Heaven or Hell

by Roni Teson

  “Yep. Many discussions went on and decisions were made during our old coffee sessions in the kitchen.” Joe smiled. He was relieved to have felt his jaw start to relax and his wall of defense begin to release in the presence of these men. Especially in the presence of the man whom the General claimed was completely innocent regarding his participation in the accident that’d killed Angela.

  “I was working at my second job, cleaning toilets and dirty dishes at that twenty-four-hour diner on Third Street, when my wife called me and told me she thought she was going to lose the baby. She was six months along. She said her sister was going to drive her to the hospital and would I meet her there? Of course I would. I’d driven our car to work, if you could call it that. It was a car registered to one of my cousins. The tags were expired and the car operated when it wanted to. An old Buick Regal, a car that was made out of real heavy metal and was sometimes difficult to control.” Flavio paused and took a napkin off the table to mop his brow, though Joe noticed that the man wasn’t actually sweating the slightest. He must just have the emotional feeling associated with sweating …

  “I was in a hurry and headed in the opposite direction than your daughters. Being in a hurry didn’t help in this car, it shook when it went over forty miles an hour, and I know one thing for sure—it wasn’t shaking. I had it going at a steady thirty-nine miles an hour while I leaned forward, trying to make it go a little bit faster. I was in a hurry to get to my wife.”

  Flavio paused, took a sip of his coffee, licked his lips, and wiped his hands on his legs. Joe could sense he was nervous.

  “I’m sorry. It all happened so fast. I don’t know if she took her eye off the road, or if she leaned in, but your daughter’s car crossed over the line. I honked, but it happened just like that.” Flavio snapped his fingers. “The front of my car hit the side of your daughter’s car, causing it to flip. The Regal spun slightly out of control and had some damage to the front end, but nothing else. The metal on that car was really strong. I stopped and got out, but as other cars were pulling up, and as I heard the sirens, I got back in my car and slowly drove to the hospital. I knew that help was there with your daughters.”

  Flavio took a deep breath and looked at Joe. “For years my heart has been heavy with this. I was sent back to Mexico where my wife and I tried to have another child. It didn’t work out. I began to drink too much, and eventually she left me.”

  The General spoke. “Tell him what you were doing in Mexico when you died.”

  “I sobered up and started a crusade to help those like me—alcoholics. I didn’t know what else to do. It kept me sober. I remarried, though we never had kids.” Flavio sighed. “I stayed in Mexico. I couldn’t return to your country after what had happened.”

  A tear fell down Joe’s face. He felt himself somehow to be a reflection of this man. Or perhaps Flavio was a reflection of him. “How’d you get deported?”

  “At the hospital that night with my wife, I think the insurance folks called INS. Within twenty-four hours of that accident I was back in Mexico, even though immigration wasn’t as hot a topic at the time as it is today with Homeland Security and all. We still got deported. I’d parked the car on a side street near the hospital, and I never saw it again.” Flavio, who seemed to be holding his breath, exhaled and sipped his coffee.

  Joe looked at the General and back at Flavio, “All these years, I didn’t know. I don’t know what to say to you today.”

  “Please, accept my apology,” Flavio said. He appeared more than sincere. “I’d like to see you let this go and move on with what you need to do next.”

  “It’s a little late for that, isn’t it? I should’ve handled this whole thing differently.” Joe bent his head down and began to cry.

  The two men sat patiently at the table without saying a word to Joe while he sobbed on for what seemed like eons. Eventually, his need to cry faded, and he began to feel restored. He wasn’t sure how much time had passed but he was aware some type of healing had taken place within him.

  “I’m flabbergasted.” Joe shook his head. “I don’t know what else to say.”

  “Well, you’ve got a long way to go, my friend,” the General answered. “And we’re only working on your major issues right now. You have minor life-altering influences to deal with as well.”

  Flavio cleared his throat and said, “It caused me great pain, personally, to know that you blamed me all these years. I would take every moment of that accident back if I could. In fact, it would’ve been easier if I’d have died and your daughter lived.” Flavio’s eyes filled with pain.

  “Oh, you don’t know how many times I’ve asked for that, too.” Shame flooded through Joe’s insides.

  “Yes, I do. And that might be why it would’ve been easier to have died myself.” Flavio spoke in perfect English now—his accent completely gone. “You’ve no idea how much those intense thoughts affect people, on both sides of the spectrum—or better said, in both worlds. Look, this wasn’t your fault, nor was it my fault. I don’t think it was Teresa’s fault, either. Accidents happen. I’m asking that you find a way to let go of the emotions surrounding that accident.”

  “Yes, I get this now. I’m sorry,” Joe mumbled.

  “Listen, General Nate spent a lot of time convincing me to speak with you and clear the air. Coming to this place was difficult.” Flavio paused for a second. “It wasn’t easy making my way back this far. He had to convince me, and I’m glad he did. You’ll understand, eventually. But for now, I’m hoping you can let this go.”

  “Wait a minute. You’re here to save me? And at the General’s request? You’re not here to save yourself?” Shocked, Joe released the last bit of tension from his body as this surprise swept through his being.

  “That’s correct.” Flavio nodded.

  “I thought you said I was holding you to this thing with my emotions,” Joe stammered.

  Flavio smiled. As he spoke, his accent returned, “Okay, let me explain this in the simplest terms. Once a person figures out what’s holding him back, that’s all that’s needed. I didn’t need your permission to release your emotions that were affecting me. I just needed to figure out what it was and then I released it.”

  The man picked up his beanie and bent his head down to catch Joe’s eye. “Hey, Joe, that’s all you need to do here. It’s okay that it was an accident. It’s time to let it all go. All of it.”

  Joe looked into his coffee cup and mumbled, “I know, but look at the chain of events that my reaction caused.”

  The General cleared his throat. “Think of the good that came out of it, too. Both of you have saved quite a few folks from the wretchedness of the bottle. And don’t you think there’s some irony to the fact that you both spent the last years of your lives saving people?”

  “Now you’re going to tell me that everything happens for a reason, aren’t you?” Joe asked.

  “I don’t know that one,” the General said. “But I think it smells of truth.”

  “I heard that quite a bit in Mexico,” Flavio put in, “and then later on the other side of the spectrum. I think if you look hard enough at something, you can always find a reason. But I don’t necessarily see some big plan for all of us. We have too much free will for it to be so calculated.” Flavio set his beanie on his head and swallowed his last sip of coffee.

  “Interesting,” whispered Joe. “But what is this thing you keep calling ‘the spectrum’?”

  “We’re in it, my friend.” Flavio stood up, shook Joe’s hand, and leaned over to hug the General. “I’ve got to get back. Good luck, Joe.”

  “Wait, wait, wait.” Joe rose from his chair. “What do you mean we’re in the spectrum?”

  Flavio stopped on his way toward the exit and spoke over his shoulder. “It’s the place in between.” Only seconds later he was out the door.

  For a while after that, Joe sat with
his head in his hands looking down at his coffee. All this time he’d been wrong. They’d all been wrong about the accident. And to think, the General had asked Flavio to speak to Joe so that he could help Joe.

  “What now, General?” Joe looked up, but the General was gone. Joe was sitting alone in The Cafe.

  CHAPTER 24

  ANGEL WAS IN THE BACK SEAT of Teresa’s car when Teresa got the call from the priest. Their father had passed away early that morning while Angel had been messing around with Teresa’s and JJ’s dreams. Panic overcame her. Where was he?

  Her head spun as she focused on the cloud. Maybe he was with her girls waiting for Angel to come home. Within seconds she landed in the empty cloud. She noticed it was time to find a new resting place—this cloud was becoming sadly wispy—and she feared her father wouldn’t be able to find her if they switched clouds.

  The cloud could possibly make it through one more night, but either way they’d have to move because the scent of rain was in the air.

  The hospital was the next most likely location to find her father. Angel closed her eyes and thought about her father’s hospital room. Immediately, she found herself sitting in the chair across from his bed where his body still lay. Father Benjamin and Aunt Jessie were there, but Angel knew Joe wasn’t in the hospital—from the moment she entered the room she could sense he was gone.

  “What now?” she whispered.

  Aunt Jessie held a tissue to her eyes while she held Joe’s lifeless hand.

  “I’m so sorry, Joe,” Jessie said. “I didn’t do enough years ago when you went over the deep end. I’m sorry. And I was hard on you today … Or, I mean yesterday. I just want Teresa to be okay.”

  Jessie dabbed her nose with the tissue. “I can’t believe this happened so quick.”

  Where else could her father be? Angel closed her eyes and thought about her father. A sadness filled her head, but at the same time tiny lights tickled her insides like butterfly wings. Angel believed she was picking up on some of her aunt’s emotions, yet feeling something else simultaneously.

  As she thought about her father, suddenly she was sitting at a table with candles in front of her. Yes, this was her fifth birthday party. The house was filled with relatives, and Angela had on a dress. A dress! Angela hated dresses—she remembered. The little girl wanted to wear that corduroy pantsuit, but her mother had won the battle that day. Angela had pouted a little, but deep down she was happy, anyway. The five-year-old blew out the candles while her second cousins danced around the table. Her father picked her up, hugged and kissed her, and set her back down alongside all the other children at her party.

  Angel blinked, and she found herself sitting in a classroom. Mrs. Kennedy’s class—this was the second grade. Beyond a doubt, Angel confirmed she was Angela as memories began to flow. The classroom was hot that day; it must’ve been the first part of the school year, a September heat wave.

  Angela’s head lay on her desk; she was tired after running from a group of boys. The same group of boys that had caught her and held her down while one of them messed with her puffy shirtsleeve during recess. Then they laughed and told her they’d put a bee inside her sleeve. Which she thought was a lie, until she heard a slight buzzing noise coming from the left side of her blouse.

  The shirt was homemade from a flowery fabric with elastic on both sides of the sleeve. Her mother had spent hours making the shirt. Angela didn’t like the flower print on the blouse, but didn’t want to hurt her mother’s feelings—so she wore the shirt to school.

  The little girl’s heart raced when she realized a live bee was trapped inside her shirt. She was too shy to scream out, and so very quietly Angela pulled at the elastic in the sleeve until it snapped. Angela knew her mom would be upset over the ripped seam, but she’d panicked over the bee. As quickly as she ripped the material, the bee was gone—it flew to the window. Within seconds, Julia Tinsdale yelled, “A bee, a bee!”

  The children in the classroom jumped up and ran to the far wall, screaming and shouting. Mrs. Kennedy yelled above the screams. “All right, all right! It’s just a little bee.” The teacher spoke as she moved toward the window.

  Angel was overcome with fillings of guilt. She knew that little girl, Angela, blamed herself for letting the bee go free in the classroom.

  “Where did it come from?” David laughed and looked at the other boys.

  Angel felt heat in her face, and her head pounded. The second grader was consumed with self-blame over the drama in the classroom, and in that moment Angel experienced exactly what Angela, her younger self, had gone through.

  In the classroom, Angela cowered in the farthest corner from the windows, behind the rest of the kids. She dared not tell the teacher or anyone else how that bee had gotten in the room, for fear that she would be punished. It disturbed Angel now to know the boys had gotten away with such meanness, and how distraught it had made the young Angela. She wished the girl could have handled it differently.

  Mrs. Kennedy pushed open the window and shooed the bee outside. “Okay, it’s gone. Everyone, back to your seats …”

  When the kids moved slowly to their seats, Angela was the last child to be seated. As Angel witnessed this incident, she was overcome by the loneliness Angela felt. She remembered Angela choosing to be isolated from the rest, even though some of the kids tried to be friends with her. She was so insecure and shy that she preferred to remain alone. At home and with her sister, Angela was happy; at school with the other kids her age, she was a mess.

  When she turned around, Angel realized she was back in the hospital. Strange, since she wasn’t thinking about the hospital at all but had focused on her life as Angela. The busy sounds of the hospital were gone, however—in fact the entire building appeared to be vacant. Angel poked her head through the door to her dad’s room. He was gone, but an imprint remained in the bed.

  Moving quickly down the hall, she caught up with the male figure that was a younger, healthier version of her dad. Angel walked next to him and spoke to the right of him, “Dad, I remember it all now!”

  Joe turned his head to the right and looked through her, yet he acted almost as if he actually saw something. Angel moved forward and to his left. “Dad, can you see me?”

  Oh no. Her insides began to turn. Whatever he was experiencing, Angel wasn’t a part of it. The situation was identical to her daily dealings with Teresa. Angel could see him but he couldn’t see her.

  While she followed her father, Angel whispered to herself, “This can’t be happening.”

  Her dad picked up the phone at the nurses’ station and then put the phone back down. He moved downstairs to the lobby and sat down in the empty waiting room. Angel sat next to him for a few moments and soon she found herself drawn to the front doors.

  She moved through the exit to the hospital, and her dad followed. Angel believed her father couldn’t see her, but for some reason he was following her. So at this point, she knew staying with him was important. She felt this in the core of her being—Angel must not lose her dad again.

  She watched as her father encountered a man and learned this man was the General—the person they’d looked for on Skid Row. The two men went to a place called The Café, and Angel sat down at their table in an empty seat. As the man named Flavio approached the table, Angel was transported back in time—to the accident.

  She sat in the front seat of the car, as Angela, her younger self—and was totally astonished at the sight of a carefree Teresa. Her sister seemed like an entirely different person, easygoing and in spite of their mother’s illness, happy. The essence of this young woman was completely unlike that of the Teresa of today.

  “Hand me that cassette, Ang. I want to listen to Abba. Oh never mind, I’ll get it.” As Teresa leaned over, the steering wheel shifted to the right and the car swerved. “Oops.”

  Teresa sat up and corrected the movement, pushin
g the steering to the left when a loud popping noise filled the air. A blowout caused the car to swerve over the line. The sound of a car honk followed, and Angel noticed her seat belt wasn’t fastened—in fact, neither girl’s seat belt was buckled.

  At the moment of impact, a metal-on-metal crunch sound filled Angel’s ears. The car rolled a few times, and Angel remained inside going through the accident as it happened. Her foot hit the radio dial causing the volume to rise, and by the second roll, the passenger door opened. Angela’s body was thrown from the car. She landed on the ground with a broken neck—a quick, painless death.

  Angel moved freely now, still at the scene of the accident, but away from Angela’s body. She went to the car, which had landed in an upright position. Teresa was semiconscious in the driver’s seat when Angel approached.

  “Oh, good, you’re okay,” Teresa said. “I think I hurt my leg.”

  “Don’t touch anything. Help is on the way,” Angel said.

  Angel stepped away from the car and noticed the driver of the other car approach her sister’s vehicle. But then he suddenly backed off at the sound of sirens. A few cars had stopped at the side of the road, and the drivers of these vehicles were also approaching the wrecked car. Nobody noticed the man, who was Flavio, slip away. Angel stood at the edge of the road and watched in silence as Flavio’s car slowly backed away from the accident and disappeared around the corner.

  Angel then saw and understood the aftermath of the accident for the first time. Everything, both spoken and unspoken, came to her clearly now.

  Within seconds, the paramedics and police were all over the accident scene. Teresa, who’d gone in and out of consciousness, swore to the police that her sister was up and walking around outside her car door. The police, concerned over her injuries and her young age, didn’t want to tell her that her sister had died on impact. And as was typical during this time in their lives, the police couldn’t reach her father.