She sat in a sun-warmed field, braiding her hair with the indigo dust of flowers and stars. Every breath she drew was as heavy and purple as the twilight around her. Her lungs were full. They were bursting with wind and sun and shadow, with all the bliss of nature that she had drawn into herself and kept stored away at the edges of her voice.
Her lungs had been expanding for every second of these long, long years, and now an eternity spent frozen on the verge of a night sky had finally caught up with her. Her rib cage ached where they pushed against it, and when she sighed, the rest of the world held its breath.
Time swirled around her in lazy circles, pausing to listen as she returned everything she'd held onto back to its proper place. The stars themselves poured from her lips as her voice wove through the silence, clear and breathy like dew:
"The moon is my goddess,
A mistress pale and lonely;
She watches me from high above
And when I stop and look to her,
I know which wind to follow.
Oh, it's all so clear
In the arms of the night;
I think I'll never walk astray.
She drinks the light
Of another day gone by,
But gives it back to guide me
When I stumble in the dark.
So what should I see
In her dazzling face
But judgment calm and true?
Yes,
The moon is my audience,
The one and only,
So, please, let me take a bow
Before I fall asleep tonight."
The final note dwindled into the distance as the last pulse of color faded from the heavens. She had sung the world to sleep, and now the only movement was the uneven heaving of her chest.
She wondered at the sudden lightness of her breath, the way it tasted so cold and fresh. Her throat ached, and a sudden breeze sent a shiver down her spine, but still her hands curled into fists at her sides. Everything was where it belonged, now, including the air in her lungs. She felt her eyelids drooping, but she had one more thing left to do.
As the moon climbed to its highest point in the dark and infinite night skies, Rukino Saki drew herself to her feet. She stood tall before the universe, her hands on her hips, then dipped forward into a deep and regal bow, her hair falling gracefully past her shoulders.
Her gaze didn't leave the ground until she had straightened up. She smiled into the moonlight that fell on her anew, glowing on her cheeks and hands and shoulders, and closed her eyes.
"One final curtain call," she whispered, exhaling deeply. Then she turned on her heel and marched from the shadowy field, smiling the whole way. And never once did she look back.