I stared at the night sky as the chill night air tickled my face. The first stars were just beginning to faintly glisten in the sky as I stared into the endless bounds of space. I felt the same chill night air whipping by my body causing my clothes and hair to whip around randomly. As the numerous lights of the bustling city below came closer I continued to stare at the sky. Oddly the stars seemed to grow more numerous and brighter rather than fading into the light pollution as I would have thought they would. The twinkling stars seemed to play snippets of my life with each rhythmic pulsation. The sounds of car horns, sirens and the chatter of uncountable voices grew louder as I fell. My vision seemed to tunnel as the tall buildings around me blotched out more and more of the beautiful stars. Each star that disappeared seemed to be another person who I would never see again, I silently said my farewell to each and every one of them. My life a string of regret, I couldn’t help anyone, I never would be able to in this life. A wry smile played my lips as I considered that maybe I’d be luckier in my next life, not that I actually believed in a next life, but it was a nice thought to comfort myself as the unforgiving pavement raced closer, its rough black surface dyed with the artificial light that inundated bustling street. I turned from the asphalt to the interminable sky, to the last stars I could see, the last goodbyes, the last moment I would be.

               In that single instant there was so much to experience. I remembered her smiling face, though the smile seemed more melancholy now than I remembered it ever seeing it before. Her visage faded only to be replaced with another face, then another. I watched helplessly as I saw each and every person I had failed. I remembered their expressions when they had fallen, the pain in their eyes, yet they always seemed to be smiling. When the last face faded I found myself on a river bank, a memory. The warm air made V shaped patterns rush across the long grass covered slope gently leading down to the water’s edge. The world was stained in the rich vibrant reds, oranges and yellows of a slowly setting sun hiding its luminous rays behind the horizon. I knew she was sitting next to me, but I couldn’t bring myself to look at her. I felt that the moment I saw her face again this perfect moment would end the wind would stop caressing my face the emerald grass would lose its luster and it would all fade into nothingness. I resisted, drinking in this moment for what seemed like an eternity but the compulsion to look at the woman sitting next to me grew and grew. I resisted with every fiber of my being but slowly my head turned and I locked eyes with her. Her hand reached out to caress my face and her lips parted to speak.

               I heard a single scream, the world reappeared around me slowing to an incredible degree as I saw the woman who screamed, her face didn’t register but the mixture of terror and pity in her eyes hit me with full force. I watched as her hand slowly moved to point at my falling body, feet, inches above the ground, I watched as people started turning their heads, ever so slowly, millimeters, eyes widened. A moment of searing pain, blackness enveloped my consciousness. The sensation of falling, however did not end, the wind was gone leaving, yet the knot in my stomach the feeling of weightlessness remained. I looked around trying to see my surroundings, if you could call a preternatural darkness “surroundings”.

               I wondered if this was the afterlife, an endless void, accompanied by nothing but the unending feeling that I was freefalling. A wry smile crept over my face as I considered what apt end it was for one like me. Someone who could never catch anyone who took a fall. My musings were interrupted by the appearance of specs if light winking into existence in the distance like a night sky in every direction, like what I had seen when I had begun my descent, I wondered if perhaps I would be trapped in my last experience for all eternity. I stared at the lights, they were crisp star-like specks of light unmarred by the light pollution of civilization, and they felt just as distant. More and more specks winked into existence some were brighter and drifted upward faster, some were dimmer and moved more slowly. Whether it was just the distance or some other reason it was beautiful none the less. With little else to do I looked around at the many lights, enjoying that the void through which I fell was at least a little less lonely, in one or two of the little white stars even seemed to be falling just like me.

               As I looked down I observed one of the lights almost directly below me getting brighter and brighter. At first I thought nothing of it, making judgement calls on what’s normal for a place I couldn’t have been in for more than twenty minutes seemed like a silly idea. The light kept growing closer or at least larger; it was soon the size of a baseball, more of an orb of light than a speck at this point. As it continued to grow, it was like I was falling straight towards it. Somewhat morbidly I wondered if a dead person could still be burned to a crisp by a star or if I would fall right through it.

               Still the thought of falling into a star was frightening and I must admit that I panicked a bit… it was during this time that I learned that the swimming strokes I knew were not the slightest bit effective at removing me from a collision course with the ever growing orb of light. My attempts at flapping, gliding and running proved similarly ineffective. I’m sure if I would have felt ridiculous if I had not been rapidly closing in on some massive white sphere of light. I was quite afraid for my life, well I was dead, but I was at least fearing for my well-being in this (soon to be short lived) after-life. As all my knowledge and creativity proved useless to change my trajectory I stopped thrashing around like a madman and simply hoped that crashing into a star would be no worse than crashing into pavement like a civilized person.

               Since I had given up *cough* I mean calmed down, I began to wonder about the orb I got the distinct feeling that it was also falling, though obviously not as fast as I was at this point. I had to wonder though, what was this star thing, it easily filled a third of my vision if I looked towards it, yet I felt no heat. Though I couldn’t say for certain whether that was because, as a dead person, I had no sense of touch anymore, or if the giant orb was simply not hot. I doubted that It was a star at this point though, it was extremely uniform in its brightness and color, no sun spots or giant streams of plasma shooting out into space. Maybe it wasn’t so dangerous… well I can dream.

               The ball soon grew to the point that it erased the darkness, even if I looked directly away from the behemoth the most I could see was a patch ever so slightly darker than the rest of my surroundings. I braced myself for whatever kind of impact was coming, just hoping my second death would be as swift as the first.

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               I stared at the night sky as the chill night air tickled my face. The first stars were just beginning to faintly glisten in the sky as I stared into the endless bounds of space. I felt the same chill night air whipping by my body causing my clothes and hair to whip around randomly. As the numerous lights of the bustling city below came closer I continued to stare at the sky. Oddly the stars seemed to grow more numerous and brighter rather than fading into the light pollution as I would have thought they would. The twinkling stars seemed to play snippets of my life with each rhythmic pulsation. The sounds of car horns, sirens and the chatter of uncountable voices grew louder as I fell. My vision seemed to tunnel as the tall buildings around me blotched out more and more of the beautiful stars. Each star that disappeared seemed to be another person who I would never see again, I silently said my farewell to each and every one of them. My life a string of regret, I couldn’t help anyone, I never would be able to in this life. A wry smile played my lips as I considered that maybe I’d be luckier in my next life, not that I actually believed in a next life, but it was a nice thought to comfort myself as the unforgiving pavement raced closer, its rough black surface dyed with the artificial light that inundated bustling street. I turned from the asphalt to the interminable sky, to the last stars I could see, the last goodbyes, the last moment I would be.

               In that single instant there was so much to experience. I remembered her smiling face, though the smile seemed more melancholy now than I remembered it ever seeing it before. Her visage faded only to be replaced with another face, then another. I watched helplessly as I saw each and every person I had failed. I remembered their expressions when they had fallen, the pain in their eyes, yet they always seemed to be smiling. When the last face faded I found myself on a river bank, a memory. The warm air made V shaped patterns rush across the long grass covered slope gently leading down to the water’s edge. The world was stained in the rich vibrant reds, oranges and yellows of a slowly setting sun hiding its luminous rays behind the horizon. I knew she was sitting next to me, but I couldn’t bring myself to look at her. I felt that the moment I saw her face again this perfect moment would end the wind would stop caressing my face the emerald grass would lose its luster and it would all fade into nothingness. I resisted, drinking in this moment for what seemed like an eternity but the compulsion to look at the woman sitting next to me grew and grew. I resisted with every fiber of my being but slowly my head turned and I locked eyes with her. Her hand reached out to caress my face and her lips parted to speak.

               I heard a single scream, the world reappeared around me slowing to an incredible degree as I saw the woman who screamed, her face didn’t register but the mixture of terror and pity in her eyes hit me with full force. I watched as her hand slowly moved to point at my falling body, feet, inches above the ground, I watched as people started turning their heads, ever so slowly, millimeters, eyes widened. A moment of searing pain, blackness enveloped my consciousness. The sensation of falling, however did not end, the wind was gone leaving, yet the knot in my stomach the feeling of weightlessness remained. I looked around trying to see my surroundings, if you could call a preternatural darkness “surroundings”.

               I wondered if this was the afterlife, an endless void, accompanied by nothing but the unending feeling that I was freefalling. A wry smile crept over my face as I considered what apt end it was for one like me. Someone who could never catch anyone who took a fall. My musings were interrupted by the appearance of specs if light winking into existence in the distance like a night sky in every direction, like what I had seen when I had begun my descent, I wondered if perhaps I would be trapped in my last experience for all eternity. I stared at the lights, they were crisp star-like specks of light unmarred by the light pollution of civilization, and they felt just as distant. More and more specks winked into existence some were brighter and drifted upward faster, some were dimmer and moved more slowly. Whether it was just the distance or some other reason it was beautiful none the less. With little else to do I looked around at the many lights, enjoying that the void through which I fell was at least a little less lonely, in one or two of the little white stars even seemed to be falling just like me.

               As I looked down I observed one of the lights almost directly below me getting brighter and brighter. At first I thought nothing of it, making judgement calls on what’s normal for a place I couldn’t have been in for more than twenty minutes seemed like a silly idea. The light kept growing closer or at least larger; it was soon the size of a baseball, more of an orb of light than a speck at this point. As it continued to grow, it was like I was falling straight towards it. Somewhat morbidly I wondered if a dead person could still be burned to a crisp by a star or if I would fall right through it.

               Still the thought of falling into a star was frightening and I must admit that I panicked a bit… it was during this time that I learned that the swimming strokes I knew were not the slightest bit effective at removing me from a collision course with the ever growing orb of light. My attempts at flapping, gliding and running proved similarly ineffective. I’m sure if I would have felt ridiculous if I had not been rapidly closing in on some massive white sphere of light. I was quite afraid for my life, well I was dead, but I was at least fearing for my well-being in this (soon to be short lived) after-life. As all my knowledge and creativity proved useless to change my trajectory I stopped thrashing around like a madman and simply hoped that crashing into a star would be no worse than crashing into pavement like a civilized person.

               Since I had given up *cough* I mean calmed down, I began to wonder about the orb I got the distinct feeling that it was also falling, though obviously not as fast as I was at this point. I had to wonder though, what was this star thing, it easily filled a third of my vision if I looked towards it, yet I felt no heat. Though I couldn’t say for certain whether that was because, as a dead person, I had no sense of touch anymore, or if the giant orb was simply not hot. I doubted that It was a star at this point though, it was extremely uniform in its brightness and color, no sun spots or giant streams of plasma shooting out into space. Maybe it wasn’t so dangerous… well I can dream.

               The ball soon grew to the point that it erased the darkness, even if I looked directly away from the behemoth the most I could see was a patch ever so slightly darker than the rest of my surroundings. I braced myself for whatever kind of impact was coming, just hoping my second death would be as swift as the first.