AVON CALLING

The door bell chimed. It chimed again and again. I hated it even when it chimed only once. My sister, Nancy, thought it would be cute if our doorbell played a happy greeting. I didn’t like the idea but she went ahead, without my approval, and set it up to play ‘Merrily We Roll Along, Roll Along, da da da de da.’ She would ring the bell herself just to hear it and annoy me. This time I can’t answer the door no matter who is bugging me. I died two days ago. All I can do is lie here waiting for Nancy to come back from Annapolis. Wow! This is going to freak her out, especially if I’m already wormy.

So far I know nothing about death except I’m not breathing. There was no long bright tunnel to enter when my heart stopped beating. No angel, devil, pushed me, pulled me, lifted me. My mind works a little but when I tried a mathematical equation, I got blip. Sounds like that god-awful chime come in clear. Once I thought I felt my heart start to beat when a car drove past my house during the nite and the driver honked over and over. It must have been like an electric shock treatment. Maybe if Nancy comes home today I can still be revived.

I’m so bored, don’t know for sure if I’m sleeping or awake. Nothing hurts. Nothing feels good. I’m not hot, cold or luke-warm. My fall asleep nite game lights up my dull thoughts. I’ll make a list of all words I can think of that begin with letter ‘A’. There are hundreds, thousands. I start, ‘apple, ace, are, able, yes, come, stay.’That does not work.

Maybe a prayer is the way to go–come back to life. ‘God, god, take me to heaven now or send me to hell. Do something. If I’m going to rot, at least send somebody here to put me in a box and bury me so I don’t hear that infernal chime ever again. OR, god, let me breathe again, get up from this bed that seems harder and harder. Give me a chance to do some good on this earth.’

A noise, a loud rumble fills my thoughts, my ears. Mist begins to slide into my room. It rises slightly, curls around me. My vision is fading. ‘God, what are you doing?’ I hear wheels, wheels that sound like my 10 speed bike. It s peddles turn by themselves. A force I cannot see stops the bike by my bedside and I am lifted by nobody, put on the seat. ‘What do I do now, god?’ God, the Omnipotent, ignores me.

I have no control. My feet start to churn. Music sounds and I hear myself singing, ‘Merrily We Roll Along, Roll Along.’ There is no ‘a da da de da’ and I am gone.