My dry laugh echoed through the empty church, reminding me that I was completely and totally alone.
I picked up a cheese fry and, for the first time, I let my thoughts wander back to that night when I died. Had that been yesterday? The day before? It was hard to tell how much time I had spent trapped in a Christmas card heaven.
I popped one of the fries into my mouth.
“Well, one thing is for sure,” I said to Burt. “Heaven makes the best cheese fries.”
I offered one to him, but he wasn’t interested.
The box in front of me sat untouched for the next hour while I wandered around the church. The stained glass was breathtaking, and, as I finished off the plate of fries, I admired all of the hard work that Glen or whoever had put into creating the windows. Or was zero work put in? Was it all just my imagination?
I was ready for the box, and Burt must have known I was too. When I tore my eyes away from the stained glass, I found him sitting on top of it.
I ripped the paper off in one quick and satisfying rip.
As I unfolded the top, I expected glitter or fireworks to burst forth in some spectacular display of triumph because I was ready for the next step. Inside, however, there was just a small notebook and a large silver-looking key which was rather unremarkable.
Burt wasted no time jumping right into the box after I had taken the contents out.
The key felt very heavy. I flipped it over several times, but I saw nothing special. No markings or anything else set it apart from the million other keys being used right then in the real world. I tried to pry my fingers into the sides of the notebook but it was sealed shut.
I stuck my head back in the box, hoping for any sort of directions, but there were none. I pulled Burt out of the box as he gave a few quick meows in protest.
“Now what?” I asked.
As soon as I placed him on the pew, he trotted off.
“Thanks for all your help,” I muttered to his retreating tail. A moment later he gave a loud drawn-out meow.
I looked over, Burt was sitting in front of the same door that Glen had gone through earlier. It was cracked open, and I could hear the wind howling. A cold draft radiated throughout the church. I shivered. There was nothing around me to grab for warmth, and suddenly I knew it was time to go. The lone candle had blown out, and the welcoming feel of the church was gone.
I got up and followed Burt to the door. I took a deep breath and pulled it wide open. I was greeted with nothing but solid black on the other side. My glittery snow, the smell of fresh trees, had all been taken away and replaced with nothing.
“Is this the end or the beginning?” I said, more to myself than to Burt. There was only one way to find out. I scooped the cat into my arms and stepped forward into nothing.
CHAPTER 7
All around me were aquariums full of fish, as if whoever designed the place wasn’t a fan of boring white walls. There were tiny colorful fish that darted back and forth in the blink of an eye. There were bigger orange ones who swam lazily through the water, apparently unbothered by the stranger and the cat who were studying them.
I finally picked myself up from the hard tiled floor I had crashed onto after leaving the church. Altogether, there had to be thousands of fish, if not more.
Burt lifted a paw and swatted at one that swam right up to the edge of the tank as if trying to get a good look at us.
“Wait a second.” I moved closer so that my nose was right against the glass. The fish didn’t move. “I know you.” I had won a fish at a carnival when I was in the second grade, and I lovingly read and sang to him every night. This fish had the same markings, right down to the black spots covering its face. That fish had lived for five years.
“That’s Cowabunga. If you look closer, you’ll find twenty other ones you’ve also owned, including five variations that your parents pawned off as Cowabunga.”
Someone was behind me—surprisingly, seeing as how there were no doors in the room we were in.
I spun around and came face to face with a tall slender man in a black and purple pinstripe suit. I figured he was older-- his salt-and pepper-hair and voice scruffy with age gave away that much. He didn’t have a single wrinkle anywhere, however. It was as if his face had been smoothed over time and time again. He stared at me with a bemused expression on his face before I gathered up the courage to respond: “Are you God?”
“I get that a lot.” He didn’t smile, nor did he make a move to acknowledge Burt, who was weaving in and out between his legs. “I’m sorry to disappoint, but most people never really meet the guy.”
I wasn’t disappointed. In fact, I had zero expectations, but I did want to leave the room full of fish which was starting to freak me out.
“I see,” I said slowly. “And where exactly am I?”
“The next step.” He gestured around. I wasn’t understanding. The next step was...fish?
“And that is?” I felt like he was deliberately being coy.
All around me the fish continued to swim. I spotted another Cowabunga in the aquarium.
“These are all the fish that various people who come here have had in their lives. We find that pet fish seem to be a common denominator in people’s lives.” He ran his hand across the glass on the far wall, creating a squeaky sound that caused Burt to put his ears back. “I dare you to find me someone who has never had a pet fish.”
I’m sure there were some out there, but he seemed like the type who didn’t like to be corrected. I nodded, as if this was all a totally normal conversation. “But why are the fish here?”
He turned to face me, narrowing his eyes as if I had just asked a question not worthy of a response. I was sure at that point, he’d heard just about every question, but God forbid someone ask about the thousands of fish milling about.
“It’s quite simple. We really judge how good a person is based on how they treat the simplest of creatures that can’t take care of themselves. If your fish is here, then you’re in good shape. If not, chances are you’re in hell.” He winked.
That was rather abrupt. I nodded in response, studying Cowabunga for a moment before choosing my next question for fear of looking stupid in front of whoever that pinstriped man was.
“What’s next?” I had gone immediately from a Christmas-card heaven to a room full of fish, so there was really no way of knowing.
“The final decision.”
Burt gave a low growl from somewhere near my ankles.
“I trust you have a key,” the man continued. “Once I leave here, you can move at your own pace as you see fit.”
I blinked and he was literally gone. I hadn’t expected him to leave that quickly.
Burt was again swatting at fish.
I shook my head at him, “I’m dead and all I got was a lousy cat. Why couldn’t you be a cool sidekick like a lion?” Burt seemed unbothered by my comments. He walked back and forth against the fish tank, purposely rubbing all of his fuzzy body up against it.
“You’re such a cat.”
A gold outline appeared where Burt had rubbed. A door was quickly forming in the middle of the aquarium.
“Or not,” I whispered as I stepped towards it. The door stretched from the floor all the way to the ceiling. I would have to stand on my tippy toes to reach the handle.
I placed an ear to the door. Nothing could be heard on the other side.
“Do I knock?”
Burt said nothing, his tail swishing back and forth as he waited for me to make a decision.
Fair enough. The door swung open for me on its own. I took a deep breath and stepped through.
I was in another room now. This one had doors plastered all over the walls and ceilings. It was like a carnival fun house.
The key was still clutched tightly in my right hand as I looked around. Whichever door my key opened was probably the one leading to my destiny. Look at me getting the hang of all these terms used in Heaven.
The man in the suit was alr
eady waiting for me in the middle of the room. We were the only two there, and yet I could hear whispers, quiet at first until they grew louder, filling my ears. There were a few laughs too, and I heard my name being softly chanted.
The room suddenly filled with a light so bright it was almost blinding. I had to cover my eyes.
“Quiet.” The man’s voice boomed, and silence immediately fell over the whole room. There were faint words written on each door, but with the brightness of the light, I couldn’t quite figure out what they said.
“Dylan, Dylan, Dylan.” The voices were back, chanting louder this time despite the exasperated sigh from the man in the middle.
I looked to Burt for guidance. He seemed to be fixated on something above. Slowly, I raised my gaze, and that’s when I saw them. Hundreds of faces pressed against the glass that separated them from me. I wondered if they were alive or dead. Their faces seemed normal. It was still eerie, and I shuddered as I turned my attention back to the man, who was tapping his foot against the tiled floor, a tapping sound that echoed just as loud as the chants. He looked up, whispering something that I couldn’t hear but apparently the others could. They fell silent immediately, and I took a moment to survey the doors again. The strange thing was that some of the doors were in the middle of the walls, completely inaccessible by someone little like me.
“I presume you have the key.”
I nodded, extending my shaking hand. They key, which was planted squarely in the palm of my hand, seemed to grow heavier with each passing moment.
“Good. You’d be surprised at the naivety of some humans. They lose their key before they even make it to the destination doors.”
Destination doors. I repeated the phrase in my head. That’s what they were. I just wished I could read what they said.
“So let me tell you a little bit about what our job is.” He sat in a chair that had materialized. He gestured for me to sit also.
“Umm.” There was literally nothing there except two complete strangers and a cat. I was well aware that every last pair of eyes above was focused on me.
“Just sit,” he said firmly. Not knowing what to do I crouched into a sitting position, ignoring the laughter which erupted from above. Thankfully, a rather squishy and comfortable red lazy boy chair had appeared right behind me. I felt like shooting an angry glance above, but I had no clue who any of those people were.
“Everyone who makes it to this room has been chosen.”
I was chosen. Take that, creepy people above.
“To fulfill a purpose back on earth,” the man continued. “You’ll see big doors.” He gestured to the two large wooden ones on either side. “Those lead to the most common fulfillments.”
“But they’re boring,” a voice from above sneered, muffled by the glass pane. “We want something exciting, Judge.”
The Judge. So he did have some sort of name or at the very least a title.
“You’ll see more narrow doors.” He pointed above and behind him without even turning around. There were hundreds of doors and yet he somehow knew exactly where each and every one was. Some of the doors were ridiculous, no bigger than a shoebox and others were no wider than a crack. As if he could read my thoughts, which seemed to be a common theme in this alternate universe, he chuckled. “The smaller doors are the less common and more difficult needs.”
‘How does someone fit through those?”
An uproar of laughter greeted my question, and the judge did little to stop it this time. Instead, he waited until it died down.
“Anything is possible here. Now, your key has been chosen for you because Glen entrusts you with something. Most tasks are small: you go through that large wooden door and that’s it. You befriend an elderly neighbor, you stop a rumor from destroying someone’s life, you pay for a parking meter. It’s how we keep up our end of the bargain we have with earth.”
In all my years of life and all the good deeds I’d come across, I had never stopped to think that any of that was anything other than sheer kindness.
“Now, some are a little more difficult.” He gestured to a row of identical doors directly to my right. “You turn off a stove someone left on, you call the police on a burglar, you push a friend out of the path of an oncoming vehicle.”
He held my gaze on the last phrase and I couldn’t pull away. He needed me to know what he was getting at, and I think I understood. I must have had a destination on earth.
“So why am I back here again if I already fulfilled a purpose?”
The voices all around me made a collective “Oooh,” as if I had just disobeyed someone or had been called into the principal's office, which I guess in a way I had.
“Because there’s always more work to be done,” he said matter-of-factly. “We don’t have a say in how many purposes someone gets. Some just keep going back.”
“I see...and what are those doors?” I looked around at the doors which were only wide enough to house the doorknobs.
“Those are a rarity. Purposes only given out to the truly special, under truly dire circumstances.”
I nodded. I was just an ordinary girl. I had already saved Nina. I had no idea what more the Judge, God, Glen, or anyone else could possibly want from me.
I stood completely still, hoping to keep my mind blank as I waited for whatever was to come next.
I looked up. The various faces pressed against the glass were waiting with bated breath as if they knew something I didn’t know.
“You don’t know how long they’ve been waiting for another round of destination doors.”
“Too long,” another voice yelled as Burt gave a deep growl.
The Judge then spoke the words that made my blood run cold: “It’s time.”
I wasn’t ready. In my own personal heaven, time ran on my watch. There was no one rushing me, pushing me forward into the unknown. I had no idea what was to come next, and all I had been given was a useless notebook that didn’t open and a cat mechanic.
I couldn’t do it. I wasn’t ready. “I can’t.” My voice broke as I rose from the chair, the judge doing the same.
“You can and you must,” he said sternly.
“You can and you must, you can and you must, you can and you must,” the voices above were chanting now, filling my head.
The key, picking up on the excitement, began to vibrate as well. I knew time was running out.
The Judge spread his arms wide, willing me to choose my door. His fingers long, and his nails pointy as he gave a bow and backed away, giving me the space I needed.
I immediately walked to the first large door, Burt following me. The key didn’t fit the small hole. So much for helping an old lady cross the street.
For the next hour, I jammed and wiggled my key into every last door that I could reach. None would budge. Everything was silent, except the light pitter-patter of Burt’s feet as he circled the room with me.
That’s when I saw it. A door roughly the same height as me, but so incredibly narrow that I missed it during my first glance. I knew it was there for me. It had a soft glow and twinkled in a way that matched the falling snow. If only it would lead back to the heaven I had just come from.
“Ah, so you see it.” The judge had folded his hands neatly in front of himself before he addressed me and the crowd above. A tall, thin gold ladder appeared near the door, leading straight up to it.
The crowd was murmuring, their voices climbing together in a crescendo. I could pick out bits and pieces of what they were saying.
“This is going to be good.”
“When is the last time that door was chosen?”
“I knew it. We should have placed bets.”
I plugged my ears and approached the ladder. I ran my hands across the rungs which were radiating warmth. I was returning to earth. Would I wake up as Dylan in a coma? Would I see my family’s tear-streaked faces around my bedside, catching them in mid-prayer as my eyes fluttered open? Would Dad miss the moment because he’d be scour
ing the hallways for a halfway decent cup of coffee?
I turned around. The Judge was gone. A new voice made a throat-clearing sound, and complete and total silence fell over the room. Burt even stopped moving. The faces above were frozen in their places, their mouths stuck in wide-open scowls.
The voice sounded if it were coming from sort of intercom, although there wasn’t a trace of one among the doors. Nothing made sense.
“Gwendolyn ‘Dylan’ Dwyer,” the voice boomed down. “You have now noticed the door that glows for you. When you leave here, your time as Dylan is done.”
The room was growing smaller, doors disappearing one by one as mine grew wider. There was nowhere to run.
“You will be someone new.” The voice was growing closer, speaking with more urgency. “You will obtain a new identity. Over time, you will have a new look as you acclimate to this new identity. You will be--”
I let out a scream. The notebook I was clutching underneath my armpit suddenly shot straight up and hovered in front of me. It resembled the self-help book which laid untouched next to the bathtub on my floor. This time, however, the name ‘Abigail Rose Henderson’ was sprawled across the front in intricate writing.
“This book is essentially your bible.” The voice stopped to chuckle. Something told me I was listening to the voice of God.
I reached for the book, which was hovering just beyond my reach, as the voice continued: “You just turned eighteen. As you maneuver through this life, you will learn new things about yourself, collect new thoughts, become the new Abigail. The previous version of herself has gone on to her new purpose.”
I didn’t want to be Abigail. I wanted to stay Dylan. I liked me. I ran my hands over the embroidered poinsettias on the Christmas dress I was still wearing from the day before. Would those be the last memories I’d have of a past life? I had made mistakes and sure, life was stressful. In this moment, I didn’t care about any of the struggles I had gone through. I didn’t want to be someone new. I wanted to be someone I knew.
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