Warm. Soft. I am floating on…water, warm water with a
surface tension thick enough to support me as I float. Were those my father’s
words, “surface tension”? I have never seen the sea, but my father says I will
float easier on the ocean than on a lake or a river. I must be on the ocean. My
father’s voice is drifting away, growing silent. The smell of sea air is all
around me; I can breathe it in deeply through my nose. I open my eyes. All I
can see is a steel gray sky above me. What color is the ocean beneath me?
I turn over to see, but I breathe in water, salty, bitter
water that chokes me. I can’t breathe. I flail, I thrash. I try to call out but
I cannot make a sound. I thrash so much that the seawater begins to froth up.
Soon, bubbles of white foam surround me. Right when I can no longer move my
limbs and feel like I will black out, the foam begins to rise and carry me up
with it.
I am floating again, this time, on a cloud, bright white
against the gray sky. Milky tendrils made of tiny crystals tickle me behind my
ears. The wind ruffles my hair and my clothes. The feeling is very peaceful,
soothing. I turn my head to the left and there, floating on his own cloud, is
Fretly. He waves to me and I wave back. He points at something to my
right. I look that way and there is Soern floating next to me on his own cloud.
He is laughing great big belly laughs as the three of us float at the same
speed, in the same direction, surrounded by the mercury sky.
Suddenly, a pink arrow shoots out of the gray and pierces
Soern’s cloud from beneath him and then rips through his body. He cries out and
grabs the wound in his chest. The Kirzan on his cloud begins spiraling away
from me. “Keep going,” he bellows as he falls out of sight below us.
I turn to Fretly, alarmed. My friend has a concerned look on
his face. Somehow I know it is not because of Soern but because something else
is wrong. Fretly begins shaking his head slowly, sadly. “Wait,” I want to say,
but as I do, his clouds drops from the sky. I reach out and grab his hand even
though he should be miles below me as fast as he’s descending. Then I notice I
am falling quickly, too. We look at each other. His face is calm, which makes
me feel calm despite the wind rushing faster and faster over us.
When we hit what I think is the ground, there is nothing. No
smash, no sound, no pain, just the silvery gray light around me. Fretly is
gone. I am no longer on a cloud but am back on the hard, grassy ground. I am sleepy. I
roll over on my side and curl up in a fetal position. Clouds, or small patches
of fog, begin to roll in from every direction. They roll towards me like they
are attracted to me. They bump up against me, hard and soft at the same time.
Sometimes, they poof little puffs of air into my face. Sometimes they stick out
a tongue and lick my face or my hands. They constantly make a noise, a wet
slurping noise, like a sucking and a chewing. That sound and the gentle touches
lull me back to sleep. And I sleep.
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