Life Is Short

The music plays as the car drives swiftly down the highway. Sheets of rain hit the road like rocks had been thrown from the sky. This is where it started, where everything was going to happen. Her future would change in just one moment. A girl, Rachel, sixteen and her mother, Stacy, were on their way to visit family for Thanksgiving. Rachel's grandparents lived only an hour away, but they had no time to visit except Thanksgiving and Christmas. Now that her grandfather was diagnosed with lung cancer, they had planned to visit him more than ever now that they knew the real meaning of "life is short." As they drove they sat in silence not saying a word about anything, not even the visit they were taking. The rain grew stronger as Rachel thought of every visit before and how this visit could be the last or just one of many long torturous visits. She thought of the visits before and how little they meant to her and how she would wish to be out with her friends than here with her grandparents.

So they’re about fifteen miles away, when the car swerves to the right and crashes head on into a telephone pole. Rachel wakes up to find her mother unconscious, but alive. Again she drifts off in her thoughts, that life was going to be shorter now and this time it was her life. She sits alone waiting for the unthinkable. She prays that her mother will hold on just enough time for help to arrive. Rachel had been there for what seemed like an hour, when she heard a car pull up beside hers. A man walked out. He looked in his thirty’s, brow hair, dirty clothes, but with a bit if kindness in his eyes. He started pulling Rachel out of the car then her mother. He dragged them away from the car and as he did so Rachel’s mother began to slowly wakeup. The man then began to search for anyone on the road willing to give extra help. He waved his arms in distress, but only to seem invisible to everyone passing by the to him the one person who could help the least was the only one that would. He had nothing and knew of nothing that he could do for them. So to his last idea he had made his choice. Rachel’s mind then went blank and the world around her disappeared.

Rachel wakeup with a jerk to find herself in her bed like nothing had happened. She wondered if it had all been just a terrible dream. Her mother entered the room and she asked her why she wasn’t ready to go yet. That day they were to go to her grandparents. For Rachel this was like a flash back. It seemed that she was living the same day over again. On the road she described to her mother the dream she had. She just couldn’t believe that this day was so near to the one she dreamed. The road was just as wet and slippery and the rain grew just as strong. She warned her mother to slow down so nothing that happened in her dream would become reality. Soon enough they arrived at her grandparents. The visit began as it always had, the talk of the things going in each person’s life and the changes that have been made. Rachel’s grandfather seemed to be in bad shape, from heavy cough to moments of crucial pain. She would just sit and stare at him just wondering what it would be like knowing that as you live each day one is going to be last. It didn’t take that long till she realized that it was more then unimaginable. That day the Thanksgiving diner was better then most because they all know that he might not have another. The day was at its end and they all said their goodbyes and Rachel left with her mother and the thought that she might not ever see her grandfather alive again.

That night Rachel dreamed of many different things, but only one was stuck in her when she awoke. The dream was like the rest of the one the night before. She was in what she believed to be a hospital bed with her eyes closed and it was like she was only inside her head. Everything was out of site, but voices surrounded her. The voices seemed to be talking to her, but knowing they wouldn’t get a response. Many nights after she would have the same dream, but each time it seemed to be a different person or they were talking about something else. The last night she had the dream the voice said to her in a quiet, soft voice, “ Please, don’t do this to me, I need you. You’re all I have left. Please, please just wakeup. I LOVE YOU, RACHEL.” This dream was the last of all and she was glad, but the next night became worse than any bad dream. She found herself in dead space and she was left all alone. A light then appeared and a smooth voice slowly whispered her name. A figure then came from the light, but not enough to see what it was. The voice then said this to her before vanishing out of site, “ Rachel, you are needed somewhere better now. Someone needs you more then I. You must live your life as before… without me.” She wakes up without opening her eyes. The sound of her heartbeat is in the background and the bright lights shine on her as a spot light. Her eyes open and she is in a hospital bed with her father at her side. He looks up to see her face, when he sees her awake he jumps out of his chair and hugs her close to him thanking God for the great miracle. His prayers were answer for what he believed to be the first time in his life. Now he was to explain everything. Her mother had died when the ambulance had arrived, but no one knew how they were able to get out of the car in time before it caught on fire. Rachel described the man to her father, but he told her that no one else was close enough to reach them before it was covered in flames, only seconds after the crash. In her mind and heart she knew it was an angel. The things she thought were dreams were visions of reality in her dream. The figure in the light was what was with her the whole time, her mother.