Dead Time

Dead Time

They say I'm dead and what the hell do I know. Perhaps they're right. Maybe this is what death's like and that's another thing that twenty-first century science hasn't quite got nailed down yet.

If you believe in God is this when he comes and rescues you? Whisks you out of the decay and takes you home? Is it too late to start praying?

Probably. Too much Edgar Allen Poe and not enough Holy Bible in my head. A few words of comfort wouldn't go amiss and there aren't many of those in Poe. Quite a lot about being buried alive though.

Lucky I'm dead, else I'd be scared to death by the finality of the casket closing around me. And I know Scully wouldn't let them do that if it wasn't the right time.

Do I really have more faith in her judgement than I do in my feelings?

I guess so. Which is ironic given our history together. When it came right down to it, she was the theoretician who claimed to know what was and wasn't possible. I was the empiricist who poked at the tower of cards and jumped up and down on its rickety foundations.

I guess that's what made us a team.

A partnership in every way.

My feelings never added up to much compared to her rules.

Oh God. Don't talk like that.

I'll be insane soon enough. I don't need to be angry as well.

I'm not dead yet. Not properly.

Or if I am, it's not what I imagined. Not oblivion.

I recall images of heaven filtered through childish dreams and quasi-religious fantasy, fairy tales I learned in church but which never meant more to me than something that Hans Christian Anderson might have written. A world of fluffy clouds ridden by gossamer-winged angels strumming out favorite tunes on golden harps.

But if this is the stuff of fairytales, then it's one that the Brothers Grimm designed.

I'm not sure why I'd expected oblivion. The X-Files should have taught me that death wasn't the end. Yet, for me, I always imagined it would be. Assumed it. Like I assumed that I'd never be taken by Them.

Maybe that means I really did believe in God. Maybe I just hoped he was the merciful sort, and that when it was over, it was over.

Maybe it's not over.

Memories merge, tangle and tumble, and make no sense.

But when the pieces fall just right....

Clarity.

Breathtaking in its audacity, blinding in its intensity, ruthless in its dissection.

The conclusion as beautiful as it is frightening.

I had loved my life.

Imagine that.

How much easier it would have been if I hadn't.

If I'd just loved catching the bad guys, unraveling mysteries, being Spooky the guy with the missing sister. If I'd just loved the people I'd met, the things I'd learned, the things I hadn't yet understood. If I'd just loved Scully.

How much easier it would have been if I hadn't loved it all.

The elements were not divisible. Nothing was disposable. And nothing took precedence.

I don't know why I'm still here.

But knowing what I know, maybe I shouldn't be surprised, and perhaps I needn't be here at all. Death isn't the end, not if you can reach out from death and reconnect with the living.

The whos are obvious. There are people who've meant so much to me that I can will them into existence, even here. All I have to do is find some way to return the favor and surely they can will me into their world?

I've read all the literature, seen it first-hand a time or two. Surely, I'm ideally suited to becoming a ghost?

Apparently not, maybe all that intellectual understanding is an obstacle.

Maybe I know too much. How's that for irony?

I don't understand. Everything's changed except me.

I can feel people.

I can't feel the closed casket, the weight of the earth outside squeezing its walls, the creaking and the cold. I can feel the air.

Oh God, I can feel people. Maybe I've finally made it out. Maybe I'm a real ghost now.

No. I still don't get it.

It's not how I imagined life after death. Well let's face it, it's not how I imagined death at all.

Not that I imagined death very often. Whatever other people might have thought about me. Death was neither a hope nor a fear. It was simply there. A thing for one day, far into the future. A thing for now, if all other options looked worse.

Though I admit, there were times when "now" seemed very close.

But this. This is weird.

Understatement. This is fucking weird.

But then, weird shit happens.

I can't touch them, but they can touch me.

I can't make myself heard, but I can hear them.

Maybe I flunked Haunting 101.

I'm not totally convinced I'm dead.

I thought I'd sorted this out once, resigned myself to it.

But I think I'm in pain and I don't remember fantasizing about pain before. Not that kinky.

And then there's the sounds people make. At first they were a blur, a dull babble of nothingness humming away, out of reach. But then, I started to hear words. Not well, I don't think my hearing's too good, but I could hear something, things that sounded like words and some of the words seemed significant, as if they might actually mean something.

Which I guess could all fit into my trainee ghost list of objectives and attainments.

Except, I think some of the words are directed at me. Not many. Most of the babble flies straight past me, over my head as it were, I think I'm lying down. Yet a portion of it seems to be about me, I hear my name used, as if I'm really here.

But some of it? Some of the words, I swear, are just for me.

And they aren't the kind of things you say to dead people. Not vague protestations of love and regret.

Skinner read me a story. No, really. I swear I heard Assistant Director Walter Skinner read me a fucking bedtime story. Not just any bedtime story either. He sat there and read me excerpts from the National Enquirer.

And Scully's been here too. Talking in cold medical tones to doctors and nurses. Talking to me like I'm dangling by a thread and any sudden change in volume or tone of voice might destroy the fragile link. Maybe she's right about that. But it's harder to understand her soft words about babies and love and home than to follow Skinner's theatrical trip into the world of the tabloid paranormal.

Skinner tried to make some joke, asked me when Monster Boy was going to get back to work. I think it was a joke. Then he started crying. So I figure this has to be real. My psyche wouldn't dare come up with a thing like that. Skinner would fucking kill me.

Scully's here now. Something about ultrasound and I can't tell if she's laughing or crying. If I could just touch her, talk to her, see her.

Anyway, I think the gist of it's pretty clear.

I may not actually be dead.

I wonder if I'm sane?

Sleep tight, folks!