When I Got to Heaven
I was released in a rush of sensation.
Pain, of course. Intense, incredible pain. An agony that truly can only be experienced once, a pain that numbs you after. I fell. My body hit the ground, but I did not. I stayed perfectly still, dangling like a fish from God’s fishook. No movement, no sound, no sensation–for an instant, I was a statue in the gallery of the universe.
Then God began to reel me in. And I rose.
There was light. All around me, like a funnel, expanding, opening, filling all of Creation. I felt my arms, and I raised them to the portal above my mind, groping desperately, anxiously. I needed to feel it. I needed to feel anything. Desperation flooded me, and fear and greed and lust and need and I needed. The world of light crashed down upon me, and my fingers touched the face of all that is.
His skin was as soft as tissue paper, and split to my touch. My fingers wormed their way into his skull like ravenous maggots. Deeper, deeper, deeper, deeper, I needed. Harder, harder, harder, harder, I needed. Inside. I had to be inside. I embraced Him, his bleeding skull and tangled hairs, sewn from the strings of dead stars. His breath was the inky smoke of nubulae, and it billowed around me like mist. His face collapsed like a paper mache sculpture drenched in blood, sticking to me, wrapping around me like a funeral veil.
I stood upon the stair, carved from God’s bones. In my hands, a saw, a chisel. Blood dripped from both. I stared into the ever expanding sky, saw the stair rose into oblivion. I took a step. And another. And another. And another. And with every step, I heard silence. No chorus. No songs. No angels.
I took another step. I knew it would be better up high. I knew I could make it, up high. I walked with a purpose, skipping stairs now, taking them two at a time. I felt no weariness–the lungs that had once ached with pain, caked with filth and tar, they were rotting an eternity beneath my feet. I could breathe endlessly, and yet I didn’t need to.
Higher. Higher. My hands were shaking. My throat was dry. My eyes watered.
Higher. Higher. The world was so vast. Bombs exploded in the brilliant cosmos. Radiation blanketed the world, and the people gasped and choked.
Higher. Higher. Fire fell around me, igniting the world’s gasses. Buildings were furnaces. Bodies were candles. Souls were kindling. And they all burned.
Higher. Higher. The Earth was far away. Near me, a star exploded, and destroyed a galaxy.
Higher. Higher. There was only mist now. The universe had ended long ago, and now there was nothing but possibility.
Higher. The possibilities are endless.
Higher. I have discovered the impossible.
Higher.
And now the gate. Just like I imagined it. And the latch. Just like it should be. I pushed the doors open. I took a step over the threshold. The clouds. The waterfalls of luminosity cascading from cliffs of imagination. The sky is indescribable–like a mosaic of all that was and all that every will be. I smiled. Everything is in its right place.
Hello?
Hello?
Is anyone there? I’m here! I’ve arrived! I did everything right. I lived my life, I followed the rules. I want my reward. I want to see my dead family. My dead heroes. I want to see them. I want to talk to them. Where is God? Where is the Messiah? Where are they? Where are you? Where is anyone? Where is everyone?
Hello? Can you hear me? Maybe they’re hiding. Hello? Is there someone there? No…just a shadow on a cloud. Hello?
There’s…there’s no one here. I’m all alone. I…I got to Heaven. I saw God. I received salvation.
So where is everyone? Where is anyone?
I…
I’m the only one.
I got in. I got to Heaven.
But when I got to Heaven, everyone was gone.
And I was all alone.
