Chapter 7 – Becoming the Flame

She was no longer searching.She was the fire.

There are moments in life when something inside you shifts — quietly at first, then with unstoppable force. This chapter is that turning point for Amara. It’s about remembering who she is, reclaiming the joy and desire she once thought lost, and daring to let her inner flame shine.

Sometimes, transformation is felt in small gestures: a laugh that bubbles up from deep inside, a scent that stirs memory, a glance in the mirror that finally sees you as you are. And sometimes, it comes roaring through dreams that leave traces on the body and soul.

For me, writing this chapter was a reminder of how powerful it can be to honor both the mystical and the everyday — both the magic and the ordinary moments that together ignite the flame within. I hope as you read it, you can feel that spark too.

A few days passed. The dream of the staircase lingered like a sweet melody in her blood. She felt something inside her had shifted — and the world around her noticed, even if no one knew exactly what it was that had changed.

One morning in the kitchen, Mila tilted her head, nose wrinkling in the cutest way.
“You smell like jasmine, Mama,” she whispered, almost reverent.

Amara froze, a shiver crawling across her skin. She hadn’t worn perfume. But there it was again, faint and sweet, rising from nowhere — or perhaps from her.

Then Mila twirled, her chubby arms flung wide, skirts flaring like a butterfly. Amara laughed and scooped her up, their joy spilling together. The laugh came from deep inside her chest, honeyed and free, as if her body had finally remembered how to laugh without apology.

Her husband, however, had grown quieter. He studied her as though she were a stranger who’d slipped into their home. Once, in bed, he reached for her. His hand was familiar, the same weight, the same warmth. But the touch felt empty — like a song played without sound.

She moved his hand away gently.
“I’m tired,” she whispered. And she was. Tired of pretending.

She had hoped he might ask what was happening. That he might notice the light shimmering at the edges of her silence. But when one evening she confessed, “I feel like I’m waking up from a long sleep,” he only nodded and turned back to his phone. And that was the last time she made any effort to repair what was broken between them.

That night, the dream returned. And this time it did not whisper. It roared.

She was back once again in that liminal space where nothing was solid yet everything throbbed with truth. The air shimmered around her, heat waves dancing across her skin.

And then — he was there.

No silver car this time. No bench by the sea. Just him. Barefoot, sunlit, golden. The horizon behind him burned with the colours of dusk, molten gold dissolving into indigo.

He strode toward her with the calm inevitability of a storm. His hands were not hesitant. His lips remembered hers. This was not the tremble of reunion. This was claiming. Consummation. The yes they had carried across lifetimes.

Their bodies met, and something holy cracked open. The stars themselves seemed to draw closer, as if they had held their breath for this very moment. Amara’s stretch marks gleamed like constellations across her skin, her body a galaxy mapped with memory and desire.

Every breath was a remembering. Every gasp sparked like lightning in her bones. The ocean inside her rose, tide meeting shore.

And then, silence — vast, sacred, whole.

She woke not with longing but with stillness. This time there were no desperate tears, no clutching the pillow for echoes. She rose with salt on her lips, his warmth across her chest. The dream was not just dream. It had left an indelible imprint on her flesh.

She lit a candle and stood before the mirror.
Not to weep. Not to plead. But to see.

The mirror had once been a courtroom, sharp with judgment. Now it felt like a threshold. Her body bore the stories of motherhood, marriage, and memory: soft places, silvered lines. But in those stories she also saw light. Love. Sacred history etched into skin.

She touched her reflection with reverence.
“I’m ready,” she whispered.

The next day she opened her old notebook, its spine cracked from years of neglect. She hesitated, fingers hovering. The blank page blinked like an open doorway. For a moment, the familiar fear whispered: Too late.

And then she heard it — faint, like a memory of the dream — a voice: Yes.

Her pen moved. I want to become the woman I was always meant to be. For me.

That afternoon she enrolled in the writing course she had bookmarked five years ago. When the confirmation email arrived, her heart thudded as though she’d been chosen.

She unearthed her abandoned translations, smoothing crumpled pages. She danced in the empty house, hips swaying, laughter rising. Her body remembered joy. Rhythm. Him. But now the ache no longer consumed her. It became fuel.

She joined a gym. The first day, the mats smelled of sweat and effort. She felt awkward, out of place. But when she stretched, her spine cracked open like a sigh: Yes. I am alive.

She bought herself the perfume she had always denied. She chose clothes that made her feel luminous and feminine, not hidden. She let her own gaze land on her body with tenderness instead of critique. The flame was feeding her now.

Sometimes she left Mila with her husband and went out with friends. They laughed until their cheeks ached. She was no longer waiting for life to begin. She was relishing it.

One evening she handed Leena the first chapters of her story. Her hands trembled as she offered them.
“It’s rough,” she warned. “I don’t even know if it makes sense.”

Leena read in silence, eyes widening, shining. When she finally looked up, her cheeks were wet. She laughed, then cried harder, pulling Amara into a fierce embrace.
“This isn’t just your story, Amara,” she whispered. “It’s ours. For every woman who forgot. For all of us who gave it away just to survive. This is the story of waking up.”

Amara held her, her own tears spilling. The flame that had sparked inside her was already touching others.

So she kept writing. Each sentence burned another layer of fog away. Each page drew her closer to the woman who smiled in the mirror. To the woman who danced without apology.

She didn’t know where it would lead. But she knew this much: the flame was no longer a dream. It lived in her now, flickering steady. She was its keeper.

One night, she caught her reflection in the kitchen window as she swayed barefoot on the tiles. The glass shimmered — not just her own face, but a flicker of golden dusk behind her, as if the dream had followed her home.

She smiled.

She was no longer searching.
She was the fire.
And when she looked into the mirror, the flame smiled back.

Previous Chapter 6 The Descent

Thank you for reading…✨

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Lia