The Moon in Star's room

It happened so far away-approximately two hundred and thirty nine thousand miles-that not a soul on earth heard it, but during the first night of December the moon exploded into quadrillions of pieces. Scientists didn't know why or how, but one thing was certain: the earth was doomed. Without the moon the tides wouldn't exist, earth would start to spin faster and faster, summers would be so hot you'd burn to a crisp and winters so cold you'd freeze instantly. It was enough to send the world into a whirlwind of panic.
Star Winslip was unaffected by the ensuing pandemonium played out on the television and in the newspapers. Her mother, however, was busily packing suitcases and flicking through holiday brochures, trying to decide where on earth they could go that wouldn't result in instant sunburn or frostbite.
"I found a piece in my room you know?" Star said one morning whilst lazily staring at the clear, blue winter sky through the kitchen window.
"A piece of what?" her mother flustered, as she ransacked drawers.
"A piece of the moon," she replied. "It was glowing and everything."
"That's fascinating, dear. Have you seen our passports? I'm sure I put them in here."
"What should I do with it?"
"With what?"
"The moon in my room."
"I really don't know, Star. Why don't you keep it, as a souvenir? I'm sure there are plenty of other people around the world that have a piece of it," said her mother as she turned to searching through the cupboards in her bid to find their passports.
Her mother's words floated aimlessly through Star's head, like unmoored boats, until they rejoined to form an idea that suddenly animated her entire body. She jerked away from the window and ran round the kitchen table to her mother. "I have an idea," she gushed, so excited she could barely get the words out of her mouth. "I'm going to collect the moon."
Her mother stopped pulling out pots and pans from the cupboard and peered up at Star with raised eyebrows. "You're going to collect the moon?"
Star nodded. She was resolute.
"Star you can't even finish a sentence, do you really think you can collect ALL of the moon?"
"Are you trying to say I lack...dedication?"
"Yes, dear. I am," said her mother. "You have a habit of starting things and never finishing them."
"No, I don't."
"Star, look at that on the counter," said her mother pointing to the chopping board. "You started to make yourself a sandwich three hours ago and the bread's still on the board, the knife's halfway through the block of cheese and the pickle jar now has a spoon living in it. I'm sorry to say, darling, but you have the attention span of a gnat."
Star huffed and pursed her lips. Deep down she knew her mother had a point but she wasn't about to show it. "This I'm going to see through. You just see that I don't," she said. She made her way to the counter to prove it by finishing her sandwich but took one look at the thick block of hard cheese and the sticky spoon in the pickle jar and walked off.
Okay, she couldn't finish a sandwich but she'd find the moon, and what's more she'd put it back together again.
It took all the will power she had to focus her concentration, but the inspirational quote she wrote on her notice board in large black letters served as a constant reminder to knuckle down.
'If a job's worth doing it's worth doing properly.'
If that phrase hadn't been her father's principle pearl of wisdom she wouldn't even remembered it let alone use it as her motivational mantra.
After a week of brain-busting thought, study and research, Star's plan was thus:

TASKS
1.Get a twitter account
2.Find out what a twitter account is before completing task 1
3.Tell the Telly people what I'm doing to drum up business
4.Get mum to phone the newspapers to do the same as task 3 - it's called delegation not laziness
5.Get in contact with as many people as possible who have bits of the moon
6.Make a map of their locations, to help locate more pieces
7.Get in touch with NASA and tell them where all the bits of the moon are so they can go ahead and supa-glue them back together again and rocket propel the moon back into the sky
8.Get rich and famous for saving everyone from becoming a french fry

Star stuck to her plan, just like she said she would. The gutter press were more interested in her idea than the broadsheet newspapers who sneered at the stupidity and fancifulness of her plan; 'inconceivable' they called it. However Star received a lot of publicity for her idea and given that the entire world was in desperate need of some hope of salvation, she received a lot of emails and letters from people all over the world who saw value in her idea. But instead of just giving Star the location of pieces, people decided to off load them on her instead. Every day the postman was delivering more and more small, brown cardboard packets from Tibet, South Africa, Paraguay, Alaska, Siberia, Australia, Singapore, Italy, even from people living down the road from her. The deliveries became so vast the mail service bought a tipper truck especially for mail going to Number Sixteen Parkview Terrace. Star tried earnestly to stay the deliveries by emailing as many of everyone who had gotten in touch with her, but her pleas seemed to go unheard and yet more rocks were dumped on her mother's doorstep.
"This time I really do wish you hadn't carried one of your ideas through from start to finish, Star," sighed her mother as another ton of moon rubble was tipped into the driveway. "What do you intend on doing with this lot now?"
Star stared at the shimmering grey mass, that was now as high as her two-storey house, with wonder. 'All those pieces, large and small have travelled round the world for what could be the last time,' she thought. 'And why? Because people want to help save it; not themselves, it, the world, the planet, the earth.'
It was a most empowering feeling. Star thought she was fifty feet tall in that moment, and it wasn't the fame or glory that did it, it was pride, and she wasn't going to let anyone down.

"By hook or by crook I'm going to fix the moon," she said. "Even if it takes me a lifetime to do it."