Learning to Fly

The bird soared past the gate and over the cluttered buildings endlessly, looking for a place to rest. Again and again she circled the autumn sky until she reached the center of the town square, and landed neatly on the great stone statue that towered above everything else. It was right next to a decaying brick building where a man lay dying.
He had been fading away slowly for a while. The old man had cancer and the doctors had given up on him; his family had given up on him, and he had given up on himself. He never rose from his bed and spoke to no one. A few family members came to visit from time to time, but the man ignored them. They would beg him to at least try to sit up, or go outside for some fresh air. The man stared at the ceiling.
Occasionally the man would look out his window and see the bird soaring outside his room before returning to the statue that was its home. It was times like that that made the aging man do anything to have been soaring in its place.
Outside, the bird was preparing for the approaching cold. She shifted restlessly as the tranquil moon cast shadows above the town square. The days were getting shorter.
The man awoke to the coo of pigeons outside his window. Their long shadows danced along the plaza, and the man sat up with difficulty for a better look. He was feebly trying to open the window until he saw the bird nestled at the base of the statue. It was lifeless. He lay back in his bed and did not look outside again.
The window was open a crack but it was enough for a light breeze to blow into the lonely hospital room. It rustled the curtains and breathed life into the man’s body for a few seconds, until it continued on its way, blowing some leaves from a tree in its wake. It left the hospital room as lonely as it was before.
Soft white snow was now swirling outside as night fell across the city, covering the old cold stone statue in a soft blanket of darkness. The man opened the window and soared past the grey apartment buildings, past the pigeons perched on the rooftop, into the winter sky, rising higher and higher until the swirling snow and the stars blurred into one mass of blinding light; past everything that physically exists and perhaps even past the entirety of space and time that is the universe.