Shorter fiction
The Chapel
Excerpt from upcoming short story collection anthology entitled The Carpenter.
Introduction
I'd like to eventually publish an anthology of a short story collection I've started.
"I don't see anything, no pulse. Should we declare her–"
"I'll call in the time.."
"Wait a minute. I’m picking something up.. We’ve got a pulse, ladies and gentlemen!"
"Woohoo!!" The other surgeons and doctors exclaimed.
As I was coming to, I could see everyone was standing over me, staring hard at me. They were so close. In my personal space, I could hear both their hesitant and labored breathing. I could feel their concern and worry. I felt it all shift as I fully awakened.
I had seen too much from the other side. I did see the tunnel, I came to see a light, then all of sudden gray, nothingness.
I remember putting my finger on one of the grey walls and being able to push my way almost completely through it; it was soft and flexible, almost malleable. They were more of a charcoal hue, closer to black.
I heard muffled screams and yelps down the corridor, which was also completely black. As I was walking, after having already walked a long way, I started seeing something, as if it was trying to poke its way through the walls, almost like a giant finger. Then it seemed like it was two fingers, then all of a sudden a hand! It looked like it was reaching out for something, or someone.
As I walked by at one point, it seemed as if it was reaching out to grab me! My eyes gradually opened at that point, or what it seemed like. As I wake, I find that I’m floating, hovering over something.
As my eyes open wider and my vision becomes clearer, I see a young woman lying on a hospital bed, with a bandage wrapped around her head and tubes sticking in and out of her, with a monitor beeping and going off beside her. As I continued staring and squinted my eyes in an attempt to get a closer look, I realized the young woman in that bed, with brunette wavy hair and big curls, was none other than myself.
I close my eyes, then suddenly I find myself walking slowly down another corridor. It begins to get brighter as I continue walking. Suddenly, statues appear of cherubs at opposite ends of each other, then at the end of the hallway appears a cross with a purple garment and golden rope ties draped over it. Behind it sits two stained glass doors that very slowly creak open.
As I look into the pews, I see no one, then all of a sudden, a ruddy gentleman of about middle age appears in the first row to my right. In front of him lies the stage with a pulpit and another royally dressed cross behind it.
"I've been waiting for you," he spoke.
"Am I alive or dead, or somewhere in between?"
"On the threshold, about to cross over, if you'd like?"
"What is this place?"
"This is your purgatory, sort of like a checkpoint," he explained.
"Ok. And who are you?" I asked.
"I'm nobody. Just a carpenter."
"What does your line of work entail?"
"A lot of handiwork, here and there. I also find myself giving advice and getting people out of difficult situations when there seems to be no way out."
"Sounds costly. What do you usually charge for your services?"
"My philosophy is that every human life is precious and priceless. We came into the world with nothing and hopefully someone waiting to take us into open arms on the other side. We all, no matter who we are, could use a helping hand, someone to guide us on life’s journey. I feel advice, or physically helping someone, shouldn’t cost anything."
"All my life I've wanted help. I've known of a higher power from the time I was a little girl. I've called God's name in prayer at night, by my bedside. I always knew, always trusted, He would keep my soul when I’d finally rest my head on my pillow at the end of the day."
"Do you still trust Him?"
"I've found myself questioning Him alot lately in life, over the past few years, really."
"Do you trust anyone as of late?"
"My ex, I did. Yeah, I trusted him with my whole heart, my soul. So much so, I've tattooed his initials pretty much every which way across my body, especially my chest, closest to my heart."
"I see."
"He’d left the night before the accident. I remember him picking me up so we could go out and talk. He had decided to come back, to give 'us' another chance. The last thing I remember was the accident, the car over-turning, then rolling into an embankment in the snow; then everything went black."
"You must've been out for sometime."
"Almost died.."
"You should get it out.”
"Here?"
"It's the perfect place, why not?"
"I have been looking to release a lot of these burdens lately."
"He cares, always there."
"I think I better kneel and pray."
"Better out, than in."
As I knelt down to pray, really vent, I looked up for a sec to see where my new friend went. I felt a chill in the room come on all too quickly, as I could see my breath now escape from my body. I turned to look, it was my ex, or a former resemblance of him. A silhouette in the corner, more like a shadow without any light on him. And like a flash of lightning, he moved closer to where I was at the pulpit kneeling.
He then spoke my name.
"Theresa, is that you?"
"Angel?"
He extended his arm reaching out for me, in an attempt to hold me, unbeknownst to us both for the last time.
"Am I dead?" he asked.
"Yes. I think we both are."
"I can't see myself in any of the stained glass here in these doors. No reflection."
"It's gotten a bit colder here since I first saw you."
He moved so quickly upon my saying those words. Touching his hand to the side of my face, I brushed it away almost immediately.
"You're freezing!" I exclaimed.
"Am I? You weren't saying that the last time we were so close."
"You went back to Alexis."
"I told you, she kissed me!"
"And your hands finished the follow thru?!"
We began shouting at each other incoherently; he started walking away, the last time I would see him doing that.
"You were never any angel of mine, despite the name! Every chance you got you brought hell to my doorstep!"
As he walked down the hall, he slowly faded, I thought he was gone. I kept asking myself why I still felt a chill and could still see my breath in the air. All of a sudden the room got to a freezing low temperature. It seemed as if snow was falling inside the chapel walls.
I turned to look to the wall — nothing. Then slowly, a black silhouette of a claw reached around from the corner and stretched out its arm, then the form of a body appeared along with a spiky tail. It opened what seemed to be red glowing eyes. I kept wondering where my new friend the carpenter was.
The monstrous, demonic looking figure detached itself from the wall and started slowly, stealthily walking toward me, as if to harm me greatly.
All of a sudden my new friend showed up out of nowhere with this mirror he pointed at the demon, once my boyfriend, someone I believed I knew so well. He was pulled inside and then my friend smashed it to pieces.
"He can't hurt you anymore," he said.
Suddenly I woke up; I hadn't even realized that I had fallen back asleep. There was a knock at my door the next instant.
"Ms. James, are you decent?" a voice spoke. It was the nurse, hopefully with some good news.
"That was a pretty bad accident you were in before you came here. Luckily for you, your condition seems to be a lot more stable at this point. You did, however, suffer a few fractures to your lower back and upper thigh. With inpatient monitoring and some physical therapy, you should be dismissed from the premises within the next two weeks or so. The doctor recommends that you follow up with ongoing physical therapy for the next few months in our outpatient wing."
I waited for about two weeks from that day; my mother showed up to pick me up upon my discharge date. I was so thrilled to finally get out of there!
My mother wheeled me out through the exit near the chapel, the one I had seen in my dream, or unconscious state. We ended up taking an uber back to her place in the city since her car was in the shop.
As we were talking with the driver, I couldn't help but think how much his voice sounded so familiar to me, as if I'd heard it someplace else before the ride home. When he finally turned around I had realized — it was the handyman from my dream! He tipped his hat and smiled and winked at me.
Upon turning back around he said, “Yeah, my friend got ill with something, pretty sure a fever. I'm just filling in for him for the next few days.”
He continued, "Hey, my friends and I know of a really great spot out on a lake nearby where we like to go fishing from time to time. Maybe you’d like to join us sometime?"
"Well, we might take you up on the offer sometime soon, stranger. What else do you do besides fill in for your friend from time to time?"
"I'm mainly a handyman; I do a lot of carpentry here and there."
He dropped us off and helped us get our belongings out of the car. He handed my bags to my mother as I balanced myself in order to get my crutches out of the trunk.
He got back in and closed the door, looked up and smiled for the last time before driving off.
I kept looking at him peculiarly, curiously, before turning to go up the stairs inside the door behind my mother. Bewilderment still hung over me. I laid myself down on my bed almost immediately upon entering my old room, my mother still had it to where as if I never even moved out.
Teenage posters were still hanging on the walls, and old makeup tins and lipsticks by my first vanity set were still there. I turned over and looked at the ceiling with my old glow- in-the-dark planet stickers sitting on it.
How did this man from my dream make his way into that Uber? How–
My phone had been disconnected from the outside world almost as long as I had been away in the hospital. The moment the WiFi kicked on, text messages and voicemail notifications started flooding my phone’s home screen. I just turned it off, slowly covered myself up with my quilts, curled up and drifted off into deep sleep — the longest I’m sure I would have for awhile.
©J.E. 2023. All rights reserved.
