Death's Doors

When the sky opened into a yawn of darkness and twisted hopefulness, Audrey could only watch. She lay there, arms splayed out, bleary vision and roped off dreams held back by the singular thought, my baby.

Her baby, who was full length white fur with a curly little tail, a smushed little black nose that puckered out like her baby’s chest, her baby was a black and white boxer mix puppy she named Giant. After the breakup, the thought of being alone crippled her. Giant, who was three pounds and six weeks old when Audrey found him, kept her company.

Audrey poured her love into him. She poured her love into him the way Jenny never did. She had wrapped him up in a blue and yellow floral blanket she grabbed from the back of her maroon four door sedan. The kind of sedan that’s good for someone with a family, someone with their shit together. Not for someone who just got fired.

Mascara thick like chocolate syrup drizzled from her framed eyes. Blood shot from the panic attack and shaky hands from the lack of Xanax, she thought of Giant. His fur, the small mattes she had worked out, brushing and massaging.

It had only been for a second, she swore. The charger, choking the shifting stick between the warm heated seats of the maroon sedan, the charger wouldn’t budge. She pulled and tugged on the thing, everything zooming at 75 miles per hour. Thoughts of her rent and her car payment and her dog evaporated quickly as her hands started to shake. She saw it, the silver hood of the truck. She saw it, shining in the headlight’s white halo. The silver truck that would smash right into her side while she clawed at the thin white cable.

Hands shaking, her phone fell out of her bag, over into the empty passenger’s side where it then slid between the seat and the cup holder to the matted, thin carpeting of the floor beneath the passenger seat. She could no longer see the brightness of the screen, even after stretching her eyes over to look. Her phone, the keeper of directions and GPS, screamed at her, “right turn ahead! At the next light, turn right!” And she panicked. Her stomach twirling and now instead of her phone she reached for her orange bottle.

Fingers of one hand gripped the wheel while she craned her neck from her purse to the windshield. Her dark eyes darted, the beige skirt she spent two hours ironing now wrinkled and spotted, Fuck! Is that coffee? God dammit! Which was out loud. There, the bottle, at the bottom of her brown purse. Knowing full well brown and beige don’t go together, the brown purse was the nicest one she owned. She had blown away the dust, emptied out the guts of it which only contained two pennies, one small package of Valentine’s Day tissues from that breakup with Jenny, one mauled black pen from Jenny’s pen-chewing habit and one hardened piece of cinnamon gum, also Jenny’s.

Now, nerves on fire, Audrey’s anxiety swelled. She dumped the lid off the tiny medicine bottle to the floor of the passenger’s seat where it rolled and slid and became neighbors with her phone and she felt it happen before her eyes accepted it.

The shattering of her future and all the windshield glass ripped her attention away. When she looked up to meet the sound of destruction, all she saw was the slow motion movement of her life disappearing. The white little Xanax pills flew up as the brakes forfeited entirely, Audrey’s seatbelt flying along, too. The metal of the buckle cracked into her collar bone as she flew. She flew up, around, her body a rag doll, gravity pulling and deciding with what to do next.

And next, there was her phone. The empty orange pill bottle reaching out for its white round lid. The charger that had been stuck, the thing that caused all this in the first place, taunted her. It whipped her arms and her fingers as she threw up her hands in despair. She closed her eyes thinking only of her baby, Giant. His small paws, reaching out for her, his bold brown eyes happy, his tail wagging away her fear of death.

Her heart beat ferociously, the blood splintering down through every single vascular line she had. And before she hit the asphalt, the sound of smashed up glass and metal reverberated. Everything darkened and the sky flew open, offering itself up to her. She fought it off, at first. She wasn’t ready to die. Not like this. Did she have a choice?

The lights shut off and when Audrey closed her eyes this time, it was the last of this life. She dropped into darkness, floating freely, not weighted down. The worries of her life faded away. The thought of bills. Of the car. The cost of repairs. Giant. Her dance lessons. Her fear and questions of being able to dance again or walk again or move on her own again, her anger at the silver truck, at her old boss, at Jenny, all faded away. Like a strong meditative sedative, Audrey’s feelings about her life, this life, faded away into blackness.

When she woke, it was quiet. Calm. It was light, the dark having given way to her new future. She could hardly take it all in. All these shiny, large, beautiful doors, all lined up around her inside this room. The light that emitted from each one was colorful and brilliant. Each door different. She tried to understand the deeper meanings, of colors and patterns and textures and shapes embossed, but there was no time. Death came for her, only this time, to send her off again. Death, with red and green flowers plucked fresh and pressed into a remarkable crown for her soft and mellow head, Death smiled at Audrey. Confused, Audrey’s face waxed and waned in perplexing patterns until Death said, “Pick one”.

Looking to Death’s curious eyes and then back into the chasm of brilliant doors, into the room of all possibilities in life, with no labels adorning their facades, Audrey walked. “Is there any way to tell what you’re getting before you go through?”

“No.”

Closing her eyes, feeling only with her fingers, she walked and felt the slick wall roll beneath her skin. Her footfalls were quiet, her mind empty. And then, she stopped. Audrey felt the magnetic pull of her next life. She had no choice.

“This one.”

“Very well. Once you’re in, you’re in.”

Audrey felt no fear. No hairs complaining on the back of her neck, no imagery of abandonment or her previous life’s puppy.

The door whispered when she opened it. It groaned and the frame of it glowed. She stared at it for a long time, wondering. Maybe in this next life she would really fall in love. Maybe she’d have children, real children. Maybe she’d feel happiness outside bottles of all sorts and sizes. Maybe she’d meet Jenny again.

No song erupted when she stepped through the frame. No ample applause or anxious waiting. Instead, the glowing light of the tall open blue door disappeared when Death shut it behind her.

Audrey closed her eyes. When she opened them again, it was the first time in her life.