Finally one day I tried to open my eyes.  It was hard at first and I struggled to even think about trying to lift my eyelids.  My body wanted to stay were it was in the state that it was in, but I knew that I would have to try, if only to see whether or not my eyes were actually closed.  At last I managed to open my eyes, which was such a struggle because they were so heavy from the sleep that I had been in.  The first thing that I saw was the sky, it was blue and there were fluffy white clouds floating around in a lazy manner, and then I noticed the treetops.  That was when I realized that I was laying in a bed in the middle of the forest.  There was the faint sound of birds calling to each other, animals scurrying around in the under brush.  The sun shone down through the trees and started to warm my face.

I forced myself to sit up and look around.  The last thing that I remembered was laying on the ground with my hand clutched to my throat because I had been cut, on impulse I put my hand where the scar from the cut should be, but there was nothing.  The skin was smooth and even, as if nothing had ever happened to it.  Also there was no stubbly on my face, which I would have expected if I had been asleep for days.  The sheets were clean, smooth, and bright white not at all rumpled like they should have been from sleep, and ho they had managed to stay white after having been on a bed in the middle of the forest for days was beyond me.  Out of nowhere a fox jumped up on to my bed.  It sat at the foot just looking at me with its big brown eyes, with its head slightly titled.  But it did not move aggressively in any way, it just sat there as if trying to decide why I was there.

“She likes you,” a voice came from the shadows.  It was male sounding but peaceful and did not cause me alarm.

“What is her name,” I asked.

“Rabbit,” the voice chuckled and then a tall man who looked to be in his late twenties came out into the light.  “And I am Icheb.”

“Wesley Wyndam-Pryce,” I held my hand out to him.  “But you already knew that didn’t you?”

The man nodded.  He was dressed in a white semi-rob thing and for some reason, even though compared to me he looked young, it seemed like he knew everything, like he had all the answers in the world right there at his fingertips.  “Come with me,” he turned around and started to walk away from me.

“Sorry Rabbit,” I told the fox.  “Have to keep up with the man who has the answers around here.”  Rabbit hopped off the bed, gave me another look, and then started to follow Icheb.

Everything that was happening was so unreal.  At first I could not understand any of it, I am how could I possibly be in the middle of the forest after having been cut across the throat, in a bed that had no dirt on it even though the sheets were white, talking to a man dressed kind of like a monk, and a fox, it just didn’t seem possible.  Then it clicked, although I am not sure why it took so long for it to click, I was dead.  I had died and now I was in heaven.  That was when I really started to look around me, this was not the heaven that I had heard about from my mother or minister, and this place was so different.  There were no people that I knew waiting here for me, ready to greet me and welcome me into the next stage of existence.  Not one was flying around with halos on top of there heads, in fact there only person that was around seemed to be Icheb, there were no other people at all.

I swung my feet over the bed and looked down.  “No shoes,” I muttered.  “Of course not, because if I am dead why would I worry about my feet getting hurt.”  I looked up head at Icheb.  His robes were long but I could still clearly see that he didn’t have shoes on either.  I ran to check up with him and was about to ask him a question when I saw that we had come onto a meadow.

Butterflies skipped on top of the blades of grass that were moving back and forth like an ocean.  There were some people scattered around, some where sitting down talk to each other, others were chasing after the butterflies, but no one seemed to be worried about everything, they had a strange calmness to them, and I didn’t recognize any of them.  “Where am I,” I finally managed to say in a half whisper.

Icheb looked at me with his smile still plastered across his face.  “This is Stage One,” he gestured to the grounds around him.  “Well that is the official name anyway.  It is also called The Transitional and The Decision Phase.”

“Decision Phase?” I titled my head at him and jumped a little when Rabbit rubbed against my leg.

“She likes you,” he laughed.  “Rabbit will be your guide through Stage One, she picked you, consider yourself lucky.”

“An animal?  My guide,” I looked from Rabbit to Icheb with uncertainty.  “How am I supposed to talk to her?”

“Like you would to any other person,” a voice popped into my head.  “Hi, I’m Rabbit.”

I jumped back.  There was a fox talking to me, in my head!  Extreme blood loss, yes that must be it, of course there was a fox named Rabbit talking to me, because there was not enough blood going to my brain.  I laughed.  “Of course you are,” I tried to calm myself.  “Because it just makes so much sense that in the afterlife you have a talking animal to guide you around.”

“Technically,” Icheb spook with a something that sounded like hesitation in his voice. “You aren’t in the afterlife.”

“What do you mean?”

“I think I’ll let you handle that one Rabbit,” Icheb looked around at what I could clearly see was nothing.  “Someone else is waking up.”

“Thanks so much,” Rabbit’s voice popped into my head.  Then she looked up at me.  “Well sit down so I can at least make eye contact, this hurts my neck.”

I lowered my body to the ground keeping my eyes on the fox.  Her brown eyes now showed some wisdom that she had kept hidden from me before.  “What is this place,” I crossed my legs and propped my head up on my hands.

“This is Stage One,” Rabbit restated from early.  “It is not heaven, it is not hell, and it just is.  A lot of people come here, to this section of Stage One.”

“Section,” I gave her a quizzical look.

“Stage One is divided into several sections,” she continued in a voice that reminded me of someone, soft and gentle but at the same time analytical because she was rattling off facts.  “This is Stage One: Section Decision, which is why it is also called the Decision Phase.”

“Why,” I felt like a child asking the most simple basic questions, but my mind was spinning from everything that was going on, I just could not really grasp that it any of this was actually happening.

“It is very simple actually,” Rabbit sat on her hunches for a moment and then gave up and decided to lie down.  “People who are here are not dead yet.  Most of you are lying in a coma or have some type of brain damage.  Something that can be cured but not necessary will be.”

“So you are saying,” I stuttered.  “You are saying that I am not dead yet?”

“Exactly,” she nodded her head to show that she was being strewn with me but instead it made me want to laugh at her.  A fox being stern with a human, a half alive human of all things, it was just too crazy.

“So I get to decide where I want to live or die?” I sat back a little.  Anyone, anyone else would be happy if they heard something like that, anyone but me.  I didn’t want to go back, I didn’t want to have to face the people that I had caused so much pain.  The only person that was worth seeing again, Fred, well she probably couldn’t stand to look at me because of my failure.  I let her down.  I let them all down.  How could even think about going back when they would all never look at me the same way?  “No,” I shook my head.  “I don’t want to go back.”

“It is good that you have a decision in mind,” Rabbit sat up again.  “But that does not matter.”

“What do you mean,” I sputtered out.  “Isn’t my decision to make?”

“No,” she shook her head.  “It’s not.  The council will make the decision, but you want, will be taken into account.  However, before you go to the council you will spend some time here and you get to see how you’re near passing has affected the people close to you.”

I felt my body start to shake.  “I don’t,” my lips trembled.  “I don’t want to see.  I know what they don’t want me back, I don’t want to confirm that.”

“You don’t have a choice,” the fox stood up.  “Enjoy your time here.  Talk to people.  I will be back later to check on you.”  She walked out into the meadow and it looked like she had started to talk to someone else.

I just sat there.  I watched her go trying to remember who she reminded me of, it was Fred.  It was always Fred.  I loved her with all my heart, but she did not feel the same way.  Now, now I was going to be forced to see that, it seemed so cruel and unnecessary.  I would rather do anything else than see that but as Rabbit said I didn’t have a choice, I was going to see again, and again my heart would break.