Payton Klaer

I think I felt nothingness before I saw it – the way my arms weren’t forced down to my sides. My hair wasn’t touching the back of my neck like it usually does. My feet weren’t planted on the ground. And there was no sound. When you try to sleep and it’s quiet – there are always still sounds whether it be a car alarm going off or the air conditioner running. But this silence was deafening. It was all I could focus on until I willed myself to open my eyes.

Even when I could see, I was able to pretend I couldn’t because there was nothing. And I don’t mean empty walls or the same bedroom as always, I mean nothing. An empty and endless void that stretched on for far too long and far too wide. No colors. No texture. This place was the literal definition of nothing.

I could have been falling. No, I should have been falling. Maybe I was and I just couldn’t tell. Maybe I was falling so slowly that I couldn’t see it happening. That was when I realized I could see myself. When I looked down I saw my arms and legs. I saw the clothes I always felt comfortable in. It wasn’t dark in this place. It was just empty.

After what could have been seconds or countless hours I started to see things. There were dots filling the area around me. Little yellow and white orbs. I couldn’t tell if they were just out of reach or lightyears away. It could have been both. Or neither. They appeared so suddenly that I started to question whether or not they had been there the whole time and I just hadn’t noticed. Maybe I imagined them. Maybe it was my mind playing tricks on me as I stared into the darkness.

When the orbs started to grow and multiply I didn’t know what to think. Was I making all of this up? Was this my own coping mechanism or was it real? Could I reach far enough out to feel the heat of the stars around me?

But then I saw colors streaking through the darkness. I saw purples and blues – no. It was more than that. It was a rich and deep violet with scattered shades of amethyst and periwinkle. The blues were the color of aquamarine and indigo with hints of the sky appearing in whisps. It looked like a scene from a movie. The perfect rendering of space. The night sky as the protagonist looks up, taking in how insignificant they are in the grand scheme of things. The colors moved and combined like watercolor, lighting the scene around me.

And all at once I could see.

I was standing, softly, on what could have been sand. It was silky and moved when I so much as twitched my foot. But it was dark. Darkness speckled with shades of grey. And ahead of me was a sea of sand. Hills rolled out across the horizon completely made up of the sand. The sky was a perfectly painted picture of night with stars and planets filling it, thousands of lightyears away. Green streaks danced through the expanse – like how I imagined the northern lights would appear if I had ever seen them.

Suddenly, a boat. It soared through the vast and open land ahead of me. It was long and wide, made of dark wood that seemed to glow a muted blue in this environment, but remained completely empty. When I squinted my eyes, I swore I could see a captain standing at the wheel, waving to me. The boat left a trail of stars that painted its path with a streak of yellow. It stood out against the dark sand.

I understood. I don’t know how or why I knew what was happening, but I did nonetheless. This was what was meant to be happening.
I was not surprised when the boat came close, bringing with it a great wind that almost knocked me off of my feet. Slowly, it halted right in front of me. And I knew to begin climbing the rope ladder that had been thrown down. I didn’t doubt my actions even for a moment
When I got aboard, I spun around, looking for the captain but they had disappeared. They had been like a whisper I wasn’t sure was there to begin with.

Although, maybe none of this was really there.

The boat lurched forward and continued its journey through the sand. It sped ahead toward the neverending horizon and I felt myself smile involuntarily. The feeling of the wind on my face just felt right. Like this was something destined to happen. No matter what was causing this feeling, I felt like this place was meant for me for the first time since opening my eyes earlier that night. Was it night? Or was it always like this?

Would I ever see the day again?

I found an empty crate in storage. It wasn’t hard pulling it up a set of stairs and onto the deck, near the bow. I sat and watched the world open around me in awe of this place. That was the first time I started to question how any of it could be happening other than inside my mind. Night skies lit up with green lights and pirate ships propelled by stars skating over a sea of black sand.

None of this could be real.

Suddenly, things started to change. I watched as the stars in the sky moved faster than I could realize and they started forming pictures. Constellations drew themselves together and I saw The Big Dipper. A moment later it became Casseopia and then Pegasus. The collection cycled through more and more and more images until every star in the sky was shifting to match those around it. It was a light show of cosmic proportions.

Then, it felt like the stars were looking at me like billions of eyes seeing into my soul and blinking simultaneously. The boat slowed under me and we came to a stop. We had reached my destination, apparently. And just as we came to a stop, the stars started to move again. The feeling of being watched was gone and quickly was replaced by my own curiosity.

I didn’t recognize that constellation.

It appeared to be a child kicking a ball. They had short hair pulled up into a ponytail atop their head with wisps flying out here and there. They were laughing with crinkled eyes and hands in the air. The ball soared through the air before speeding back into the cluster of stars. Then it was an older child, maybe in elementary school. Their hair was now down to their chin and was straight as an arrow. They sat at a desk with their hand eagerly in the air and a book open in front of them. The pages began to turn, slowly at first and quicker until the stars shifted again.

Now it was clear the child was much older. They were in high school with a bag slung over their shoulder. They were kneeling down to pick up papers and books that had flown out of a classmate’s hands. Both students had wide smiles. There was a different hue to the child that had been growing up through the constellations. The stars began to take on an orange glow making their figure stand out against all other parts of the image.

Everything swirled together and spread into a new picture. The child was an adult. They were unpacking groceries from a car with another figure who appeared to be much older. They happily walked up and down the sidewalk, taking the paper bags into a small house where the other figure stood with a smile. When they shut the trunk everything collided again. This time they sat at a desk surrounded by books. Next to the desk was a replica of a skeleton.

My breath hitched when I saw that detail. The stars weren’t painting a new story for me – they were recalling an old one. These were my constellations.

That was when I went to medical school. I had spent two years going back and forth on the decision, but I’m glad I did it. My mom had been so proud. She always said I was destined to help people. Actually, I don’t think I am glad I made that choice – I think I was always going to go to medical school. I think it was written in the stars for me. Like something I had to do. Something that was always going to happen.

With a turn of the page, the scene changed again. I was shaking hands with my new boss. Well, new at the time. I had gotten hired right out of medical school to work in a retirement home. I was relieved when I shook her hand. It was like everything was finally starting to come together. I had been studying all day and all night for my exams. Getting that diploma and job was just what I needed. Everything I had dreamed of was coming true that day. Even now, I couldn’t stop myself from smiling back at the memory. My colleges didn’t understand why I had wanted to work in a retirement home. They thought a place like that was only for the “back-log” of nurses and doctors. But I saw the beauty in it. There, I would be able to help people who needed it the most. The people who might not have friends and family to rely on.

I tried to remember some of my co-workers when I noticed the orange hue of the stars had become more apparent in this scene – like I was radiating some sort of energy off of my silhouette. But again, the stars moved, wiping the board clean to make way for the next image.

It was me sitting at the edge of a bed, hands entwined with an elderly woman. She had been in my care for two years at that point and her condition was getting worse. I still can recall the stories she told me whenever we had a check-up. Some were about her grandchildren tearing apart her garden while others were about her growing up and how different the times were. I remember getting the phone call the next morning not to come to work because they didn’t want me grieving on the job. But there were more people who needed help so I went in anyway.

I never really had time to process all of that now that I think about it. Even today, looking back on everything, I miss her.

I took a steadying breath as the stars moved into another form. I was able to recognize this one quickly. For once, this was a memory that I thought about far too often. Even for my life before all of this. I saw myself, in that bright orange collection of stars, sitting at a desk in the retirement home with my hands cradling my phone. The stars didn’t have to write out the messages on my phone’s screen for me to know what they were saying. It was all happy birthday messages. From my mom. My dad. Cousins. Grandparents. The few close friends I had. Acquaintances from college and classmates from high school. Everything from one line-texts to notifications of being tagged in posts. That day I had been working a double shift and I hadn’t seen any of it until late into the night. It might have even been early the next morning.

The worst part about all of it was that I hadn’t even realized it was my birthday.

This time the stars spun around into a spiral before spreading into a grim scene. The orange hues were dull as the person slept in a bed. There was a large group of people at the bedside. Everyone was smiling. I didn’t want to see this. I didn’t want to watch as it happened.

But I couldn’t tear my eyes away.

I stared as the orange stars flickered.

I didn’t cry as the color finally returned to the same yellow as the stars around them.

They had all come to see me off – just like I had done so many times. Caring for those who weren’t ready never prepared me for the possibility of my own death. I don’t know how I never saw the signs. I don’t know if there were signs. I was so consumed by my work that it hadn’t even occurred to me until it was too late. But, it never mattered that I wasn’t caring for myself. I was caring for so many other people. Everyone was always dreading the day I went into their room to give them the news so I always tried to make it as painless as possible.

I think being around that much death made me forget about myself. It made me disregard my own life in favor of those who needed extra guidance into whatever came next. And I’d do it all again in a heartbeat. Sure, I never had a family of my own and I never got to do that cross-country road trip with my friends and I didn’t get to go on that picnic with my mom – but that’s just the nature of it all, isn’t it? You don’t get to do everything you’ve planned.

It’s harsh. Believe me, I know.

On the bright side, in this strange sandy landscape, I get to continue making a difference. I sail this great blue vessel through the neverending expanse to help those who still aren’t ready to move on. That’s what the figure did before me and that’s what someone else will do after me. But for now, I’ll continue to help others along this road. And I won’t be upset for even a moment.