Dead & Gone (DARAGON)

Ooh heaven is a place on earth

Heaven. (Sort of?) I'm not really sure
what I expected the whole After Life
thing to look like exactly, but I was
pretty sure it would've had something to
do with fluffy clouds and giant
waterslides and golden-doodle puppies
and, like, galloping around on a black
stallion all day, every day.

Not quite.

I stepped off the bus and took in my
surroundings. Okay, definitely not earth.
I mean, it felt like earth. It looked like
earth. It even tasted like earth, as weird
as that sounds. Except much, much
sweeter, like the air was made out of
maple syrup, or a pumpkin spiced latte.

Hamloaf, I don't think we're in Kansas
anymore.

But as I watched the bus pull away-as
it began to really sink in that I was
completely alone in a creepy parking lot
without a jacket or a phone or a friend in
the world-I began to sense something
else buried below all of that delicious
sweetness. Something sour and full of
decay. Anundertaste.

Then I got it.

The air tasted like dead flowers.

No, dead roses.

Just like the ones they'd had at my
funeral. Just like the ones they'd
scattered all over my grave after they'd
lowered me in.

I could still hear the hollow thumpthump-
thump of thorny stems hitting the
oak casket as the flowers had landed,
one by one, on top of me. I could still
remember the way the smell had begun
to transform as the hours, days, and
weeks had passed.

Sickly, putrid, sweet.

Suddenly, the more I thought about it, the
more I realized the taste was
everywhere. On my tongue, up my nose,
down my throat-choking me with the
thought of death and dying and rotting
pink petals. It made me want to throw
up, even though there was nothing left
inside me.

It didn't matter.

I threw up anyway.

I coughed and choked and twisted on the
asphalt, gravel and dust clouding my
eyes and hair and lungs until the only
thing I could do was curl up in a ball and
wait the misery out. Every single part of
me ached, sort of like the universe was
exploding inside my skull, or like my
body was tearing itself apart in order to
rebuild everything from the inside out.
To re-create some twisted semblance of
me.

All the king's horses and all the king's
men couldn't put Brie back together
again.

When the worst of it subsided, all I
could do was lie there on the ground,
drifting in and out of consciousness and
bouncing between a weird mix of
snapshot memories. The way Jack's
nose scrunched up whenever he smiled.
The way Hamloaf always woofed and
farted in his sleep. Wooffart, fartwoof.
The cold, green, churning Pacific.

It was like I was everywhere and
nowhere all at once. I was twelve,
riding down the freeway with Dad in his
red convertible, singing "God Only
Knows" with the Beach Boys. I was
nine, darting through the sprinklers with
Sadie and Emma and Tess, laughing as
Hamloaf chased us across the yard,
biting at our bikini bottoms. I was
fifteen, biking with Jacob down to
Mavericks beach on the very last night
of summer. The night he held my face in
his hands and told me he loved me.
A sudden jolt of heat forced my eyes
open, and I blinked hard, feeling my
pupils dilate and then contract. For a
mo-ment, there was nothing but black.
But soon, a soft red glow began to creep
its way toward me like a pair of twisted
hands, motioning for me to follow.
Finally, from across the parking lot, my
eyes settled on the source of the light: a
familiar neon sign, buzzing and blinking
and warming up the dark.