Walking back down the long dusty path into an experience of a life time, knowing I can't go back. I've left my world behind me, troubles, truths, love, hates. The only things that accompany me on my way are the memories of all the good and bad things that have happened to me. The only thing that awaits me on the other side is complete paradise.
             As the cotton candy clouds of heaven open up for me, only happiness is left by my side. My strawberry body is filled with emotions, and yet still feels empty. I keep on walking, yet something is holding me back, a fear, an uncertainty. What if I don't belong here? I could be expelled from this place like a rock being thrown into the lazy ocean, lapping at the golden shore.
             I remember all the people I have known, all the places I have been. I know this is part of the great odyssey that is life, and death. And yet I still know nothing about the things that will greet me on the other side of the gate, and if I want to go on at all.
             The road is getting smaller now, and I know I can't stop. Everything I am feeling must be pushed forward, I mustn't let it hold me back. The road is getting steeper as I climb towards a mystery, and now I see her.
             She is the thing that keeps me going, the warming candle burning in my sensitive, aching heart. For many years I have waited for this moment hoping it would come, but somehow dreading it. Her smile is as warm as the sun breaking the horizon at dawn. Her lips are the colour of a bright red, wet lollypop, glistening and twinkling in the sun. Her eyes are the pure blue of the sky out of a bedroom window in the morning, warm and inviting. Her fine, golden hair bounces with the wind at her shoulders. I want to hug her and never let go again, like I did so many years ago. "Kiara", she called softly, I didn't know what to say.
             I remember the heartbreaking day it happened. Like a crook taking a sweet from a baby, her ...