One Summer's Day

I walk with my yellow sneakers, pink shorts, and white with a green stripe shirt. I haven't worn it since I was a kid. But I'm wearing it now. The wind pushes me forward. But where am I going? I see the leaves rush past me, urging me to keep going. Soot covers my hands but I don't know how it got there.

The wind blows me so hard I have no choice but to go forward. Everything is pitch black but I know I'm in a tunnel. I feel my hands push along its sides and top. Smooth like newly dried concrete. I practically fly forward not being able to control myself. My stomach flurries with fear until I reach the blue sky, and I'm soaring for merely seconds, until I'm not.

Water closes in all around me. I fell in so hard I reach the murky bottom, mud sliding in between my fingers. I can't breathe. I hold my hand over my mouth and try to swim to the top. But the top doesn't come. I'm swimming in an endless sea. An endless river, though the water pulls me in no direction. No matter how high I swim, I reach no air. I can't breathe. I can't hold it much longer. I can't...

Something touches me. It scares me so much I jump. I look back behind me to see nothing more than black. But a gentle hand holds mine, that I can see.

Then I hear the voice. It speaks a name.

"Cen."