The Other Side of Heaven (5 page)

Immediately after
hearing the conditions, I was infuriated, I felt as if not only was I lied to,
but misled others. Fr. Craig looked smug over my reaction, Brad was indifferent
and Bill, simply said, “Well, how did you think they’d get there.”

I listened to Bill explain that
each chosen person would get a day, that sometime during the course of that
day, they would pass away. How they’d go directly to a special place where
their loved one would be waiting. The loved one would not only carry the
knowledge of the time that had passed, they will have been refreshed to the
moments just before their death. Refreshed meaning, they’d carry those same
feelings they had when they were alive.

The chosen would be dead for
three minutes, not enough time to declare a miracle, but enough time to change
a life.

“If they come back,” Craig said.
“There’s a chance they may not come back.”

“Is that true?” I asked Bill.

“They could choose to stay and
not walk back through.”

“Four of the five didn’t return,”
Craig said. “Not on my watch, but back in 1983. The Called … that’s what they
call us you know, the ones picked to do the dirty work, The Called in that
instance was tried for murder, that he did something to these people. He wasn’t
found guilty, but he sure carried it. He ended up killing himself. The church
teaches us that suicide is a sin, wonder if he got a buy because of his good
deed.”

“He killed himself, you’re
drinking yourself to death,” Bill said. “Wanna know the difference? He
made
a difference. You stopped. You led people to believe they would get this great
gift and you didn’t follow through. I thought, you know, maybe … just maybe
you’d want to finish what you started and stop this madness.”

They argued and poor Brad was
just baffled because, I guess to him it looked as if Craig was arguing to
himself. I needed air and I left the RV, grabbed my phone and called Artie.

I expected her to join my anger
crusade about it., I ever explained it all with edgy words, maybe
subconsciously trying to get her to say, “You are so right. Run. Run away from
this.’

Instead, she was calm.

“It makes sense, you know, the
dying,” she said. “It does. I just assumed that was probably how it happened.”

“But, Artie, is it right to do
this to people?”

“You’re not doing anything,” she
said. “Remember. You may choose who goes, but it ultimately their choice if
they want to go.”

She was right. I could pick them,
tell them the circumstances, but was their choice. Who was I to take that away?

Arthur Fletcher was one of the
‘Named’ back in 1983, chosen to go spend a day with someone he loved and lost.
His daughter. Arthur was the only one of the five who didn’t die. Even Brad in
all his youth and tech know-how, had a hard time finding out about the
incident. An article about an Insurance salesman from London who was tried for
the murder of four people when he led them to believe they’d meet a dead loved
one.

That article gave him the name of
Mr. Fletcher, who moved to the United States shortly after his testimony freed
the insurance man. That was the end of the information. At least information
available on line.

So I began my own investigation.
If the information wasn’t readily available, how did Fr. Craig find out.

Fr. Craig wasn’t so easily swayed
into his quest. Yes, he died and was dead for six hours following a fishing
accident. He met Bill, was told his mission, and started his search. The Pastor
at a local parish introduced him, ironically to Travis.

My interview with Travis wasn’t
the first … or the second. It was Travis that informed Craig about a woman ten
years earlier who had come to see him about the same thing.

Travis had never been picked.

Bill with all good intentions
told Craig about Martha. A senior citizen who froze to death in her apartment,
came back, and selected her five. Bill believed if he told Craig, that would
help him. A part of Craig still wasn’t convinced the Quest was the right thing
to do.

Meeting Martha backfired.

Two of her five didn’t return and
it weighed heavily on her and she told Craig, ‘at least she wasn’t the
insurance man.’

“I reached him by telephone,”
Craig said. “He begged me not to do it. That he himself wasn’t convinced it was
an act of God. He told me about the five. About the trial. Then two days later
he took his own life.”

Craig ended his quest for life
and sought solace in a bottle. I believed he did so because he was given a
mission he failed to complete.

“Why didn’t you look for Arthur?”
I asked him.

“Because I don’t believe anything
he would tell me would convince me otherwise. I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t with
a clear conscience promise people resolution when I didn’t know if they were
going to actually find it.”

“What about the three that
returned from Martha’s quest.”

He didn’t bother. His mind was
made up. Perhaps he was scared. I would have searched out those three. Although
it would have been far easier for Craig to do so back then, since Martha was
still alive. She had since passed away.

Instead, I focused on Arthur. He
was the one I needed to speak to. He was the one that returned.

With Bill’s help, I found Arthur
Fletcher. He owned a real estate rental agency in Des Moines, Iowa. I made an
appointment to see him under the guise of looking for a house.

I went alone. After all, I needed
to hear what he was going to say.

The secretary told me on the
phone he was only in on Wednesdays, but if I truly wanted to speak to him,
she’d see if he would make an exception. I don’t know why I didn’t think he was
older, for some reason I had a middle aged man in mind. Even though he took the
trip to the other side of heaven over thirty years earlier.

While waiting on Arthur, I could
tell his secretary, Jenny, was a bit more. She barely spoke to me. I think her
phone rang a dozen times. Arthur arrived. He was a fit man in his seventies,
reminded me of someone that probably acted in his younger days. He invited me
into his office and I took a seat.

“So,” he said, as he sat behind
his desk. “I had this dream last night. That my two o’clock special Monday
appointment named Natalie, really didn’t want to see a house.”

“That’s odd,” I replied. “Quite a
dream.”

“My dreams never lie anymore. Not
when they’re vivid. Not in decades. You can say it was an inherited gift.”

I cleared my throat and looked at
him. His blue eyes seemed to stare right through me as if he were searching for
an answer in my soul.

“I died,” I told him. “I was dead
for eighteen hours. I crossed over. While there and here I have been told
something. I was given a mission.”

“You need to find five people who
need to resolve something with a someone who died.”

I exhaled. “Yes.”

“You know I lived in Des Moines
all my life. Then my daughter died. Because she didn’t die here in the states,
I moved overseas. My own investigation into what happened. I lived there for
about six years when I met a man who said to me I had the opportunity to go to
the other side of heaven and spend one more day with my daughter. Resolve
things.”

“I’m so sorry about your
daughter.”

“Yeah, I am too. But .. I feel
differently now.”

“Arthur,” I folded my hands and
leaned on his desk. “I thought, you know, the mission was a good thing.
Emotionally draining, but good. Then I met a priest who was given the mission
ten years ago. He stopped and didn’t do it because of what happened to your
group back in 1983. I’m torn. I am.”

“Why in the world are you torn?”

“Because people died.”

“They died happy.” Arthur said.
“It makes me laugh that anyone that hears the story. Even you. You said ‘our
group’. It gives this image of five of us sitting in a church basement drinking
tainted juice that killed us. I never met the other four. Never. I knew I’d
have to die to cross over and I knew there was a chance I wouldn’t come back.
But not coming back wasn’t my body, it was my mind. My soul begging to stay
with my daughter and I had too much on this side to not come back.”

“Can you tell me anything.”

“I can tell you it all,” Arthur
said. “My daughter moved to England and met her husband there. She was
twenty-three years old. I talked to her two hours before she died. Or rather,
before they found her dead. No one knows what caused it. They ruled it natural
causes, no real reason, but I was unsettled. I didn’t know the husband, I
thought he killed her. Then I had the chance. I took it. If I could ask her
what happened, was she happy. You know. See her one more time.”

“How did it happen?”

“Same day as the other four.
Different times. I guess that’s why the murder charges were brought up. I was
watching the television when my time came. One second watching the news and the
next a bright flash of white light just engulfed me. Then I heard the voice. I
heard the voice first, she called, ‘Daddy’.”

When he said that I felt a chill.

“The light subsided, a mist
cleared and wouldn’t you know it, we were in her bedroom. The room she had all
the way up until she left home. She was sitting on the bed pointing to a Donny
Osmond Poster. She was laughing at it, saying she didn’t pick the meeting spot.
Oh my God, I held her. I grabbed my daughter and held her in my arms. That
alone made me not want to leave her. I didn’t want to go. I think I held her
and cried longer than I talked to her. We both cried.”

“So you felt like you didn’t want
to go back.”

“I felt it, but knew I had to.”

“Did you resolve anything?” I
asked.

He reached across the desk and
laid his hand on mine. “I did. It was a gift. I held her, I said goodbye, I
told her I loved her. Those were things I didn’t get to do. She told me when
she died she was happy. She loved her life and I had to accept she did die from
natural causes, something in side of her gave out and it was her time. When
time was up with her, the white light appeared. I knew I had to go back to it.”

“Is there anything you regret
about it?”

“No. In fact, it just makes the
thought of dying a lot easier knowing there is another side. Natalie, why are
you looking for answers?”

I sat back. “I was worried. What
if the people I choose don’t come back?”

“Then they were meant to stay. I
can tell you and I can’t speak for anyone else, this made my life easier. I
didn’t lay in bed all night obsessing. I didn’t blame myself. I felt at peace.
Make your choices, Natalie. You have been given a gift to share. These people
need it.”

I thanked him and spent a few
more minutes in his office after that, I felt better about it all. However a
part of me still held a speck of uncertainty. Until I walked out of his office.

It was when I was saying my
goodbye that I turned and saw Jenny’s desk. I froze. I literally could not
move. I didn’t see it before because I was on the other side of her desk, but
from the door way of Arthur’s office, it was clear and in plain sight.

When I died and crossed over a
lot of souls bombarded me, vying for my attention, begging me to pick their
loved one. A lot of faces, but one face stood out. It was that of a young man.
It was a face that I never forgot and for some reason was etched in my mind. He
spoke to me about his mother. I knew right then and there my reason for seeing
Arthur wasn’t to hear his story but to cross paths with Jenny. Because right
there on her desk was a framed picture of the young man I met on the other side
of heaven.

<><><><> 

His forced sabbatical was a road
trip to healing. So, Fr. Craig continued on with us. I believed, even though he
didn’t say it, he wanted to see it through.

When I returned to the RV, I told
him about Jenny, he was floored. At least he looked as if he were.

“You’re sure, you are absolutely
sure that was her son?” Craig asked.

“I have never been more sure of
anything.”

“What was her reaction?”

“Shock. I think to everything. My
seeing him, knowing he passed, my quest. Arthur gave me validity, so I didn’t
sound insane.”

“Wow. Just … wow.” He stood from
the small RV kitchen table. “Brad went to get food, wait until he hears.”

“Yeah.” I noticed him reaching
for the cupboard then the bottle inside. “Could you not have a drink?” I asked
gently. “Just this once, absorb what I am about to say with sobriety.”

He brought his hand back from the
bottle, his fingers trembled and he rolled them into a fist. “You’re gonna go
through with it?”

I nodded. “I am.”

“Aren’t you afraid, aren’t you
concerned about them not coming back?” That’s something I wouldn’t want to
carry. I didn’t want to carry.

“I am concerned,” I replied. “But
things will be different. I have a plan.”

Poor Brad. Once again, I felt bad
for him. Sitting in the small RV, his head going left to right, getting only
pieces of a conversation between three people, one of whom he couldn’t see. He
maintained his sanity.

Bill, however thought I lost
mine.

“You’re making demands?” he
asked. “We grant you this and you are making demands.’

“Just in case, you know, heaven
makes a mistake,” I said.

“Heaven doesn’t make mistakes.”

“Exactly.” I pointed. “So that
tells me, all the times before, all the people that didn’t return, you know.
You knew they weren’t coming back. That is why I am picking those who have more
reason to return than to stay there.”

Craig added, “I didn’t think of
that.”

“Yeah.” I nodded. “And I want
assurance.”

“Assurance?” Bill asked. “What do
you mean?”

“More of a comfort thing. I don’t
want those I have chosen to be scared. I want no secrets. No hidden agenda, all
transparency. You have made sure I have a team. Well, five people chosen, five
team members. So none of the chosen will be alone when they go.”

“The team can’t cross over,” Bill
said.

“And they won’t. They’ll be
there. On this side the chosen will be gone three minutes. That’s fine. A team
member will be there to call 911 just as a back up.”

Brad held up his hand and wiggled
his fingers. “Okay, five chosen, five team members. But I only count four. Me,
you, Fr. Craig and my aunt.”

I smiled. “I’m recruiting
Arthur.”

Bill groaned. “Fine. Fine. Never
has someone made demands, but fine. So I take it you made up your mind.”

“Yes,” I nodded. “We met a lot of
people and as unfair as it is to those we didn’t meet, I believe I know who
should go. They just need to give the okay.”

Bill waited until we were alone
and I told him my choices. With the exception of Jenny, who I asked right off
the bat, I phoned the rest. It was a matter of waiting to hear back from them.

I believed that the whole purpose
to visit a loved one and find resolution was so they could have that peace of
mind the rest of their lives. What was the point if they weren’t returning with
the joy of that resolution?

I was confident in my choices.

Then Bill tossed in a damper.

“You want transparency, I give
you that. You made up your mind. If the five you have chosen say yes, there is
something you need to know,” he said. “Not all visits will be a trip to a room
with teen heartthrob posters. You need to tell these people that each scenario
will be different and reflect on what they need to find resolution.”

“I can do that.”

“Are you absolutely sure in your
choices?” he asked.

“I am.”

“Do you want to change your mind?
Make changes?”

“I already asked them. I can’t
change unless they say no.”

“Then you also need to know, that
if the five of them go, then two will find complete resolution of those two,
one will get a gift, one of the five will be heartbroken, one will debate on
returning, and the final will not come back.”

“One of my five will die?” I
asked. “That’s not fair.”

“I’m just giving you the heads
up.”

“Who? Which one?”

Bill shook his head. “I can’t
tell you. I guess you didn’t pick as well as you thought you did.”

I wanted to shout, ‘You smug
bustard,’ but I refrained, knowing where Bill came from. Hearing that frustrated
me. One would not come back and one would be heartbroken? At that instant I
felt like Fr. Craig, wanting to just quit. But I couldn’t. I was in too deep.
And although Bill said Heaven didn’t make mistakes, I hoped and banked on the
fact, that there would always s be a first time. I was so confident in my
choices, Bill had to be wrong. He had to be. I was positive.