Avenging Cupids

Chapter 22: Idealistic Purgatory

Saltwater coursed through her throat, burning away any screams Willow might have had. There wasn't a single glimmer of hope; all that her senses could pick up was an incredible pain as salt seemed to take the place of blood in her veins, and a darkness so profound that she was sure she had lost her sight completely.

Death was so easy that the feeling of life slipping away heartbeat by sputtering heartbeat was both welcoming and blissful. As she sunk towards the abyss, fond memories spun like a whirlwind in whatever was left of her coherent mind. She would miss Alden and the feeling of significance he gave her just by existing--and oh God, she would miss the small kisses he planted on the hollows of her temples. She would miss her neurotic and harebrained best friend who had provided Willow the sun even in the midst of gloom. She would miss Kasey's theatrics and Mrs. Blackwood's guidance. She would miss her angelic parents and her car and handbags. She wondered if she'd remember them in the afterlife, or at least, wherever she was condemned to.

Then all too soon, there was nothing--not even the will to survive. There was only the sensation of having disappeared from the world without a wisp of trace. Her last thought was, Alden, I love you now and will love you then, and she drifted into nonexistence.

And then, just before eternal darkness, sheets of water began to fall away until she no longer felt wet. In a flurry of confusion, Willow found herself floating through a passageway that she felt was somehow custom-made just for her. She looked down the length of her body, which was, to her shock, still dressed in a dry chiffon dress and strappy sandals--and found that she was floating over white fluffy carpet, the same that lined the area of her bedroom at home; the familiarity of the carpet comforted her with a tiny brush of relief which increased when she lifted her head to the ceiling.

The passageway's tiered ceiling was so much like her own that for a moment she believed she was standing in her bedroom, the dimensions of which were somehow warped and stretched by her own tired mind. The ceiling was even complete with recessed lighting and a crystal chandelier, the same one that her mother had installed after winning it at a charity auction; the handcrafted fixture, Azaria had told her, once decorated one of the many parlors of the Palace of Versailles in France, and was the only one of its kind. As Willow examined its branching arms and complex array of crystal prisms, she realized with a jolt that although she was drifting towards the chandelier, it seemed to stay just out of reach--it was like trying to chase the moon. The walls were painted a blush-color like the rosiness in a baby's cheeks, a color that Elle had always insisted was pink, but Willow protested was amaranth.

What was this place? She squinted into the distance, hoping to find some sort of exit or a break in the amaranth lining that suggested the passageway was finite--but there was nothing but an endless white floor and amaranth walls that tapered to a tiny point some miles away. Willow wondered then if she was even moving, or if the seemingly never-ending hall just simply provided her with the illusion of movement; it would explain the immobile chandelier, hovering just a few feet ahead of her. She tried to move her legs, and was perplexed when she couldn't. 

Walking was a subconscious action that required no effort, wasn't it? So why, then, were her muscles not responding to force or encouragement, no matter how much brainpower she used?

Willow felt a lurching sensation in the pit of her stomach, and she was suddenly speeding down the passageway. Two things happened at once: the walls took on a new texture at the same moment that she realized she was hurtling towards a bright white light that had subtly appeared at the end of the hall. It was all so cliche--the long tunnel with the light at the end--that it was almost ridiculous. She would have laughed if only the walls of the hall hadn't sparked her attention.

Lined haphazardly along both sides of the wall were shadows of all shapes and sizes. The shapes became less translucent and more and more solid as she whizzed by, and soon she saw that the shapes were lined with gold and bronze and silver on their perimeters. Intricate details began to etch themselves magically into the borders right before her eyes, and she realized that they were the skeletons of picture frames. There were millions of them, and increasing in beauty and complexity as she travelled further along.