The pigeon barely noticed her at first, she was just one of many humans that she crossed paths with every single day. But there was so much joy and happiness that it radiated around her like a golden aura. The pigeon couldn’t help but be drawn to her. So, she perched to watch the mother with her daughter for a while. She couldn’t hear any words, not that she would understand them anyways, but the smiles shone brightly through the car windshield and that she understood.

The pigeon watched the horror as it unfolded and was powerless to stop it. The human’s maternal instinct was so strong that it thrust her body into action before her mind could catch up. Much like how a mother will instinctively lunge towards the elevator doors if her child wanders off on the wrong floor. There was no thought. Only action bore out love for her child.

Time stopped and the human’s heart traveled through time and space to the moment she first met her daughter. Love spun between them an unbreakable string that transcends all things from all worlds. Every smile, hug, joke, meal, game, everything that they had ever shared together welled up inside the human and a fierce determination to survive was sparked.

Then, seconds later, after the smiles were gone and the golden glow that radiated so bright only seconds earlier was starting to fade. Screams drowned out everything and even muted the breeze.

The human’s energy went inwards, as it often does when death is approaching, but the string that connects her to her daughter was so strong with love that it amplified all the remaining life force she had left in her, outwards, stopping her spine from being crushed by the car that bared down on top of her.

The pigeon called fate as death’s shadow grew. Life answered and found a way. The breaths continued. The human was not done with this life and rejected death, shrinking its shadows with her bright light from within.

The human’s daughter could not see her mother’s fight as the pigeon did – a warrior standing squarely against death, with a light shield protecting her from death’s shadowy advances. Blood filled the driveway, but the pigeon saw death’s retreat and knew that the human was going to survive. Not because her physical condition deemed it so, but rather her soul shone too bright for death to grip her.

The ambulance came and paramedics struggled to stabilize the fractured human. The pigeon flew high into the sky to attract other pigeons to her cause, which had now become to protect the human and the human’s child by calling fate on their behalf. All the pigeons briefly gathered, and all were made aware of their duties then they dispersed throughout the city.

The pigeon returned to the ambulance. Sometimes flying high above it, warning the ravens that Odin would not succeed where death had failed. Then she flew next to the ambulance to investigate through the window. At one point the pigeon was sure that the human looked directly at her as she could feel her energy. The pigeon didn’t know how to say anything in human but tried to send a message through her mind to the human that everything was going to be ok. Her daughter was safe, and that death had abandoned her.

The worlds are not scripted for the profound love between mother and daughter. Everything can be re-written when it comes to the love string that bonds two hearts together. Not even death can glean a taste of this radiance as its very existence is the opposite of all that is death.

Time will heal the broken ribs and cuts and bruises. Love will smooth over the trauma of this dance with death. The seasons will lessen the echoes of chaos etched into the wind. All days from this one, until the last, are bonus. Every sweet kiss and every warm hug will be felt more deeply because the veil that separates this world from the next was briefly breeched and rejected. Every day is on loan with love paying its interest.