My name is Johnathan Blackburn, I'm twenty-three years old, and I just had an epiphany....

The club is packed.
Wall to wall bodies crash and sway together in time with the sickening beat that blazes from every corner of the room. He can feel the heat from the half naked dancers around him building and building. The smells of fifty different designer perfumes clash together to form an amalgamation of spice and sweet that uniquely identifies this particular region of the good old U S of A. A girl, drunk to the point it's a miracle she can stand, rubs against him as he fights his way through the crowd. The feel of her soft, sweaty flesh mixed with the stiffness of her sequined blouse leave haunting traces on his skin.

One of those, "What the hell am I doing?" sort of moments that come along and make you truly look at where you are....

Out on the street the cool night air is an amazing respite from the pulsating air and overpowering pheromones inside. Against the pounding club wall he leans and lights up. He watches the other people walking around in the neon and arc sodium wash of the street. More sequin shirts walk by in a gaggle, laughing and smoking, looking red and blue and deathly yellow as they pass by different clubs and bars. The police and bouncers all have a collective boredness about them. One of the cops yawns and pulls out his cell to check the time.

He follows his smoke up into the night sky and looks on past the city lights for a moment.

And as dumb as it seems, that turning point was when I looked at the stars and saw Orion's Belt...

Suddenly he tosses his half finished cigarette out into the street. The feel of smoke snaking its way down his throat was starting to make him ill. The wristband on his wrist felt itchy and uncomfortable. He takes it off and lets it flutter down into the gutter.

But, that was the only constellation that I knew. For the life of me I couldn't pick out even the big dipper.That sort of stuff used to be common knowledge, right?

The night starts to chill him, so he buries his hands in his pockets and makes his way to his car. Down the alleyway he crunches through a multitude of broken bottles. There is a beggar sifting through the trash behind some industrial building. In the stairs of the parking deck there is a drunk taking a piss.

It just sort of reminded me that people used to tell stories. They used to look up at the sky and wonder. They used to know each other.
In that moment I would have given anything in the world just to know the stars. To know the stories. To know that feeling...

He gets to his car, that safe, familiar bit of home. The radio comes on to his presets. He feels the cold grip of his steering wheel. Soon, he's on the road and headed home.

I just want to know what it is to truly know and need someone else.