The Other Side of Heaven

by Jacqueline Druga

  6. The Called – And so it Begins

  Three days after I had officially stepped forward my life had become insane and busy. And I thought tax season was bad, it paled in comparison to what I went through.

  At least we had a plan of action.

  Brad had opened up a special email after my own had been bombarded. On the third day, the emails weren’t as bad as the second. There was no way I could read them all, and sadly I didn’t. However, they were read. Brad, Artie, her husband Walt, and a group of women from Artie’s church read through the thousands of emails and forwarded to me the ones they thought I needed to see.

  Everyone felt the same way after reading. Somber, sad, they were impossible to read out loud, because no matter who tried, they got choked up.

  “Listen to this one,” Artie would say, then no sooner was she a sentence or two in, she could read no further.

  After they forwarded me the ones that really stood out, I would discuss and read them again with Brad.

  The plan was to weed through those and then after selecting some, I’d hit the road, traveling to meet each person that was, in the best way I could describe, a candidate for the experiment.

  It was a contest, but one whose winner would be tough to pick.

  I knew the moment I read the first letter, that my task was not going to be easy. His story, her story, it didn’t matter who told it, it was the same. Laced with heartache and pain, sadness and regret. Not ‘one’ person’s grief was greater than the next. It would be a near impossible decision to make, to decide who was more deserving of the opportunity. I wish it were something I could give to every single person that contacted me, but it wasn’t.

  Natalie, I am writing because I would love the opportunity to see my aunt. She helped raise me and was like a sister and my first friend. She was a wonderful woman who suffered horribly from ALS. If I could just see her not in pain …

  Dear Natalie, my brother was only twenty-nine when he passed away. It was as if he didn’t have a fighting chance. Our parents were alcoholics, he started drinking young and died of cirrhosis. I just wish I could tell him I was sorry I wasn’t there more when he was sick …

  How do you choose? All the letters were like that. Each one genuine.

  Admittedly, my gut tugged at me on some of the letters. A strange feeling hit while reading them. Something pulled at me and told me, that ‘this could be the one or one of them’.

  I wasn’t making progress in my tiny apartment, despite all my help. It was time to go. The settlement checks had cleared and financially I could leave.

  Artie wanted to go with me, but I felt it was unfair to her husband Walt and her children. Not only that, she was an amazing nurse who was needed at the hospital. She would be a great help and only a phone call or text away. She didn’t want me to travel alone.

  Poor Brad.

  I wondered if he were recruited or if he really wanted to go. He was nineteen, just turned nineteen, actually. Was off from school, young and handsome, the last thing I believe he wanted to do was go on a road trip with me. Yet, he was there. He showed up with a bag packed, went with me to get the RV. He was in for the long haul, he stated. He wanted to see who would go.

  A thousand letters read, and we had a starting point.

  I didn’t intend to travel with a teenage boy, but I was glad he was with me. On the morning of day four, we had our course mapped out. At least the first part.

  We were on our way,

  First stop.

  Archer City, Texas.

  7. The Called – Circle of Life

  Pastor Carl Higgins was a middle aged man who exuded the youth of a twenty-something person. His gray hair was striking, he had a great smile and he greeted us warmly when we arrived at his church.

  The First Baptist church was a modern looking structure. Typically, when I thought church or Baptist, I thought stone, cobble and steeple.

  This church was beautiful in a new way. Pastor Carl was one of seventy-five pastors who contacted us about someone or persons in their congregation who would meet my needs. We made a point that we would speak to these pastors.

  It was a two day journey. After leaving home, Brad and I spent the evening in a Kansas Campsite ground. It was really nice not having the press. I relaxed, Brad worked hard reading and sifting the emails. That was when Bill made a quick appearance. I hadn’t seen him in days. He explained he was watching and was around. I would see him when needed.

  When we arrived in Texas, we set up camp outside of Archer before meeting with the pastor at our time of six PM.

  His wife had made a light dinner, which I really appreciated. Both of them seemed genuinely happy to meet me and Brad.

  They, like the campsite manager in Kansas, asked if Brad were my son. I suppose I was going to get that a lot. I told them he was my helper.

  “So I need to know. No one has asked you publically,” said Pastor Carl. “Were you in heaven?”

  “I don’t know,” I replied. “I went somewhere. I was greeted by many people who had died, then I was whisked away by Bill and he said …”

  “Bill?” Carl asked.

  “He’s my heaven contact. He told me of my mission and pops by every once and awhile.”

  “Bill is his real name?”

  I shook my head. “He told me to call him that.”

  “Is he an angel or …”

  “I honestly don’t know.”

  “What does he look like?”

  “Bon Jovi in that ‘my hair is short cause I want to be an actor’ phase.”

  “A Heavenly figure that looks like Bon Jovi.”

  “Not the band, the man.”

  “I … I get it.” Pastor Carl sat back and lifted his cup of coffee. “When you went to this place with all the souls, what was it like.”

  “Bright, misty, warm. I felt confused because I didn’t know anyone and they were all talking to me. Asking me things. Requesting. I didn’t find out until after that they were wanting me to pick their family member.”

  “Maybe one of them will be here.”

  I didn’t quite understand what he meant.

  “I asked you to join me because I had a story for you to hear.”

  I nodded. “Yes, someone that you felt needed to have this chance. That’s why we are here.”

  “It’s hard to choose, and I am sure you will find out. But I apologize for my email being slightly dishonest.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I don’t have one story, I have many.”

  I wondered if the good pastor often did the same things with his Sunday sermons. Beat around the bush to build suspense until he arrived at the point. That was what he was doing with us. I knew there was a chance he had more than one persons story to share. So I didn’t look at his contact email as being dishonest. However I learned he wasn’t telling the stories, the people who lost would and they wouldn’t know I was there if I didn’t want them to.

  No, I had to be there. Knowing the stories were just one part of my process. I needed to speak, hear, feel the person. Hence why we hit the road.

  Carl and his wife Cindy started the grief support group at the church when they arrived in Archer three years earlier. They ran one in their previous church, it all started when Cindy lost a baby.

  She was in her seventh month and the grief was real.

  “Of the four babies that I lost, he was the face of my struggles. I knew his gender, we named him,” she said. “I just couldn’t get over the loss. I joined a support group, but it wasn’t faith based. So we started one. I’m not asking to be considered …” she grabbed my hand as we sat in the circle of chair waiting for the others. “Just know, there are many circumstances of loss that cause grief, deep grief that could be over looked.”

  “If you could take this chance. What would it resolve? I asked.

  “It would let me know that he was okay. To see how he turned out or did he get a chance to be a baby again. Hold him. Yeah … I would want to ho
ld him.”

  I watched her eyes gloss over and I squeezed her hand. She was the first story of the day and it tugged at my heart, I didn’t know if I was emotionally prepared to handle the first meeting.

  Somewhere, somehow in the course of my mission, I would become a better speaker. At least I hoped.

  I was overwhelmed sitting in the circle with those in the group. Every person there was experiencing something I could not relate to. The deaths I had faced in my life, while they hurt, somehow had an ending, a resolve.

  Yet, several of these individuals also had something else in common. Aside from loss, they swore they were there, or almost … at the other side of heaven.

  Alice had lost her father decades before and struggled because she was the last one with him.

  “I knew he was sick, he was very sick. But I was there, I fed him, I wiped him down. He passed away hours later,” she curled a tissue in her hand. “Was it me? Did I do something? Did I not cut his food small enough. I blame myself for his death. If I only knew. If I could hear him say to me, ‘It’s okay, I’m fine, you didn’t do this. It was my time.’ I could accept it. I had a dream once, where my daughter was spinning in circles with me and my father appeared. It felt real. He said to go back.”

  “I didn’t get the go back request, but I had the spinning,” Lydia said. She clutched a frame picture of a young man, his hair dark, a little long and he wore a baseball cap. “My brother was so full of life. He made everyone laugh, played practical jokes. Was the protector. He died three months ago. He was fooling around with his handgun and the safety malfunctioned. He died instantly. I had a dream he was in my mother’s house. I walked in and he swung me around. He said he was fine. But it was a dream. If I only knew. If I could hear him say he was fine.”

  “I need to hear that. I need to say thank you,” said another women, Gretchen. “I never thanked my grandmother for all that she did, for raising me, the sacrifices. I wasn’t there at the end, I let her down. I should have been there. I’ve dreamt of her. They always feel like visits.”

  “Me, too.” A man named Doug said. “Dreams I mean. One stands out. I was lucid. I knew, you know, it was a dream, yet my mother was before me. I could smell her, see the color of her eyes. I heard this song playing that always reminded me of her. She said go back. It’s not your time. I believed I was dead. I woke up having a hard time breathing. You know to this day, I can’t listen to that song anymore without getting that eerie feeling of my mother’s ghost.”

  “Maybe it’s not eerie,” Pastor Carl said. “Maybe it’s a connection and not listening to the song is ignoring it.”

  “No.” Doug shook his head. “I think it’s a key. It opens a doorway and I’m not ready to go back there again.”

  “Is that true?” Lydia asked me. “Is there a key?”

  And that was the first of the questions. The rest of them came one right after another.

  ‘If we’re chosen. When would we go?’

  ‘How would we get there?’

  ‘How long do we get to spend with our loved one.’

  ‘Will it be a dream? Will they know they’re dead?’

  Question after question and not a single one could I answer with certainty. I was promising these people a chance at something and I had no idea how I was giving it to them. Sort of like having a car giveaway, yet not knowing the type or when or where the car would come from.

  I felt defeated and like some sort of con artist, misleading these people. Perhaps deceiving them for some sort of sick pleasure. I wasn’t, but I didn’t have the answers they sought. At the end of the meeting, after they poured their hearts out to me, they looked at me with a lot less hope than when I first arrived.

  Even the pastor was dismissive.

  There was doubt, they didn’t need to say it, I felt it.

  Brad had stayed in the back, out of sight during all the talk and urged me to speak when we left the church. I didn’t.

  I walked, silently, arms tight to my body crying the entire way back to our RV.

  Archer was an historic little farm town that seemed to close down when the sun settled. Not that I was a big drinker, but I wanted a drink and I stopped at the convenience store, grabbed a bottle before arriving back to the RV.

  I didn’t even get a glass.

  Brad leaned against the kitchenette counter. “Feel better. Take another chug.”

  “You being sarcastic?” I asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Not appreciated.” I took another drink.

  He reached above my head and opened the cabinet, grabbing a glass. He set it before me. “At least be hygienic in case you ever have a guest.”

  I poured the liquor into the cup and placed down the bottle. When I did, I closed my eyes. “I am out of my league.’

  “You just started this journey.”

  “Am I crazy? Really? Am I? Maybe I hit my head. Maybe I imagined it.”

  “You were dead.”

  “I still could have imagined the whole Heaven thing.”

  “You were dead for eighteen hours,” Brad said. “What’s going on?”

  “You saw how they looked at me in the beginning and how differently they looked at me at the end.”

  “Yeah, I did.” Brad nodded. “That doesn’t mean anything.”

  “I didn’t know what to tell them.”

  “No, you didn’t. But now you know what to ask Bill the next time he pops by, right?”

  I sniffled and took a drink.

  “Did you expect this to be easy. Go in listen to a few tales, tally up and make a decision.”

  I raised my eyes to him.

  “If you did, you were way off base. It feels hard because you listened to painful stories, you empathized with people’s heartache. It affected you. You wanted to help right there, at least give answers, but you couldn’t.”

  “So what do I do.”

  “You keep listening. But the second you can, you get answers. These people do deserve to know why they are pouring their heart out.” He sat down across from me. “Natalie, this was the first town. The first group of people you met. There are hurdles to every new thing a person tries.”

  I took a sip of my drink. ‘How old are you?”

  “Nineteen.”

  “Yeah, well, I’m not convinced you aren’t some old man in there. You’re very wise.”

  “Thank you. I have strong roots.” He tapped my hand. “Now … let’s take you out of the equation.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “As much as you are important, the deliverer, the deciding factor, this isn’t about you. Put aside what you’re feeling and answer me this. Did you hear anyone tonight that stood out? That pulled at you. I mean really pulled.”

  I paused before taking another drink and the second he asked, someone did come to mind. “Yes. Yes I did.”

  “Good.” Brad smiled. “I did too.”

  8. THE CALLED - NARROW LIST

  Travis McGuire served coffee from a tin percolator, it reminded me of my grandmother, only he didn’t strike me quite as old as my grandmother was. We had received thousands of letters and emails in just a few days, and we knew it would be impossible to visit them all. We had the ‘stick out’ pile, ones that pulled at us, we separated them by areas, and pulled a lottery draw out of each pile. Travis won the lottery and we visited him. It was our own elimination process, fair or not.

  Travis’ story at first wasn’t compelling. In fact, when I pulled his email as a refresher, I didn’t see why we even put him in a ‘gut pulling’ pile. How did it even get in there? He was brief in the email, left out details. I only assumed that maybe Artie or one of the other church ladies knew him personally. I couldn’t recall his story.

  What was it about him?

  We sat at the dining room table in the modest home. It was warm and welcoming, a plain décor with older curtains that flapped with the breeze. The long buffet table held multitudes of family photographs, they spanned from black and whi
te to modern.

  Everything seemed preserved in the house, as if time stopped and he never changed anything. Even the table cloth, plastic and flowered.

  “Thanks for meeting me,” said Travis, as he sat down. “I didn’t expect the call. Reaching out, was difficult, and I didn’t say much.” He sipped his coffee and looked at Brad. “This your son?”

  “No,” I replied. “My searching companion.”

  “Making sure she stays on track,” Brad added.

  “Well lucky her.”

  “Tell me. Who is it that you would want a chance to spend one more day with?” I asked.

  He extended a reach to the table of photos and lifted a frame, setting it on the table. It was an older photograph of a beautiful blonde haired woman.

  “My wife,” he said. “Thirty-six years ago, she was pregnant with our fifth child.”

  As he gave that introduction, I somehow expected him to say she died during childbirth.

  He continued, “I was in a very selfish phase. All I saw was the work hours I put in. I was at the factory working doubles to support all the kids. When we met I was a baseball player, I worked on cars and played guitar. Little by little everything I did went by the wayside with each birth. The fifth kid, I figured was the last straw. I was a done man. Not happy. I couldn’t find happiness and was convinced I wasn’t a family man. We fought, day and night. I can still see the kids in the living room covering their ears while we screamed at each other. She kept saying I was wrong, that my happiness was with the family. That God had his plan for me. I didn’t believe it. I even suggested that maybe she shouldn’t have the baby. Nothing she did was right. I was bad. It was me and this ain’t post death talking.”

  I watched as he stared at the picture, sipped his coffee and then replaced it.

  “One evening, I came home and Janice and the kids were gone. Split. She took only a few items, forty from the bank and the good car. Gone. Instead of me feeling outrage or broken, I was elated. I read the note, she said for me to find my happiness and when I realized it was with her and the kids, she’d be waiting and to find them, she was at her mother’s. I … didn’t bother. I didn’t call her mother, I didn’t reach out. I went to the bar, I had fun and never looked for my family. Until …just about two weeks pass and suddenly, I got this sick feeling in the pit in my stomach. Loneliness. I came home, I sat in the kids’ room, and I thought, maybe she had something. Yeah .. She had something. I cried. I needed them. She knew. It was that second when I decided to pick up the phone to call and beg her to come home, that the phone rang. Janice was on her way back home and was in an accident. A bad one.”