Dreamcatcher

10: Backstory, Part 3

Reinfeld Park was empty. What existed between the bare, snow-covered playground and the half-frozen pond underneath the famous bridge was just silence. Nobody stirred on a frosty night; people were usually inside drinking hot cocoa while binging television shows with their dogs. In fact, Aerial was the crazy one.

"Why would she want to meet me here....?" she mumbled to herself. She turned her head and looked far distances to see a girl-shaped figure with pigtails. Yet there was only the ringing from Aerial's ears, a warning of the unforgiving winter night.

Aerial: where are you? i don't see you anywhere

Her typing was slow, her small fingers cold and clammy. Even shoving them into her pockets didn't relieve the pain, but Aerial didn't regret coming out. Emmi was somewhere.

So Aerial kept waiting. It seemed like waiting was all she did for Emmi. She couldn't help her, she felt too afraid to contact the young girl directly in fear of her disturbance, and nothing she did felt right. Aerial only waited. She never did anything.

And that was because she trusted Emmi.

Ten minutes passed, and that temporary trust from the message Aerial had received dissolved like the snow her foot stepped on.

Aerial: Emmi, where are you? i've been waiting a while

Maybe Emmi's phone died, or maybe she forgot it at home. Another minute passed.

Aerial: i'm leaving, it's too cold

As she leaned on the wooden fence of Reinfeld bridge, she felt her heart sinking. She walked along the frame and brushed off the snow on the railing, quietly following the frosted trail back towards the entrance of the park. Emmi was nowhere.

The snow began to fall. Aerial looked off of the curved bridge and saw the small flakes landing gently on the pond surface. The ice was thin, thin enough for it not to be totally frozen, but it was a grim reminder of the coldness Aerial had sacrificed to wait, and only wait.

She was already at the entrance when she felt a jolt in her pocket. Her eyes widened, her hand immediately reaching into her jacket like a second-hand instinct. When she flipped the phone open, however, her questions only multiplied.

Emmi: aerial, what do you think of me

Aerial: what do you mean?? where are you

Aerial stared at the message hard and long, but soon she was met with more confusion.

Emmi: are you proud of me, aerial?

It was the same question again.

Of course I am. Why are you asking that, Emmi? I'm more proud of you than the majority of people you know, and I care about you more than them.

No, what if that was a lie? What if Aerial was useless to Emmi? She couldn't even comfort the young girl when she was crying on the sidewalk, and she couldn't even message Emmi despite her longing to. Aerial wasn't a friend. Did that mean she didn't have the right to be proud of Emmi, the right to tell her that she cared about Emmi more than everybody else?

Aerial: what do you mean?

Aerial: tell me where you are please

Aerial: i've been waiting a long time, just please answer me...

Aerial waited another minute, but her phone went still. With a defeated sigh she shoved her phone back into her pocket, turning around towards the park. She was...She was angry. She had wasted her time. She had wasted Emmi's time.

Something moved in the distance, a small dot like an ant. There was no sudden gust of wind. Aerial squinted, moving closer on instinct. The dot moved more towards the right. The dot grew the tiniest bit larger.

Aerial ran. She ran not away from the park but towards the dot, the hope in her heart regrowing each step she took. The dot grew closer but never clearer, a permanent fuzz.

The dot stopped moving right, but now up. It wobbled a bit in the distance. It moved up again.

Aerial, who was now squinting even harder, began to see the blob clearly. It didn't move anymore, but parts of it were. Soon the black blended into blue, some into green, then into gray. Then there was yellow – no, blonde. Blonde...

Emmi's hair flew in the wind, graceful and smooth. It shined even in the near-darkness, and as if it could illuminate the young girl's shadowed face, Aerial felt as if she could see her more clearly than ever before.

Her pigtails were gone, her usual pink winter coat stripped onto the pavement. She stood still on the wooden frame railing, almost daring to teeter back and forth on her heels like she was breaking time and gravity themselves.

Aerial did not know if Emmi could see her, if Emmi could hear if, if Emmi even knew she was there. But Aerial could see her ever-growing smile, the way her shoulder-length hair blew in the wind like ribbons and feathers, and the way how Emmi wasn't the pig-tailed girl afraid of tests, afraid of her parents, afraid of failure.

Emmi wasn't perfect, but at least she was free.

Time slowed. Aerial felt her feet go numb as she sprinted over to the bridge, almost slipping on the icey pathway, all stability breaking out underneath her like her world itself, and she felt like she could almost, almost do something about Emmi, do something about what the young, pig-tailed girl was about to do.

But Aerial was too late. She waited too long, too long to do anything she wanted to do.

Emmi was gone from the railing. There was no sight of her pigtails nor her let-down hair. There was no soft smile, no glistening eyes of both desperation and tranquility, no glistening eyes of last-minute regret that Aerial had seen the moment Emmi turned her head, a last-minute goodbye.

And there was nothing Aerial could do, nothing Aerial could do at all, nothing, nothing, nothing.

But Aerial could have done something. She could've, but she didn't. Why hadn't she? This was all her fault, she was the one who caused this, she caused it so she needed to fix this, but she couldn't fix it because Emmi was gone, Emmi was gone now, Emmi was gone...

Emmi was gone.

Cold tears trickled down Aerial's cheeks. She was numb all over. She couldn't feel her hands, her legs, her fingers, her thoughts, her heart. But she was numb, and she could feel that instead.

This was all her fault. Everything was her fault. Who's fault? Aerial's? Emmi's parents? Emmi? Maybe, maybe, no...

This was all her fault. Everything was her fault. And since everything was her fault, she needed to fix it. She needed to fix Emmi. She needed to fix the future, the past, the present.

She needed to fix herself.

She needed to fix Death.

She needed to fix the one who caused this.

"...the dreamcatcher..."

She needed to fix the Dream Catcher.