Everything
was blurring in and out, the lights slowly rolling by. Images started to slowly
form, until shapes could be made out. It appeared he was in some sort of big
building. Until he passed a sign that said “Morgue” in big bold letters, that
he just caught a glimpse of lying down. He appeared to be on some sort of
stretcher like bed he thought. He felt very strange, he couldn’t move. But he
could see everything above him, he couldn’t feel anything physically, but
mentally he was still all there. He saw two men and a woman moving about above
him. They were dressed in medical type clothing, pushing the gurney he was
currently located on. He had no clue why he was on it or why he couldn’t speak.
He tried to remember his last memory before waking up here, he dug down deep
into his thoughts until he was starting to remember, the pieces slowly coming
together.
“Eddy!”
yelled a voice from behind him, “Are you even listening to me?”. Eddy turned
around to see his ex-wife standing there in his messy kitchen. He wasn’t in his
right state of mind at the moment, as he was currently wasted. His eyes glazed
over with an expressionless look on his face. A bottle of liquor in his right
hand. Eddy was a middle-aged man, he had shoulder length black greasy hair with
gray peppered in. He had a black beard and bushy eyebrows. He was of average
height and medium build, but right now he was barely standing. “Eddy, do you
even know why I’m here?” she said to her drunk ex-husband. “It’s your
daughter’s birthday. It’s her 16th birthday for crying out loud. And
you couldn’t even make it to that, you’re unbelievable. She was crying after
her party you know, after her friends left”. The woman now with tears in her
eyes, “What’s wrong with you? Do you not love your own daughter?”. Eddy then
came back to life some with a slurred speech. “H-how dare you woman!” he
screamed. “Of course, I love my daughter. Maybe if you would’ve told me it was
her birthday Christine!” he shouted at her, alcohol pouring all over out of the
bottle as he waved it around. Tears streaming down her cheeks, she didn’t know
what to say as she looked at a man she once loved. A man who was full of
disappointment to everyone around him. “I’m done Eddy…” she started to say. “Done
with what?” he cut her off and took another swig of alcohol. “You…stay away
from Lucy. She is better off without all of this in her life. Not to mention
the constant disappointments from someone who is supposed to be her father”, as she
said this Eddy was getting furious, he threw the bottle at her, it smashed into
the wall into a thousand pieces, as the alcohol flung about. “YOU CAN’T DO
THAT!” He screamed, “YOU CAN’T TAKE MY DAUGHTER AWAY!”. Christine covering her
face from almost being severely hurt from the bottle, she was no longer sad but
furious, and stormed out of the small broken down home in the run-down city.
She got in her car and started to leave as Eddy shouted from the doorway,
barely being able to stand on his own two feet. “YOU CAN’T YA HEAR ME!? YOU
CAN’T!” He yelled after the car racing away from the house.
Eddy came back from the memory, back to reality. The gurney
has stopped now, and the people around him were now getting some sort of tools
ready. Am I in some sort of coma? he
questioned to himself. He tried so hard to speak to the people but to no avail,
it was like he was just trapped inside his own body. He started thinking of the
memory and how horrible of a father he had been. If he was able to use his body
right now, he’s pretty sure he’d be crying. And now something very strange was
happening to him and he wasn’t sure he’d be able to make it up to his daughter
Lucy, making up for 16 years’ worth of being a bad dad would probably be
impossible he thought. But as he was trapped in his mind, one of the men
grabbed a sharp object near the gurney, and was going towards his torso with
it. He could hear the people now, as they were just having a casual
conversation about a restaurant nearby. The woman laughed at one of the man’s
jokes. They removed the sheet that was placed over Eddy, as he now realized he
was naked on this gurney. The man with the object slightly chuckled after
removing the sheet, “We know this guy wasn’t satisfying many women, right?” he
said to the other two. The woman laughing too hard at this immature joke and
handed him another tool. “What are you doing?” asked the other man in the
corner who was suiting up for what looked like surgery to Eddy. “You two are
apprentices, you only watch right now” the older doctor ordered. The other two
stepped back, to Eddy’s relief as they seemed like they were about to cut him
open. He almost laughed to himself, that
would’ve been a nasty thing to do to a man in a coma he thought. But then the doctor also grabbed those
sharp tools and began to head towards Eddy’s motionless body. He screamed at
him to stop, I’M STILL IN HERE! DON’T DO
IT! “Now the first thing you want to do is to make an incision from the
shoulders joining down over the sternum in a Y shape and down to the pubic
bone” the doctor said and started to cut Eddy’s body open slowly. Eddy
panicking like never before inside. As the people about him, took control of
his life, and started opening up his torso and exposing his internal organs.
“Now the next step to perform an autopsy is…” the doctor kept talking but after
Eddy heard the word “autopsy” he was starting to understand what was happening.
Everything was going dizzy now, as he realized he wasn’t in a coma, he was
dead.
Eddy
watched his ex-wife race down the street away from him. He was also mad about
the fact he broke his last bottle of liquor. Eddy hadn’t had a stable job in
years, so going out and buying more wasn’t exactly affordable for him. He
walked over to a picture hanging on the wall nearby of Lucy and himself, when
she was only 13 years old. Eddy saw himself, he was a different man then, his
hair was short, his face groomed, a smile on his lips. He was working at a big
firm, some thought he would be the future of. Even in his drunken state of mind,
he was feeling the pain of his life choices now. He grabbed the picture off the
wall and sunk to the floor with it, his back against the wall as he clutched it
tightly. He had flashbacks of his life before this. When he and Christine first
got together, when they were so young and in love. They lived a studio
apartment while he finished out college, both working dead end jobs. Until they
found out they were pregnant with Lucy. They celebrated that day, over spending
their money to congratulate themselves. They knew they were poor, but they
didn’t care, they had each other and they were about to have a daughter they’d
love more than anything. Eventually Eddy would get that low-level job at the
firm he would rise in. They’d move into a nice house, and life would be on its
way to perfection for them. But sometimes life has other plans for us. Eddy
started working later and later nights as time went on. He and Christine
started to slowly drift apart, and the hardships of having a child were taking
their toll on them. But their love remained the same.
But years later, one late
night at work, Eddy’s supervisor walked into his office. “Eddy my man, you look
down. C’mon let’s bust this joint and hit a strip club” his supervisor said.
“Charlie, I can’t, Christine would kill me” Eddy replied not looking up from
his paper work. “Eh the wife doesn’t need to know, c’mon drinks on me. I’ll
even buy you a lap dance. I’m your boss now get up” said Charlie back, jokingly
but also applying some pressure with his words. If Eddy could go back to that
moment, he wouldn’t have gotten out of that chair and followed Charlie. He
would’ve went straight home to his family, made love to his wife, and never
would have let her go. But he did follow Charlie out that door. Eddy snapped
back in his drunken state of mind, he clumsily walked over to where his car
keys lay and snatched them off the table. In no condition to drive, Eddy opened
his car door, and started the vehicle.
Eddy now
woke back from his past visions and saw the doctor once more, as the three
people were pulling organs out of his body. The doctor giving the younger two
lessons on this process, Eddy’s body being nothing more than a project. He
could see both of his flaps of skin from his torso stretched on both sides of
him. They even removed a bullet from one part of his body, he saw it on one of
their tools, but had no clue where it came from. The horrific site was one he
never thought he’d see. Is this my
punishment for being a bad person in life, am I condemned to this hell forever?
Is this what hell truly is? As Eddy was thinking this over, the
three-person team was finishing up the autopsy. “So when will we know the cause
of death?” the young man asked. “We must examine each organ thoroughly to find
the cause. It’s apparent so far he was a heavy drinker judging from his liver”
the old doctor said. Eddy was curious if he’d ever hear what it was that caused
his untimely death. They sewed his torso back together, and covered him back
up. “Okay put him with the others” the old man ordered the other two. They then
rolled the gurney in another room with white walls, and a set of locker like
doors to one side. They pulled open one of the small doors and pulled out a
long bed like thing. They then lifted Eddy’s lifeless body into the bed. Eddy
saw that they were about to lock him in this tiny space for god knows how long.
As he tried his hardest to scream and break the curse known as death. STOP! PLEASE DON’T LEAVE ME HERE! But
to no avail as they slowly rolled the bed back, and Eddy into the small
confined space. The last rays of light from the outside, slowly disappeared as
they closed the door and locked it. Eddy was in complete darkness now, as the
others went on about their lives.
Eddy was swerving all over the road in his drunken state. He
didn’t care though he had one place in mind, and that was Charlie’s house. If a
cop caught him, he knew for sure he’d be jailed. He cut off cars in traffic,
and even side swiped another, taking off one of their side mirrors. Cars horns
were honked and people yelled furiously at this insane man. He started to drift back to that
night that changed his life.
As he and Charlie walked into a strip club
downtown, Charlie was about the same height as Eddy, he was always in suits. A
very showboat kind of man, his hair slicked back, and he often wore sunglasses.
He was well known here as the servers and strippers greeted him by name. Eddy
felt uncomfortable and out of his element as they sat close to the main stage
while strippers did their thing. He slowly sipped a beer, and looked around.
“Eddy, man! You gotta loosen up! This place is amazing. Look I got just the
thing to help you shake off those nerves”. Then Charlie took out a small baggy
out of his pocket, inside was some sort of pills. Eddy raised an eyebrow in
question, “Drugs?” he said and shook his head, “Not my thing”. “Dude these
aren’t drugs, these are miracle workers. You having a bad day? You take one of
these. Look all it does is relaxes you, like weed in a pill form kind of. Just
take one, I insist!” demanded Charlie putting one of the pills in Eddy’s face.
“You’ll be fine in an hour, you’ll never know what hit you”. But Eddy shook his
head no again and got up, “I have to go to the restroom”, as he walked away
unapologetically. Charlie looked dissatisfied with Eddy’s reaction and looked
around to see if anyone was looking, he grabbed Eddy’s beer and dropped three
pills in as they dissolved into the drink, chuckling to himself. “You’ll thank
me later man”. Eddy returned and unknowingly finished off the beer, Charlie
could already tell he was loosening up as he started to get into the strippers.
Eddy turned into a wild man that night, drink after drink, and bill after bill
he threw at them. Charlie eventually had too much to drink as well, as he lost
sight of Eddy. But Eddy being on the drug, was making unwise decisions as he
and a stripper were doing much more than a lap dance in a private room.
Eddy came back as a huge tractor
trailer was honking it’s horn at Eddy’s car who was on a direct course to collide
with each other. Eddy yanked the wheel to the right and the car just missed the
much bigger vehicle. He knew he needed more of those pills if he was going to
make it another day, he needed to find Charlie’s house and get more from him.
Eventually and miraculously he made it to Charlie’s house in one piece. He
stumbled up to his door, and knocked rather loudly. Charlie reluctant to open
the door to the obnoxious knocking. He saw Eddy, a former worker of his, and a
nuisance as of late, ever since becoming addicted to the pill. Eddy was always
hitting up Charlie for more and more, Charlie never helping this man out and
breaking the addiction, as he was the supplier for it. “Eddy, I don’t have any,
go home you drunken fool”. “Charlie please, I really need some right now” Eddy
started to say. “I don’t have any” Charlie said again, trying to close the door
on this pitiful man. “But Charlie, it’s been a really bad day man, Christine
was over, and she may not let me see Lucy anymore…” he said and started to tear
up, wiping his face. But then Eddy noticed something through his blurred
vision, he saw on a nearby stand behind Charlie, what looked to be a piece of
cake, wrapped up with saran wrap, with the word Lucy written in frosting on top
of it. “W-what is that?” Eddy pointed with a shaking finger at it. Charlie
following his finger to the leftover cake, “Oh, that…well I stopped in to give
Lucy a small gift for her birthday. 16 is a big one ya know. Speaking of, where
were you?” Charlie asked seeming disappointed now. Eddy started to get mad at
who he thought was his friend. “Why man? Why wouldn’t you say anything to me?
You barely know Lucy, why were you even there you son of a bitch!” yelled Eddy,
his face beat red, and clenching fists. “Eddy calm down, look I actually do
have a small amount of more pills, I was saving for me, but you can have them”
he pulled out a baggy out of his pocket and threw it at Eddy as it hit his
chest and fell to the porch. Eddy still angry went to lunge at Charlie, but
Charlie quickly closed the door, and Eddy banged on the door for him to open
it. “Eddy! Go home now or I’m calling the cops, you drug addicted scumbag”
Charlie said behind a closed door. Eddy quickly snatched up the bag of pills
and dumped them all into his mouth, they dissolved on his tongue, and he
started to stop shaking, and he felt warm inside for a brief moment. He was
about to get back into his car, when three police cars pulled up behind his car
blocking the driveway. “Freeze!” yelled an officer stepping out of his car and
pointing a gun at Eddy.
Eddy was in the dark locker-like freezer bed for what seemed
like days, although he had no real way of knowing. He knew nothing but the
darkness, occasionally he’d hear mumbling outside of the door. Until one day he
heard the door unlock and saw light beaming in once again. An unfamiliar person
to his left, was looking him in the eyes, of course his eyelids were probably
closed he thought, although he had no way of knowing, seeing it was especially
strange he could still see out of his eyes. On the other side of the bed he saw
her, he saw his old true love, Christine standing there tears in her eyes.
“Sorry I couldn’t make it sooner, it’s just my daughter and I had been out of
town” Christine said looking down at her former husband. “Oh Eddy” she said and
touched his cheek with her hand, and wiped the tears from her eyes. Eddy swore
he felt the warmth of her hand. He wished he had tears to cry right now,
because although his heart wasn’t beating, he still felt every bit of heartache
and love “Lucy, do you want to see your father?” Christine said to her daughter
who wasn’t in eye shot of Eddy. Eddy pleaded and begged inside that his
daughter would come and look at him, so he could see her beautiful face. But
nobody was coming. But then Eddy heard another voice, a man’s voice say, “C’mon
sweetheart I’ll go with you if you want”. Then Eddy did see his daughter and
she was every bit as lovely as he remembered her, but then to his shock and
dismay, the man next to her was Charlie. Eddy furiously wanted to jump up and
attack him, why was he here!? With my daughter, and wife!? “Ah Eddy, it’s a
damn shame. Such a good worker, can’t believe what happened”. Lucy now crying,
tears streaming down her face, and falling onto Eddy’s lifeless face. She
snuggled her head into Charlie’s chest as he held her head, and tried to calm
her down. Eddy swore he saw Charlie smile for a brief second, as he looked down
at him. “So, is there any news of what happened?” asked Christine to the
stranger in the room, “hold on just a second and I’ll get the pathologist dear”
said the woman and walked away. A minute later the doctor who Eddy remembered
from before, came into view. “Hello there, I’m Doctor Park. I performed the
autopsy on dear Eddy here” he said as he shook hands with Christine and then
Charlie. “I’m afraid to tell you that we don’t have the results in just yet.
Something very peculiar was going on inside Eddy. Give us a few more days, and
we’ll contact you when we know”. “Ok thank you so much” said Christine, still
flushed from tears, looking down at a man she thought she’d spend eternity
with. Eddy looking back at her, she was as beautiful as when he first saw her
he thought. He would never forget all of their memories, all of the trips to
the local pizzeria where they often sat and dreamed of their future, or when
they would take those road trips a few hours away here and there just to be
with each other and no one else, Eddy knew no matter what he always loved her. “Well
guys, we better get to the funeral home” Charlie piped in, breaking Eddy’s
thoughts, and his and Christine’s gaze, or so he felt they had one. Eddy knew
one thing for certain, he hated Charlie with all of his being. As the doctor
rolled him back into the dark freezer area.
Eddy put his hands up from the cops around him, but before
they could approach him, he took off down a side alley. The cops not hesitating
to fire, bullets whizzing by him, one pierced into his leg, and he screamed out
in pain. But he kept going, and crouched behind some garbage cans out of site
for a moment, holding his leg in agony. He knew they would find him soon
enough, but he was feeling pretty dizzy now, and not right at all inside. Maybe
it was the bullet he thought to himself. As he was in and out of consciousness.
He thought back to the night, his life changed forever.
After he
had cheated on his wife with a random stripper, he was grabbed by security, and
the woman demanded she wasn’t okay with it, even though a few minutes ago, she
was. The bouncers took all of his money and gave it to her, and called the cops
on him. Eddy being wasted and drugged up, not in his right state of mind. He
was arrested and had no choice but to call Christine, she bailed him out of
jail. The stripper not pressing charges since all she really wanted was all of
his money in his wallet. But all was revealed to Christine. Eddy and she had a
long fight that night, that lasted all night long. Eventually leading them to
separate. Charlie came over to Eddy’s new place one day, and re-offered the
pill to Eddy, who now in his desperate state of mind would do anything not to
feel the guilt and regret of messing up his life, also not knowing Charlie
started him on it to begin with that night. So began the process of Charlie
supplying Eddy with the pill regularly. Until eventually Charlie himself fired
Eddy, as he was not performing well anymore. “No hard feelings buddy, you
understand” said Charlie as he was giving Eddy the boot from the firm, a dream
job for Eddy once upon a time. The downward spiral of Eddy’s life all began
that night.
As Eddy
laid behind some garbage cans, slowly but surely fading away. Until he drew his
last breath. The cops eventually found him, and had no clue why he was dead. As
they called for an ambulance right away.
Eddy came back out of the locker again, only this time he
stayed out. He was shipped to a funeral home in the back of a hearse. All Eddy
was thinking is how long will I be
stuck inside my own body? Surely this wasn’t forever, how could that be
possible. Your soul being trapped inside it’s vessel forever? Maybe this was
just a big dream, or more like a nightmare. But Eddy was taken into a
funeral home, where these strangers took his body and shaped his face a certain
way. They also dressed him in some cheap suit the funeral home provided because
his family didn’t know what clothes he’d want or if he’d even care to be buried
in. I wish they would’ve listened to me
when I said I always wanted to be cremated thought Eddy to himself as he
was being placed inside a big wooden casket.
The funeral was an open casket at the grave site. Eddy looked up at the
sun, and he knew it may be for the last time. He was in utter shock that this
was what was to happen after death. He thought he deserved it though, he had
been careless and let his life drift away from him, that damned drug he thought to himself. There weren’t many at the
funeral, most of Eddy’s family passed away. He made very little friends, most
he had lost by begging for money to buy more of the drug. His brother came and
said his goodbyes, a few old co-workers, and finally his daughter and Christine
were standing there, the only ones who cried he had noticed. “I loved you Eddy,
so much” said Christine and kissed her fingers and pressed them to his lips,
and the casket was slowly lowered into the ground. Eddy screamed and tried to
wriggle and squirm or do anything but to no avail. But before Christine walked
away her cell phone rang and she answered reluctantly “Hello, Doctor Park?” she
said. Eddy could just make out the loud doctor on the other end of the call. “From
what we have seen, it appears Eddy may have been unintentionally poisoned. He
was addicted to a drug known as "the pill". But his last dosage, seemed to be
laced with something that Eddy’s system couldn’t handle, ultimately it stopped
his heart” the doctor said. Eddy not believing what he was hearing, his own
addiction is what sent him to his grave. But wait, my last dose before I
passed he thought…was from Charlie. “I’m truly sorry for your loss, these new
drugs can be dangerous” the doctor continued, and he and Christine parted ways
over the phone. “Well Eddy I hope that last dose was worth it” said Christine
and walked away. WAIT CHRSTINE IS WAS CHARLIE DAMN
IT! But no one could hear him. “Goodbye dad, I hope wherever you are. You
are finally happy” said Lucy then too, also walking away. Eddy screaming so
loudly within his own head, this was the worst kind of hell. But then Charlie came
into view and crouched down in a squatting position right in Eddy’s face.
Almost whispering he said “It’s okay buddy, I guess that first dose I hooked
you on at the club got you addicted. Can’t believe you didn’t taste three of
those in your beer. I almost feel this is my fault. But hey your wife and
daughter are in good hands buddy. I can give them more anyway. I’m glad that last
batch finally put you out of your misery. Good luck Ed” then Charlie threw dirt
in Eddy’s face. Blocking more of his view of the sunlight. Charlie then looked
away at Christine and Lucy “We better get going if we are going to make our
trip to our new home tonight, it’s a few hours’ drive after all”. As the casket
lid was then closed. Eddy screaming out “NOOOOOOOO!”
But suddenly Eddy woke up in his bed back home. He smelled
the musty sent of his home, he felt the touch of blankets, he had no clue what
happened last. But he knew it was all a dream. “WAHOO!” he jumped out of bed,
and ran to grab clothes. He could feel them once more, he knew the first thing
he would do is go and see Lucy and Christine. He ran outside the sun shining on
him, he squinted his eyes and said a small prayer to god. Thanking him for
opening his eyes. He got in his car and raced to see them. He ran up the steps
to find his wife and daughter, Christine opened the door, and to her surprise
saw him there. “Christine!” he yelled and hugged her. “I love you guys so much,
and I will do anything to make things right baby”. Then Lucy came out from
behind her mom and he hugged her too. “Guys I’m home” Said Eddy, but suddenly
the sun went out. And it was night, then Lucy disappeared, and then Christine disappeared.
Then the house disappeared, and one by one everything around Eddy did until he
himself did too. Then suddenly all he saw was darkness, as he heard the crunching
sound of dirt being thrown on top of the wooden casket.
