There’s no such thing as time, to a photon. There’s no such thing as death. There’s no such thing as the first gasp after the start of the universe, when this one left a blooming star for what would someday be Earth.

Without time you can’t show up or leave again. Without time you can’t miss anyone, even if you try.

This photon has always been traveling; it always will be. It has always been darting through the atmosphere, bent by the air. It has always been ready. It will always be touching the page, and touching your eye, and gone.