Chapter 1
When have four years already passed?
This is what Amy asks herself every day. So, the daily schedule would be: wake
up early in the morning, attend courses, go home, work, sleep.
It was a cold winter morning, the
wind was fierce and she had to wake up early to deliver some an essay at
college. Her dreams were fuzzy, something about being in a magical golden
forest. The alarm went on, with the same hideous song, which almost tormented
her every morning. At first, it seemed to her that the song was a part of the
dream… yet the images were distorted by that awful screeching sound. All the
golden beauty got dissolved in a terrible headache caused by the early wake-up. But she wanted to hard to sleep and return to
her magical place…. But the alarm said no.
She heavily opened her eyes, and saw that her room was still dark.
She forced herself off the bed, dragging herself to the kitchen to start the
coffee machine. Oh, that smell! The heavenly scent of steaming coffee is
probably the best part of an early morning. The fractures of the dream were
slowly passing into the land of oblivion. For the first time during that
winter, the sky bleached, foretelling
the snow. Amy looked through the window. Ignoring her sleepy reflection she saw
a perfect view. All was white with black stains, like a movie black and white.
The only pixels of color belonged to the fragile red lights of the cars. A crow
was crossing the sky. It was like an arrow hurting the perfection of the
flawless sky. One minute later the sky was invaded with chaotic groups of
crows. Their screams were disturbing the morning serenity, so the clouds
started crying violently with angry huge snowflakes. The blizzard was doing a dance of death,
beautiful, tragic and dangerous at the same time. It wiped everything in its
way, leaving behind virgin white surfaces… It almost washed away the shame of
the night…
Her soul trembled in the rhythm of
that terrible dance. How special it feels to understand when nature speaks the
same language as you do, and no one else would understand it… Amy wished she
could produce a blizzard of her own, one that could wash away her torment; one
that could leave her pure and untouched on the inside. But those crows were so
loud… their awful mourning distorted any trace of serenity. It sounded like
they were hit by a sudden unexplainable madness, as if some wicked sound
disturbed them deeply too. To Amy’s surprise, they were also packed in groups
of thousands, which moved like a single individual. Funny how such small
creatures act like the cells of an entire body, flying simultaneously, managing
to express something big.
Watching them flying in a chaotic
beautiful dance, Amy started thinking about her future. Oh! The uncertainty was
killing her slowly! It almost felt surreal… how other living things could
express so well what she felt: a terrible cry of despair and restlessness. Suddenly,
one of the crows hit the window and fell dead. She was still trying to wake up
from her thoughts and figure out what had just happened. The bird was as stiff
as a piece of wood, as well as Amy. It died so quickly like most of her dreams.
It is sad how fragile life is, and how easily we can be crushed by trivial
things.
*Beep Beep Beep*! It was the familiar
sound of the alarm clock again. Amy swore, turned it off and went back at the
window, staring at the dead crow. It was a sort of fascination to her: its
perfection, its frailty, its peacefulness. A tear was quickly shed from her
left eye directly on the beak of the creature. It froze instantly, looking more
like a diamond now. It decorated so well the inert black beak. Staring bleak at
that still image, she startled when the alarm went off again. Apparently it was
for real this time. She was actually a little bit late for school. Getting a
quick dizziness from standing up so suddenly, she rushed to her closet, picking
up the first clothes that came to hand, grabbed her backpack and rushed out. It
was like in a frozen hell. It was snowing, but that snow did not shelter any
tranquility; it was violently freezing and hurting anything it touched. Awkwardly
enough, there were groups of crows flying randomly above the cold buildings. Their
screams reminded her of the dreams she had just had and her heart started
bumping like mad, when remembering the whole dream. Yet, she tried to ignore the event, moving on
through the terrible day that was to come.
And still… somewhere through the
clouds, there was a ray of light, so frail and scared, that one could easily
miss it.
