(Sink or Swim) Homework

[Star]

"Isn't it?"

The End. Close curtains. Chairs up, doors locked. Sure. Rebirth. Another spin of the wheel. Blah, blah. File under Charlie Brown's Reincarnation. Plus Buzzkill.

"I mean, like. You know, we only take one thing with us, right? And that's what's funny. The whole, you know, hypocrisy. It's all like 'Oh No! You killed an Awakened!' like it's some Big Deal, but no one ever stops and says, well, wait, at least they were Awakened." The Enlightened Soul. "I mean, think about it. Sleepers. That never Awoken. They take this, I dunno, this, half-baked Soul into The Beyond. And it's not a big deal, but, really shouldn't it be a bigger deal?"

Everyone wants something. Sure. They say that every story has three principles. But the fulcrum? Yeah. Eyes blinked. Blinked again. Feel that? The hot warmth, squeezing at the throat and up to the eyes.

Sleepy Souls.

A half roll, half-flip twisted him onto his feet with a sudden grace. "Ummm. Look. I, uh. I left some laundry in the dryer. It's totally getting wrinkles."

Every. Story. Has. A. Third.

Right, Valentine?

[Zodiac]

She simply shrugged lightly, lifting his book again to offer it to him. "It's never as bad as people like to make it out to be. Sometimes... I just wish I could crawl back into my unawakened self..." she frowned a little bit, "back into a world where I kept no secrets from my mother, and where nightmares ended when you woke up. A world where it was okay to fall asleep with someone and feel safe..."

She didn't look at him as she spoke, and her voice was quiet, but she knew full well that her soul was no where near where it needed to be. But then, for her it wasn't about what she took when she died... it was about the legacy she left behind, feeble though it may be. "Sorry... yeah, you should... get to that."