Honored: 7 Honorable Mention Stories from the Writers of the Future Contest

by Michael D. Britton

  Vacancy.

  This place oughtta work.

  If I recall correctly, it’s only a short walk up the hill and then down some sand-dusted steps to the driftwood-cluttered beach. Perched on a rotting log near the tan sandstone cliffs etched with graffiti, I can release my beauties, let them do their work.

  If only this soaking rain lets up – they never do well in the rain. But it is best if nobody’s around.

  I’ve been here before – the Saltair Inn, Lincoln City, Oregon – some nine years ago I think it was. The place has changed a lot since then – more useless trinkets scattered around, a huge old boat’s been dragged up onto the lawn, looks kinda like it was picked up and dumped there like Dorothy’s house on the witch.

  Hated that little witch – Dorothy, that is. Spoiled, whiney brat.

  But the place is in many ways the same as ever – eponymous salty air, cool mist floating down through the fir trees, no unwanted questions from the proprietor, and enough space between the bungalow rooms that nobody will hear the squawking sounds that are bound to come from my room.

  Cabin number seven will do nicely – only has neighbors on one side. I can back my Econoline right up to the front door, unload the cages easily and set them up in the main room.

  Riker and Troi should be comfortable enough – we’ll only be here a couple days at most. The smell of the ocean through the open window is already making them antsy – I feed them a couple of handfuls of dried crab bits, stroke their feathers, then cover the cages for the night.

  In the morning, we will hunt.

  ۞

  It was the summer of ‘92 when they found me. I’d been out of the Navy brig over ten years by then – had plenty of time to think about choices and consequences – but knew I could never go back. Nobody wanted to hire a military criminal, and I didn’t care to work for anyone, so I made my living collecting shells along the coast – from as far south as Fort Bragg, California, up as far as Astoria, Oregon.

  Beautiful, whole shells, a thousand varieties – spiky conches in dozens of shades, spiraled mollusks, striped Nautilus, marbled pearly abalone. I’d clean and shine them all up and sell them out of the trunk of my rust-orange ’77 Corolla, until I could afford a van.

  It was a good deal – my overheads were low: free raw materials, free labor, free lodgings (I slept in the car), no storefront to maintain, no taxes to pay, and no family to support. Free as a bird.

  Life was simple, apart from the ever-present sand – in my shoes, in my clothes, in my hair, in the creases of my body, and in my car. I wore out three DustBusters in the first two years. I finally got sick of the sand in the hair and shaved my head, but I let my beard grow down to my chest – over the years it’s become white and scraggly like an old fisherman, though I’m only fifty.

  Everything was pretty copacetic – then those two seagulls came on the scene.

  I was combing the beach just north of the depressing lumber town of Eureka. It was a cloudy day, and my collection bag was still nearly empty after spending the whole morning tracking back and forth along the water’s edge as the tide receded.

  Along came Riker, majestic and bold, white underbelly and dark brown top feathers, and landed right in front of me with a soft flutter – not six feet ahead. He took a couple steps toward me, his webbed feet slapping the wet sand, stared me down for a few seconds, then coughed up the most beautiful, speckled Nautilus – about three inches across – and placed it at my feet like an offering.

  Before I could recover from my shock, I heard the loud complaining of Troi. She waddled over, beak wide open, yelling at Riker with a repeated awhk-awhk-awhk-awhk!

  They seemed to be having a complex conversation, like an old married couple disagreeing on a finer point of decorum.

  Then Troi flew off in a huff, but returned only a minute later. In the mean time, I’d bent to pick up the Nautilus Riker had given me, and was turning it over in my hands, glancing up now and again to see Riker staring at me with oddly intelligent eyes, as if to say, “Not bad, eh?”

  The sound of the waves crashing to my left seemed to fade as Troi returned, bearing a new gift – this one a remarkably bright pink hunk of hard coral.

  But instead of placing it at my feet, she dropped it on my head with a soft thunk that I could hear and feel at the same time. It bounced off my black flat cap, brushed my shoulder, and amazingly wound up in my left hand.

  She landed next to Riker and awaited my reaction.

  “Uh, thank you, thank you very much. This is very nice stuff. Do you know where there’s more?”

  I felt really dumb standing there talking to a pair of birds, but the beach was empty, I was a little high on Humboldt green, and I felt much less dumb when I heard an answer in my head: Sure. You just have to know where to look. Come back tomorrow at this time and we’ll show you what we can do.

  Uh, excuse me? Did I just converse with a seagull? What was in that weed?

  They flew off, I went back to my car, and took a much needed midday nap.

  Next day, they’d delivered me a pile of shells and sea treasures that made my usual take look like a little bundle of junk.

  I thanked them, and although I was completely sober, I heard Troi say: No problem. Would you like to go into business together?

  And thus, a wonderful arrangement was formed.

  ۞

  Riker never spoke.

  I mean, he could squawk like any other seagull, but he did not communicate with me the way Troi did. She pretty much spoke for the both of them, which was fine, since one freaky telepathic bird was enough for me.

  But Riker was definitely the better of the two when it came to creative finds, and volume of collectible deliveries. A real workhorse, he could pick up and bring me twice as much as Troi.

  And that’s just what he commenced doing the morning after we showed up in Lincoln City – just up the road from the Inn.

  It was a gray, cold day, not long after dawn, the wind blowing hard as it always does at the beach. I could smell the ocean’s fresh saltiness – even after all these years it struck me vividly and sometimes threw me back to my first days aboard the U.S.S. Iowa. The waves pounded against the wet sand, their force as impressive as ever.

  The tide was way out, and I released Riker and Troi from right near the bottom of the cliffs, where the biggest logs of driftwood made for a good seat on which to wait for them to do their work. I stomped down some of the reedy grass and took a seat with my back against a log that resembled a faded wooden whale. My bird friends took off in different directions, and I laid my head back with my eyes closed and my hoodie up to fend off the wind, trying to feel the sun’s weak rays on my face through the cloud cover.

  My job was a lot easier these days. All Riker and Troi required from our little deal was food, shelter, protection - and data. They demanded knowledge – they had a voracious appetite for learning – they had me teaching them lessons in any subject I could get information about, from geography to history to politics and even math. I avoided the subject of economics, just in case they got wise and realized this business deal was slanted in my favor.

  Their first round of collection at a new locale usually kept them out for at least twenty minutes while they soared on up-drafts and scoped out the area and did whatever it was they did to locate the most beautiful shells available.

  But this time, Troi was back within ten minutes, squawking her head off.

  “What, what is it? Speak English!”

  It took her a few seconds to settle down enough to communicate.

  It’s Riker – he’s missing. He found something he said you’d flip over. He wanted to go back to where he found it and search for more, so he passed it off to me. Here.

  She spat out a perfect sphere, about an inch and a half in diameter. It seemed to have a soft yellow glow, but only when my eyes were not looking directly at it. I picked it up, and it felt cold like metal, about the weight o
f glass, and seemed to bear a gentle electrical charge. The moment I touched it, I felt the hair on my arms lift.

  When I was flying back here, I heard Riker cry out. You know he never does that. I headed back toward him, and he was dropping toward the water. He disappeared behind a swell, and when I reached where he had been, he was gone.

  I was worried about Riker, but the power that emanated from the ball was distracting. I felt twenty years younger, stronger, and perfectly at ease with the situation.

  “Don’t worry – we’ll find him,” I said.

  How? What is your plan, exactly?

  “I’ll go up on the cliffs with my binoculars; you fly back out and keep scouring the area where you last saw him. Go!”

  Troi let out a distressed squawk and flapped her wings hard to take off, kicking a little sand toward me.

  Before turning to go up the steps to the top of the cliffs, I looked back down at the curious ball cupped in my hand.

  Why did it make me feel so light, so empowered? Just holding this ball and staring at it infused me with adrenaline.

  I placed it in my vest pocket - close to my heart – picked up my collection bag and trudged up the steps to the top of the cliffs.

  I was concerned about Riker - in all these years, he’d never just disappeared like this. I reached the top and leaned against the concrete wall at the top and scanned up and down the beach with my binoculars, then started sweeping out into the water.

  Nothing.

  I honed in on Troi – she was executing a grid-based search pattern – something she’d learned in her studies over the years. Her perimeter got larger and larger. While she continued her search for nearly an hour, I sat on the bench at the top of the steps and kept my eyes peeled, occasionally taking the ball out of my pocket to examine it again. Troi finally returned to me, exhausted and distraught.

  He’s nowhere – nowhere!

  “Did he indicate where he had found the ball?” I asked. “Anything about where he was headed back to?”

  No. He was too excited. He just wanted to get back to the place.

  A few large rain drops hit my head, shoulders, and the ground around us. Within a minute it was coming down thick and hard.

  “Come on,” I said. “We’ll go back to the Inn and wait for this to blow over, then come back out and look again.”

  Troi squawked about it, but she knew I was right – there wasn’t much we could do in this heavy rain, especially as it was greatly limiting the visibility.

  We returned to the room and sat in silence. I continued to look the ball over, trying to figure out what made it so powerful to me, why it seemed to enliven my senses and clear my mind from the jumble of thoughts that usually bounced around my head.

  By nine o’clock, it was dark and the storm was still raging, hammering the parking lot outside and causing torrents to drip off the eaves in steady streams. The window was cracked open a few inches for the fresh air, and the room was filled with the smell of rain.

  “It’s no use,” I said, “we’ll have to wait till tomorrow.”

  Crack of dawn we are back at the beach.

  I hated it when Troi got bossy – she was just a bird, after all – but her life partner was missing, so I cut her some slack.

  “Crack of dawn, of course,” I said. Then added, “I’m sure he’ll turn up.”

  Strangely, I was sure.

  ۞

  Troi was up before the sun, insisting that I get moving so we could be at the beach by the time there was enough light to see by.

  The storm had finally dissolved, or moved on, and the ground was wet but the sky was already clearing by the time we got back to the cliffs. Before I could even pull out my binoculars, Riker came fluttering wildly over the concrete wall that bordered the top of the steps and perched on the bench beside me.

  Troi squawked once, loudly, and quickly lighted next to Riker, nuzzling his neck excitedly. Then she started in on him.

  Awhk-awhk-awhk-awhk! Awhk-awhk-awhk-awhk! Awhk-awhk-awhk-awhk! Awhk-awhk-awhk-awhk!

  Riker just stood there and stared at her unflinchingly. When she was finally done, he looked at me.

  And spoke to me.

  The same way Troi always did – directly to my mind.

  Richard, he said, I presume you still have the ball.

  “Uh, yes, of course I do,” I said, pulling it out of my vest pocket and holding it firmly. “How is it that you’re talking to me?”

  Yes, asked Troi, how is that?

  Yesterday I met a most extraordinary being. He showed me how to do this. He is the owner of the ball, and he has an important message for you.

  I couldn’t believe it. I had become accustomed to having two hyper-intelligent seagulls, including one that talks telepathically. But it felt very strange to be communicating this way with Riker. I’d never, in all these years, heard his “voice” before. He sounded, in my mind, far more intelligent than I had given him credit for previously.

  I have discovered a place that is not a place. It exists somewhere between the quantum states, and is accessed through an ever moving, ever changing portal that is mostly located just offshore. It is there that Conthu resides.

  “Conthu?” I asked.

  He is the being to whom I now owe my life, and my allegiance.

  “Your allegiance?” I asked, as Troi let out a persnickety squawk.

  I am afraid our business arrangement has outlived its usefulness, Richard. You have been an excellent partner, and a friend. But I have new horizons to explore now, as does my beloved, if she will join me.

  Troi looked at Riker and cocked her head. They must have been having a private conversation, as they stared at each other knowingly for a few minutes. Finally, Troi turned to me.

  I will go with him. But before we leave, he must relay to you the message of Conthu.

  I was stunned. So suddenly, after this long time as a team, they were just going to go away. This Conthu must hold some great power. “Go on then,” I said. “What does he have to say to me?”

  Riker recited the message.

  The ball in your possession is called a Chooser. With the Chooser, you have the power to select your destiny. Not change the result of your choices, but select which choice to live with.

  “I don’t understand,” I said.

  Of course not. Riker paused for a moment, as if collecting his thoughts and attempting to dumb it down for a mere human. Imagine existence as an infinite number of co-existing realities – each the result of a choice. Each time you make a choice, all possible alternatives are created and exist, outside your own realm. I know you’ve heard of quantum reality theory – it was discussed in one of the texts you shared with us a couple of years ago.

  A couple of early morning beach walkers approached from the street. Riker and Troi took off and circled overhead for a minute while they passed. I nodded to them with a fake smile. When they were at the bottom of the steps the birds returned and landed on the bench beside me. I cautiously said, “Okay, so, the universe is made up of lots of alternate realities.”

  No, the multiverse is made up of an infinite and ever-increasing number of alternate existences. It’s important that we keep the terminology clear, Richard. Conthu has explained to me that the Chooser allows you to “window shop” – to peruse the possibilities – to view the immediate consequences of a choice - to get a glimpse of the “what if.”

  “And?”

  If you see a reality you believe you would be the preferable outcome of a given decision, the Chooser allows you to enter that reality – to assume that existence.

  “That sounds fantastic,” I said. It was a little hard to swallow, but being in business with a pair of talking seagulls was enough to keep my mind open. “So, what’s the downside?” I asked, always looking for the angle. “And how does it work?”

  You will know how to use it, instinctively. The longer you possess it, the greater your ability
will be. The downside, as you say, is that you may only use it three times. Once it has been used the third time, you will be given a choice. You may live with the sum of the choices you’ve made, or return to a point in the past – a time before this moment - and go forward with no opportunity to switch realities, confined to the consequences of all of your choices, as all mortal men.

  “Kind of a money-back free trial Chooser ball, eh?” I chuckled wryly.

  Riker looked at me, and looked as serious as a seagull can look. Do not make these choices lightly, Richard. Conthu suggests that you hold in your hand one of the greatest powers in the multiverse.

  I looked down at the Chooser. “Tell me,” I said, “why did Conthu give it to me? Was he done with it?”

  Conthu exhausted all three of his uses, and is passing it on, as has been the tradition for as long as the multiverse has existed.

  “Did he keep the choices he made, or did he hit the reset button?”

  Have a good life, Richard.

  With that, Riker and Troi flapped their wings and soared out across the beach, over the breaking waves, out to the rising and falling swells of deep blue water, and out of my life forever.

  ۞

  I returned to my musty room at the Inn and began loading up my van. My heart sank as I placed the empty, rattling cages in the back on the gray carpeted floor and slammed the doors.

  I couldn’t believe they were gone.

  As quickly as they’d entered my life, they’d disappeared. As I thought about it, I realized that our relationship had always been on their terms. They were always in control, and just let me think that I was the boss – they condescended to this lowly human, got what they needed from me, and provided me with the silly little sea treasures that I used to make a living.

  Although they’d never divulged much about their background – how they came to be super-genius seagulls – they had been my friends – the only ones I’d had since I was a child.

  I shook my head in awe of those magnificent creatures.

  I was going to miss them.

  I hopped in the van and pulled out onto Highway 101, down the hill heading south. I had a feeling I would keep doing some of the same things I’d been doing, even without the birds. Like the library books. I’d become accustomed to reading every day, and couldn’t see myself not continuing to be a voracious consumer of information. I’d probably even keep reading out loud – it was just the way I was used to doing it.

  I wouldn’t be continuing my business, though. There was no way I could go back to combing the beaches myself in search of a paltry few shells – I’d gotten to used to having one of the best selections on the coast. Besides, somehow the thought of doing it alone made me feel empty inside.

  No, I would use this crazy Chooser ball to somehow bring myself a fortune I could survive happily on.

  This was a gift, and I was going to make the most of it.

  ۞

  My first opportunity was only two days later.

  I’d traveled as far south as Brookings, and had decided to camp about five miles up the Winchuck River along the north bank.

  I was only about six miles from my turn to head inland from 101 – just coming down the hill past Harris Beach State Park - when I spotted the dreaded flashing lights in my side mirror.

  Busted.

  I really couldn’t afford this. It wasn’t so much the speeding ticket, but the fact that I hadn’t held a driver’s license in nearly twenty years.

  I also had no insurance.

  The husky state trooper took a few seconds to climb out of his cruiser and lumber up alongside my van, hoisting his britches a little as I rolled the window down. He took off his shades to look me directly in the eye.

  “License and registration?”

  Oh yeah – I didn’t have registration either. “Uh, I’ll have to dig in the back for that stuff, officer – sorry – this van is my mobile place of business and my filing system is, well – let’s just say I could use a good secretary, haha.”

  No expression. “You aware of how fast you were going?”

  “Well, no – I’m guessing a little too fast?”

  “I clocked you at sixty-three. Are you aware the limit drops from fifty-five to thirty five as you come into town? There were some big signs that tell you that – just a couple miles back?”

  “Oh, I’m sorry, must’ve missed those.” I looked at his name tag – the name seemed familiar but I couldn’t place it.

  “Look, I’m going to need your license and registration. Why don’t you step out and get in the back and do whatever you need to do to produce those for me?”

  “Uh, sure,” I said, unfastening my seatbelt. The officer started to stroll toward the back of the van. I wondered how long I’d be able to rummage around in the back, stalling, before he either gave up on me or hauled me into jail. I quickly realized he wasn’t going to give up, and I really didn’t want to go to jail. Not again.

  So I threw it into gear and stepped on it, spinning my rear wheels and throwing up gravel from the shoulder onto the hood of the cop car.

  In my rear view I saw the cop move faster than seemed possible for such a portly fellow, and soon he was in his car and flying after me with lights blazing and sirens screaming.

  Stupid, stupid, stupid.

  One of those things where each moment ticks away, making things worse, and worse . . . and worse. Digging a hole.

  Digging my grave.

  I held my foot to the floor and glanced at the speedometer every few seconds as it curved past sixty, seventy, eighty.

  Up ahead, the Brookings Harbor Bridge came into view. A tow truck pulled out from the left into my lane. I swerved around it on the right, my right-side tires going off the edge of the shoulder.

  I over corrected as I got back on the pavement, fishtailed, and hit the sloping concrete barrier at the edge of the bridge’s superstructure. The van lifted up off the ground and spiraled clockwise like something from The A-Team.

  As my life flashed before my eyes, I found a vision of the Chooser filled my mind.

  And time seemed to slow to a stop.

  The world around me melted away and I saw several scenes at once.

  I know that makes no sense, but like hearing an orchestra play a symphony, you can hear the music as a whole, but also pick out individual instruments or group parts. I knew that each of the scenes I saw represented a reality – an alternate life that I could choose.

  Each scene began at the moment I had decided to step on the gas and flee from the state trooper. The first thought that crossed my mind was pure amazement at the fact that I had billions upon billions of possible choices at that instant.

  At the time, I’d only seen two: jail or jet.

  To my wonder, the possibilities had been literally endless.

  And somehow, the one that appealed to me most came through to my mind, as if a clarinet had broken into a solo – it was the only thing I could hear, the only thing I could see, the only thing I could feel.

  Suddenly, it was the only thing I was experiencing.

  Reality changed around me, and the accident that was about to kill me, did – only I was no longer in that existence.

  I’d used the first of my three genie wishes.

  And I think I chose wisely.

  ۞

  The state trooper approached my window, and I rolled it down. He removed his shades and looked me in the eye.

  “License and registration?”

  I looked closely at his name tag and smiled broadly. “Trooper Pokrovsy? Are you related to the Pokrovskys of Medford?”

  I had completely caught him off guard.

  “My father was Anatole. You know him?”

  “I served in the Navy with Anatole’s son, Michael. He’s a good sailor – a good man.”

  “Was. My brother passed away last month.” He paused and looked me over, peeked at my cages in the back. “Look, about that license
and registration – forget it – you just need to make sure and slow down as you come into town, okay? Take it easy, sir, and have a good day.”

  Wow. It was that easy.

  I clutched the Chooser as Trooper Pokrovsky walked back to his cruiser, brought it up to my lips and gave it a little kiss.

  A second chance.

  A new life.

  And two more opportunities ahead of me.

  I decided I would plan those a little more carefully than the last.

  ۞

  I kept the Chooser close, never letting it out of my sight.

  I take that back – I rarely ever looked at it – but I kept it on my person at all times.

  For months I obsessed over it. Wondering how I would use it again, and ever so slightly hungry for that phenomenal experience of picking a reality out of a sea of possibilities. Listening for that one perfect note in the symphony, searching for that one star in the vast heavens to shine on me alone. It was thrilling, yet terrifying.

  One thing my first Choice had taught me was that there are far more options than the two or three or dozen that you can see in the moment.

  I began to train myself to think outside that limited scope of choices, and try to imagine many, many more paths that I could take at any given time.

  Having given up on my career as a purveyor of trash washed up by the ocean, I racked my brain to see the possibilities – a relative few of the infinite number of possibilities – and decided that I could try my hand at living a less transient life.

  I traded in the van for a black ’98 Accord, got a two-room apartment in Rockaway Beach – a couple of hours north of where I’d last seen my seagulls – and took a swing-shift job busing tables at Sam’s Roadhouse Bar and Grille, a slightly over-priced diner with good food and a steady clientele both in and out of season.

  It felt weird to be living life like “normal” people, but it also felt good. There were benefits to having your own little space in the world – even if it was rented.

  But after four months of the daily grind, I started to get restless. I was sick of the same old faces at work, the same four walls when I got home. I sat slumped on the ripped brown leather couch in my living room with the shades drawn shut to keep out the bright overcast light of late morning. The place smelled like cardboard pizza and cat litter (though I had no pets). I could faintly hear the traffic outside on 101, and the whistle of the tourist train as it pulled away to take sight-seers back down to Garibaldi.

  I pulled out the Chooser.

  As I contemplated the choice I was about to make – a “Should I Stay or Should I Go” moment – I was reminded of those magic eight-balls and had to laugh to myself.

  What was I doing?

  Did this thing really even work? Maybe that whole experience last year had been a dream – or some kind of weird drug-related flashback.

  But I did still have this strange glowing ball that tingled and played in my hands as if it were alive.

  I decided to do give it a try.

  I stared at the ball and tried to imagine what would happen – what could happen – if I were to quit my job, pack up my few belongings and head out in any direction.

  My breath was sucked out of me in an instant as I felt like I was pulled into the ball.

  This time, the experience was far more intense than the van crash incident.

  Last time, the possibilities had been infinite. This time, they seemed more infinite. I felt like I was swimming around in this great universe of choices and outcomes for hours and hours. A cacophony of paths to choose, a myriad consequences, the lives I could lead as numerous as the sands of the ocean.

  I was amazed at the sheer potential of my life.

  Yet here I was wasting away in a dead end job in a dead end town.

  As I flew through the multiverse in my mind, I was surprised to find myself coming back, again and again, to the same choice result.

  Oddly, it was a choice that kept me right here in Rockaway Beach.

  To obtain the happiness that the Chooser was now allowing me to see, hear, taste, smell and feel, all I had to do was go to work tomorrow.

  The one choice I had not been considering.

  I opened my eyes.

  I was sweating profusely, my hands shaking. I put the ball down on the table, and leaned back on the couch.

  No earth-shattering warping of the space-time continuum this time – just the feeling of assurance that by staying on my present course I was making the best choice I’d made in my life.

  And to think – I’d almost run away from it.

  ۞

  The next day at Sam’s I saw her.

  She was sitting alone in a corner booth. She’d had lunch, then stayed on, drinking cup after cup of hot chocolate while she tapped away furiously on a laptop.

  A writer.

  And the most beautiful woman I’d even seen in my life.

  For so many years, I’d never allowed myself to even consider getting close to a woman. I rightly convinced myself that no decent woman would be interested in a drifter like me.

  But my life was different now. I wasn’t some executive or business owner, but at least I had an address.

  And there sat this perfect woman – long, wavy strawberry blonde hair, deep brown eyes, flawless pale skin, slender fingers pouring out her mind and heart into the keyboard with intensity.

  I approached her table to clear away some of the cluttered dishes and wipe down a little excess water left behind by condensation from a water glass.

  “Can I get that for you?” I asked.

  She typed a few more words then looked up into my eyes. My heart leapt. I knew she would do that – I had witnessed it in the Chooser. I didn’t realize how powerful a feeling it would be.

  She breathed deeply, then smiled a sweet, genuine smile. “Oh, yes, thank you.”

  I proceeded to clear up. “What are you writing?”

  She pursed her lips and gently shook her head. “Supposed to be finishing up a novel – I’m on deadline – but I keep having to rework the ending. Every time I think it’s done, I read it back to myself, then delete it and take another run at it.” She chuckled in exasperation. “It’s starting to drive me crazy.”

  I clunked the last of the used dishes into my gray bus tub and used my bleach-scented white terry hand towel to wipe down the table. “Choices,” I said, leaning over to reach the far side of the table. “So many ways to play out the story, yet you must choose only one.”

  “That’s my problem exactly!” she said with a smile. “Makes me wish this were one of those old Choose Your Own Tale books from the 80s. Then I could write all of the endings I want to write. It’s so hard to choose the best one – the one that will satisfy the most readers.”

  “Why not just choose the one that satisfies you? Forget everyone else - do something for yourself.” I picked up my tub and stood for a moment as she looked up at me, her lips parted.

  She slowly nodded. “Huh. Why didn’t I think of that?”

  I smiled and walked away.

  I knew she’d be back.

  In fact, I knew she would one day be my wife.

  ۞

  The years passed.

  My life with Elizabeth was blissful. We lived in a little bungalow surrounded by gold, pink and magenta wildflowers, overlooking the ocean, at the north end of Lincoln City. She made a comfortable living with her novels, allowing me to spend my time with my hobby – a throwback to my younger days of beach-combing – shining up shells and making artistic little sculptures and etchings out of various flotsam from the sea.

  I often thought of Riker and Troi as I strolled along the beach, wondering if I’d ever see them again.

  And from time to time I thought about the Chooser, wondering if I ever even needed to use up my third wish. Life seemed perfect – no need to choose another reality when this one was just fine. Another use would have to be for something very important, for sur
e.

  I always kept the Chooser’s existence to myself – I felt somehow that Elizabeth would think I had cheated my way into her life if she knew about it. No longer alone, I couldn’t carry it at all times – I had to just put it away.

  Silly, really. We were happy. No reason to keep the secret. But somehow, although Conthu (via Riker) had not warned me to conceal it, I thought that something bad would happen if anyone knew about it.

  I was right.

  It was three days before Christmas, the sky was dark with rain and the wind gusting against our doors and windows. Elizabeth was trying to find a good place to stash my present. She ended up finding my hiding place for the Chooser.

  She brought it to me, fascinated.

  “What is this?” she asked, intrigued, holding it out to me as I sat in my easy chair buffing a spotted conch.

  I nearly had a heart attack. My hands shaking slightly, I put down the shell and said, “Let me see,” reaching out for it.

  “I found it up in the closet” she said. “Look at how it glows.”

  She started to sit in the chair opposite me, but staggered and bounced off the arm, crashing to the floor on her side.

  She screamed out in pain, and held up her hand – the one that had held the Chooser.

  It was turning black and shrinking, as if being fried to a crisp.

  Elizabeth’s whole arm then shriveled as she cried out in agony.

  It all happened so fast, I barely had time to jump out of my chair and kneel beside her before she was consumed.

  A shallow mound of fine black powder formed her silhouette on the hardwood floor.

  In my grief and anger and pain and confusion I stared into the Chooser and yelled, “No!”

  I was sucked back into the multiverse.

  I floated among countless lives, countless forks in the road.

  But no reality called to me, none felt right.

  I was confused at my choices. There was no clarity and no relief, only a series of choices that seemed to offer pain, more pain, and excruciating pain. There was also agony, misery and woe. I couldn’t see how to “fix” what was happening to Elizabeth.

  As I tumbled endlessly between the realities, hours, days, weeks seemed to pass. Finally, I started to see the truth: Elizabeth’s death was inevitable – it existed in every one of the infinite possibilities that sprung from my most recent Choice – to stay in Rockaway Beach and meet her, and fall in love with her, and marry her.

  There was no escaping it.

  For Elizabeth to live, we could not be together – but I could not undo that choice, because it was the result of the Chooser.

  I was literally going to be the death of her.

  No matter what.

  Condemned to this heartbreak, I selected the only viable reality – the one in which I was already living. None of the other possibilities mattered – Elizabeth died in all of them anyway.

  To think, I’d basically wasted two of my three chances.

  The happiness we’d shared was worth wasting a million chances – but her sudden, horrible death wasn’t worth an infinity of possibilities.

  And then I remembered the final condition of the Chooser.

  I was to decide whether to accept my three Choices, or return to the beginning and enjoy none of them.

  The beginning.

  That car chase with the state trooper.

  The one that would be my end.

  Well, I knew in a heartbeat what my choice would be.

  Holding up the Chooser, I spoke to it sternly (having no idea how this part worked), “Okay! Take it all back, then! I renounce you! Hit the rest button!”

  Apparently, that was good enough.

  The world was spinning, my van’s engine was revving, and the ground was getting closer.

  I felt myself slip forward in the seat – I’d removed my seatbelt back when I was pulled over.

  I heard the branches cracking under the force of the vehicle as I hit the bottom of the ditch.

  Glass shattered.

  My head and chest exploded in fiery pain.

  Blackness and silence.

  Then whiteness.

  Two bright seagulls floated toward me, welcoming me home.

  ۞

  New Beginnings

  Writers of the Future Honorable Mention, December, 2011

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