My Second Chance At Life

       

I woke up on my hard futon covered in beer stains and burn holes from cigarettes. What is the point in buying a real bed if you live by yourself. Today is going to be just a regular day, same as every other day since I graduated college five years ago. Go to work for eight hours, work my ass off for some old shit who makes a dozen times more than me and works half as hard, stop by the liquor store then go home and drink myself to sleep. Yep, what a life. I get out of bed and fix a bowl of cereal, since I'm the only one eating it I have had the same box for weeks. The cereal is stale and its like biting into a wet piece of cornbread. Oh well, another lackluster meal for a lackluster failure like me. I go to the bathroom and brush my teeth with a cheap toothpaste I bought at a flea market. The cheap shit leaves behind a weird residue on my teeth and it stays around for hours. Aggravated by the constant torture of my waxy teeth I storm out and begin my morning commute to hell. I look down at my phone and realize that it doesn't match the time on the clock tower. Shit, today time went forward an hour, I'm late for work. I have called off once a day every week for the past month if I don't make it before my boss shows up I'm fired. I begin a full-on sprint, I haven't run this fast since my junior year of high school when I ran track. I feel my joints aching with every step, father time is a bitch. Ignoring laws, I begin to jaywalk and sprint right into oncoming traffic. I had no time to worry about frivolous laws and fines when I could lose my job, I'm only a couple blocks away from work and If I cut across fifth street I can shave off a couple minutes. I look to my left and seen that the road was clear, and I begin to run across the street, then I hear a loud screech of tires and a horn honk. I turn to see what the sound was but all I seen was black.

"Hey, wake up sleeping beauty!"

a loud annoying voice echoed in my head. My head felt as though it weighed a ton. I open my eyes and all I see is white, there is a man with a big beard hovering over me and he is dressed like a frat boy on spring break. He had an unbuttoned Hawaiian t-shirt on and khaki shorts. The guy looked like a model for old navy.

"Who the hell are you and where am I?"

I asked slurring my words, still dizzy.

"Who me? Oh, I'm a lot of things, I guess I'm who you would call god."

I look at this narcissistic man with a puzzling expression on my face.

"Yeah, I get that look a lot at first. But nevertheless, I am god, sorry to disappoint ya but I'm not very, godly."

I think to myself, is this guy serious? I let out a chuckle and use every ounce of my strength to stand up from the cold, hard, marble ground.

"You know, I'm not a very religious man but if you said that to some people they would kick your ass."

I exclaim in a firm voice. He looks at me, almost as though I offended him.

"Well buddy, I don't know how I can prove it. The whole water to wine thing was really just to impress the ladies. It's not exactly true."

I let out a chuckle, even though this blasphemous, narcissistic madman is insane he's kind of funny.

"But anyways, your dead. Sorry to be so blunt but I'm not exactly a sweet talker. Walk with me and I'll take you to where you wait to cross over to the other side."

I decide to humor him considering I don't know where I'm at and don't have anything else to do.

"So, like purgatory?"

I ask, trying to play along with this narcissists facade.

"No, it's kinda like a hospital waiting room, except our vending machines actually work." He answered with a playful tone.