[mature] The past can hurt. You can either run from it or learn from it (any)

[salt]

to make something beautiful should be enough;

She’s lived in the corporeal world longer now, and it is no longer her instinct to shift to her ghostly form. It was, for a long time – she found comfort in the transparency – but now she is comfortable in this form, her black coat turning to gray with age.
She laughs, too, at the girl’s comment. The river’s current seems strong enough, and Salt has never swum much.

“Hi, Umani,” she says, trying out the girl’s name – it’s different, more complex than her own.
“Are you from here?” she asks, curious, as she always is, about their stories – all so different from her own.

salt