Page 155 - Musings 2020

above, a single ray of light bore down upon the two of us. He looked at me and smiled a
skeletal grin.

“Going up?” The light got brighter and brighter until I was forced to close my eyes. I was
curious to see what was waiting for me on the other side. I was excited to see all those who
passed before me, but… but I just couldn’t get out of my mind that I would miss all of Jake’s
milestone moments. He just started kindergarten, so I would miss teaching him how to ride a
bike, helping him with his homework, teaching him how to drive, sending him off on his first
date, watching him graduate high school and college, being there for his wedding, never
meeting my grandkids.

At that moment, I dove out of the beam of light and back onto the freeway, the red and white
streaks flew past me forwards and back, disorienting me and causing me to tumble over the
guardrail and plummet a hundred feet below under the overpass. I landed with a deadening
thud. I took this opportunity to run. I scurried away from where I was and headed in the
direction of where I used to live. I darted through the trees and bushes that were underneath
the freeway, frantically trying to make me way back home. I ran for about a minute before
POOF He appeared through that same puff of white smoke and towered over me.

“What do you think you are doing,” he scolded. “Didn’t you hear what I told you? By the
time you get back to your house, everyone will have moved on! You’ll be heartbroken
because they will have moved on without you.”
“I don’t believe that for a second!” I shouted back. “I loved my family with all my heart. And
they loved me. I refuse to believe that I will ever leave their thoughts.”
“Mike, I’m telling you, just wait and they’ll…”
“NO! I can’t wait. I need to…” a lump rose up into my throat, and I was left speechless for a
moment. I swallowed it back down, and with it, my eyes began to well up and overflow. I
looked down at my shoes. I just now noticed that even though I had been running through the
dirt and mud, they were still spotless as the day I bought them.
“…Did you have kids?” I asked Him.
“what?” He was puzzled. I did my best to compose myself, but I couldn’t stop thinking about
Jake. The tears were now running down my cheeks.
“When you were alive, did you ever have kids?” I think he finally knew where I was going
with this line of questioning.
“No,” He sighed.
“Then you have NO idea the kind of pain I am going through right now. There are certain
things that a father needs to do with his son so that he grows up right. I needed to be there for
him, and now, I won’t be able to. I was robbed of that chance to make sure that I could raise
him to be the man he needed to be. I was robbed of experiencing his successes, his failures,
his joy, and his sorrow. I can’t be there for him. And you just want me to WAIT?”

He stood there, silent.
He nodded his head for a moment, took a deep breath, and looked back at me, sternly.
“I know I can’t reverse time. I know I can’t, just can’t come back to life. THIS! I can accept. I
just want to say goodbye, and that I’m sorry I’m not going to be able to be there for him.
Sorry for everything I’m going to miss.”
He brought his boney hand to the bridge of his nose, and rubbed. Looked down again, and
sighed.

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