Dear Readers,

Taking a brief trip out of cancer retirement to write this little something. Just read Bridge to Terabithia for the (second? third?) time and am astounded once again by its emotional resonance. I felt deeply inspired to write a post script of what happens to Leslie Burke after the rope broke. Please review.

Pippin

...

When the water closed over her head like the lid of a coffin, Leslie Burke wasn't afraid. The water was cold, swift, and fierce, but she wasn't breathing, and that made all the difference. After all, if she tried to breathe underwater, she'd drown, wouldn't she?

She knew this was a fact that was saving her life. The creek was morbidly swollen, the waters thick with mud and fallen branches. If she took a single breath, it could be the end. It could fill up her lungs and kill her. Leslie might be imaginative, and but she knew what drowning was. She wouldn't imagine away the water.

But there was confusion as well. Her head should have broken the surface by now, but she was surrounded with an icy cold current, and it had solidified on top of her, preventing any kind of swimming. How was she supposed to breathe if she could not reach for shore?

It was the feeling of pain in her head that gave her the answer, a solid thunk that jarred her brain out of its senses. She must have hit her head, and she couldn't tell which way was up or down. That's why she wasn't swimming. That's why she wasn't breathing.

That's the reason why she's drowning.

The headache built, and the pressure was building faster. She didn't care if her lungs bust open like popcorn kernels. She wasn't going to open her mouth, not even to cry for help. It didn't matter anyway. She was drowning, she resigned to it. The pain in her head was lessened as long as she relaxed. The pain of cold stabbing her eyes like knives felt all the better when she shut them. The water that rushed like a thousand voices was much quieter, as if entering a hidden library under a waterfall. Everything was quiet and peaceful here.

It was just like slipping into a dreamful sleep. Images and feelings skittered past, scattered like rays of sunlight falling between the groves where the Spirits waited. Leslie Burke was in a happy trance, and even while her body was tumbled and dashed against a fallen log, catching between the branches, she felt satisfied and a little excited for what was about to happen next. Her bones might have been bruised, or even broken, a bloody cut on her scalp turning dark with the waning morning hour. But she looked on, self aware that whatever was happening to her mortal form was only secondary to the joy she felt now. She was finally a member of the grove, joining the Spirits that she always believed were there, listening to the prayers and pleas of Jess and herself...

That's the only sliver of doubt that entered her mind. If she was HERE, then what about Jess? What was going to happen to him? She couldn't be responsible for him in her current state. She couldn't seek him out. She couldn't invite him to come up and play any more. She had ascended into a world of imagination where ordinary human beings could not have access. Jess, too, would have to drown in the creek if he wanted to join her. Part of her wished he would, but it wouldn't be fair to his parents or his sisters. Leslie would never ask him to do something so selfish. Let him stay where he was. At least he could draw, and run, sing songs and do what he was good at. He could even milk that old cow. Given the choice, he wouldn't realize what he was giving up if he chose to follow Leslie's path. Only when he came to this realm would he realize that it wasn't his time yet.

Golden lights were everywhere. Leslie found herself in a place of pure reverence, where spirits shined, and her vision could not look over them for more than a second. The light of the sun was so bright that it was almost like seeing white noise, there was nothing all around for miles, and yet there was everything. Like herself, the other spirits were iridescent beings, the golden lights a physical manifestation of their souls. Leslie found that she, too, was merely a golden light, wandering amongst the others just like her first day at school, charging towards one end of the field and staking her claim, as if to say, I belong here just as much as you do.

There was something soft playing in the air, but it wasn't like music made with clunky instruments on Fridays. It was as if the Wind itself was given a true voice, and the voice was singing through chasms and mountains. Without words of English, the wind could still speak, and Leslie heard the voice as easily as if it were printed in the Sunday morning comics.

The voice was telling her that she was going to be all right. The voice was welcoming her, at last, into the kingdom she had always wanted to know about. Whether it was Terabithia or not, Leslie thought it was just beautiful. It defied all her expectations, and she felt that her timing was perfect. It didn't matter what she had been told about the afterlife. What mattered was the content of her soul. Maybe she had never said the right words, or recited a liturgy, or learned the names of saints and sinners alike, but she had made a clear choice between love, or nothing. She had chosen love over the void. She had made her choice without thinking too clearly about it. Even when she visited church with Jess and his family for the first time, she had made a choice outside of the dismal walls and gaudy stained glass windows. The preacher had droned and shouted but failed to present a message that she knew to be truer than all truths... she was loved. She chose the light that created that love, unconsciously or not.

And now, the love was welcoming her home, just like a Queen.

...

...

Thank-you for reading. This does not necessarily represent my personal views of what happens after death, but is a result of my imagination, and what I believe would happen IN UNIVERSE according the Katherine Peterson's story. I believe in Heaven after we die so while this sort of delves into my own personal beliefs, I hope that it feels true to the book, according to the beautiful mind of Leslie's character.