A Stroll with the Lady:

Cecilia had gone to bed late. But before she climbed into her bed, she spent a long moment staring out the window at the night air, just thinking. But she must have thought very hard, for she had what she thought was the strangest dream of her life.


The moon hung bright overhead and asked her why she was all alone amid the sparkling lights that night.
      She hung her head in response, just to keep walking. She was ashamed of where she was going; where she had been. She was ashamed to be her. It wasn't until all her friends had gone away and left that she had an answer for the moon.
      She strolled once again alone amid the city's stillness and awaited the question. But when it came, when she knew the answer, there was a new question. Not, "why are you alone" but, "why are you here."
      But she found she did know the answer. "I am here because this is me: the stars in the sky, the lights in the river, the smell of life while the city sleeps. It calms my soul."
      And then the moon smiled, because the girl had figured out the riddle of the sky. The girl asked the moon why she smiled, and it was simply stated: "not every girl can talk to the moon".


Cecilia awoke with a strange sort of tightness in her chest. It felt as though someone had given her soul a hug.