6

I remember that time when the lion came. He came to me in my dreams. I thought he looked familiar, but know I've never been to the circus. I climbed onto his back nonetheless, and his fur from his mane licked my cheeks. He races in the forest in every direction I point him in. He climbs in trees and catches me food. I am his child and he loves me. I rest my head on his soft hair and I start to fall, his growl is the only thing that would reach me.
I can't see because I haven't opened my eyes. I feel the hot, sticky air pass through my clothes and hair. I can feel it's breath behind my ears. The space I'm falling in can feel me. I can understand the very atoms in space, they are whispering to me in unison as one entity. I am afraid to open my eyes, but when I do nothing is here. I'm just lying down on cold cement. I am alone. In a dark city. I can't hear a soul, not even those little fragments. Fear grasps me from every inch of my body. I start to run. My sneakers are the only sounds resonating on the buildings. Tap tap tap tap tap tap tap tap tap. My breath is smoky and I can feel the sharp pains in my sides. Those fragments have turned against me and came inside me. They are stabbing my stomach, making me groan. I run as far as I can. Orange lights are illuminating my path and my sweater is soaked in blood. I jump into a puddle and I am swimming away from the tall scrapers and the red sweater. The orange light is barely creating a glow under here, and my breath is coming quicker yet my lungs feel fine. I try to kick my legs towards fringe of air but for some reason my muscles feel like magnets. My legs seem all wrong. I pull my underwater hair, which seems to have grown since I woke up, away from my face and notice my limbs are now, in fact, one. My once pale and bruised skin is now an collage of opal scales, the orange light only just casts a sheer on it. My feet are toe-less and in their stead there are luminous fins trailing away from me. I wiggle my fin and I am pushed forward through. I writhe in my new half and I jet though the water like the true swimmer I am. I don't remember running or what it even is. I flutter myself to the depths of the ocean like a moth in black satin. Once again blackness is around me. It feels cold. Colder than ice. Am I freezing? Is my heart beat-less? Am I dead? I must be, for this is the blackest black; no one can even begin to imagine it's pitch.

I hear a sound. The sound of the heaven above me. it sounds angry and envious. It thunders though the water like an old echo from another dimension. The ocean opens and explodes into the air. I feel gravity for the first time and I feel heavy even though my body is floating in the sky. I notice small drops of glass water falling down to the waiting sea. I think I'm falling too fast. Too fast indeed, if I hit that water as fast as I'm going now, I am going to split. The water will feel as though it's glass and I will break. My insides with be outside and I will no longer be able to swim. I flap my arms try to grasp into the air and suddenly I am lifted. I desperatly try and hold onto that feeling again and the same results ensue. Higher and higher I become until the ocean is just a color. A blue on the world. My wings brought me to safety, and I am within the clouds. No fears up hear just the wind, the sky, and the sun, and the moon. The moon is so bright tonight. I am so ridiculously happy. I fly in circles; and in between the cotton whale. In the sky I try to remember how it felt to breath water, but this air is making me woozy and it's too sweet to help. I glide through the wind and with the wind. It helps me and makes me stronger. I feel water once again on my body, but I do not breath it. It washes me and it feels now that I have nothing to be sad for. I have first touch of holy water. I am reborn. I look higher up for there cannot be any better than this. And suddenly I catch my breath and almost choke on it. I see white diamonds strewn over black sand. I'm below an even bigger ocean, a bigger more better ocean. I see the moon for what it really is. Its the mother pearl of these diamonds and she shows me their hiding spots and tells me to follow the path to them. I go higher up. I push my wings past my weight and go faster. Faster and faster. Once i pass a certain point i know there's no going back. I look one last time to what I thought was all, and I blink away my tears. Faster and faster. The air around me is thin and I feel light as one of my feathers. My breath once again is being torn into my sides, every exhale feels like my last. I breath in a shallow gasp and my eyes see lightness. Everything is white. Have I lost conscience? Am I in heaven? Everything is so bright and clean.

I try and move my wings but instead of bones and muscles I feel nothing, yet i know it's okay. Am I even seeing with eyes? Once I think this, my vision is placed behind me and I see a terrestrial body. I move my arm and part of the form moves. It looks pure and clean. The most white you could ever imagine. I was. I am. Finally in the the heaven I sought, I am a star.