Guardian Angel

I ran, turning a corner sharply. I was only two blocks away. I could make it. I started to sprint faster, my body was aching, but I didn't care. It didn't matter. All that mattered was the church, the big, scary looking one with a hearse in front of it, that was now half a block away, where a voice in my head was telling me to go, where it said I'd get answers.

I ran up the steps, managing not to trip, before running through the doors - actually through them. I slowed to a walk, poking my head around the corner, peeking into the room where numerous people were sitting, most of them were crying.

I paused. "Good to know people loved me," I said observantly, walking straight down the middle aisle, slowly, looking at the people I once knew. People who I hated were there, crying like we had been the best of friends. Both of my parents were there, and sitting next to each other, my mother crying into my father's jacket while his arm was around her. I was shocked, they'd barely spoken to each other in the past five years or so; seeing them like that was unusual.

And it was all because of me.

I didn't know whether to be happy or not.

Then I saw my bandmates, sitting together in a pew, but spaced out. They were all crying, but one was crying harder than the rest, his body shaking. I could see that the rest of the band looked like they wanted to comfort him, but they didn't move. Nothing they could say could comfort him. He sat right on the end, leaning on the end of the pew, his face red and eyes puffy from crying, and I reached out and touched him, wanting to comfort him more than anyone else, knowing I'd actually be able to, but my hand just went through the other's head, and I groaned in displeasure, my hand clenching into a fist.

"Dammit!" I yelled, no one hearing him in the silent room. "God fucking dammit! Why the hell am I here?" I asked, wanting to break down in sobs just by watching everyone. I turned to leave, not able to handle it, but a figure stepped between him and the door, grinning. I froze mid-step.

"Hello Frank," the man smirked.

"You haven't aged a day since I last saw you," I said, recognizing the figure, "I thought you were dead."

The man laughed, "I am dead. So are you, Frankie, or did you forget?"

Considering he was dead, he looked oddly human. He didn't look transparent, like how you think of ghosts. He looked almost the exact same as last time I saw him alive. I wondered if I looked like him, or if I looked transparent. I looked down at my hands quickly, before answering him.

"I didn't forget, this is my funeral, after all," I let out a dry laugh, turning to look at the open casket.

"It is. Have you taken a look at yourself?" Adam asked, gesturing to the casket.

I shook my head and took a couple steps forward, until I was in front of the casket. I saw myself, pale white, my tattoos looking incredibly dark and out of place. My eyes were closed and the ends of my mouth were turned up in one of the smallest smiles I'd ever seen, just enough to show I was in a better place, as people say. But was I really? I was wearing a dark jacket with a light shirt under it. In the casket were pictures of my bandmates, and a picture of my parents and I when I was a child, a few guitar pics and a stuffed animal with a guitar. "What do you want, Adam?" I asked finally, turning around and facing the older man.

"I don't want anything. You on the other hand want answers," the man, Adam, said, smirking. "You want to know why you're here, what you're supposed to do, don't you?"

I nodded slowly, watching the man. How did he know what I wanted? 'He might've heard you ask 'Why the hell am I here?' dumbass' "How can you see me?" I asked suddenly, "no one else can see or hear me."

"I'm dead, like you," the man said slowly, like I was stupid, sitting on the edge of a pew, "dead people can see and hear each other. Now, do you want to know why we're both here or can I leave?"

"Yes, tell me," I said.

"Well, as you know, you're dead, but you're nothing but a spirit at the moment. You haven't been accepted into Heaven yet-"

I interrupted, "Then why not send me to Hell?"

The man laughed, "Hell doesn't exist. It's a story to tell people so they be good and behave. Makes life easier on the big guy, although there's still some idiots who don't care if they get sent to Hell, but they still get this opportunity, just like everyone else," he was rambling, delaying the reason I was here. "As I was saying, you haven't been accepted into Heaven yet. You have to go through a test, to show you're worthy of it. It's not an impossible test, but it's in no means easy. Sure, many have passed it, including me, but there's also others who haven't. Doomed to walk the Earth dealing with the guilt. Those are the spirits that haunt people."

"A test? I didn't study." I joked.

The man shot me a look, and I shrunk back. "You can't study for this type of thing."

"I was joking. You never knew how to take a joke, did you Adam?" I said, rolling my eyes.

"I guess you don't want to know what you have to do then. I guess I'll be going. Have fun wandering the Earth alone for the rest of eternity!"

"Wait, no! I want to know! Tell me!" I practically yelled at Adam, who had been my mom's boyfriend for the longest time, and almost became my stepdad before he died of a heart attack. They'd never gotten along, and it looked like even death hasn't changed that. "Please tell me."

Adam looked over to where my mom sat. That's when I realized I couldn't hear anything that wasn't myself or Adam. I couldn't hear the crying, the pastor speaking, or anything. I could only see it.

"You have to comfort the one who misses you most. You have to get him to move on, to be happy, move him out of his depression. You have to show him you're in a better place, and that you'll see him soon." Adam was still looking at my mom. When he first died, he had to comfort her. Watch her be miserable, miss him and almost killed herself. Seeing her now reminded him why he volunteered to be the one to assist Frank. When I died a few days ago, she prayed to Adam, asking him to take care of her baby boy. Even though she couldn't hear him, he promised.

Even in death he still loved her.

"How can I do that?" I asked, "I can't touch anyone! They can't hear me or see me!" To make a point, I walked over to a person - my distant cousin - and started hitting him repeatedly, my hands only going through.

"You'll be able to interact on some level with him. Have you ever watched a horror movie with ghosts and stuff moves, crashes, breaks, and people think they hear voices? It's like that. You just have to figure out how to do that on your own, since I'm not allowed to help you with that, but I can tell you it takes focus."

"Okay..." I said, unsure of how to make of this. This wasn't how I pictured death. I pictured that you die and are automatically in heaven. Nothing else. "We're talking about the same 'he', just to clear some of this up."

"Yes we are."

"Okay, and how will I know when I've comforted him enough?"

Adam looked at I, locking eyes with him. "The world will melt around you. You'll see everything bad that's ever happened to you pass before your eyes, to disappear forever. Then you'll blackout and wake up at the Pearly Gates in front of the big guy to get your angel wings."

I thought for a moment, taking it all in. "What if...And I'm throwing this out there, that I don't want to comfort him? I want to be by him everyday until he dies?" I asked, reaching a hand out to touch the man.

Adam chuckled, "Then when he dies, you won't ever see him again. You'll be doomed to wander the Earth, and if he passes his test, he'll go up to Heaven. You won't see each other for the rest of eternity." Adam watched as my face fell. He took a step forward, resting a hand on my shoulder comfortingly. "Frank, when you pass this, and I do mean when since I know you can pass it, you can come down and see him. You'll still be able to whisper to him, and scare the shit out of him, as long as you don't send him into depression or insanity, in which case you'd have to do the test all over again. You won't have to give up seeing him everyday until he dies."

"How do you know?" I asked quietly. This was the most fatherly Adam has ever been to me, and it was strange, yet comforting.

Adam smiled slightly, "I know because I've been with your mother ever since the day I died. I worried about the same things you are right now - if I'd see her again before she died. When I asked my mentor, or angel, whatever you want to call it, about it he told me the same thing I'm telling you." Adam paused, looking me in the eyes. "When your mom said she could hear my voice and you thought she was crazy, she wasn't lying. I was talking to her. I miss her so much, I, I wouldn't be able to give up seeing her forever."

"Wait, I have a question."

"Maybe I have an answer," Adam answered.

"Okay, I've been dead for three or four days, why are you only coming to me now?" I asked, pushing my hair out of my eyes. "I could've spent those days trying to comfort him, but instead they were wasted wandering around without a purpose."

During the days right after I died, I'd found myself in a hospital. All there was, was a body covered in sheets, which I knew was me right away. There was no one else, then a few nurses came in, put my body on a stretcher, and wheeled me away. That's when I knew I was really dead.

After that, I wandered around, going between the cemetery and the hospital, not sure where to go, really. I couldn't remember much, like my memories had been erased, but slowly they came back. The bad ones came first, and fast. Then they progressed into better memories.

That's when I heard the voice that told me to come here. Come to think of it, it sounded like Adam's voice.

"I don't have an answer for that, sorry. I don't even know. The same thing happened to me. And everyone else I've ever helped."

There was a silence as I tried to think of another question, one that I could get a straight answer from and not any of the 'I can't help you - that's cheating' bullshit.

Adam looked up at the ceiling, then back at me, grinning. "I have to go I. I'll be around and help you when I can. You can do this Frankie, I know you can." Adam offered a smile, before disappearing into thin air.

"I wonder if I can do that," I said to myself, turning around to face the crying man who was curled up in a ball, trying to stop himself from sobbing. I noticed everyone else was standing, their words mouthing words in a form of unison, so they must've been singing. Everyone but my love, the man who brightened my world. The man I married years ago secretly, no one knowing but our friends and family.

The people sat back down after the song ended, and I could only tell by sight, since I still couldn't hear them. "I wonder if I'll ever be able to hear them," I asked myself, turning to face the front of the church. A man, who must've been the pastor, said a few words before my dad nudged my mother off of him and stood up, three of my bandmates - except my husband - getting up also. My husband stayed in his seat for a moment before Ray lifted him up, whispering something to him. My husband nodded, walking in front of Ray. One of my cousins went up, also, taking the last spot before they started wheeling the closed casket down the aisle. I stepped aside, even though it was unneeded. The six people wheeled it out, their faces tear stained, especially one man's.

Everyone else started to rise, pew by pew and follow them out. I followed the casket out of the church, leaving everyone else behind. When the casket was put in the hearse, the door shut, Ray put an arm around my husband, reassuring him and being support for the man who looked like he'd collapse on his own.

"I can do this," I said quietly, stepping forward and reaching out and focusing on my hand, thinking of times when I hurt my hand, and it throbbed and I knew it was solid then and wished it wasn't. I wanted to have him know I was there for him by a touch, even just lightly, as I laid a hand on him, my hand actually stopping for a second before it went through the sobbing man. "I'm here for you, Mikey. I'll never leave you. I love you more than anything."