What if I lived? ✔️

Second time's the charm

Milky light.

For some reason the afterlife seemed to be wrapped into milky light and music, so much voices singing together, layering over each other until there was just one song. The song of souls. It told endless stories, of sadness and fear and love and hope and family and strangers. Of everything and nothing, banalities that no one else even cared about, but also important events that had changed touched the lives of thousands. I lost myself in that song, let it sweep me off, away and away until there was little left of what I had been before.

The afterlife felt familiar. It was calm, wrapping around me, lulling me into a trance-like state, the river of souls running its course. Everything was so peaceful, so right.

A thought stirred inside of me, far away, silent, as if asked by another. Did I really deserve to be here?

"You're the only one who can decide if you're worthy" a loving, ancient, female voice answered.

I had no eyes in this place, not in the same way I had before, had nobody at all, but I could still hear her, still see that light. The light was everything, it was the goal.

"Don't give up" a different voice pleaded.

Young compared to that song of souls, and it was so full of life, so full of hope and promise, something stirred in me. I knew it from somewhere, from before, from the world where all that pain had been.

"Don't give up" I remembered the voice had meant to me.

It made me hesitate. Give up what? The voice had saved me before, hearing it had made me feel safe, as if I could tell everything about myself without being judged. As if no wrong I had done would matter anymore, for I had come home.

I turned, away from that light, away from that song: "Don't give up!"

Feelings stirred inside of me, good and bad, long forgotten in the whirlwind of a very different song. A song that was luring me back, towards that light.

"Don't give up!" the voice sounded desperate, sad.

I couldn't stand the thought that it was sad, what if it was hurt? What if it meant there was danger.

"Don't give up!!" it got more urgent, as if I had done something, as if it was me causing the distress.

What could I do? What was I not supposed to give up?

"Don't give up" it got louder too, as if he was running towards me.

I tried to reach for it, it needed help! But every time I got close it just seemed to get farther away. But I couldn't give up.

I couldn't stop trying, I needed to help. I had almost reached it, when it said something else: "Come back to me."

And then I was gone. In light and shadow and ice and fire, in life and in death.

The afternoon sun shone in through the windows, highlighting the few red leaves still hanging on the trees outside. Everything in the room was green, from the walls to the bedsheets. I blinked; I knew this room. But something was different, there was a blanket on the couch, along with some cushions, nothing except for pictures stood on the desk and most importantly, I hadn't seen this room from the bed-angle yet.

I blinked again, repeatedly, my mind slowly settling back into this body. It felt so foreign, so limited, though I could not exactly point out why.

When I turned my head there he sat. Azriel Shadow-Singer, feet propped up on the bed, deeply absorbed by the paper in one hand, the other at his cheek.