ALIVE ANGELS ; lana del rey

➵ three, secrets

*:·ﾟ✧ CHAPTER THREE. secrets

⋆ ˚｡⋆୨୧˚

THROUGHOUT MY CHILDHOOD, I've subconsciously learned that it's worse to emotionally wrap yourself around people, events, and places than to start to watch everything you had slip out of your fingertips. 

The memories drift farther away as time goes on rather than just not becoming connected to anything. 

Zipping and hoisting my backpack up to my shoulders, I gather all my belongings while preparing to leave. When I'm finished, I wait for Carmen until she's finished compiling her things into two bags. Then, exiting the alley between Florida Frozen Yogurt and Cinnamon Girl café, we take two free bikes from a stand and migrate to different places around Caeruleus. 

A couple of cars on the road pass us by, but it's difficult to find anyone who is really focusing on two teenagers biking around the town at two o'clock in the morning. 

⋆ ˚。⋆୨୧˚

Carmen and I share similar stories of heartbreak, desolation, and change, but nonetheless, everything we say differs hugely. Parental issues contrasting public humiliation, friendship break-ups contrasting romantic relationship endings, constantly moving contrasting being taken as stupid. There's one point where our motives meet, though. 

Change. 

Change is a powerful being, and it took over both of us long ago. So now, we're biking fast, past the traffic lights, past the pavement, and past everything we've ever known. 

The wind seeps through my flowing hair like a brush as I swerve around the biker's lane with Carmen leading in front of me. I shake my head in satisfaction and smile uncontrollably as the street lights dimly light the sidewalks. The breeze creeps into my sleeves, causing my sweater to flow with the wind.

"What's this feeling?" I think to myself out loud, hoping Carmen will respond.

"It's an escape."

A smile creeps onto my face before Carmen slowly comes to a stop at Ride Road, dropping her bike onto the sand, and I do the same. Following her, we pass by Woodstock Lake and Dark Paradise Elementary. The summer-like scent of this area is familiar, and then it comes to me–Born To Die lake. 

I run closer to the shore, Carmen trailing after me. Sinking into the sand, I stare at the black sky, dotted with scattered stars, breathing in the sea-salt smell of the ocean blue crashing down onto the surface. 

I look directly into the charcoal sky until my vision becomes blacked out. 

Then, waking up, I find myself floating in the sky, right above Born To Die lake. A glowing silhouette appears emerging from the clear, blue water itself, rising until she surpasses my altitude. 

I peer around me, and Carmen is adjacent to me, goggling with an appearance of astonishment. Following a gust of wind and a strawberry-colored glow surrounding her, wavy, medium-length brunette hair flies in the air as a being with a flowy, sheer floral dress covered in various stitched flowers ranging in reds, pinks, whites, and beiges reaches closer. 

Heart-shaped sunglasses appear to be worn by this supernatural deity, matching the strawberry-colored glow surrounding them. 

The sky shifts to an afternoon blue and the smell of popsicles, snow cones, and cherry cola fill my senses. A soft, soothing, and amplified voice comes from the mystical, human-like being, enunciating faultlessly.

"I am Born To Die, the divinity of rebirth and transformation."

The imagery appears in the atmosphere as Born To Die moves her hands to visualize. Everlasting love, rebellion, summertime sadness, tragic abandonment, melancholia, troubled high schoolers, forever favorites. The abundant features continue as the wind trickles through my fingertips from the altitude.

"You will encounter many deities like me along your journey around this ethereal land, seeing specific deities when they are the most essential. Remember that the world is built for two, always transforming into a heavenly state."

"You are loved." 

The divinity's words spoken pulse through the air continuously as the particles of her glow float in the atmosphere, creating a grainy fading of the deity's departure. 

Carmen seems starstruck by the interaction we just had as we immediately fall from the height we were frozen at as the glowing silhouette disappears.

"Oh my god," Carmen remarks in shock.

"Did that–?" I ask.

"Yeah," Carmen responds.

"Are we high?"

"I'm not."

"I think I might be."