Dear God,
Memories are really a funny thing. It is strange how your mind chooses what you remember, even if the memories are old, or a common thing, or an insignificant thing, or just what you ate a long time ago. I have many memories of my childhood. Some of these memories it's important and made me who I am, others are happy moments of my life, and other it’s just ordinary things in a guardian's childhood.
A memory that I will remember my whole life, it's when I learned to fly. This memory is one of the most wonderful and frightful of my entire life.
The first scary thing is that Ocean taught me to fly. The second scary thing is that Ocean was a child just like me, so that lesson was full of different feelings and a lot of near-death experiences.
Ocean chose a peculiar time to teach me to fly, that was nothing less than when mom was in a war. Thus, he had the freedom to teach me how he believed was best. But what improved the moment is that I was not in the age to learn to fly, thus no one was waiting to see a little girl stand on a cliff. But Ocean was a demon and did everything to have a time away from the adults and alone with his young sister to teach her the value of life.
The flying lessons were a tradition in my family. That was created for my dear older sister, who decided on a beautiful day to teach her young brother to fly. That lesson was pure chaos, which resulted in some broken bones and a whole week of a traumatized Ocean demanding sleep with Sun. Thus, when Ocean was a little old and had a brand-new sister to teach flying, he, as the little devil that he was, embraced the opportunity to follow the family tradition.
Ocean started to make me flutter my wings and stay in the air for a few moments before we slept when no one was looking. After that, we moved to a meadow next to our home and I started to stay in the air for a longer time, and with those exercises my wings started to become stronger. It took some weeks, fluttering my wings in the school at night, and when we had some time to make it in the meadow. When Ocean was sure my wings were strong enough to make me fly from a high point, he took us to the high tree next to our home. Those trees were famous in the entire world for the wood, the height, and thickness of the trunks. When I was there, I remember being terrified. I remember I said to Ocean that I don't wanted to do that, that I wanted to go back to our school, and that I did not want to learn to fly because any friend of mine was flying, so such thing was stupid. I remember that when I said that word, stupid, Ocean took one of my hands and make me look him in the eyes and said to me a thing that change everything to me:
“You need to learn to fly, little Moon. You know why?” I shook my head while trying not to cry. “Because flying, and to be a good fly, will give you the most important thing in the whole world.,” he stayed a few moments in silence to create anticipation in his small audience. “Freedom,” he whispered to me as if he was telling me a secret that I must keep with my life.
Those words touched my heart and gave me the courage to jump from that tree. When I was a little older, I asked Ocean how he knew what to say to me to convince me to try to fly from that tree. He laughed at my question, and told me that he honestly didn't know what to say to me at that moment, thus he told me what Sun told him when he was on top of that tree. He said that I had the same reaction that he had, and he thought that if those words helped him, it would help me too. Some time after this conversation with my brother, I talked with Sun about the subject. The funny thing about it was that Sun didn't create those words from nowhere, but mom told her when she was taught Sun to fly, and Sun was afraid of the height of the tree. Thus, when the time came, Sun told the same words to Ocean, and Ocean told me it too.
***
That day in the tree, I broke my leg. I had a lot of courage before I jumped, but when I stayed to fall, every single drop of courage vanished. I honestly don't remember every single detail of that day, the strongest memory is the pain. The pain was horrible, and it became everything I knew in my life when I was on the floor with my broken leg. The memory that is stronger, beside my pain, is Ocean. I remember seeing him fall behind me, trying to save me from my fall. It was so vivid, I saw him with his sea eyes wide open while he fell, his wings curled behind him, trying desperately to be faster than I.
And when he finally reached in the floor, the only thing he said over and over again was:
“I am so sorry, Moon. It's my fault. I am sorry. Please, stay awake, everything is going to be fine. I am sorry. I am so sorry. You're going to be okay. I promise, Moon,” his voice was weak and low. It was different from Ocean’s normal voice. I looked at his face and saw that he was crying, my brother. The tears dropped from his sea eyes and ran down his dark skin. My older brother was crying. “You need to be awake, Moon. Don't sleep…” His voice was so far away from me, and I could not reach him. And after a time his voice disappeared.
***
I was not awake, but Ocean told me what happened after I passed out.
He carried me until Aladris’s House. But he could not let anyone see that I was hurt, because they would start to ask questions that we could not answer. Thus, Ocean needed to be careful and took routes that were not used so much, and that took more time than was needed if he took the right way. Besides that, it took a lot of time to find Sun in Aladris’s big house, and when he finally found her, I was awake and doing my best to not make any noise.
We scared Sun, but she was a healer, and she did the best work to stop my pain and fix my leg. Sun was the best healer in the nation, thus everything took just a few moments, and when she finished I was new, and ready to play with my brother and sister.
The Sun’s reaction was what Ocean and I were waiting for. She yelled with us that what we do was stupid and that we should wait to make it with her, she yelled with Ocean that he should have been more careful, and that if I still wanted that lessons he should be more careful in the next time.
***
The next day, after school, we came back to that tree. I almost fell again, but Ocean was there to hold me and to take me back to the top of the tree.
***
My training in the tree took a lot of time, a lot of almost falling, after that first day, and various days until I built trust in myself. But when Ocean and I were trusting in my wings, and my flying skill, we changed our training place.
We lived next to the coast, next to the huge and infinite sea, and there existed a cliff so high that for a long time I thought that there was no end. Mom told me that if I stayed close enough from the edge, I could feel God, I could feel you.
Our first day of training on the cliff was a beautiful day. The Sun was not so strong, the wind was cold, and the air smelled like happiness. On that day, we ran away from our teachers, so we stayed there the whole afternoon. That afternoon was so perfect and bright. At that, moment it seemed like everything was so possible, accessible, and that the whole world was delightful and fair.
The first time I stood there, with the high and with the sea underneath me, I almost gave up, again. But, Ocean was there with me, again, and told me that I didn't need to be scared.
When I started flapping my wings and felt the wind in my skin, and the salt in the air, it seemed like I had lived my entire life just for that moment. It felt like time stopped when I was there, with the sea below me and my wings working so hard to keep me aloft, and the feeling that, for the first time, I was complete.
When I came back to the earth, Ocean was there, waiting for me. I hugged him. I hugged him so hard, started to cry, laughed, and told him how thankful I was for him bringing me there. And when I looked into his sea eyes, I saw tears in his eyes that he didn't let fall.
“It's wonderful, isn't it?” He said it with a big smile and bright eyes. I just could shake my head, because I could not find words to describe that occasion. “Thank you for letting me be part of this moment, little Moon,” he whispered it when he gave me another hug. And that hug felt like we said everything that we wanted to say to each other with no words.
***
Dear God, thank you for listening to me and staying with me. Please, give me the strength I need to stand by my family. And please give us a good night of sleep. That’s what I ask you and appreciate, God.
