by Ann Crawford
“Is she supposed to get that job?”
“She is now.”
And in another: “She wanted to learn patience. Being in a hospital for a few months will help. And then she can help that handsome, young doctor meet her friend.”
And fifty miles away, two hundred miles away, four feet away, in other cubicles, the angels for the people who would be leaving their bodies that day are working diligently, too.
In one cubicle: “Are you sure she’s ready to go?”
“No, I’m not sure, but she’s sure, and that’s what’s important here.”
“But what about—”
And in another: “But he’s always said that he wanted extreme measures taken.”
“You know he lied about that, just to appease his wife. But she’ll have to draw on power she didn’t know she had and become stronger than she ever realized she could.”
“But what about—”
And in yet another: “Is that how she’ll make the grand exit she’s been wanting for so long?”
“She’s going to be so happy.”
“But she finally got happy here.”
“This is always the wildest irony—they can’t leave until they’re completely okay with staying. Or done whatever other work they came to do. And that can take a lifetime.”
“Well, of course it takes a lifetime!”
“True.”
“Just some lifetimes are shorter than others.”
“True.”
“And except when it doesn’t.”
“Doesn’t take a lifetime? True. Some humans come in with that gift or do their work early and can coast the whole time.”
“Yeah, all two of ’em!”
And, still, anything can change at any moment because of that flexible flux we call the future. And while death from the human experience isn’t exactly just yet another step on the pathway, it is just another doorway... as grand as all of the other doorways in all of creation, in all of eternity, in all of infinity.
Four hundred people showed up for Barbara’s memorial, about ten percent of the town’s population, although there were many from out of town, as well. The formalities were primarily for the other mourners. Emily was barely even mourning. Unlike the other two family deaths and the funerals for so many young or sudden deaths, what a difference it is when someone has reached the end of a full, long, loving life and everything that needed to be said was said. Emily patiently waited to give her respects to her mother after the hubbub of activity and in the most appropriate place: her living room, sitting in one of the rocking chairs, looking out at the garden.
Meanwhile, she ensured the event was a true celebration of her mother’s full, long, loving life by requesting that people share their favorite memories of Barbara, the one thing they loved the most about her, not what they wished they had said or anything like that. Actually, as with Emily, everything had all been said.
And Emily senses her mother’s happiness. She’d be happy anywhere she found herself in all of creation because that’s the choice she made—a choice anyone can make.
“Even you,” David says.
“Yes, even me,” Emily responds, without knowing her words are a response. Or perhaps she does.
A few days later, she returns to work. As soon as the bell over the door does its ching thing, Marion thrusts a printout of a boarding pass into Emily’s hand.
“What’s this for?”
“The art-and-flower show in Los Angeles. I can’t possibly go this year, and you need to get the Heaven out of here.”
“Hey, that should be our line!” David laughs. “At least Marion knows how to follow directions very well.”
“Truthfully,” Angela says, “she’s been giving us directions for a while.”
“You leave tomorrow,” Marion continues.
“Tomorrow?”
“And stay a while. Relax, have fun, do something different.”
On her way home, Emily stops by her lawyer’s office to pick up her finalized divorce papers.
That night, as the humans sleep, Brooke fiddles with a few dials on the computer console. The radiant sphere of Earth appears on one of the monitors. “Oh!” she gasps, just as she did when she saw it for the first time. She stares at the spectacular splendor of the globe. From this view, there are no borders, there’s no strife—just a magnificent jewel shining brilliantly, suspended in the blackness of the firmament. One tiny piece of heaven in the infinite heavens. One tiny dot of forever in the unified field of forever.
She senses Blake standing behind her. “So what is all this, really? What is life on Earth? Some experiment by some mad scientist?”
“You tell me.”
“Well, as Henry once told me, it’s a school. But all they have to learn is to be all that they are. Just be who they really are. They really don’t have to do much of anything at all. The being will take care of the doing.”
David and Angela notice the picture on the monitor and move in closer beside them.
“And are they getting it?” Blake questions Brooke.
“Some have it. More and more are getting it.” She stares at the orb of light for a few moments. “It’s all given. Everything—love, abundance, harmony—it’s all already there. Here. Everywhere. Their only job is to receive it.”
“So what’s the whole point?” David asks. “I mean really.”
“You tell us,” Angela says.
“For Infinity to experience every aspect of Itself that It can?”
The senior angels smile.
“If it were up to me,” Brooke says, “I certainly wouldn’t have designed a world with war, suffering, degradation—none of that.”
“How would you have designed it?” Blake asks.
Brooke considers his question. “Well, I guess that wasn’t really part of the design, per se. But free will was.”
“And aren’t those who go to Earth considered the bravest in the whole universe?” David asks.
Six angels speak in unison: “They are.”
Chapter 7
Whizzing along the freeways heading north and then east from the airport, four unseen passengers in tow, Emily actually appreciates Los Angeles for the first time in her life. A strong wind has cleared the sky, revealing the Hollywood sign and even the Angeles Crest off in the distance. She’d been to the city half a dozen times before, but it was always a rushed, harried trip. And she’d always been, well, Emily—the earlier Emily. The rushed, harried Emily.
And what is this strange feeling that’s come over her? Could it be peace? Joy? What in the world is that unusual, foreign sensation?
While Emily decides to give up on trying to figure it out and just enjoy the new...strange...whatever-it-is, David and Angela just enjoy the joyride. Stephanie consults her computer while Jasper whispers. A large, blue pickup truck tailgates Emily’s compact rental, which is right behind a large, green van.
“Uh-oh!” Stephanie shouts, instantly bursting the bliss bubble. The other three angels nearly fly out the window in surprise. “Get her out of here—now!”
“Emily, get out of here!” Angela entreats. Jasper adjusts his whispering as well as his volume to the new directive. David attempts, although in vain, to see what has shown up on Stephanie’s laptop.
“The karma and intent of the driver behind her has changed,” Stephanie explains. “His love meter is so low it’s barely registering on the chart at all.”
“What the Heaven—?”
“And that really big accident that was supposed to happen?” Stephanie continues. “Not going to. Elements from most of the people have completely changed. Looks like a much smaller one will happen overall, but a really, really bad one is going to happen right ahead here. But it’s not meant for her.”
“Emily, change lanes,” David instructs.
That tailgater has started to annoy her, really messing with her mellow. Emily looks in the left-hand rear-view mirror and spots a car barreling down the lane that she would
be moving into. She decides to wait for it to pass.
“Emily,” David speaks very slowly, very clearly, “this is not the time to be polite. Change lanes right now.”
Emily changes lanes, causing the barreling car to swerve into the far left lane. This is Jack! His angels wave wildly to Emily’s angels as his car zooms past. Jack glances over, too, but is wearing a far less amicable expression.
Shaking, Jack looks in amazement in his rearview mirror at the crazy, terrible driver who not only cut him off but also almost smashed into him.
At the same time that Stephanie’s computer revealed the news, Christopher’s computer charts and graphs revealed the change in the whole program around the major accident, too. Rapid-fire, the team bats ideas around Jack’s car under Blake’s coaching.
“Okay team, think fast!”
“Flat tire!”
“Great idea. How’s that play going to happen?”
Christopher stares at his computer screen and then looks up at the road. “A pothole’s coming up, straight ahead! Make sure he hits it.”
“Distract him,” Blake bellows. “Or else he’ll swerve to avoid it!”
“Jack,” Brooke orders, “look in your mirror and scowl at that crazy, terrible driver again. Now!” Pause. No movement. “I said NOW!”
Jack complies. KERCHUNK! His front left tire hits the enormous pothole. With tremendous care, he steers over to the upcoming exit, miraculously not crashing into any other cars.
Still recovering from her quick lane change and nearly causing an accident, Emily notices a large crate in the middle of the lane she’d just been in. She looks in her rearview mirror just in time to see a very bizarre scenario unfold: The van stops short because of the crate, and the pickup slams into the van at top speed. The car right behind the truck has no chance to stop either, but the cars right behind that one have time to swerve into the other lanes while the cars behind those are able to come to a screeching stop.
Shaking, Emily takes the next exit and pulls over to the side of the road. Jack’s rump just happens to be staring her square—or, well, kind of round, really, as the case may be—in the face as he rummages around in his trunk for the jack and spare.
Jack closes the trunk and heads to the front of his car. As he turns to the tire, he notices a very beautiful woman sitting in a car just behind his. Not only is it a little odd to be just sitting in a car on an exit ramp, she’s also staring straight ahead, hands locked in a death grip on her steering wheel, and she appears to be hyperventilating. Bewildered, he walks over to her.
“You okay?” he calls through her window.
Emily nods, still trying to catch her breath.
Jack starts to return to his flat tire but turns around to look at her. He walks back to her car. “You sure you’re okay?”
Emily nods and, without any consideration of the fact that there’s an unknown man standing by her car, she lowers her window. “I’m fine.” And then—she wails. Jack’s angels put their hands over their ears. Emily’s angels put their hands over their faces.
David grimaces. “Way to make a great first impression. Way to go, Emily.”
“Maybe it’s for the best,” Angela sighs. “This way he knows what he’s in for, right up front.”
“Everything’s always for the best,” David grouses. “It could just be a little more graceful is all.”
“That’s our Emily,” Stephanie says, “the strong-winded one.”
“You never told us about this!” Sapphire grumbles.
“And for very good reason,” laughs Brooke. “Can you blame them?”
“Thanks for sharing the wealth!” Christopher groans. “You shouldn’t have. No, really—you shouldn’t have!”
Once he recovers from his momentary shock over the howling emanating from this woman, Jack leans over and pokes his head in her window. “Can I help you out of your car?”
Emily nods. Jack opens her door. She takes his hand and starts to lift herself out of the car, but then collapses back into her seat. She points to the freeway; Jack follows the direction her finger is pointing and sees the three-car pileup.
“Oh, wow,” Jack exclaims. “I didn’t even notice that—all I noticed was my flat tire. I was just there, right there, a minute ago. You, too?”
Emily points out the van and pickup. “I was right between those two!” She wails again. And again.
Jack suppresses the urge to cover his ears. He notices her suitcase in the backseat and figures that her car can be this overly immaculate for only two reasons, and the suitcase doesn’t announce that she just left a car detailing service. “A rental car? Are you a long way from home? Tell you what—let me finish changing my tire, then I’ll take you for a cold drink. How does that sound?”
“Okay.”
“It’s probably not too safe for you to just keep sitting in your car, this close to the freeway exit.”
“Okay.”
Jack watches her emerge—unfold, really, since the car is a compact is Emily is not, height-wise anyway—from her car. He says a long, “Wow!” (silently, to himself, and his angels were very thankful for that small favor) as she slowly straightens up, clutching her car to maintain her balance. “How tall are you?”
Dumbfounded that he would ask such a question at such a time, Emily finishes drawing up to her full height and commences drawing up the wherewithal to answer. “Six feet. Why?”
“Oh, just wondering.”
As Jack changes his tire and Emily attempts to steady her stomach, David and Brooke observe a gathering of light beings over the car that had crashed into the back of the truck. Other beings hover over the pickup, as well. The middle-aged woman inside the car slumps over her steering wheel as the whole front end of her car now resembles an accordion.
But her spirit is in ecstasy. “Ohhhhhhhhhhh,” her spirit self gushes. Her light hands and feet detach from her physical form, followed by her head and then her body. She holds her arms out as if to embrace the cosmos. “So much love!”
Her head angel takes her hands of light. “Of course so much love,” he says to her. “That’s all there is. That’s all you are, Jeannette.”
The beings of light start to become visible to her.
“Mom, Dad!” Jeannette cries. “Maggie, Mike! Oh!”
“Are you done here?” the angel asks her.
“Oh, yes,” she says. “I’m ready to go home.”
“Are you really done?” he demands.
Jeannette hesitates. “Yes. I want to go home. Please take me home!”
“Home is wherever you are,” he informs her.
“But it’s so beautiful. There’s sooooooooooo much love! I can feel it! And there’s my family!”
“Your family is everyone around you. Everywhere. It couldn’t be any other way.”
Jeannette makes no response except to reach out to the love field all around her, so palpable to her in this state. (It’s that palpable in every state—if you want to open to it.)
“Have you really finished what you came here for?”
“Yes.” But it wasn’t very firm.
“All this will always be here, waiting for you. You can always bring this into your life here on Earth. So are you really complete?”
An even longer hesitation. “No.”
Sirens blare. Ambulances, fire engines, police cars, and additional emergency trucks race along the shoulder, past the newly formed and growing traffic jam, until they reach the three smashed vehicles.
By the pickup truck, the light beings, which numbered about a hundred, welcome their compadre with rowdy cheers.
Two paramedics approach Jeannette’s lifeless form and search for a pulse. “She’s gone,” says one.
The light beings waiting for Jeannette slowly fade away, but her spirit doesn’t want to let go of her angel’s hands.
“We’re right here,” he tells her. “We always have been, we always will be. And all of this will not only be waiting for you at your right time
to leave, but it’s available now, here, anytime you want it.”
He lets go of her hands. Jeannette’s hands and feet of light dock and click back into her physical hands and feet; her head slowly follows suit, and then the rest of her light body clicks back into her slumped form.
“No, wait,” says the other paramedic. “There’s a slight pulse! She’s still here.”
Jeannette’s spirit self notices the EMT tending to her physical self. “Hey,” her spirit calls out to her angels. “Maybe he’d be interested in my brother! His partner just dumped him.”
“We know,” they smile.
“Is this hot one here gay? And single?”
“As a matter of fact, he is. And you thought you were done here!”
“Emily,” Emily scolds herself as she drives behind Jack’s car, “this Jack could be a descendent of the Ripper. Yeah, well, at this moment I don’t care in the least. He’s adorable!” Emily follows his car to a nearby café. Her heart has almost settled back to its normal beat. Almost.
Telling Jack about the events leading up to the pile-up doesn’t help it calm down any. They gratefully sip the cold drinks their waiter just set before them.
“No kidding,” Jack says. “You were driving along and something told you to change lanes? And then it repeated itself?”
“Yes, and he or she had quite a sense of humor, too. I was going to wait until someone passed me, but whoever was talking said, quite distinctly, ‘Emily, this is not the time to be polite, change lanes right now.’ So I did. I almost plowed into someone who was coming along behind me, but I sure changed lanes.”
“Hang on just a minute! That someone you almost plowed into was me! I had to change lanes to keep from hitting this crazy, terrible—I mean, you, I guess.”
They laugh.
“Not so crazy and terrible after all,” he smiles.
“Oh, we’ve only just met,” she smiles back. “Give it some time.”
