[P] whom the gods love die young

[Marisol]

“Light came from the east,
bright guarantee of God,
and the waves went quiet;
I could see headlands
and buffeted cliffs.
Often, for undaunted courage,
fate spares the man
it has not already marked.”

Marisol dreams herself awake.

When she hits the ground, her body crumples like an accordion; it tears at the seams like a wet piece of paper.

When she hits the ground, she hears the noise it makes—a wet crunch—and if the blinding pain weren’t enough to knock her out, the sickening sound of it is, and her head goes perfect black.

---

Marisol dreams herself awake. Her soul rises from her body. She watches this from a place even higher in the sky, so high that she is looking down on both parts of her, and finds herself surprised—embarrassed?—by the insubstantiality of her own spirit, which from here looks like nothing more than a plume of breath in cold air. A silver ribbon dancing in the breeze. 

I am not dead, she reminds herself, though it feels like it. Her head buzzes like radio static as she tries to rationalize her aliveness. Vultures would be upon her already, their long beaks buried in between her ribs. I am not dead. The dull ache of pain, the insistent brag of her weak heart, says otherwise. No matter how much she wishes she were already asleep forever.

It’s impossible to know whether the sensation comes from her body or her soul whatever part of her that is watching all this unfold, but suddenly, Marisol feels the bright, sharp cold of a breeze against her cheek. It smells like rain; up-turned dirt; and the cool heaviness of the clouds coming down. The shock of it—how real the feeling is—startles her into sudden wakefulness. A shiver ripples through her. From a mile above, Marisol watches the dark brown statue of her body shiver, then fall still again. 

She sees now that her wing is bent at a terrible, crooked, unnatural angle. At the place it’s meant to bend, it has turned in on itself; a needle-thin white bone sticks straight out from a clump of dark feathers that has matted together with blood. Mari feels her stomach sink so fast and so deep that it makes her sick. And it is that sickness that sends her into another fainting spell, a dreamless sleep that will not last as long as it’s meant to.

---

Marisol dreams herself awake.

When she opens her gray eyes, the haze of the world comes half into focus. She sees that somehow—against all odds—she has made it to Terrastella’s hospital. The edges of her vision turn a foggy black; Marisol only manages to stand for a moment before her body gives out, and she falls to her knees in the dirt.

It is impossible to know whether the sight of the girl that comes toward her is real or a fever dream.


“Speaking.”

credits