Melgren was beside me, hanging on to every word, looking at me with the same starstruck eyes he had when looking to the skies. 

It warmed every inch of my skin, and every fiber of my being felt renewed again with one look at his warm eyes. 

"Tell me more," he'd tell me. He'd ask while pointing up at the stars, "what about that one?"

"That's a part of Cassiopeia. And that there is Andromeda." 

Icarus smiled as I told the story of Andromeda and the sea creature, explaining the different interpretations from the books I'd read. It didn't matter if I used the original jargon or interpolated the words into something similar; Icarus would soak it in, occasionally remarking how gripping or outlandish some of the stories sounded. Icarus hardly said anything ill about them, no matter how controversial or upsetting the original myths behind planets and moons' names. 

But it wasn't just the planet's namesakes I'd discuss with him. Some days I'd rephrase the things I had found at the library from college science books, spilling tangents about the theories of white holes or black matter—even geological information about Earth and how each uncovered layer determines how old the Earth is. 

Those conversations didn't last long, as Icarus was more curious about the sky above us, from weather patterns, storms, and our usual discussions about space. 

His obsession with the stars was as grand as my obsession with Icarus—as crazy as that sounded. But there was something about seeing someone so passionate about something that made you appreciate them more. 

"Look, a shooting star," Icarus cried out, jabbing a finger up at the sky. "See it?"

I hummed, seeing the tail end of the streak of light before it faded from view. One blink, and someone could have missed it. 

"That's crazy," he said. "Despite how quickly it appears and disappears, it probably goes much faster than we see."

"What's crazier is that a meteorite could be as small as a trash can and still be seen from miles and miles away with how hot it gets."

Icarus laughed. "If it were a star, it probably would blind us all."

"More like incinerate the entire planet before we even know what was happening. Especially if it got any closer than our moon."

"Probably for the best, then. Not knowing what hits us."

"Although, one day, the sun will either burn out or become a dwarf star," I told him. "Or it will consume every planet, reducing everything into tiny fragments in a galactic explosion."

"Not soon, I hope," he said, frowning.

"Millions and millions of years from now," I told him. "The Earth is actually moving away from the Sun."

He jerked his head in my direction. "Then why is it so hot nowadays?"

I waved a hand above us. "Short answer, climate change. The heat cannot escape the Earth. The ozone layer is so thin that it can't refract the sunlight as it once could."

"Humans really messed up," he said. "Made it an overheated hellscape."

We shared a laugh. "You could say that."

He sighed before looking back up at the sky. "Well, I'm certain we'll burn this world to ashes before the sun can."

"Definitely a possibility."

Little had I known then that we'd burn each other before either of those events would occur; if only we would burn as brightly and be immortalized in a college textbook for another to find and obsess over.