Little Tara was the smallest star in the whole sky, tucked right at the edge where the dark just begins.

Every evening, the same worry crept in. “What if the moon forgets to come tonight?”

She strained and peered into the darkest part of the sky, searching so hard that her own light grew thin and pale, flickering with the effort of looking instead of simply glowing.

The more she searched, the smaller and dimmer she felt.

So Tara tried something different. She stopped straining. She stopped searching the dark corners for a moon that wasn’t there yet. Instead, she did the one thing that was actually hers to do — she shone, as brightly and as steadily as a little star could, and let the rest of the sky take care of itself.

It wasn’t easy, at first, to simply glow instead of worry. But she kept at it, twinkle by twinkle, until glowing felt like the only thing she was doing at all.

And slowly, without announcement, without hurry, the moon began to rise at the edge of the hills, round and silver and exactly on time, the way it always was.

“You came,” Tara whispered, her light glowing warm and full again.

“I always do,” said the moon, rising higher, gentle and unbothered. “You never needed to search the dark for me, little one. You only needed to keep shining, and let me arrive in my own time.”

Tara smiled and settled into her place in the sky.

High above the sleeping world, her light softened into a quiet glow, and she drifted off to sleep, safe beneath the moon she never needed to search for.

Goodnight, Tara. Goodnight, little worries that wait too hard for good things to arrive.

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Milo’s Very Long Tuesday — another small creature waiting under the stars for something that always comes, just not always on time.

The Teddy Bear Who Watched the Stars — a different kind of night-time waiting, and the same quiet comfort found in looking up.