Next Lifetime

Chapter 1

"Still no sight of him?"

"I'm trying, goddess."
"Not hard enough, Abhimani. What you fail to realize is the longer you run from your fate, the longer you will be stuck amongst the humans."
"I just don't like the idea of a soulmate being chosen for me, especially when I have to travel through various lifetimes trying to convince him of such."

"Well you don't make the rules, do you missy? Now wake up before you're late for work."

The monotone sound of the generic alarm tone of my iPhone woke me from another restless night. I groaned loudly as I fumbled under my pillows to silence the God awful sound. When I finally lifted my head, I found Anubis on his usual perch atop my nightstand, staring at me incredulously.

"Fuck you looking at?" I snapped, willing myself to roll out of bed and get yet another day started.

"Meow," was his only response.

"Oh no witty anecdotes this morning? Well fuck you too," I called back, as I turned my shower to just past Satan's asshole. Maybe if I give myself third-degree burns I could be excused for the day. My name is Abhimani Wright, Mani for short, and I'm a practicing pediatric audiologist at Cedar-Sinai hospital in Los Angeles. For the last 5 years of my life, every morning had been the same routine: wake up, shower, treat deaf kids, come home and repeat. It's like my life was stuck on the same boring loop; but it wasn't always this way.

--

The sun always seemed to shine brightest in the Ancestral Plane. Every ounce of the lush oasis glowed bright golden. The trees were thick and green and the waters were the purest blue you'd ever want to lay your eyes on. Things had been a lot more quiet around here since Sekhmet took her leave, possibly still deeply affected by the loss of her champion, though that was her own fault. I myself was seated in my usual place next to my mentor, Bastet, as she looked out to somewhere far away.