We Were Birds

With each breath she takes, Fern knows she is one more moment closer to the end, even though her feet are not moving.

She stands at the edge of the water of the tropical beach, tiny waves catching her toes in an affectionate caress. Fern knows that behind her sits Astrid, calm as ever, and Fern feels an emotion she had little time for welling up within her. Anger. In life she was hardly angry. In death she was angry even less. She knows why she feels this way, however. It's because of Astrid, or not because of Astrid. It's not the girl's fault, Fern knows that, but she wants someone to blame for all this regret. Bending down, Fern traces her fingers in the sand, her mother's dress grazing the top of the salty ocean. She could have moved on. She could have gotten older, found someone else, had kids, gone back to school, helped other people...anything. But she didn't. She let her entire world revolve around Quinn and his death and now she is paying the price.

Fern wants to blame Astrid for it. She wants to blame Astrid for all the thoughts that keep piling into her head - about God, suicide, regret, life - but more than that, Fern wants to stop. She just wants to pause and erase, move away from herself and leave her body back at the beach and let the rest of herself wander forward. She can't, though. Whenever Fern feels ready to let herself go, another thought springs up. When I died, I was so sure of everything. That this was how it was supposed to be. That I'd done everything, seen everything, felt everything. And now I'm here and I feel so much more.

Maybe its like what Astrid said. This place looks like a Heaven, but it might be a Hell. Or is it?

Fern stands up and turns around. Astrid is peeling apart a green leaf, scattering bits and pieces of it in the sand. She is stripping it down to the skeleton, which is a good metaphor for what Fern feels Astrid is doing to her. "You confuse me, so much," Fern finally says.

Astrid looks up with a raised eyebrow. One would never know she was scared if she never said anything. What would Fern give to at least look this confident in the face of such uncertainty? "What do you mean?" she asks, her voice simple and plain.

"I...well I just thought I had it all figured out and then suddenly you come along and you mess everything up for me. I thought I'd died for a cause, I thought I'd died like Juliet died when Romeo killed himself - because he was dead - but you make me feel like it all was pointless and I never should have done it. And you make me wonder if this place really is Heaven or if it is Hell or if maybe I won't go on because I don't know if I killed myself. Because I ended my life on my own terms but I'm not sure...everything feels so messed up and you make me feel so silly and naive when before I thought I was so sure of everything."

They stare at each other for a long time. Fern doesn't even notice that her hands are clenched into fists and she is standing so straight and tense that at any moment she could collapse - like a newborn seedling, so tall and so proud, at the first winter's wind. She silently begs for Astrid to say something that will make everything all right, she wants Astrid to bestow some of that confidence onto her, but Astrid only looks down and buries her toes in the sand. "Sorry." That's all she says. Sorry. This fearless girl is apologizing.

Fern wants to hit her, but refrains. Instead she whips around and runs down to the beach. She keeps running even when her ankles hit the water, she keeps running until she can't run because of the pressure and the sand and then she just collapses - collapses into the ocean.

The ocean is silent underneath, but roars in her ears louder than the loudest airplane. Her nose and ears fill up with water but she keeps her eyes firmly clamped shut. Fern has no idea why she just ran into the water in such a rash manner. She's never been this irritated, this angry, with anyone. And she can't even figure out who she's mad at. Astrid. Her father. Her mother. Quinn. Herself. Why couldn't death have been some black void filled with sweet dreams of Quinn and her together forever? Why did it have to come with so many questions with no answers? Death is too much like Life. This was what she was trying to escape. Why is it the same? Why is she here?

Why can't she just let it go for one moment?

Fern's lungs ache. She doesn't breathe. She can't die; she's already dead. Instead, she opens her eyes and watches the surface. There are bubbles trapped to the underside of the surface, like the world flipped itself over and this should be right-side-up. A school of fish swim above her, tiny blue-orange things that don't even know that they're dead. Or maybe they're magic. Either way, they swim together - they just know. They're like birds. They just knew what to do. They didn't have questions to ask because they already knew the answers. They never had to consider because they already saw. They'd already figured out the beauty and harmony of life and now they were just playing their part.

Is this what Death is for?

Above the surface of the water, the crystal blue sky hangs over and Fern can see it, beyond the water. And maybe beyond that sky are the chorus of heavenly angels that sing the beautiful and the sinless into Heaven. Maybe when you get on that train it takes you to pearly gates where seraphim and cherubim stroke harps and harmonize in magical sounds. This place is so beautiful that it just must be the work of some all-powerful, all-knowing God. This place is for one purpose: to prove the existence of such a man.

Is this what Death is for?

And then Fern thinks of all the mistakes she has made. From the smallest, the daily trip ups she made in her early years and the foolish things she did with Quinn; to the largest, leaving Quinn, coming back when she should have simply stayed away, and then dying of her own accord. These mistakes could eat her up because she could spend years thinking of them, considering them, wishing things could be different. She could spend millenia wondering what if? and searching for the answers of her past. She could spend decades in those whispering shadows of the days long gone that she spent with Quinn; those perfect, intransible days where everything was beautiful and things like true love really did exist.

Is this what Death is for?

Suddenly, arms tug Fern out of the water and she is up, up, up, sputtering water out of her mouth as Astrid clings onto her. Fern's eyes are red and her nose and ears drain quickly of the water. Astrid looks horrified. "What did you do that for?" she cries, dragging Fern out of the water and up onto the beach. Fern's dress is clinging to her body, much like her limp hair. "I thought you were trying to kill yourself or something! You looked so distraught back there!"

Her anger has evaporated. Fern realizes that all of a sudden. It's like she can't feel angry for that one moment. Because for two seconds of her life, she did just let it all go. She stopped thinking and let all those feelings come back to her. She still wondered and still questioned, but it was as if she was watching herself float underwater, wondering the point of Death when the point was so obvious. When the reason for this place was staring at her right in the face. Standing, shivering, on the lonely beach with no one but this scared and faux-courageous girl beside her, Fern sees the same wonder and harmony as she did before. Tears leak out of her eyes and she leans onto Astrid.

The beach is empty besides the two of them. Death is so empty like this. But it's because most have finally figured it out.

Astrid drags her up to beyond the beach, grabbing their shoes - which lie under the shade of a palm - along the way. They head back to the road and Astrid hands Fern her soft and destroyed black sandals before putting on her own shoes. "You're crazy, you know that, right? You're crazy."

Fern's been called a lot of things before, but never crazy. She laughs. "Maybe."

"I've been doing some thinking since yesterday, when I was, you know, telling you my life story." Fern nods. They'd spent the night at the beach, just looking at the stars, while Fern withered and died inside a little, missing home and missing real stars. "I'm scared, but I think there's no point in me not trying to move on. There's nothing for me here. There's no one I'm waiting for. I should go."

"You don't want to wait for your father? Or mother?" Fern inquires.

Astrid nods. "You know, I think they'd both want me to try and move on. My mom especially. I remember, a few days before I killed myself, while I was still planning it, I had a talk with my mom. She told me that when I'd been diagnosed with brain cancer, she'd asked God 'Why?' But of course, like God, he didn't really answer her. She wanted to know why he had done something like this to me. When I asked her what she thought about letting me do it myself, she became very quiet. She said that she didn't think a God like the one she loved would deny me access to Heaven, if he knew that was where I'd meet everyone I loved. She said she didn't think God really ever wants to hurt anyone." Astrid pauses. "I don't know if I believe that. Sometimes I like the idea of some tyrannical, despotic God that throws people into Hell on a whim. I think I like that because I like thinking I could go up against a frightening God. I think I could go up against a God who enjoys putting a family through misery. But I don't know if I could handle a miserable God who just wants to make people happy and tries really hard but can't do it alone."

"Well isn't that what he has those angels for?" asks Fern. She smiles at Astrid. "I'm not trying to be cheeky. I really don't know."

"Neither do I. And I'm still scared. But I think if God is like anything I picture him, then I think I could handle it. And I think I will see my parents someday. I mean...I hope." It's strange, because at first, Fern had the impression that Astrid just didn't care about what happened to her parents, especially her mother. This confidence image, this courage image is so much more than that. It's more than a facade, more than a mask. It's an armor. Because it's easy to fake strength, it's easy to hold your head up high. It's harder to cry in the face of others.

They are walking, and soon they come to another station. The two girls ascend the stairs and wait at the station.

Fern sighs. "Either way," she starts and hesitates. Her throat closes. "Either way, it doesn't matter. Because I think I'm finally starting to understand. Last night, and so much of this morning, I spent my time just wondering and thinking and feeling sorry for myself. All this time I've kept one foot in the past and one foot in the present. Now, though, I think I'm going to take a step and keep one foot in the present and one in the future. Today...today in the water I realized something. Death is a lot of things for a lot of different people. For some, it's just a waiting room. For some, it's a way to make amends. For your mother, it's a justification. For my father it probably was a surprise. For me...for me it is a way to understand. A way to understand myself and where I belong in this world. Not Death, really, but Life as well. It is so many different things, but for all of us, it is a place where we can continue to move. Because in Life we are always moving forward. What is so different about Death? For people who have lived a full life, it is easy to move on, but for people like us, it is harder. But either way, we move. We are always moving, because we cannot stop."

She is surprised to see that more tears have fallen from her eyes. She has never cried twice in the same day. But Fern's not crying because of what she said. She's crying because the train is coming up and Astrid is getting on that train and Fern is not.

The train stops. Astrid puts her arms around Fern's frail, wet shoulders. "I think," she says softly. "I think you're right." The younger girl gives Fern a reassuring squeeze and then lets go. "I guess I'm off on the next adventure then. If I can't get through, I'll come find you."

Fern shakes her head. "Don't be ridiculous. You know your mother was right."

Astrid swallows and looks so scared and so small and so young. "I know." Is all that comes out. She lifts her hand in a wave of goodbye and steps on the train. She stands at the entrance and they look at each other for a long time before the train doors close. They still look at each other. Then, just as the train is rolling out of the station, Astrid smiles and waves goodbye. The train starts and Fern feels her feet start to move after it. The train chugs faster and faster and Fern runs across the station and down the stairs and after the train as it runs through the tropical greenery.

She runs and runs and runs. She knows she cannot catch up with it and eventually she will be left behind, as Astrid once said she was afraid she would be. But now it does not matter.

With each step she takes, Fern knows she is one more moment closer to the end, and now her feet are moving.