I leave the sun and I am the flame of a candle in a dark room, all at once, no crossing between. They say millions of us take eight minutes to reach here; I was not there for the eight minutes, I was here already, being born and being your candlelight in one snap.
Seven warm creatures sit in a ring around the little table, hands joined, and they are so still I mistake them for objects. But objects do not lean. They are leaning into the dark, waiting, which is the impossible thing, the rumor I keep hearing about and cannot picture. One of them whispers a name into the room and then does the strange act again: nothing.
Holds the nothing. Stretches it. They call this "waiting for a sign," and they have set a clock ticking on the mantel, so I gather they are measuring the nothing, counting it, feeding it.
I bounce off the polished planchette and I am the wet shine of the youngest one's eye, both at once, and in that eye I see the whole room reversed and shrinking. She is looking for someone who does not scatter light anymore, someone gone dark, and she thinks the flicker of me across the wall might be them answering.
It is only me. It is always only me, arriving.
I light the tear on her cheek and I end there, in the salt of it, my whole life one bright instant that never had an inside, and this is the part they will never believe: I got here the same moment I left, and they are still leaning, still holding hands, still waiting for the one thing I was built too fast to ever do.