by Kristen Day
"Rebecca," I said as soothingly as I could, "Alice--Ali, she survived. Your house caught on fire, you and James were running out the front door and the roof collapsed. You were holding Ali, and even though you and James were crushed, Ali got away with nothing more than a few scratches and probably a little smoke inhalation."
"Well," Rebecca said, "Separation from a living person is something easily fixed. Everyone knows ghosts can haunt people, just tell me how. My daughter is not going to grow up without her mother."
"It doesn't really work like that," I said, "Do you remember anything that happened after you died? Do you remember a hallway, or how you escaped from it?"
"A hallway? What does that have to do with Ali? No, I don't remember a hallway, all I remember is--"
Rebecca broke off and I saw tears fill her eyes, "I remember," Rebecca said darkly, "You're boyfriend killed James! I was still pregnant with Ali, I wasn't even going to name her that except for it's what James wanted. You were a traitor to the family! You stood by that drunk lunatic, that Michael even though he killed my James, your brother! And then he killed you just a month later!"
"What?" I asked incredulously, "No, that's not what happened at all! Maria committed suicide, I was coming back from her house when I got hit by some random person. You and James died almost a year later! I never had a boyfriend, you and James died in a fire protecting your daughter!"
"He told me you'd lie to me," Rebecca said bitterly, "James was in one of my dreams. At first I didn't think it was anything to worry about, I didn't realize I was dead and that James was actually communicating with me. But he was right, he told me you'd try to tell me something else happened so I wouldn't blame you and your disgusting lover."
My jaw dropped, "Rebecca I--"
Suddenly Rebecca relapsed, she started screaming again. She lashed out at me, palm open, nails out; before I knew it I was nursing three long gashes on my left cheek.
Katelyn, Danny, and Michael came rushing back in. Between the two of them, Katelyn and Danny were able to wrestle Rebecca back to her bed and belt her down. Within seconds, one of them had administered some sort of sedative and Rebecca was out cold.
"What happened?" Michael asked me. He gripped my arm as he did so, but just as quickly let go, he was still afraid we might end up seeing each other's memories again.
"Daman has her brainwashed somehow, she thinks you were the one who killed James. She's got her death twisted up with the story that was fed to me in the misery door. She hates me, and now that she's got it into her head that you were the cause of James' death, she's going to hate you. Daman is going to make sure of that."
Michael nodded and looked wearily over at Rebecca's bed, Katelyn had gone back to the other side of the curtain to fetch Maria and Danny was sitting on the edge of an empty bed wiping his forehead, "Who would have thought death would be so much like life? I thought pain was supposed to end, and I didn't think there would still be sedatives." Michael said.
"Well, I guess death is full of surprises," I quipped.
I guess Michael wasn't in the mood for jokes just yet; he just ran his hand through his hair again and looked down at me. He seemed to notice the scratches on my cheek for the first time, "We should take care of those, the last thing we need is them getting infected. I'll help you since it looks like Katelyn and Danny are a little worn out."
"Okay," I said a little reluctantly, "Let me just get Maria and I'll show you where my room is."
If I hadn't already been willing to bait Daman into nonexistence, my run in with Rebecca would have made the decision for me.
Chapter Twenty-eight
Maria was sitting quietly on my bed, I was sitting uncomfortably on my chair, and Michael was dabbing at the scratches on my cheeks with some kind of salve he'd grabbed from a cupboard I hadn't noticed near the door of the infirmary. It burned like no ointment I'd ever used in life, but it was effective. The only problem was it hurt so much Michael could only heal a few millimeters of a scratch at a time before I pulled his hand away from my face. And with three two and a half inch long, surprisingly deep, nail scratches down the side of my face, the process was painstakingly slow.
"Ouch! Stop!" I cried for the third time. I swatted Michael's hand away and turned around to look in the mirror. The result of the medicine was obvious, but so were the tears of pain coursing down my cheeks, making the stinging in the cuts even worse.
"Why do people stay here?" I suddenly asked, "I mean, I know you can't 'kill' yourself to get out, you had to go through that door, but why did people stay here? Why did you?"
Michael met my eyes in the mirror, "Why do people on Earth not commit suicide?"
I hate when people answer questions with a question, but I decided to humor Michael, "Because they have family they wouldn't feel good about leaving behind, I guess. Or because they can't work up the courage or anger to actually do it."
"Partially, but beneath that is something else, fear of the unknown. As horrible as it is here, people get used to it. They even delude themselves that this is Heaven. Others choose to believe it's Hell, and some just accept it and that's it. They already dealt with their own death once and they don't want to deal with anything similar to it again. It all comes down to fear." Michael said. The whole time he was looking straight into the reflection of my eyes. The effect was a little creepy and made me want to look away. I did, but only for half a second as I turned around to face the real Michael.
“Continue,” I said.
Michael grabbed the tub of salve, and started searing my flesh with it again. I guess he also took my command to mean that I wanted him to continue explaining his answer to my question.
“I almost went through the door a week after I got here, it was actually the day someone told me about it,” Michael said. I winced as he came to the deepest point of the first scratch, but I didn’t cry out or turn my head away. I was afraid if I did it would startle Michael into silence, and that was the last thing I wanted to do when he had suddenly become so forthcoming with the information I craved.
“Daman loved it here, I did to an extent, but I missed really living. Even though I could still feel it was like no time was passing. Of course the sun rises and sets, but it’s more of an illusion than the real thing. The flowers are too vibrant, the pain too exquisite, and the people were all too nice. To me it felt like a brainwashed delusional Utopia that was really a dystopia waiting to happen. But Daman would hear none of it, to him this place was perfect, and in the end he convinced me to stay.”
“How did he convince you, I wouldn’t have been easy to convince. In fact, I’m pretty sure that if the door were still where I could get to it I would have gone and pulled Maria through with me days ago.” I said. Even as I spoke it I questioned if it were the truth, but I tried not to think about it.
“He told me we could change it. He knew how but he needed my help. Daman promised me that if I stayed just for a little while longer we would be able to make this place like everyone had imagined a happy afterlife to be. I wish more than anything that I hadn’t listened to him.” Michael said. He had stopped applying medicine to my cheek and was looking into the tub of salve like he wanted to drown himself in it.
“Well, it’s a good thing you did stay isn’t it? Daman might have ended up even more powerful than he is now if you hadn’t been around to fight him from the very beginning. Plus, Leigh would have no one to follow around.”
The comment about Leigh was another failed attempt to get Michael to lighten up.
“I guess it is good that I stayed if you look at it that way,” Michael said humorlessly.
Michael went back to applying the salve to my face and I went back to trying not to cry which didn’t last long. As soon as Michael finished with the first cut and moved to the second I slapped his hand away again.
“Sorry,” I muttered, “Rebecca really got me good on that one.”
For the first time Michael cracked a smile.
“So you�
��ll smile at me being in pain, but you don’t laugh when I said that thing about Leigh?” I asked.
“I’m not smiling at you being in pain, I was smiling because you rolled your eyes like you were embarrassed you got hurt,” Michael said, “Which I guess is almost like smiling at your pain, except emotional not physical.”
“I’m not embarrassed that she hurt me,” I said angrily, “I’m not embarrassed at all. I’m upset that she doesn’t know what really happened to her and that I ended up getting smacked for trying to tell her the truth. It was pretty much all in defense of your name, so really these cuts are your fault.”
Michael actually full on laughed this time, “Why are you so angry at me? I didn’t actually do what Rebecca said I did and I’m helping you out now which should be payback for defending me.”
I thought about it for a minute, and I realized the only reason I was upset was because Rebecca hadn’t listened to me. I was just projecting my anger for her and for Daman onto Michael.
“Sorry,” I said again, “I’m just overloaded with everything right now. My emotions are high, I’m hungry, and I’m angry that there is no ‘rest in peace’ now that I’m dead. That’s a lot to handle.”
I yelled the last word as I smacked Michael’s hand away again.
“If you keep doing that I’m never going to finish and you’re going to have to go get food with a half healed cheek. I’d be willing to bet that chewing isn’t going to feel too great.” Michael said.
I rolled my eyes and growled in frustration, “Fine, just hurry up, I’ll try not to hit you again.”
“You want me to hurry?” Michael asked.
I glared at him, sure he was teasing me, “Yes, I want you to hurry, just get this done with!”
“If you’re sure,” Michael mumbled.
“What is tha—“ I began.
I quickly found out why Michael had asked if I was sure. He didn’t continue dabbing my cut, instead he took a giant glob of the medicine on the three middle fingers of his right hand and smeared all of it across my cheek.
Pain exploded over my whole head, I screamed and kicked out at Michael with both feet. I missed and both my heels slammed back into the floor, adding to the immense agony I was already experiencing.
After nearly a minute of torment, the pain finally ceased. I glowered at Michael who was leaning against the wall across from me, arms folded, with a slight smirk on his face.
“Now I really am angry with you!” I shouted, “Why would you do that?”
“You said you were hungry, and you said you wanted me to hurry; so I took the necessary steps to remedy both situations.”
I jumped down off the sink and squinted up at Michael’s face. I was considerably shorter than him, but I didn’t care. I stuck out my finger and wagged it at his face, “Never do something like that again or I will kill you.”
Michael laughed again, “For someone so small you are very convincing. How about you grab Maria and we’ll go find some food for you both. She’s probably hungry too, am I right?”
I took a deep breath and stepped away from Michael, but I didn’t break eye contact, “Yes, she probably is hungry.”
I stalked into the other room and grabbed Maria’s hand, she stood up immediately and motioned to her mouth with her free hand, “I know, Maria,” I said exasperatedly, “We’re going to go get food right now, just be patient.”
As if his whole purpose was to frustrate me, Michael was standing at attention, holding the door open for Maria and I took walk through, “Ladies,” he said with a slight inclination of his head.
I rolled my eyes and pulled Maria forcefully through the door. I was walking so fast Maria was having trouble keeping up, but I didn’t let up on my speed. I focused on the door at the end of the hall I knew led to the kitchen and I was determined not to stop until I reached it. When I did, I looked back to see where Michael was.
He was still standing right outside the door to my bedroom, “Where are you going?” he called down the hall.
“To the kitchen!” I shouted back. Maria flinched slightly at the sound, but I hardly noticed.
“Then why are you going all the way down there?”
“This is the door to the kitchen isn’t it?” I asked, “It’s the door I went through to get there the first time, and it’s been the door I’ve used to get there ever since.”
Michael bit his bottom lip, “Well,” he said shrugging his shoulders, “If you want to take the long way I guess I shouldn’t try to stop you.”
I had been about to open the door when Michael’s words finally processed, “The long way?” I called over my shoulder.
“If you ask them nicely all of these doors will take you where you want to go as long as no one else is using them for something else at the time. The one you’re trying to go through is already in use.”
Michael had been slowly walking towards me the whole time and he was finally standing right next to me.
“How can you tell?” I asked. All the doors looked exactly the same to me. There was nothing to distinguish the door in front of me from any of the other doors in the hall.
In response, Michael pointed to the ground, “There’s light coming from the crack under the door, which means someone is using it. Of all the doors in this whole hallway you picked the one door that is in use.”
I bit back my retort and swallowed my pride, “Would you mind opening a door for me then, oh wise leader?” Okay, so some of my retort survived the swallowing process.
Thankfully, Michael didn’t take offense. He turned the door nearest his left hand, said, “Kitchen, please,” and opened the door.
Chapter Twenty-nine
It wasn’t the same kitchen I remembered. This place looked more like a dining room, except there were dozens of tables all filled with people. There was an open buffet table lining one wall and everyone seemed to be in a happy, jovial mood.
“This is not the kitchen,” I said to Michael.
“Sure it is,” Michael responded, “There’s food, and tables, and chairs. Although, I don’t know if kitchen is really the right word, dining hall seems like a more apt description.”
“Okay, fine. How did you get to this dining hall then? I’ve only been to the one kitchen the whole time I’ve been here.”
Michael inhaled the smells of the food around him, “The one thing I like about this place is that you see what you create when you open a new door. If you notice, there are people just sitting there by themselves eating quietly. They’re in another kitchen they created which obviously is less exciting than this one.”
I added that bit of information to the mental list I had started to keep. I also made a mental note to ask for a pen and a notebook or something of that nature so I could start writing some of the things I learned down. My brain was starting to become too crowded to handle all the new, mind boggling data it was trying to process.
Michael and I joined the queue of people taking food from the buffet table. I helped Maria load her tray with food and we found a table that was unoccupied except for one of the quiet eaters Michael had pointed out earlier.
Something was bothering me and I wanted to ask Michael about it, I opened and closed my mouth a few times, but eventually I decided to leave it alone. Unfortunately, Michael noticed my indecision and prodded at me until I finally blurted it out.
"Is Kinga still married to Daman?" I asked.
Michael nearly choked on his food; he obviously hadn't been prepared for that kind of question. It took a few seconds after he finally swallowed for him to answer.
"Yes," Michael said. When I drew a breath to ask another question Michael held up his hand, "I know what you're going to say. And no, there's no way she's working with Daman. She is totally invested in beating him."
"Are you sure?" I asked, "From what Gregor said she really loved him. I would've had a hard time choosing."
"Maybe it would've been harder if she hadn't come back into the room to find her new husb
and murdering her mother."
"Why didn't you stop that? You were right there, you could've done something!" I protested. I didn't look at Michael while I said it. Instead I wiped a bit of pudding off of Maria's dress and listened apprehensively for Michael's answer.
"I was in shock. I'd just watched my brother marry a woman for power and I couldn't quite believe he'd actually gone through with it. At first I thought everything I was seeing was just a very vivid figment of my own imagination. But as soon as I saw Kinga's face when she came running back in and saw Daman already using that power I knew it was true."
"Oh," I said. I felt like a jerk for bringing up the memory.
"It's okay, It's something you needed to know. You'd be less likely to trust me if you thought I had just stood by and watched my brother do what he did."
Michael was right I wouldn't have trusted him at all without knowing that, or that he was ashamed for having done nothing.
We ate the rest of the meal without saying anything, Michael walked Maria and I back to my room.
"Good night, Alice," Michael said as I started to close the door.
"Night," I replied. Michael nodded and walked away. I closed the door and resisted touching my newly healed cheek as I helped Maria change into pajamas and finally get into bed. I barely slept that night; my brain was going a million miles an hour and not just about all the information that had been thrown at me that day.
Chapter Thirty
Before I knew it, I'd been in Beyond for a month. Leigh came to my room every day and ate almost every meal with Maria and me. Sometimes she'd even drag Michael along. It was easy to keep up conversation when Leigh was around, but if she left for any reason, or got distracted helping Maria learn words, Michael and I would fall into uncomfortable silence.
There were no more formal meetings with Michael's 'rebel' group. Occasionally, I'd see one of the members in the hall or at a meal but they always clammed up when I asked them if there had been any more progress in their planning. I finally got so fed up I decided to ask Michael about it the next time I had a chance.
