The Afterlife: Reimagined
In honour of the Halloween season, I'm posting a little sneak peek of a story I've started that's re-imagined the hereafter. This story was inspired by an interesting conversation involving spirits, suicide, and whether or not those who have passed on can interact with us. While it doesn't necessarily reflect my personal views of an afterlife, I've enjoyed creating my own, elaborate realm of spirits. Enjoy the excerpt below!
It’s nothing like any description of the afterlife I’ve ever heard either in church or a religious studies class. There’s no pearly gates, no trumpets sounding, no fluffy clouds, no choirs singing or streets paved in gold. It’s not one place, either, but rather several that all touch at distinct borders. It’s lonelier than I’d expected as well. Not a single angel in sight, but plenty of other creatures creeping in the shadows. Haunts and Horrors and Demons—oh my.
I sigh.
My sense of humor seems to have died along with my physical body.
I remember the first time I ever set foot in the Dark World. It was colder then—well, that’s how it seemed to me. Freezing. I remember shivering for over an hour. I think it had been an hour. The concept of time exists in the Dark World, but it feels slower, and the days seem to drag more than they do in other parts of the Spirit Realm.
Anyway, the first time I’d gone into the Dark World was with Alick and Ivy. I remember liking Alick better. He seemed kinder, had a gentle smile, was maybe younger. He’d shown me how to shoot a crin—a gun, basically, but one that will kill a soul that’s already dead. Ivy stood back and watched with a glare on her face and bloodshot eyes through ratty red curls and waves. She always had those bloodshot eyes. I guess it was the one thing she kept from her death. Most spirits keep some physical attribute to remind them of how they died: a bullet hole, glaring scars…something of that sort. I got lucky and took pills, so I don’t have any.
Now, I hate Alick, and the Dark World almost always feels unusually warm. Alick is my supervisor that I report back to every fourth Friday. I write up daily reports of my findings, kills, any supplies I need restocked—and at the end of the month, I turn it all in. It’s god-awful. I didn’t die and become a spirit just so I could keep on turning in schoolwork for the rest of forever.
I didn’t die to become a Demon Hunter, either, but it’s what I got stuck with because I’m a Shoeboy: a restless spirit who gets stuck doing all the stuff that no other spirit wants to do. Like kill demons. And write down which demons they kill. And send said write-ups back to friggin’ Alick, who never even talks to you other than when you hand in your write-up on the fourth Friday of the month. I’m a restless spirit due to the nature of my death—purposeful overdose on tranquilizer pills. Sounds tragic, yeah, but if you’d been living my life, you’d have wanted a way out, too.
I’m usually alone. And by usually, I mean always. Other than the fourth Friday of the month, when I’d rather be alone than having to put up with Alick. And even when I’m with Alick, I space out because I’m in my own jumbled up thoughts. Mostly memories, because I can’t really imagine anything new. I guess there’s always the thought of what I’ll have to track down and crin up tomorrow. There’s also the occasional song that pops into my head. But, no, mostly memories. Memories of food—you don’t ever get hungry in the Spirit World, so there’s no need to eat, but I would give almost anything to get a bite of pizza again. Or macarrons. Ice cream. Tater tots—the sweet potato kind. Jelly beans, I guess. They sound better now that I’m dead than they did when I was alive.
Where was I going with any of this?
I have no idea, but something somewhere not so far off is screaming.
Excerpt from Trespassers Chapter One: Redemption
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