The world that birthed that story is long gone, all its people are dead, but it continues to touch the present and future because someone cared enough about that world to keep it. To put it in words. To remember it.

Maybe this is why I sleep only a few hours a month. I don't want to die again. This has become clearer and clearer to me recently, a desire so sharp and focused I can hardly believe it's mine: I don't want to die. I don't want to disappear. I want to stay.

We are where we are, however we got here. What matters is where we go next.

She hugs me. It's tentative at first, a little scared, and yes, a little repulsed, but then she melts into it. She rests her head against my cold neck and embraces me. Unable to believer what's happening, I put my arm around her and just hold her. I almost swear I can feel my heart thumping. But it must just be hers, pressed tightly against my chest.

I want to change my punctuation. I long for exclamation marks, but I'm drowning in ellipses.

I don't know... there's something kind of beautiful about it, don't you think? That we keep living and growing even though our world is a corpse? That we keep coming back no matter how many of us die?

Deep under our feet the Earth holds its molten breath, while the bones of countless generations watch us and wait.