I Died Once

*Author's Note: I originally published this story on reddit some time ago. Some grammar has been fixed and some sentences adjusted for clarity but it is largely the same. This story is told from first person but is a work of fiction. It is written for the medium it was originally produced for.*

I was 23 years old, lying there in the hospital bed surrounded by my family and friends. There was plenty of equipment around me, keeping me alive but only barely. My time was coming, and I knew it. They were there because the doctors had said any time now and survival through the night was very unlikely. I had insisted some of my friends be allowed in. My dad was doing his best to be strong like he always had but I could see him breaking. Nurses surrounded me trying to make me feel comfortable, I guess. I was certainly drugged enough to not even feel the bed I was laying on let alone any pain at least at that moment. The last couple of years had several lengthy periods where pain was all I felt. The last year or so of my life had been a never-ending swirl of agonizing torment. My mom was on my left she was crying like she was the day I was diagnosed with leukemia. I had never forgot that day. I was 14. My doctor said my chances were about a million to one.

I did my best to focus on that one chance. To make every day worthwhile and to remind everyone how precious life was. I traveled. I spent time with my friends and my family. I modeled. I endured the surgeries and every time it took a turn for the worse, I smiled. A lot of people told me I had inspired them. I did my best to make a difference and from the attention my Facebook got, I'd hoped I'd least made a small one, even now I had a smile on my face and I was doing my best to comfort my mom and the few of my friends the hospital had allowed in the room...the ones who really wanted to sit with me...until my time came. Just writing this I remember the feelings I had, and I must work hard to fight the tears.

My time came then; like it will again. I remember the light fading. It was getting hard to focus even though I was trying to joke around with everyone present. My breathing became more labored. My eyes went cross eyed almost as I fought hard to keep sitting up. The room was spinning. I started to fall backwards.

As my vision blurred and my eyes closed for what I expected to be the last time, I saw someone I didn't really recognize but he seemed kind of familiar. Someone with dark hair and a look of deep thought on his face. I figured he must have been a doctor...maybe a male nurse but from his clothes. He didn’t look like it.

It's hard to describe what happened next. I remember my eyes closed and I heard a noise that sounded kind of like what you hear on those hospital shows when someone flatlines. It was a solemn experience realizing that was probably the equipment I was hooked up to. That noise was a sign that my heart had stopped.

Someone yelled "we're losing her!" and my mom made a pained scream. Suddenly I was nowhere. I couldn't see anything, not even darkness as difficult as that is to explain. I saw and felt nothing. All at once I was in a dark place. A haunting creature stood over me, but it was a peaceful one. I can't put its visage into words because there are no words in any earthly language that can describe it. I can’t even guarantee my mind could properly conceive what I was looking at.

I remember having the impression before I knew for sure that it was in fact Death and it was coming to take me away. It reached its hand down seemingly to take mine, to lead me on. I’m not sure why I did what I did next, other than the human brains built in instinct. I ran.

It followed me gliding over the darkness as I ran. I was running into blackness. There was nowhere to go, nowhere to hide. I turned, and zig zagged, but it seemed like it was used to this game, adjusting itself effortlessly to get around me or in front of me. My breath grew labored and short as it stopped in front of me and held its hand up in a stopping motion. I was frozen in place and I could no longer move.

This was the first time I realized all the pain I had felt, every day for the last year was gone. I offered my hand to him. I was ready. I had prepared for this moment since I first learned I was sick without every really knowing it. However, something that wasn't normal happened. Before Death could take my hand, a bright light erupted forth from my hand and seemed to push it away without hurting it. Death moved backwards letting out an unearthly cry unable to force itself through the veil of light defending me from it.

I was back in the hospital. The room seemed dark as if no light was permeating it, almost like a blue filter had been placed over. My friends and family weren't there nor were the doctors or nurses, but I wasn't alone. The man with dark hair I had seen before I faded away was beside me. He was holding my hand between both of his and he had a half smile on his face.

"Death was circling you but don't worry...I chased it away." He said almost as if this was perfectly normal.

"What? Why? How?" I asked. Now that he was close, and my vision was no longer blurring, I could study him. He didn't look much older than me, 25 or 26 at the oldest. His skin had a kind of olive tone. Maybe of Greek descent or somewhere else in that area.

"Because I wanted to talk to you." He replied. "But this...setting is uncomfortable." He looked around at the hospital room and the equipment around me seeming disturbed. He waved his hand and the room morphed and changed. We were surrounded by sandy beaches and palm trees. The ocean crashed up against the shore. I was no longer in a hospital gown but my favorite outfit, a blue tank top and a rainbow skirt. I hadn't worn it since the last time I'd modeled a year and a half ago. I'd gotten too sick and lost too much weight. The skirt had no longer fit but it hung on me now as tightly as it ever had.

"That's better." He mused the half smile growing a little wider.

"Where are we? Is this heaven?" I asked amazed. It was quite a spectacle to say the least. A sandy beach, a bright sun, a crisp blue ocean and a cloudless sky. We were clearly somewhere tropical.

"Well to some I suppose it might be. It does seem like what many consider paradise." He replied. "May I offer you a seat?" He waved his hand again and like that two lounge chairs appeared as if materializing out of the sand itself. He took a seat and sipped from margarita relaxing as he looked out at the waves. I took a seat as well, laying back and studying him not sure what to make of any of this. I took it in for a while. I had done a lot since I'd gotten sick but one thing, I could say I had not done was relax or take my time because I was so used to not having much of it to spare.

"Take as much time as you need. We have all the time in the world. Death cannot find you here." He looked at me seeming almost to have read my mind. He stretched and closed his eyes pushing a sun hat over them. The items appearing out of nowhere had lost its wonder at this point. I wasn't surprised by it anymore. I heard him snoring lightly and I thought for a moment about running away but I had died...where was I going to go? I didn't even know where I was now.

I stood up and watched the waves for a moment. I got closer to the water and touch it. It was warm and prefect for swimming, but I couldn’t see any other land in the horizon. I heard seagulls squawking very loudly. This place was very peaceful.

This being, I had gotten past the idea he was a normal man a long time ago, was right. These surroundings were much more pleasant than the hospital to the point that it was unsettling. It felt artificial or constructed. I moved around discovering we were on a small island. There were no animals but the birds flying overhead. There was nowhere to run to. Finally, I let out a long breath and walked back to where the man was snoozing. I had finally thought of something to ask him. I saw back down and poked his side. He grunted acknowledging me.

"Are you god?" I asked. He pushed the sun hat over his forehead and looked at me. His eyes were brown but seemed much deeper than normal eyes. They held an understanding no man has of the universe or ever will and he laughed at my question, laughed at me.

"What's so funny?" I said standing up and turning red out of embarrassment. "I think it’s a perfectly valid question given the circumstances."

"Fair enough. Fair enough" he said still laughing but getting more control of himself with short gasps of breath. "...I suppose to some I might be considered that, but nobody has called me or my kind, gods in a very long time."

"There are more like you?" I asked. This had been a lot to take in. The idea that there might be more than one thing that can chase Death away and turn hospital rooms into prefect beach islands like you would see in a photograph was a bit much.

"There was once." He said thoughtfully. "The others were a little less…. selective than I...so maybe there aren't. Maybe there are...let's just say family reunions for my kind don't tend to go over very well. I haven’t seen another in what feels like eons, but I have been watching you for a long, long time."

It was then I realized why he looked familiar. I'd seen him before. I'd seen him a lot now that I thought about it. He occasionally liked a post on my Facebook. At times I'd seen him in the street. We lived in the same town I think, but I hadn't only seen him there. In fact, the more I thought about it, the more I realized he was plastered in the background of a lot of my memories. Restaurant trips with friends, places I'd traveled, kind of like an extra in a movie they reuse for a lot of scenes except it was my life.

"You've been following me?" I said standing up and over him. I felt kind of sick, almost nauseous. The idea of a normal stalker was scary. The idea of having a stalker that was seemingly all powerful was beyond any fear I could have possibly had.

"Yes, but not for malicious intent...and while that is flattering, I am not all powerful." he said appearing to read my thoughts, again. He didn't seem angry. I'm guessing anger was a feeling he had outlived.

"Okay than why?" I said, feeling a bit miffed. I was like an open book before this thing, but he was like a diary with a voice activated lock. The more I poked at it, the less likely it was that I was going to get in.

"You fascinate me. You are an amazing person the likes of which I haven't seen in a long time." He said this as if it wasn't one of the creepiest responses possible.

"That's it?" I asked baffled. I thought I was fairly ordinary apart from my diagnosis.

"Well no. I suppose not." He spoke. "I long for something. Something I know you can help with. You've been helping with it for a while now. It is what drew me to you but so many people...so, so many can produce it for a moment that I normally don't even give them a glance...but then there was you."

"You're going to need to backup." I said very seriously. “Explain yourself, start making more sense and stop sounding like a total creeper.

"Very well. Let me show you." He grabbed my hand and images flashed in my mind. My diagnosis. My smile. Memories of me comforting my friends. My parents. Talking to larger groups and other people that were sick like me, sharing dreams of what we would do with the rest of our lives. Hundreds of Facebook posts, shared hundreds of thousands of times. People I had never met, nor will ever meet reading them and crying. Feelings of inspiration. Feelings of hope. Feelings of love. Feelings of loss. I saw my family crying over my dead body as an orderly moved a sheet over it. My funeral. Friends posting about me. Photo and memories being shared. More people moved and touch than I could have ever thought possible. I let go of his hand and stepped back slightly dazed and more than a little dizzy. It was a good kind of dizzy though.

"Woah" I mustered and sat back down. I shook my head trying to clear it. It was very overwhelming, and I could feel my eyes tearing.

"You are dying. If this was my last chance and just in case you had any doubts; I wanted to show you that your life was important and you mattered." His half smile now accompanied by a gleam in his eye.

"Thank you." I managed. "But why? Why me?"

"I have a question for you" he said ignoring mine. I was a bit too dazed to be assertive and fair is fair. He answered my question so I may as well answer his.

"Go for it" I replied.

"If you weren't going to die, what would you do next?" He asked.

"There is so much. I'd still want to help people. I'll travel to places I couldn't. I'd go to friends’ weddings and birthday parties. I'd take care of my mom and dad when they get older like they hoped I would. I'd marry my boyfriend. I'd have kids." I said without really thinking. My dazed state didn't really allow for deep thought, so I just rattled off anything that came to mind.

"I see" he said. This answer seemed to satisfy him and the beach faded. There was no more sand. No more tidal waves or blue skies. No more trees or seagulls. We were back in the hospital room. I was laying on the bed with him next to me.

"That it?" I asked. Circumstances aside, I was more than a little content that this weird experience was rapidly approaching its close.

"Just one more thing." He raised his hand and offered it to me. "This is a onetime offer. If you say no, then I will happily allow you to move on. Death will be back shortly after I go if you don’t take this chance. Do you want to go back? Do you want to live through all those little parts of life you were afraid you'd miss?"

"What's the catch?" I asked studying his hand, not entirely sure he could offer me such a thing. "My soul?" This question seemed to amuse him.

"No catch. You must simply keep doing what you love and never lose who you are." He said quietly, still with that half smile.

"Well I suppose just a little more time wouldn't hurt" I said raising my hand and putting it in his. A bright light shined from his hand passing into mine brighter than the light that had pushed death away. The light traveled through my body moving up into my arm passing into my heart and head. As the light passed over me, I watched as his dark hair grayed, and his young face became wrinkled. Years seemed to be going by like seconds but only for him. My eyes closed. I couldn't watch for some reason. I felt his hand let mine go. I lost consciousness.

When I gained it again; I heard the slight boop boop of a heart monitor.

"I can't believe this! she's coming too!" I recognized the sound of my normal doctor's voice. I opened my eyes. my mouth was a little dry. I coughed.

"What happened?" I asked lifting my head a little. My friends had cleared the room. Only my doctor, a few nurses and my parents were there. It was obvious from their faces they had both been crying. Their wet tears still glistened.

"We...we...lost you for a moment. How are you feeling?" The doctor asked. The fact that I was speaking to him when I had been, for all intents and purposes, dead a few seconds before seemed to have caught him off guard.

"Pretty good I suppose considering that" I said laying back down. My head hurt. I could see an older man sitting next to the door with a cane. His face was different, but I recognized the deep brown eyes. I was the only one who seemed to be able to tell he was there. He winked at me and stood up relying heavily on his cane and hobbled out of the room.

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That was almost 2 years ago now. The hospital kept me a couple weeks for monitoring but amazingly my leukemia had gone into full remission and they stated it seemed like it was almost completely gone. They called it a miracle. I'm happy to say I did in fact get married and I have a little one on the way. I am currently going back to school. I am working to become a doctor, so I can travel the world and help people where medical care isn't easily affordable. My husband loves the idea and is very supportive as long as I take him with me! He had already imagined the rest of his life without me and doesn't want to spend much more than a moment apart. I have not seen my benefactor again, well at least not directly. I see him every day in the kindness people do to others and in every good deed that inspires me. I don’t know what he saw in me or what he wants from me. I do not know if he was God or devil, angel or demon, good or evil, monster or beast, living or dead. I know that my time will come again but he gave me another chance to witness and to spread all of life's tiny miracles. That is good enough for me.