The Accidental Phoenix
What do you do when you’re 46, alone, and lonely? That’s what I asked myself as I stood at the cliff edge looking down. The water was so beautiful, shimmering blue and green as it danced around rocks and sprinted under bridges. The town was not far away, a survivor of many floods, living through countless deaths and rebirths. I lifted a foot and prepared to leap, closing my eyes to this life. I remembered my children and turned away from the cliff edge.
That’s when a rock gave underneath my left foot and I slipped. I felt myself sliding down the rock face and it seemed to take hours, and there was nothing for me to grab ahold of. I saw all of my exes, wives and lovers. Dead relatives and living ones. My children’s faces. I saw the drunken nights in bars pleading with women who didn’t want me. I saw the sober nights alone in my bed, on my couch. I saw the intermittent nights where I found love, or at least companionship, and I saw God. He had blonde hair and glasses and was just watching me as I slipped off the last sliver of slanted rock.
I plummeted like a baby bird pushed out of its nest too soon. I saw rock and sky, trees and buildings, rock and sky, and then the hit. Pain shot through me like a violent tornado of hammer smashes. Red and black and loud like a million canons. My scream was silence and my vision was black followed by the bright light of a blazing star. The light engulfed every part of my being, conscious and subconscious, reality and dreams.
I was in the sand. I expected to be bruised and battered but I was in perfect condition, wet and naked. I saw the impression of flames around me for a split second but they disappeared. People were looking at me funny. Parents were hiding their children’s eyes as they walked past. I stood and saw muscles gleaming in the sunlight. I needed clothes.
I walked into town, my bare feet stepping on hard cobblestones, and a policeman approached. His face was hard concrete. “What sort of stunt is this?” he asked. “Are you one of them leftist commie nudists or somethin? You can go back to your commune after you pay your fine and serve your jail time.”
“I… I fell,” I said, confused and frightened. I was suddenly surrounded by heat and orange and yellow light. I instinctually shot up into the sky, a trail of flame behind me, and I became a bird with feathers of fire. I flew until I hit the atmosphere, and shot through, burning my way into space.
It was a dark and lonely place, but it was beautiful. I could see the planets, impossibly large celestial shapes. I was in a place of vast emptiness and spinning things. I shot past them into a universe of massive, amoebic light and color. I flew until I found new worlds, new spheres of water and land. I only needed to choose one to call home.