Luna Fortner
His family had always been reckless. His great-grandfather was killed in a hunting accident, his grandfather in a hurricane. His uncle died from carelessness and daydreaming, one day in the factory too many, and his mother was a tale longer than anyone had taken the time to tell him. He didn’t know his father, but although Christopher was too young to understand it, this too showed signs of recklessness in its own way. His current caretakers discouraged this inherited tendency in him when they paid him any mind at all, but for the most part he was left alone.
It was a good thing he didn’t mind being alone. It helped that he didn’t know anything different. Christopher spent his hours outside of school and even a few during it climbing trees and flagpoles and towers and anything that would support his weight. It wasn’t that he had a particular fondness for the act itself, however—what really fascinated Christopher were the heights he could reach. Always he wanted to go upward to greater and greater heights and witness the world below grow small and distant. Unconsciously, what he really wanted was to fly, but lacking this option, he contented himself with reaching the highest points he could and staying there until his fingers were cold and numb and he could barely climb down for his stiffness.
Once, upon seeing him ascend the old oak tree that bordered the playground, a classmate had called him a bird. She said it was because of the way he moved from branch to branch, more flittering than jumping, but Christopher had only looked at her thoughtfully before continuing his ascent. He spent the rest of recess imagining himself as a tiny winged creature, fluttering among the trees, the wind in his feathers, the calls of his people around him. To be a bird would not be half bad, he thought. Or perhaps he was one already? His classmates seemed to think so. When he went in from recess, several children addressed him that way, asking what a bird was doing in school and if he was allowed to leave his nest and a number of similar questions, which Christopher had answered to the best of his ability.
Now he was perched in his favorite spot, the highest point of the old building he currently lived in. It was atop a tower with a heavily sloped conical roof, and he had been expressly forbidden from climbing it on no less than seven occasions. Yet the sky was dark and studded with stars, and the air cool and light, and Christopher saw no reason he shouldn’t be up there, so he was.
After a moment’s consideration, he jumped off. The wind roared in his ears as he hung suspended, his arms and legs outstretched, his heart pounding with ecstasy. His fingers and toes tingled, his hair blew back from his face, and Christopher beamed as he imagined his flight, up, up, up to the moon and the stars and the sun.