paige7

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     I've always wanted to be a pixy. One Halloween, I begged Mom for a fairy costume I had seen in a department store. Mom wasn't working because of her illness so we didn't have much money. Nevertheless, Mom had a plan.

     That night, I walked out of our house with aluminum foil covered cardboard wings, a wire hanger halo, and wand made out of chopsticks with a paper star at the end. We walked hand in hand out into the black night. I was her pixy and she was my star, and that night we shined brighter than the Man-in-the-Moon.

     Now that I think of it I've only seen a falling star once in my entire life. It was the night of Mom's funeral. I'ts funny how a celestial being of the heavens can be so stationary, so solid, yet dies and falls with such beauty and grace so it can grant wishes for things we so deeply desire. That night, I wished to know who I would be without her.

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     Alyssa stepped out of the front porch of her house and looked up at the sky. Menacing, dark-gray rain clouds blocked the view of the starry night sky. Then the rain started to pour. Confused and full of messed-up emotions, she closed the front door of her house, stepped out into the rain, and started to run. She ran full speed into the grassy hills in front of her, trying to run back in time. She didn't know if it were possible, but Alyssa was determined to find her past.

     She had been running for many minutes now. Her heartbeat thumped a mile a minute in her throat. Her throat felt shrunken and tight. With every intake of air she felt like her lungs was going to burst. Tears streaked down her face. And she didn't know if they were from her eyes or the sky.

     Suddenly, she stopped running. She stood motionless and numb while the rain poured over her like buckets of ice-cold water. Only rain surrounded her. The sheets of rain was so thick she could hardly see what was in front of her. Then the sheets of rain turned into mirrors. She saw her reflection. But something wasn't right. The girl in the mirror was warm and dry. The girl in the mirrow was sitting at a table, writing in a journal. The girl in the mirror was...

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     Alyssa.

     "Yes?" Alyssa said.

     It's me.

     ""I know," Alyssa said. "Is this a dream? One of those dreams that I told the psychiatrist about?" she asked.

     "The kind of dream that is somhow having you? Yes, Alyssa. This is a dream. I am the dream. I am the dream who had you. I've created you in my mind. You are just a character in a story. All of your thoughts in your head, your words that you speak, the things that you do are all part of a story. You are just words on a page written by my hands told by my voice. I am your author.

     Suddenly, everything made sense to Alyssa. "Why did you write me?" she asked.

     I don't know. Perhaps to try to fid my true identity, my future, my life. Maybe to keep my Mother's memory alive.

     "You helped me." Alyssa paused for a while then added, "I know who I am. I am all those things that you say. Everything makes sense to me now."

     What do you mean, Alyssa?

     "You know that place between you and the words you write on a page?

     Yes.

     "That's where your true self lies. All of those things are me and so a part of you. My past and memories lies within you," Alyssa said.

     So Alyssa must be my future..

     "Yes," said Alyssa as she smiled at me. I am you and I am anyone you want to be."

     At that moment, Alyssa reached toward me, stepped into the mirror, and walked into her past. Alyssa? I called. I couldn't see her. Alyssa?
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     "Alyssa? Alyssa? Alyssa, honey?"

     "Huh?" I said sitting at the kitchen table of my home.

     "I just got home from the doctor's office," Mom said as she walked toward the table and hung her purse on a chair. "I heard voices. Who were you talking to?" she asked and opened the refigerator door in search for dinner.

     "Oh, it's nothing," I said as I closed my journal. I got up from my chair, gave Mom a hug, smiled and said, "It's nothing, Mom. I was just talking to my self."

     The end.