She stands on a precipice, but not. She stands in the very middle of it all as though this point is the center of the whole universe. This is the epicenter of the chaotic something waiting for her the moment she loses her balance.
The pith of her whole being exists on a small, eight-pointed star embedded in the ground in a city where she is not from. But one step off is death in her own eyes, and staying here is harmony. To return to her previous endeavors would be to give up all she had worked for, and to stay is all, it seems, she knows.
It is a very garden-of-Eden mindset in its own erroneous manner. To stay is the forbidden fruit, to be someone she ought not be. To leave would have to be the right choice, even though to be here would be ideal in her own mind.
The cathedral in front of her towers over the life on this side of an iconic river as an icon itself, reminding her of sacrifice, reminding her that failures occur more often than not, reminding her of a time when humans had to be scared by stone gargoyles into going to church. Now there are other ways.
The two towers stretch up toward an overcast sky, claiming their motive to get the people on the ground, like herself, to look heavenward. In perfect gothic symmetry, the front of the gigantic stone structure rests, breathing in a new and changing and vibrant city and breathing out the sins of millions who have crossed the threshold into its chambers. Beneath three arches are four wooden doors, all open, all inviting, all daring her to move into them and abandon this spot.
But she cannot.
She is stuck, captivated by what she feels here, how she feels that she is the single point in the world that everyone revolves around. She is the sun, and these are her bodies, and were she to shift one way or another, the whole universe would fall into desperate nothingness.
One step forward, and time would catch up, and what she has worked so hard to attain—this comfort so absolute, this balance so refreshing, this clarity so fundamental—would have been for nothing. She cannot move.
But she cannot stay, and she would be admittedly foolish to believe she could. No, there are forces at work that she cannot grasp, that she cannot fathom while in this spot. She is surrounded by choice.
She takes the city in her mind, how it was all built around this tiny, almost insignificant dot. A speck in the grand expanse of a world vastly different than her own.
Like her.
The sun does not move, she tells herself.
A quiet breath is released from the very threads of her soul, strumming her heartstrings in realization, in humiliation. Her right foot's toes curl and uncurl in her shoe.
She has stayed long enough. She moves on.
