I am Alexandria Burton

I am Alexandria Burton. I don’t really exist; well, not as in having a body and a life. I am a mere spirit floating in some strange state of non-existence.  I ended up this way because I was experimented on by a black-magic wizard. It happened when I was a young girl living in the early 1300s. No one ever found me and saved me from that terrible monster of a man. He experimented on making me invisible and he tried to give me the ability to fly. He ended up succeeding in his attempts, just not in the way he expected. He destroyed my body, but my spirit remained, tied forever to this mortal world. I was not dead; in fact, I now lacked the capacity to die. He forced me to live in a state that only spirits lived in; spirits that never had a chance to live. I vowed to myself that no other child would have to get stuck in such a state as mine, or go through the stress and pain of being without their family.

            That’s how I came to do what I do. I help people find children who have been lost or kidnapped. Soon after my unfortunately executed escape from the wizard, I discovered that I can communicate with the living. I have no physical mouth or ability to create sound, so I can’t talk to their ears. However, I can talk to their minds. I simply place thoughts in their heads, although it is still up to them to listen. I love doing what I do; it gives meaning to my non-existent state. The looks on the faces of mothers being reunited with their children are so rewarding, I could care less that I’m not really alive. Their silent, grateful “thank you”s to a higher power remind me that I didn’t just end up doing this; there’s someone behind it. Perhaps I am a mere tool of some great deity, but if that’s so, then I’ll continue to be that tool. I love helping children have a chance at a life, unlike I had.

            The duty or calling which I posses, though rewarding in many ways, is not always easy or happy. There are times of failure. These times cut so deep into my soul, they would cause physical pain if I possessed a physical body. One such example was when I tried to help one little boy be found. I switched back and forth between comforting him in his dark lonely cellar and planting thoughts and directions into the mother’s head. I tried to explain to her where to find him, but she didn’t understand. I failed, and I will never forget that.

            When you lack a body, you realize how much we feel is not felt with our fingers or skin. Most of it is felt by our spirits. I realized that fear is not some bodily reaction, it is real. I’m always afraid that the wizard will find a way to get to me. I’m afraid that I’ll never escape from this state of never-ending floating and drifting through time and space without leaving this world; although this wouldn’t be as bad as my previously stated fear. I am most afraid, however, that some child will have to go through anything like I had. That’s why I have accepted this calling and life of mine; to prevent children from suffering this terrible feeling.

            My life was good before I was forced into this role. I had a family that loved me, and I still love them, even after all these centuries. My little sister Lilian- my Sweet Lili- was only three when I was ripped away from that life. I would have taken care of her and loved her and we would have grown old together. I was also in love. I would have married Aaron. I was only a few years from the right age for marriage, and I adored him. I don’t know, but I imagine that he searched the longest and hardest for me after my disappearance. I was a carefree happy girl, learning to do what women did. Perhaps it was, as this century would say, merely a “crush.” I no longer know that life; perhaps someday I will be reunited with it. I dream that at least I’ll come to know my family again and that I will see what kind of a woman Sweet Lili grew to be.

One of the best things I’ve ever experienced, in this strange half-life stage at least, was when I discovered that we spirits could communicate. I had been sobbing after a failure to get a parent to listen to me. I thought that I would never be able to help another child and that my work would have been for naught. All of a sudden, I felt a hand on my shoulder. At first I knew I must have imagined it, but as I looked over my shoulder, I saw a boy about my age.
            “It’ll be okay,” He assured me.

He helped me to lead the father I had been trying to get through to, to his lost daughter; and then he left. Not all of the spirits talk back, but knowing that I am not truly alone makes life- or not life- more bearable.

            Through all my experiences- good or bad, rewarding to terrifying, earthly or spiritually, one question continues to surface in my mind. “Why do terrible thing happen to good, innocent little children?” I know that the answer matters not, and that I just have to keep working to better their lives as best I can. I don’t know why my life turned out the way it did, but in many ways it is worth it.