She knelt beside Chris and saw his face looked raggedy in the soft light filtering from the streetlights into the window. She reached out a hand and sighed as she remembered they couldn’t touch or use it to comfort. So she questioned quietly, “Why do you stay Chris?”
A pause, which seemed to last an eternity met her question. She could see a silent debate going on with how he would answer. Finally he responded, “I’m scared.”
She paused before responding, “Why?”
“Because, I don’t think I was or am a good person. I can’t believe that I deserve to be blessed with peace after all the selfish decisions I have made.”
“So, guilt for your life and afterlife decisions?” She mulled over the black and white view he had taken, “Alright, but that’s only one possibility. You were a lawyer, let’s argue for your deserving peace then?”
“Order!” A voice proclaimed and like before a blink of her eyes and she was in a court room. She looked wildly around and she saw Chris standing on the opposite table as the opposition. A mature woman with one of the white wigs sat perched high above them in a wooden box, with a large and scary gavel looming over the table. The jury box was all made up of Chris as the twelve jurors. The judge stood and her commanding voice boomed throughout the room, “First case, Christopher Lenon standing trial for whether he does not deserve peace,” she swung her vulture like gaze on Chris and said, “You will be the prosecutor, present your case.”
“Jury members, while the defendant may plead that I deserve peace and no longer part of this ever lasting torment, but do you think she is right? When we look at the evidence, about me, sorry us, do you think that we will be swayed by anything? We have been trapped in our loop for over twenty years. If our guilt was so easy to accept, wouldn’t we have already done it!” The jury nodded with small half smiles, which made her annoyed at their smugness.
“Defender, your opening statements,” the judge commanded.
She stood nervously and tried to remember all the lawyer shows she had watched on television, “The prosecutor has a set idea of his guilt, but let’s face a truth, sometimes guilt is only in the eye of the beholder. Maybe, he has not examined the other side of the case. Maybe he has not bothered or questioned his own ideas?” She paused, shrugging and smiled a warm smile, “I think before we condemn him, we should possibly look at the evidence and see if it is just one person’s opinion?”
“Prosecutor, present your evidence.”
“Case one, I represented evil people for money in my life. I didn’t care that they had committed crimes, only about making a name for myself.
Case two, I caused a man to become clinically insane due to my death and I felt nothing other than slight amusement, meaning I am more than likely a sociopath.
Case three, I allow a woman I supposivedly loved to suffer because I am too afraid to move on.”
“Present your witnesses,” the judge commanded.
“Case one, I call on me. I am the only one who knows all the wrong I allowed.
Case two, I call on Shaun to testify on his insanity.
Case three, I call on Lauren, my fiance to testify how I did, and have treated her since and before my passing on.”
“Ok, going with the easiest first,” she rolled her eyes, “Case two, let’s hear from Shaun on Chris causing his insanity!”
Shaun appeared in the witness stand and she felt an instant nausea at the weasel faced glutton. Chris began his questioning, “Shaun, we understand that you spent years in a mental asylum after my death. You then due to ill advised depression, killed yourself. Would any of this happened, if I had not stole the Reginal Commrade case from you?”
“No it wouldn’t have. I would have lived a long happy life and not been burdened by your death,” Shaun agreed.
“No further questions.”
She rose from her seat and looked curiously at Shaun, “Was there reasonable grounds to suspect you of being responsible for Chris’s death?”
“No, I had an alibi,” he mumbled.
“But, why feel such impacting guilt? You were not close, you had no reason to grieve his death, actually a more reasonable reaction would have been joy?”
“I felt bad for him. It’s normal with death.”
“Is it though? You were not lovers, brothers or friends. In fact one could argue that you hated him. He was young ambitious and successful, you were, well look at yourself. You felt guilty because you pushed him! Admit it!”
“Yes, fine. He was arrogant and stupid. He had a real bad attitude and kept belittling me. I pushed him, thinking he’d get a slight bump on the head. Didn’t expect him to die. It was a mistake. But I can’t be held to blame as he was a bad person!”
“I say this case is closed, the witness admitted to fault higher than the charges.”
“You are correct, case two dropped.”
“Ok case three, Lauren,” she floundered a little as the woman from the kitchen, that Chris had spoken on the ouija board appeared, “you were engaged to Chris?” She asked to stall for time.
“Yeah, but he didn’t love me,” she paused to take a breath, “I don’t think I loved him for real either. It’s what makes me lie awake at night.”
“But you appear to have had some hardship?”
“Yeah, I was sad for a long time. I pushed people away. I had real trouble feeling a part of the world. I guess most shrinks call it depression. But the real problem was that the sadness was too much to deal with. I tried talking to people, but they didn’t understand and I felt they pushed me away as well. So, I drank alcohol. I tried drugs. I didn’t mean for them to become an addiction. I just needed a break from the pain.”
“Would the pain be better if he was no longer a part of your life?”
“Possibly, I don’t know. I feel like I can’t move past this.”
“If you could, what would you do? What’s your dream?”
“Wow, no one cares enough to ask me that anymore, um, I would like to open a cafe and bake my own pastries!”
“Why don’t you?”
“Because I can’t, I’m not able to wake up, let alone run a business!”
“Yes, you can. There are ways. You can start baking pastries, get a cart, and begin outside business towers or markets. Then save the profits to find retail places. There is so much you can do. While you may feel sad, doesn’t mean the hope is not there to get strength from! Hope is something which makes you strong, don’t reject it!”
“Wow, everyone always placated me rather than telling me I need to move on, thanks.”
Lauren disappeared from the room and shrugging the defender asked, “Third case dismissed?”
“Case dismissed! Christopher, please approach the stand, you are the last witness,” the judge motioned at him.
She thought hard and realised that she did not want to hurt him, she wanted to help him, “You say you were, a bad person? You didn’t care about anything?”
“Yes, I was a sociopath without moral compass,” Chris replied.
“If you questioned it, you weren’t one. Due to the idea that ‘if you are worried you’re a sociopath, you probably aren’t one’ is a widely cited clinical sentiment popularized by mental health experts like Dr. Robert Hare.”
“What if I was diagnosed as one?”
“Were you?”
“No, I wasn’t.”
“It’s because you weren’t and aren’t. I’ve seen everything you’ve done since I died and you explained what happened when I died. You wouldn’t be able to be that concerned if you were an evil person. You wouldn’t have been such a help with my own process or ask for help when you needed it,” she looked at the jury and seeing Chris’s face being reflective, “you’ve comforted me, you’ve helped me. Please let me help you.”
“You have stayed because of me?” Chris asked, an epiphany realisation, that she was ready to leave.
“I was ready in five minutes,” she looked sadly at him, “I needed to get you to come with me.”
“Why?” His suspicious nature rose like a viper.
“Because, you shouldn’t be stuck! You have tormented yourself for twenty years! You’ve repaid your penance, over in triplicate! Let’s accept this together! I know it’s scary, but can anything be worse than the hell you have put yourself through?”
“No.”
She stood before him and smiled with her big green eyes, making the courtroom fade away, “Ready? Say it with me,” they both smiled and blinking into darkness they accepted not light but the nothingness from where they were made…
Lauren lifted her head from the table and shaking it, pushed the alcohol away from her, “No more, I’ve got to stop this and get my life together.” Determinedly she got to her feet and pulled open the curtains to allow the sunlight to filter through her window. For the first time in twenty years she smiled a hopeful smile.
The choice to accept didn’t happen with a crash or any trumpet fare, just a wave of peace and comfort. They could feel that they were seperate, yet still together as in the new existence they were going somewhere, but it didn’t really matter how long it took. The peaceful feeling was because even if they were moving, there was no expectation or anxiety, just an acceptance that they were what they were and would change if or when it was needed. They traveled for a long time. The memories of being human and then a ghost became faded and more dream like the longer they were moving in the non-sensory place. A barely noticeable change in pace happened and they seemed to be moving faster. Idly wondering at the change they continued and feeling a pull, a sudden light came through the darkness…
20 years later
“Just got off the phone with dad and he said the twins are beautiful,” George said to his wife, who was holding their newly born twins a girl and boy, “He’ll be arriving tomorrow to meet them. He says this little lady looks exactly like my mother!”
“Well, I know how much she meant to you both and since I named our son with a name which randomly came to me in a dream, I think it would be lovely to name her after your mum?”
“I’m sure dad will be happy with that, thanks,” He lifted his son and said, “Welcome to the world Christopher,” then picking up the girl pausing and looking into her familiar green eyes, “welcome back, Margaret.”
The End…
Maxine the Magnificent 