Free WILLODEAN (THE CUPITOR CHRONICLES Book 1) by Fowler Robertson Page B

spotted Dalmatians. My bizarre behavior set the cups to rattling and provoked the dogs to bark which caused neighbors to come out on porches. I was barefoot with no makeup, dark circles under my eyes and wild tousled hair.  The wind pat me on the back and the leaves clapped with applause. Every thought in my mind was aimed at freedom, as if it was a target to be reached, to be touched, and felt.  Every step unlocked a chain inside me, inside the house. 
    Simply be. Birds of the air, lilies of the field, stars of heaven.  Simply be.  It was a rebirth and a spirit of childhood longing set free and I’m not even sure how it happened. I stopped midway to brace myself on the branches and could see Mr. Kotter, Horseshack and John smiling up at me. I giggled and mounted upwards. Barefoot and with childlike determination, I climbed. I press through every thought that terrifies me, or makes me doubt. I discard the heart critics, my failed past, the terrible whispers of the shadows that linger in the midst of my afflicted mind. I shut it  out. I climb for one purpose.  To reach the crackle. To claim my vow. To live my namesake.
    For Willodean Adult Hart, recently divorced, no direction, no purpose, no identity, lost woman— this was epic. It was profound not because it was grand or glorious in spectacle but because it was the opposite. I was childlike and acted out the desires of a yearning wild heart, a heart that was long ago disengaged, and deadened for reasons I can’t explain or remember .  But now I feel a surge of new air, unfamiliar inhalations as if breathing for the first time.  I felt alive.  I can’t remember when I last felt alive.  It was remarkable.  I clung to the tree bark and felt the wind bristle against my skin , uncapping hidden wells of memory like water sprouts.  Maw Sue used to say something about  salvation . It stilled me with the thought and took my breath away like it did the first time I heard it.  I held onto the tree as if I was holding on to the memory, scared it would slip from me, without meaning, snatched by the Amodgians and I would forever be lost in the dark, inside the house, damned to the hell I created ins ide the rooms, behind the doors of my own mind.    
    Salvation meant much more than we realize. For Cupitors, words held a form of power, underlying attributes, significant and meaningful,  life changing and world changing.  In the ancient language,  salvation meant  room to breathe . Hearing it the first time, the air was sucked from my drab vessel of bones and cast into the atmosphere of heavens portal and before I could faint, it was rushed back to me, different, not of this earth, abundant, effervescent, fresh and redeeming. Literally, new breath.  And right now, on this branc h it’s happening all over again.  I feel as if I haven’t taken a real breath since childhood.  M y lungs expanded and my body weightless and ai ry as if I could take flight and float away.  For the first time, in a long time, I had room to breathe.   I inhaled the crisp redemption and kept climbing.  I finally reached the summit of the wondering tree, the precipice of my own soul where I could see the horizon, my past and my present staring back at me. Tears welled in my eyes and streamed down my cheeks. I stared a t the darkness without a candle.  I stared into the light without shadows.  The lesser light and the light merged in my vision and I comprehended my pain in another realm where all things collide and give understanding. 
    It was   Godlike redemption in a climb, a leaf, a crackle, the wind, birds of the air, and lilies of the field and stars of heaven. Room to find me. Room to simply be. Room to accept. Room to forgive. Room to make lovely my losses. I had room to breathe. Before my next breath, my next heartbeat, without hesitation, preparation or thought—I plucked the leaf out of the spider web while the crackle clung to it with its tiny claws.  I saved