• a thirst for freedom...

    A confounded sigh leaks from Isabelle’s lips as she treads to the murky window. Her hand grazes the layer of fog and water droplets in which her warm breath forged upon it, and she gazes out at the abundant evergreens that restrain her from seeing the dim hills gleam upon the border of the earth and the sky. A thin layer of aqueous vapor appears as a blanket on the solid surface and another lamentable sigh escapes from her lips.Isabelle’s eyes are still fastened on the evergreens outside as her finger traces a chip on the mouth of her coffee mug. Her father rests his hand on her shoulder and yet she does not break her focus. “Bad dream again Izzy?” Isabelle does not initiate a sound but instead she shatters her focus and drops her head. “Was it about..your mother again, sweetheart?” he struggles to question. She grips her mug and her amber eyes flash to the window once more. He follows her gaze and frowns, his hand leaving her shoulder.
    The eerie truth was that he was right. Isabelle has dreamt of her mother almost every night since the day she was deprived of her love. Yet every time, the dream is exactly the same. It always starts with those distant evergreens outside her window and in a split second, it flashes to a vacant meadow.

    ***

    A lonely weeping willow sits helplessly perched upon a mound of dried grass. Her mother sits below it, engaged in pleasant read. She is young and about the age Isabelle was when she died. Isabelle walks closer to her hesitantly, and notices that her mother is clothed in white silk. Her hair is in long, pink-gold curls down her back and tied with a white, silky ribbon.
    As Isabelle’s steps become quicker, the tree and her mother get farther and farther away from her grasp. Her mother does not lift her head from her book as Isabelle cries out to her. Instead, she begins to whisper, “Suppress the hidden rain.” The words hum around her head as she runs toward her slowly-fading mother. Tears stream down her face until finally her mother looks up at her, repeats the phrase piercingly, and vanishes from Isabelle’s sight. Isabelle is left alone, standing upon the dry mound of grass until she awakens in a cold sweat.
    Each and every day, she stares at those evergreens outside her window, hoping to find an answer to her night terror. An answer hidden beneath their lasting green foliage, their true significance. However, each and every day, that answer continues to elude her. Still, she stands by her window, clenching her Mickey Mouse coffee mug, waiting.