Chapter Text
Her senses drown beneath a black, frozen lake.
She lies suspended on her back deep within the icy waters, arms floating lazily out like a comfortable crucifix.
No light penetrates this depth.
No glint of day breaks the surface.
No sound of gurgles or bubbles
wakes her sleeping mind.
No.
She is shrouded in icy darkness.
Her chocolate-brown hair floats around her like an old, blood-soaked gown, and her skin glows pale green in the inky water.
Something deep within her searches for answers
despite the mind-numbing cold.
How long has she been floating?
Or falling?
It’s impossible to tell
without any light to guide her.
Yet,
she doesn’t ask herself the question, "How do I get out?"
She’s curious for a moment, but
she really doesn’t care.
Something about the thick silence suffocates her anxious thoughts,
and it feels
almost…
peaceful.
Floating.
Drifting.
Evanescing.
There’s a sudden shift in time, and
she feels gravity gently tug her down,
down,
down–
deeper into the frigid, dense water.
She doesn’t panic.
She embraces the pressure like a swaddled newborn
as she descends closer
to the soft sludge
of the earth
that she
is meant
to
coalesce
with.
The thought of finality increases her contentment
with each
downward
plunge.
And that’s when the softest aroma of lavender lances through her beautifully numbed mind, dismantling her peaceful departure.
Unexplainable
fear overwhelms her.
Her eyes snap open toward the surface.
What was
once solid blackness
is now ripples of ghostly grey light.
It swirls softly in the sky, gently brushing
aside the darkness to let itself in. A sudden pull from within abruptly yanks her upward.
This Unknown’s aggressive tug nearly snaps her cold, paralyzed body in two. Her head snaps back in the water,
mouth gaping open in pain. In a moment, she has gone from feeling nothing at all to everything at once as frigid water
rushes into her lungs and surges past her in a furious wave of tiny bubbles that cloud her vision. She’s gasping--convulsing--furiously--panicking!
She blinks.
Cold eyelashes brush against unexpectedly dry cheeks,
triggering an awareness in her that has not existed before…
Before what? She does not know.
There is no way to know how long she has lain suspended on her back in the darkness.
Like a babe born from her mother’s womb, there is only then, and now.
Now,
she sees the smallest of movements and a gentle light.
She is not alone.
Something is out there, beyond the frozen lake in her mind, and it’s watching her confront the darkness.