What kid has never dreamed about flying? Not flying like Superman would, though, you know. As amazing as that would be, every boy my age knows that’s a little bit over the top. I’m talking more of a simple gliding through the air kind of thing, as though your bones, organs, head and limbs were light as a puff of cloud held together by your own skin, where taking flight never involved the flapping of your arms in a wing-like fashion, or the wearing of a cape tucked into the back of your neck. It would be as simple as running for just a bit and then taking a quick jump forward, headlong, almost a leap of faith, because that’s the key, you know: in order to fly you have to believe you can in fact fly. Otherwise the wind won’t catch you, and you would just fall flat on the ground, with nothing to show for it except maybe a couple of scratches on your palms and knees.

Of course, there’s no science to dream flying. I figure it varies depending on each person—I’m really not here to tell you how you should do it. Besides, dreams will only allow you to remember so much about them, so what I’m about to describe is nothing but vague recollections of how it happened to me. This is my dream.

My school. It must be around noon, but the playground is deserted. I’m standing next to the big oak tree at the center of the schoolyard. A few steps down there’s the outdoor basketball courts, and a little farther the soccer field and running track. For whatever reason, I feel the urge to dart in that direction like there’s no tomorrow, a pinch of sweat gathering on my temples, and when I’m about to reach those steps I close my eyes, spread my arms in a sense of total freedom, and just let myself go, an incredible happiness sinking into the pit of my stomach, lifted by the breeze, soaring through the crisp afternoon air no more than five feet off the floor. I open my eyes then and see the lines painted on the ball courts go fast before me. And the weird thing is that I’m not even slightly afraid of anything at that moment—me, a skinny boy with a fear of heights and prone to episodes of lightheadedness. But there I am, wheeling and diving and zigzagging all above the school grounds.

I’ve never been able to remember the end of the dream. Once I’m up in the air it all starts to blur until those images dissolve into a black pool of dreamless sleep. And I’ve never understood the nature of these dreams either—it wasn’t just a one time thing, you know, they are quite frequent. My Mom always says that I have a fidgety soul—always trying to get one step ahead of me. I’ve asked myself several times if that could be true. Maybe that’s the reason why I recently started to black out unexpectedly in the middle of the day too. The doctors certainly don’t have another explanation for it at this point. All they do is put me inside these big machines that make scary noises. But as far as they can tell, apparently there is nothing wrong with me. So perhaps it is true that my soul is just pulling away from me sometimes. I often wonder where it wants to go, and why it won’t take me with it. But it’s dangerous, you know? Once I was staying with my aunt and uncle at their summer house for a couple of weeks, and one day I was just riding my bike when all of a sudden my soul decided to go on a little trip without me, away somewhere else. I woke up on the side of the road, confused and with a bleeding elbow while cars drove fast past me. And that’s just an example of many.

Now every time I begin to feel dizzy I beg my soul to stay, to be patient. I tell it the time will come when I’m older and the both of us will be able to take off and see the things it wants to see—together, with a snap of my fingers, just like that. And I tell it that until then we have to learn to live with each other, but sometimes it still doesn’t listen to me.

And you know what? I kind of secretly wish it never will.