Overhead, the stars peeked between the leaves of the trees that were mere shadows against the darkness. To his left, a little more than a twenty yards away, was that damn statue the city had commissioned and put up at the entrance of the children’s park. Kiel would bet even money the thing scared more children than entertained them. The night was very close to being exactly as it had been when he’d awakened here. A touch cooler, but other than that a perfect copy. Squatting down he ran his hand over the spot where he had come to, dead but alive. The grass was still green and long. It hadn’t been mowed in a while, just like it hadn’t been mowed when he had awakened. He took a deep breath. It was instinctive, automatic. He no longer needed air to survive. Everything he did was out of habit. But everything he smelled, everything he touched, all of that was real. In fact, it was too real. Too much sensation bombarded him from all sides, as if dying had finally given his body the chance to savor the world the way he should have when he lived.
