"We are each of us angels with only one wing, and we can only fly by embracing one another."
-Luciano de Crescenzo
I was in total darkness, so thick and oppressive that I almost felt as if I were swimming, but anytime I tried to move my body refused to cooperate and I felt immensely exhausted. Voices echoed back and forth in this darkness. Once I thought I heard Erik's and another time I heard Marisa's, and then I thought I was back in the musical because I heard Tom's voice too. The darkness seemed impenetrable but, once, I spotted a far away light in the inky blackness of my surroundings and I felt a strange peace come over me.
It didn't last long.
"Dad? Are we almost there?" Glittering white snow blows at the car, leaving behind only a few snowflakes on the windows that soon melted into oblivion. "No!" I shouted, no longer in the darkness anymore, my voice sounding strange and echo-like. Oddly enough, I wasn't in the car, I seemed to be floating above and away from it a bit. However, I knew what was coming next and did not want to witness it again. But the dream-memory went on...
"Just a minute, Angel..." Usually warm and resonant, Dad's voice was strained as he leaned forward, trying to see through the continually thickening snow.
"But Dad…!" I whined and suddenly, there was a loud sound... a blaring horn... screeching tires... a scream, mine... broken glass and twisted metal... snowflakes falling, brilliantly white against the redness... My dream-self, (I can describe it in no other way), saw the twisted wreckage as it always was but now there was something different... a translucent figure was emerging from the car, going through the roof as if it were not there! Amazingly, I recognized the figure... Dad! My dream-self struggled to follow but, as always, I could not move. The figure flew straight up and was joined by a creature that glowed with a pure celestial light, so bright that even my dream-self had to squint. The creature appeared to converse seriously with my father who looked down sadly at the car where an ambulance was extracting my semi-unconscious form but then he turned towards the creature with a nod.
The dream faded and suddenly, I was in a different place... I couldn't really see in the physical sense but I somehow felt as if I was in a room of sorts. I was waiting... for what I didn't know... until out of the corner of my eye I spied a door opening to reveal a the light in the darkness. This time it was closer and brighter than before. I lifted my face and my arms towards the overwhelming sense of peace that the light brought. I wanted nothing more than to surrender to it... there was something familiar and comforting about it... I walked forward as the light grew brighter and vaguely I saw three shapes silhouetted against the source of the light that with each step closer I felt such incredible peace and happiness that I wept for pure joy.
"Christine..." one of the figures spoke. It was my father. I struggled to run to him but some invisible force held me back. I felt his smile though, and I knew that he still loved me.
"It is not yet time," one of the other figures said, in a voice that felt like the wind brushing against my cheek.
"But I want to go with you!" I cried, reaching out towards my father and the light that shone all around him and his companions.
"It is not yet time..." the figure repeated and suddenly, they began to fade, I desperately reached out once again but they were gone.
"I'm all alone... again!" I whimpered and just as I thought I might collapse in grief, the peace came back and soothed my turbulent emotions, washing over my soul like cleansing water.
"You will never be alone..." The light pulsed faintly in the dark with the words even though they were not spoken audibly. I felt them in my heart and with the peace came a silent yet unmistakable pull... I nodded my assent and soon I felt like I was floating again...
When my eyes opened, I found myself in a hospital bed, in a dimly lit room. A machine beside me beeped steadily and, as groggy as I felt, I remembered everything. Sensations came back slowly and I became aware of two things: The first being my arm, which throbbed faintly under the bandages, and the next the feeling of a thin, gentle hand under my own.
I twitched my fingers experimentally, and finding that they didn't object to being put into action, gripped the hand. "Erik?" I asked, my whispered voice croaking. I licked my dry lips; it didn't help much.
"Christine!" Erik's head sprang up from where it had been resting against his arm. I looked at the visible side of his face in alarm. He looked like he hadn't slept for days and his voice was more worn and haggard sounding then I had ever heard. I frowned at him, lifting my hand to brush away scraggly strands of his hair out of his face.
"Are you okay?" I asked but he shushed me and pressed a button out of my line of sight. A nurse appeared soon after, brightened when she saw me awake and shooed Erik away from the bedside so she might see my monitors better. After that she asked me a few questions on how I felt, marked something down on her chart and then hurried away before I could ask the question that was the foremost in my mind.
Erik's eyes never left my face and as soon as the nurse was done, he all but leapt back to my side, grasping my hand in his. The nurse returned with a glass of water, which I drank rather greedily. I stopped her before she left and bit my lip, feeling butterflies in my stomach. Absently, I heard the heart monitor beside me beep a little faster.
"Am I..." I licked my lips again and gripped Erik's hand harder. "Am I pregnant?" There, I'd said it. Erik's hand jerked as the question escaped my lips.