Page 82 of Between Life and Death

I felt like I was floating. My hair lifted, moved by some foreign, buoyant force. Cool air kissed my neck. My feet were weightlessly suspended—nothing touched the soles.

Gravity had no dominion here—whereverhere was.

Suddenly, a light, bright as the morning sun scattered across a still lake, blazed before me. I raised my hand over my face, sheltering my eyes.

“Who are you?” asked a plethora of voices in unison—they were all female. Young and effervescent. Sweet and sparkling with life, like the finest glass of bubbling wine. And even though I had never tasted bubbling wine before, I wanted more. I licked my lips. I craved hearing them speak again.

“Sage,” I replied, my steady tone quickly chewed up by the void.

Slowly, I lowered my hand, wanting to see where the voices came from and if they were connected to that blinding, beaming light.

My eyes adjusted, or rather, the light dimmed, tucking itself neatly in, configuring itself into a glowing silhouette until standing before me was a woman, lean with gentle curves and bathed in soft gold. Her hair flowed behind her, adding to her allure. She wore a simple dress, but the way it hugged her slender frame made it look perfectly tailored—not one wrinkle or thread out of place. Everything was pristine. Perfect. The dress parted at her hips, revealing a peek of her long legs. Like her, her dress was also illuminated in a soft gold.

But it was her face that made my breath falter.

Because her face . . . it was my own. She had the same straight nose with the slight upturn at the end. The same almond-shaped eyes and narrow-angled jawline.

The glowing woman wore my face.

“Wrong,” spoke the glowing silhouette, the voices no longer effervescent, no longer sweet. Now, they tasted bitter, full of contempt. I quivered at the sound, like a leaf shaken from a tree.

Her silhouette flickered, her light fading in and out in unsteady waves. With each flicker, she grew dimmer, like a memory fading away. She was disappearing.

“Wait,” I called out to her, my hand outstretched, but it was too late. The woman who wore my face was gone, painting my world in darkness once again.

I bristled as the sound of crashing rocks and moving land started in the distance. It was the sound of a landslide, the sound of an approaching force, and it thundered my way. Something shook, and whatever kept me suspended and weightless suddenly gave way.

I thrashed from side to side, feeling for something to grab on to, anything. But in this void, this never-ending abyss, there was nothing.

I was falling and it was infinite.

The very stuff made of nightmares, the kind where one continuously falls but never hits the ground—the fear of their impending doom eating them alive. I could feel it gnaw at me now. The sanity I clutched onto was beginning to fracture and fray.

I screamed, or at least I thought I did, but no sound came.

I was stuck there, in an eternal struggle with gravity, never knowing when it would stop,ifit would stop.

Panic gripped my throat, choking off my air. My lungs heaved, ached. Where had the oxygen gone? I couldn’t breathe—I couldn’t breathe! I clawed at my throat, my nails biting deep. There was a blockage—I had to get out.

My mind lit up with red flags, begging for relief, begging for life-giving air.

But there was none.

My panic faded, giving way to acceptance. My body was beginning to shut down, a sense of peace overcoming my panic.

This.

This is how I die.

Just as the thought occurred, power—immense and divine—pulsed in heavy, undiluted waves, forcing the darkness to slink away, to bow, to hide.

There was only one thing that could shake a black void to its knees.

That was when I knew that Death had come for me.

But I did not fear him. I reached out, accepting my fate.

He wrapped his arms around me, pulling me in to his steely embrace, the kind that lays a claim, the kind that never lets you go. His hand drifted over my throat, healing the pain of my clawed flesh. When he kissed me, so deeply, so intently, I forgot if I was breathing my air or his own.

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