The Woman laid on her deathbed, shivering and alone save for the few doctors and nurses easing her to rest. She was older, but not quite old enough for this. 65 was much too young to go-- especially when her grandest achievement was living at all. She suddenly felt very panicked as time slipped away from her, her breathing growing shallower. She was dying, she knew that much, but at no cost to anybody? No family was going to mourn her loss, for she had none. Co-workers surely wouldn't think twice about seeing her vacant cubicle. Not even the nurses attempted to comfort her as her eyelids grew heavier with each passing second. She was nobody, and she would pass without any acknowledgement whatsoever.
The Woman opened her eyes, having no idea how long they had been closed. She did not feel any different, but knew that she should no longer be alive. She sat up with ease and was astonished to find that she was entirely alone. She appeared to be in the same room she had died in, but now the only furniture was the bed she sat upon.
"Hello?" she called. Her own voice cried back, a distorted echo of the original word. She thought she heard another voice shortly after, but chalked it up to paranoia when she didn't hear it again. She placed her bare feet on the cool floor and stood up more steadily than she had since before she got sick. She smiled at this, let out a hiccup of a laugh and beamed with ecstasy. She took a step forward and was again delighted by how strong she felt. Without thinking, the Woman leapt into another step, then another, and another, until she was running through the empty hospital. She inhaled strongly and realized that she would never again be out of breath. She would never again grow tired.
"This-" the Woman made out a whisper, though thought naught of it but as another one of her footsteps bouncing off the hallway. "This way," the whisper beckoned. She halted and waited for another signal. "Now, this way."
The Woman followed the soft noises down the hall towards a lone door at the end. She had never been in this part of the hospital, but had a strong suspicion that it had not been there when she was alive. Still, she felt the urge to enter. Determined, she twisted the cool knob and thrust open the door.
For several moments, the Woman tried to make sense of what she saw. A little girl with long brown hair stared up at her with big hazel eyes and an unwavering smile. Her hands were clasped behind her back, but the Woman knew she was wearing white gloves to match the rest of her school uniform. The girl cocked her head to the side, her long locks falling over her face and shoulder as she giggled.
"I know who you are!" she exclaimed excitedly, "Do you know who I am?"
The Woman swallowed and nodded. She knelt down in front of the girl and looked her in the eyes as she answered, "Charlotte." The girl stopped smiling and marched away, stopping in front of a young woman with much the same likeness as her. If the Woman didn't know better, she would have thought the two were sisters as they shared all the same distinctive features. The young woman held a baby in her arms and only paid Charlotte half her attention as she attempted to shush the cries escaping it.
"Give her here," the Woman requested, holding her arms out to receive the child. Without hesitation, the young woman handed her over. Instantly, the cries were quieted. The Woman peeled back a corner of the infant's swaddling blanket to reveal her face.
"Charlotte," she whispered. The young woman lifted her head as if she had been addressed but quickly looked back down at the child. The air shifted ever so slightly with the entrance of two others. The Woman studied the first, a teenage girl beholding the same brown hair and green eyes as the others in the room, for but a second before deciding they had already been acquainted. The second intruder was a shock compared to the saga of look-alikes. He had jet black hair and striking blue eyes, definitely without relation to the girls. He was the first person the Woman saw without feeling some sort of déjà vu. It was him that she decided to look to for an explanation.
"What is going on here?" the Woman asked. The man gave a smile that made her uneasy, prompting the infant to whimper.
"You have lived a full life as these ladies, yes?" the man gestured around the room. The Woman nodded.
"Here, you were about twenty-four, yes?" his hands rested on the shoulders of the young woman, simply a ghost of who the Woman once was. The Woman nodded, growing more confused by the minute.
"Here, you were sixteen? This one, twelve? Why, the Charlotte you hold in your arms cannot be more than a month old, correct?" he observed, to which she spoke of confirmation. "My, my. Why, wouldn't it be nice to become one of these Charlotte's again?" he prompted. The Woman blinked at him, uncertain of how she should proceed.
"I said, wouldn't it be nice to become one of these Charlotte's again?" the man repeated.
"Yes, Sir, I think it would be nice," the Woman answered. At that he grinned, too-white teeth nearly blinding her.
"Yes, it would. You could correct your mistakes, create a legacy for yourself after death. Yes, that would be rather swell. You may choose now," he told her. The Woman looked at him with great confusion.
"Choose, Sir?" she questioned.
"Choose a Charlotte, of course. From what age would you like to start living again?" Realization struck the Woman, and she began to protest.
"No, no I couldn't possibly-" she stopped. What if she could? Her eyes wandered over the young woman. Twenty-four was certainly a good age to begin anew. Why, she could pursue higher education, or even settle down and have a family. An excited expression slipped over her face as she pointed to the young woman.
"Wrong!" the man's voice boomed, startling the women in the room. "At that age, you had already made irreparable mistakes. Obviously, that was not the right choice! Choose again."
The Woman watched the twenty-four year old leave the room and felt that she had been cheated. Still, her gaze flickred to the teenaged girl. At sixteen, she had not yet had enough time to make any devastating mistakes. If the Woman lived then, perhaps she could better her grades and put herself on the right track for a better career. Shakily, she pointed.
"Wrong again," the man informed her. "Why start where you've already messed up two years of high-school? It's too late to make better friends who'd guide you into better choices. Choose again." The Woman frowned and desperately looked to her last two options as the teenager left. They were much younger than she would have liked to start. She cursed the man inwardly and pointed at the child without giving it much thought.
The man laughed, "No, no. All wrong!" The Woman grew frustrated as her last option let out a cry from her arms.
"Fine then," she snapped, "I'll be an infant! I'll start over from day one, I don't care! I just need another chance!" Her eyes pleaded with the man's. The child, who had not yet left the room, wiggled the baby from her grasp and carried it out the door. The Woman trembled and looked after them even after they had been swallowed by the shadows just outside.
"It seems that, even in death, you cannot make the right decisions," the man tisked. The woman's legs gave out, and she fell to her knees.
"W-what?" she sputtered through a cough. She suddenly felt as though there was not enough air in the room, and held her throat as if that would help. "What was the answer? Tell me now; tell me, how does one win your game?" she spoke hoarsely as the room began to spin.
"To win at life, it seems that one should live while they are alive, Miss Charlotte," he said slowly between her fits of coughing. The Woman lifted her head just in time to see the man shut her inside the room by herself. As his last words to her replayed in her mind, she suddenly felt very tired.
