“Man, how were you gonna save me when I wouldn’t save myself?”
“But I’m sorry, Billy. I could’ve done something or told someone—”
“I know that, man. We were both stupid kids, doing stupid shit. But we’re good, you and me. We always have been.”
I continued moving, floating along on a sea of nothing through a world of blinding light.
“What is this?” I asked Billy or Gramma or Grampa—anybody who would answer. “Why can’t I see anything? Where are—”
My words were halted by a faint, familiar tune, someone singing in the distance.
“You are my sunshine …”
I closed my eyes to the lyrics, allowing every word to encircle my heart with a comfort I hadn’t known since I had been a little boy, unburdened by a truth that would eventually destroy my innocence.
“My only sunshine …”
The voice was closer now, and the place where I knew my chest should be ached with longing as I desperately wished for a time when I could climb into her bed, curl up beside her, and not care about where she’d been or what she’d been doing.
“You make me happy when skies are gray …”
I remembered her arms around me. Remembered her scent, her voice, her youthful smile before addiction had the chance to swallow her whole. She was beautiful, I realized. God, I hadn’t acknowledged that in so long, but, man, she was. The second prettiest lady I had ever known.
“You’ll never know, dear, how much I love you …”
That voice was even closer, nearly beside me, and I feared the moment I’d open my eyes and not see her there. I wanted to look at her face, to know that she was as okay as I was now. I wanted—no, I needed to know for sure that she had been saved if not in the last life, then in this new one, full of happiness and love.
But what if she wasn’t there?
Would I be able to handle the crushing grief of losing her yet again?
“Please don’t take my sunshine away …”
That familiar sensation of no longer being alone swept over me, and somehow, I knew it was her.
But I couldn’t bring myself to open my eyes.
“Mom?”
“Hey, baby.”
Her voice was as crisp and clear as a November day, and the scent of spiced apples enveloped me, tugging at the edges of my mouth to curl my lips into a melancholy smile.
Yet I still couldn’t open my eyes.
“Are you better now?” I asked her.
“So much,” she replied, and I could hear her smile.
I bet it looked exactly the way I remembered it as a little boy.
“I want to look at you, Mom. I need to—”
“Oh, baby, I know.” Her hand, soft and warm, barely touched my jaw, and I shuddered with a desperate sob. “But if you saw me, if you saw any of us … you would never leave.”
“Leave?” I croaked. God, why did this hurt so much? Why did I feel any pain at all? Wasn’t this supposed to be Heaven—a paradise in which no man knew hurt or sorrow or any of those awful earthly emotions and aches? “But—”
“You’re not supposed to be here yet, Soldier. It’s time to go.”
I shook my head, frustrated without understanding. “I don’t get—”
“It’s not for you to understand, baby. Not yet.”
Panic folded itself around me as an energetic pull tugged at my being. Yanking an invisible chain, forcing me away from her and this place.
“Mommy”—my voice broke as I laid my hand over hers—“I don’t wanna go.”
It didn’t seem fair. It didn’t feel right. I had fought so hard for so much of my life, to regain this version of her, and the thought of giving it up now felt like the cruelest punishment of all.
“You were always my sunshine, baby. But it’s time for you to be hers. There’s nobody left to save. I’m okay now—we all are. Now, go live your life.”
A violent pull of the chain sent me backward toward an unknown, and I begged my eyelids to open, just to catch a glimpse of my mother before she was gone once again. Just a peek. Just a reminder before I was left to embark on my journey without her.
I tried, and I tried, but to no avail until, finally, my lids slowly peeled back to stare out into the bright white of the warm light shining from all directions. And then, slowly, my vision adjusted, and I was greeted by the face of an angel.
Ray, I thought as I took my first breath in the next chapter of my life.
It was eleven eleven.
EPILOGUE
TWO WEEKS AT A TIME
There had once been a man named Soldier Mason, who was told since the day he had been born that he would be a hero and a savior, and he took it to heart. He proceeded to live life in the gray areas between black and white, doing what he knew was wrong to keep his heart on the edge of what was right, never once faltering to make good on the promises he had made to protect others at all costs.
And that was what he had done—until the night he died twice. Until he was set free and pulled back to this world to begin the third chapter of his life, unburdened by the brand he had worn since the first time he had entered the world.
My knees jounced beneath the table now as I thought about that man.
I hardly noticed him now when I looked in the mirror. Every once in a while, I’d catch a glimpse of residual hurt in his eyes or a hint of the past flashing across the scars he carried. But I was far from the man I had been before my reunion with Rain, before that night I saved her life one last time and she, in turn, saved mine.
The Soldier Mason I knew now was a friend, a husband, and a father of two. He was a homeowner and a member of the River Canyon town board. He was a hard worker at the local grocery store and grateful to call himself a partner in the business. He was a proud man, content and satisfied. But most of all, and most importantly, he was good.
This place didn’t feel like somewhere a good man would go though, yet it felt necessary. The thought of coming had kept me awake too many nights. Ray had finally convinced me to just go and get it out of my system one night after we wrangled our two-year-old son into his bed—with little help from his big brother, who thought watching Miles outrun both of us was the funniest thing on the planet.
“If it becomes too much, you can just leave, and if not, you stay and get out of it what you need,” she had said a week ago while lying on our couch, too exhausted to do anything but wrap her arm around my waist. “But either way, you should go. I think you need to.”
And I’d thought, at the time, she was right.
Now, I wasn’t so sure.
This felt too much like stepping into the past, and in some delusional way, I was beginning to worry I’d start degenerating the longer I sat there.
Then, the door opened, and I lifted my head to watch as another ghost sat in front of me. The guard he came in with fastened the handcuffs to the table while I stared ahead, unable to tear my eyes away from the last living member of my family.
Levi Stratton.
“You have an hour,” the guard said, addressing us both before turning to me. “If you finish earlier, just bang on the door.”
I nodded. “Thanks.”
He left with a curt bob of his head and closed the heavy door behind him, leaving Levi and me alone for the first time in our lives.