By Marlene Heloise Oeffinger 

She was running. She didn’t know where to, or from. She was just running. Like an animal, chased. Yet there was no one following her. At least no one she could hear or see. There was a sense of danger emanating from behind her. A menace she had to get away from or it would swallow her whole, reduce her to nothing. It was a feeling that pervaded every stone around her. She tried to remember. But what lay behind was almost as dark as the night that surrounded her.

Remember.

The word pulsed incessantly through her mind.

There were shadows and opaque images. They were interspersed by momentary haunting visions of faces. Friendly faces. An older man. A young girl. An older woman.

The woman’s face emerged more frequently, her silvery hair spilling freely over her shoulders, eyes a deep dark blue. Almost as inky as the sky that now stretched above her. In these fleeting memories, the woman’s face held a warm smile. Yet in her heart she knew that behind that smile lurked something frightful. A chilling truth.

Remember.

She kept running. One foot in front of the other. She could only see a few paces in front of her, yet she did not falter. All she could make out were vague shadows of a jagged landscape. Cacti loomed up darkly as she sped past them, leaving them behind. Dark dense holes in an ebony universe of night. At least she assumed they were cacti. Tall, pole-like shapes. Some had limbs extending outward and upward. Some almost looked like people, standing utterly still in the darkness, hands raised skyward. She didn’t stop to check. She kept running.

She didn’t feel exhaustion. Her breathing was calm and steady. Yet her nerves were alert, sensing the night around her as a living entity. The air felt pleasant on her skin. The ground releasing the last remnants of the day’s heat, mingling it with the cool night air.

Desert.

The thought was just there, unexpectedly. She wasn’t sure how she knew. She didn’t think she had ever been in the desert before, but she couldn’t be sure.

Remember.

She focused her gaze on the darkness in front of her, conjuring up images against it like on a movie screen. The memories came slowly, like molasses.

A room.

My bedroom? No.

But there was a bed. And a man in the shadows. A tall man.

My father?

She tried to focus her mind on his face.

Sudden fear ripped through her body, the intensity of it almost causing her to stumble.

Keep running. I just have to keep running.

That was the one thing she was sure of. The abrupt fear pushed her onwards.

The desert was quiet around her. The steady draw of air in and out of her lungs sounded almost obscene in the still. Occasionally another faint sound could be heard. Initially she thought she had imagined it. Yet once it had come from right beside her. The fluttering of wings. Bird wings. She had quickly turned her eyes towards it, searching the night. But there had been nothing.

Maybe I imagined it. Maybe it was a memory.

Birds. What would birds mean to her?

Remember.

Reaching deeper into her mind, she tried to make sense of the feeling of foreboding the fluttering of wings roused in her.

The beating of wings. Many wings. I’m surrounded…

The fear spiked again but she breathed through it. She needed to remember.

In her mind’s eye, she saw the same room as before. The room with a bed off to the side. It was bright, but it didn’t seem sunlit. The tall man was standing against the wall. If she could only make out his features.

Remember.

Sudden light flooded the night. She stopped abruptly. Her arms flew up, shielding her eyes from the glare. Before her lay open land. A rocky landscape, dotted with cacti now clearly visible in the moonlight that illuminated everything. She looked behind her. Just a few steps back the dark entrance of a canyon yawned. Cliffs rose up steeply into the night sky. She never realized she had been surrounded by rock, walled in.

Trapped.

A shiver ran through her.

Her mind latched onto a memory. She had felt trapped. Not by walls. But … what?

Skin.

Skin? What did that mean?

Remember.

She grasped her head tightly, wishing she could squeeze out the memories, one by one. Like drops of water into a scrying bowl, displaying her memories on the surface. Like pieces to a puzzle that would ultimately form a whole. Her past. Her life. But her mind remained silent. Blank.

She took a deep breath.

Just keep running.

She lowered her arms, watching their descent. Panic gripped her.

These are not my arms.

Her skin was nearly fluorescent in the moonlight. Pale. Wrinkled. These were old arms. She turned her hands, back and forth, back and forth.

These are not my arms. I’m not old. I’m young!

How did she know that? Sinking to the ground, she searched her thoughts. There was no doubt in her mind. Not this time. She was young. She was … twenty-two? Yes. She had turned twenty-two not long ago. A vision of a cake, and singing flashed through her. How could she be old? Did she forget an entire life? Her entire life?

No. I’ve never lived.

She felt dizzy. Sudden images flooded her mind. Lights. Sounds. Faces. Wings. She wiped her hands across her eyes, exhausted from the onslaught. The moonlight caught on her wrist, illuminating etched markings. She looked more closely, recognizing a design. She followed the outline with her finger. It covered her wrist, circled around it. Lines. Silvery lines. Gracefully curling, slanting, forming feathers. Two feathers, circling around her wrist. She had seen it before, that design. On the old woman’s wrist.

She run her hands over her face, feeling the soft skin, the fine lines. She traced her hair. It was long. She pulled it over her shoulders. Moonlight glinted of the silvery strands. Her silvery hair.

I am her. She is me.

Her breath came in gasps, fast, uncontrolled. She fell forward, her hands bracing against the rocky ground.

Images invaded her mind. The tall man, the old woman kneeling before her. The woman holding her hands. She knew it was herself. Her hands. Her young hands.

“You will be me. I will be you.” The old woman’s voice whispered through her memories.

“Through you I can keep on living. I can keep transforming. You will be free.”

A sweet smell wafted on the night’s air. She raised her head. Fear washed over her.

Her eyes searched the horizon. Cacti. Tall. Dark. Unmoving. A tall shadowy figure stepped out from amongst the shapes, moving slowly across the horizon. She recognized him. Something inside her pulled her towards him. But her fear was too strong, overwhelming. There was still a small piece of herself inside. The young woman in her memory. And this woman feared what this man stood for. Transformation. Loss. Death.

I have to keep running.

She jumped to her feet, startling herself with her own agility. She started running, running faster than she ever had. The night flew past her.

Abruptly the ground fell away below her feet and she stepped into nothingness. The cliff’s edge had been concealed by the darkness.

She spread her arms wide as the invisible ground rushed up to embrace her.

I am free.

The thought gave her peace. Erased her fear. Yet instead of meeting the hard, cold death beneath, she soared up into the inky sky, her wings stretched wide.