She stepped out onto the windowsill. The cold , empty, night air encased itself around her skin in an unfeeling embrace. The wind whipped at her hair as if to drag her further from the blankness that lay behind. After a few moments of silence she opened her eyes and gazed downwards at the abyss of black that swirled beneath her.
The familiarity of her garden now shrouded in darkness , if the surface to it remained she could not see it , almost like ...if she fell she would continue falling , no end.
"How do you explain that" she whispered and her expression turned to that of confusion. Those words did not belong to her. They were foreign they were wrong.
A shallow breath escaped her lips and she moved wistfully fixing her gaze on the stars dancing in ecstasy above her, the intricate movements of the light blazed through her mind and she suddenly felt heat where cold had been before. She frowned " that shouldn't be allowed". She wanted to dance with the light , with the Stars. She closed her eyes and her demeanour calmed. She let out a slow breath.
And then, she let go. At first, of her grasp on the windowsill, and then, of everything. All inhabitions, all the worries, the insecurities; all the nightmares and memories so often locked away in a subconcious fortress, forbidden from surfacing. All of them, swept away in the frosty midnight air.
As she fell from her perch, it felt not as if she was rushing towards the ground below, but rather that she stayed still in an infinite limbo, the world racing past her. The cool fingers of the freefall's breeze weaved through her hair, ruffling her locks and gently brushing her soft cheeks.
She closed her eyes and extended her petite arms to either side of her equally petite body. With the increasing wind howling in her ears and pushing against her face, she felt like she was flying; soaring high, away from everything. From everyone. In this moment, she felt what can only be described as pure, unrestricted freedom.
And in the split second before she collided with the earth and became no more, a wide smile crept across her face.
CO-WRITTEN BY KATE BREEN
