The morning light shutters in through the barn’s upper rafters. A young girl, no older than 6, sits in the hayloft. She steadies a paper airplane in her hand, and sends it on its maiden flight. The pepekura craft lands softly on the nose of a Boing P-12, a replica of the 2nd World War.

“I was obsessed with the sky for as long as I could remember. I dreamed of floating among the clouds, miles above Earth, light years away from people. The wind in my hair and thin air calmed me, empowered me.”

The aircraft shook as it glided just dozens of feet above the vast fields of corn. The young girl, now nearly in her teens, gritted her teeth. A sudden white blast of light ignited the atmosphere, she stared out toward it, the menacing cloud exploded into the sky above the city. .
Her wing struck the tree first, sending the aircraft into a vicious tumble through the field.

“In that moment, I was struck from the sky. God had cast me out from the Heavens. Scourging me, forbidding me to ever enter the clouds again. I had become grounded for the rest of my life.

Some days I sit and watch. So pure and blue, unable to be as contaminated as the ground. The sky calls for me, and yet I must pass an unbreachable chasm to return to her.”