I hit the bottom of the pool. For a moment, the pool was silent beyond the small clicks I could hear as my ears adjusted to the pressure. I leaned into the pressure and let the rest of my air out with a deep scream I had been holding for years.
It didn’t matter, right? No one could hear me down here anyway, right? I looked directly up at the surface of the pool in defeat. You know… it wouldn’t even be difficult to just…not get back up… right?
“Wait… What the HECK are you talking about? What EXACTLY is your gripe with life, Brittany!?!”
My mind transported to a therapist’s office. I could clearly see my body sitting defeated, beaten, and bruised next to me on a couch. My body couldn’t even look me in the eye as I screamed at it. “Do you really want to divorce? Just like that?”
The therapist sat blank-faced and silent across the room, notebook in hand. I continued. “For real though… you gotta be kidding me!?! Like is this what it’s come to? Do you just want to give up? Do you know what will happen if you do? We’ll cease to be. Done. That’s it! No other chances. Is that what you really want!?”
Angel repeated his question. “Brittany?”
“Huh… oh yes… I’m embarrassed to say that you are correct. I guess I have been trying to distract myself from life a lot lately, haven’t I?”
I couldn’t meet his gaze. I turned my body to face across the pond and looked out at the horizon. I noted how this park was very serene and peaceful. Beyond the koi pond, trees of all kinds stood tall and proud, blocking the city horizon in the distance. There were trees of all sorts: Aspens, Oaks, Walnuts, Hickories, Elms, Spruces… such a variety.
“Come. Follow me. Let’s take a walk. Don’t worry. You can hold my arm.” He beat me to my most recent internal protest that I might fall.
As I slowly got up, I felt another pang of acid float behind my right eye and down my right arm. My head swam. I tilted forward as my left leg started losing strength. “Uh-uh! I got you!” Angel said as he caught me. “Don’t go falling on me yet!” He chuckled. I held on tightly to his right arm as I waited for the moment to pass once again.
“Seriously…” I muttered under my breath. “It’s like I have to relearn everything I learned and excelled at since I was a toddler!”
Angel pursed his lips but remained silent as we started slowly walking forward. He tilted his head up to really take in the small forest of trees around the pond. “My, my… what a collection…” I agreed with him. The sight of them all together was beautiful. Some didn’t make as much sense since I knew that some of these tree varieties belonged in completely different environments, but somehow they thrived and looked beautiful together.
Angel pointed to my right side. “I love the touch of palm trees along the pond’s shoreline. Gives the pond a bit of a beach vibe.”
“I know, right?” I smiled.
“Brittany, what you created here is quite beautiful. Seriously. Very serene, and you get to really meditate here on the past, present, and future much more easily. Beautiful memorial park.”
I stopped walking and looked up at Angel confused. “Wait…You’re saying that what I created was a memorial park? I thought this was just a dream of some forest that I had no control over.”
“Yep… it’s a dream, but it’s also very real. And you have control here. This is a true location within your metaphysical universe. You built it, and you go here often, whether you know it or not. And this is a very real arboretum inside of a memorial park. Take this for instance…” Angel turned and walked up to one of the trees that had a lantern in front of it. The lantern looked like it had been recently lit. “This Weeping Willow tree by the pond is the perfect touch…don’t you think? Well maintained.” He rubbed his hand across the bark. “And whose picture is that underneath the lantern?”
I slowly walked up to the lantern and paused in silence for a solid minute. “My late grandmother whom I never got to meet. She died the year before I was born.”
“Ah…I see. If I remember correctly, she and I did meet. A sweet soul, but V’s program for her was entirely too intense. For what it’s worth, she was incredibly strong in her human form. Because of this, I can see she is thriving in her tree form.” He gently caressed the bark and breathed a prayer, “May she forever find Rest in Peace.”
I was touched by how much care and reverence he showed the tree. We continued to walk in silence as we walked passed more of a variety of trees…an oak tree, a walnut tree, a hickory tree, a maple, and two very tall twin pines. I began to notice that many of the trees in this forest had a lantern beside them. Some had images beneath the lanterns, some had name plaques, and others were nameless and pictureless, but had a set of flowers or herbs growing underneath the lanterns to signify something unique about each tree. The lanterns of the twin pines were not lit but were very healthy and strong. I walked up to the pines and recognized that the images beneath the lanterns were my Mom and Dad.
Angel stood with me by the pines. “It’s not their time yet. Still, these pines stand tall in your heart and mind. But…what about you?” He pointed at the opposite end of the pond where the lone cherry blossom and park bench stood. I noticed an unlit lantern by the park bench as well. “You tell me. Is it your time yet?”
I didn’t answer him. I couldn’t. I was still processing that this whole “safe” place in my mind was a memorial park and not some really nice city park. Angel took my hand and patted it. “Still in shock about the memorial park part? Here, follow me. This one spot of the park really clued me in on what this place was. You never noticed this spot before?”
We walked in silence down a windy path through the forest of trees. The further we walked down the forest the more old and ancient the trees were. I noticed that they were again of all sorts of varieties from all over the globe like Redwoods, Ube, Baobab, and Acacia trees. As we drew closer, Angel picked up his pace. “Ah, here we are! Look at this!” The windy path led us to an area where the forest of trees instantly ended and before us was a vast cemetery full of headstones. The sun was at full brightness though it was early in the morning and we could see that the city line was much closer now. Maybe about a mile away or so. It wasn’t so pretty over here. The grass was burnt and yellow and many of the stones looked worn down and faded. Weeds and garbage had overtaken the cemetery.
“Well…this is a stark difference…” I mumbled aloud.
“I know… right?” Angel said a bit taken aback. “And you didn’t know about this place? It looks like it’s been here a very long time.”
I shrugged. “Honestly, I didn’t know about any of these places really. I thought this was all a dream that was just happening to me. Not a dream I was creating in the moment.”
“Yeah…well, I was about to say that your groundskeeper is a genius, but I take it back.” Angel chuckled. “Let’s walk around it, shall we?” He readjusted the arm that I was holding onto as we walked and slowed down his pace. I walked up to the first headstone… “Brittany Witcher. Gymnast. 1992-1996.”
I looked up at Angel. “Wait!” This headstone has my name on it!”
Angel pursed his lips and nodded his head solemnly. “Yes it does.” He continued walking slowly with me in silence as we moved to the next headstone. “Brittany Witcher. Model. 1992-2004.” And then the next one.
“Brittany Witcher. Actress. 1996-1998.”
“Brittany Witcher. Vet. 1997-1999.”
“Brittany Witcher. Artist. 1998-2003.”
I passed a few more headstones but then stopped in my tracks at “Brittany Witcher. Astronaut. 1997-2005.” I felt a lump form in my throat. “Angel…” was all I could choke out. We continued down the rows and rows of headstones dedicated to me.
“Brittany Witcher. Roller Coaster Designer. 2002-2005.”
“Brittany Witcher. Architect. 2003-2004.”
“Brittany Witcher. Travel Journalist. 2005-2011.”
“Brittany Witcher. Novelist. 2006-unknown.”
I paused at the Novelist headstone and was silent for a very long time. “Why does this one say ‘unknown’?” I whispered.
Angel said carefully, “Because…we don’t know when this version of you died, or if it has died. Only you do. As far as we know, this dream is like a missing person that has been missing for so long, we can only assume that this person has died.”
I let go of Angel’s arm and knelt down beside the headstone. Just a simple slab with a faded name. It came to me that warm wet tears were sliding down my cheeks and onto the slab. Angel knelt down beside me and silently rubbed my back.
I looked back at Angel and said as a sob arose, “Angel…how dead am I really? Until now, I thought at least this dream was still alive.”
Angel continued to rub my back and allowed me to mourn, right then and there. I appreciated that he did not answer my question at that moment, but was there. Once I reached a moment when the sobs subsided, he helped me up and asked, “Did you want to see more or did you want to take a break and head back?”
“I…I can do this. But can we walk around the perimeter? So I get the gist of what all is here?”
“Of course.” He smiled gently and walked me back to the edge of the graveyard between the trees and the headstones. A path circled between the trees and headstones in a circle. I noted that the headstones surrounded the treeline almost like a doughnut. As Angel and I walked along the path, I saw how the sayings on the stones started to shift.
“Brittany Witcher. Singer. 1992-1996; 2011-2018” We continued to walk past it, but I saw a few more appear like this one. “Brittany Witcher. Dog Mom. 2006-2007; 2022-“
“Angel… The headstones have multiple sets of dates now…?”
“Ah! You noticed!” He was excited to see this. “One of your inborn ‘superpowers’ if you wish to call it that is the power to resurrect from the dead. At this point…your capabilities are somewhat limited because this isn’t a power you exercise often, but resurrecting dreams is a good place to start.”
“Wait… you’re the Angel of Death and you’re okay with the concept of resurrection?”
“I know right? But I am. Believe it or not…as I shared before, I’m more interested in ensuring that people do not needlessly suffer. ‘Death’ is a form of rest. This rest can be temporary or eternal. Scientifically speaking, however, nothing truly dies. Remember, Newton’s laws? ‘Energy can neither be created nor destroyed.’ Energy is what it is and will always be what it is. When someone or something is born (including a dream), particles are bound together and organized in such a way that it builds a complex organism. Be it a human, a plant, a bacteria, or a star. The laws of entropy dictate, however, that those particles must disperse over time. And that is what death is. The dispersal of those particles. I manage that process. But there is no law stating that those dispersed particles cannot regroup and rebuild what was once there before. My brother handles that process. So while my brother and I have a bit of a rivalry between us, we are also at harmony with each other. My brother’s resurrection capabilities are not at odds with my dispersal duties.”
I continued to soak in his thought while we walked past a few more headstones.
Brittany Witcher-Friday. Beautiful. 1992-1996; 2015-2018; 2022-
“Interesting how some concepts and thoughts of yourself have died and been reborn over and over, right?” Angel mused.
“Yes…” I thought deeply about this one as the headstones changed from dreams of careers and hobbies to adjectives to describe myself. Some headstones had an enormous list of birth and death dates. I paused at Brittany Witcher-Friday. Financially Savvy. “Angel, this one has so many dates in the tiniest font. I can barely read it.”
“Yep. This one is a complicated dream of yours. Looks like it’s born and then dies on a near-weekly/ biweekly basis. Particularly with every paycheck it seems.”
“And this one is also complicated it seems,” I said as I stopped at Brittany Witcher-Friday. Smart. This one was an obelisk headstone with birth and death dates engraved over the entire headstone. “Why yes. I believe you’re correct. It’s very complicated it seems. Do you happen to know why?”
I chewed the inside of my lip while I thought. “Could it be that I really only thought of myself as smart as people labeled me as smart or not smart? Like in conversations or with report cards or such…”
Angel sat back. “You know, I think you may be on to something there. And could it be that you agreed with whatever label that person gave you whenever they said you were smart or not smart?”
“Hm. Who knows… I may have…” I sighed as Angel and I walked on.
The next set of headstones shifted from monuments to me to monuments to other people, things, or events that did happen and failed or never happened. The headstones mirrored what you would see in an infant or child graveyard. Many of the headstones had little cherub wings or hearts with the image of whatever or whoever it was. Most were flat faded headstones but some were larger and newer marble ones. I stopped and stared nearly breathless over the sheer number of them. It looked like they went on for miles.
“This part of the graveyard is for the miscarried, infant, and young dreams. The ones that you had partially or fully visualized for yourself or others but never quite grew to full maturation. It’s-“
“It’s a land of disappointments.” I cut him off. My mood darkened. I spotted a larger monument in the shape of a floppy-eared pup in a perfect, yet curious sit. Head cocked. “I’m done here. Let’s go.”
Words: 2,473
Word Total: 6,828
Just Brittany 