Prologue

"Don't look back." He had warned.

She wished she had asked why. She wished a lot of things though. She wished she had taken one final moment to look at his face. She wished she asked him when she would see him again. And most of all she wished she would have gotten on her tip toes and pressed her lips to his. But she had been young, and so sure that when he had promised to see her again he had ment soon. She had thought she'd have to wait days, maybe weeks, or months, but she never thought she'd have to wait years. Unfortunatly that is exactly what happened to Chihiro Onigo.

She waited, and waited, and waited some more, until six years had gone by. Now she was in high school, the Spirit World- and the river spirit that stole her heart- a fond but very distand memory. Chiriho is no longer the girl who spends every afternoon waisted waiting by the fake tunnel for a dragon who never shows up. Chiriho is no longer the girl that pauses at every new found river, pond, or puttle and wonders if he can see her.

No Chihiro is now a teenager whose time is spent on the swim team, giggling with her friends at the mall and the movies. She is the sixteen year old who studies for exams, and day dreams about university and winning swim meets instead of flying dragons. She tells herself she's put it all behind her. She swears by it.

But in her moments of weakness she can not deny she is lying. Moments when seventh period is dragging by far too slow and she glances at a white puffy filled sky and wonders if he's flying around. Or the first second when she dives in the water for practice or a race, and she gets a flash of another body of water, where she's carried to safty. In these moments her heart squeezes tight in her chest, and her lungs refuse to cooperate until she lets the memories play like they wish too, untill she let's the urning and nostagia settle like a thick blancket over her. It is in these brief, second long, moments, that feel like an eternity, that she's honest with herself.

Then the second passes and she blinks twice and takes off splashing her way to a win in the pool, pretending like the only reason she started swimming was not to feel closer to the river spirit.