In The White Place

It’s snowing, and the forecast is for a foot or more accumulation. Like with any apocalyptic storm predicted, we stocked up on food, water, toilet paper, and even kitty litter. Why take a chance? Now the only thing left to do is entertain ourselves.

Barney’s idea of entertainment is sitting in the recliner napping or watching marathons of any show he stumbles upon while he channel surfs. This is all he does regardless of the weather. I need to take a walk for my sanity, so I put on my thermal underwear, pull on my boots, and grab my coat, hat, gloves, and scarf out of the hall closet.

“Going out to take a short walk,” I say to Barney.

“You see it’s snowing, right?”

“Yeah, but it isn’t hard, and I need some fresh air.”

“You are bat shit crazy.”

“If I sit here any longer, I’ll go stir crazy.”

“Don’t expect me to come haul your ass out of a snowbank.”

“I’d never expect that.” I walk out the door and slam it shut behind me.

I head down the street towards the woods at the end. What did I ever see in Barney? We’re just too different. I can’t remember any redeeming qualities he had. I bet if I didn’t return, he wouldn’t even notice until he remembers it is time to eat.

The snow is pretty. The gigantic pine trees are covered in white and stand majestically as stewards of the woods beyond them. I follow the trail that’s been forged over the years by people cutting through to get into town. I’m going to stop at the coffee shop. It’s warm and cozy and they have books to read.

There aren’t many people in the shop. Most people are smart and stay home. I order a mint mocha latte with whipped cream and a chocolate brownie. After picking up my order, I head to one of the overstuffed armchairs. Taking off my winter gear, I make myself comfortable. This weird feeling of someone staring at me makes me look around. There is a guy sitting at a table wearing a heavy parka with the furry hood up, staring at me. His face is hidden except for his piercing blue eyes. He’s giving off a creepy vibe, so I hope he doesn’t stay long. Adverting my eyes, I pick up a book sitting on the table by the chair. It’s a cheesy romance book, and I couldn’t be happier.

I’ve read the same paragraph six times. This is ridiculous. I can’t shake the feeling of his eyes boring into me. Maybe I should leave and get back home before the sun sets. To my relief, the guy gets up and heads towards the door, but he stops before he opens it and turns to stare at me.

“You can never get home,” he says before he leaves.

Was he talking to me? I look around the shop and no one else is looking up from their books or laptops. What did they put in this latte? I’m imaging creepy guys talking to me. I turn to ask the woman who’s sitting near me if she heard what he said.

“Excuse me, did you understand what that man said before he walked out?”

“What man?”

“The guy in the heavy parka that was sitting by the window.”

“I didn’t see anyone there, and I’ve been here for two hours.”

“You have?” I ask.

“No one has come in here since you walked in the door. Are you okay?”

“I, um, yeah, I’m fine. Sorry to bother you.” Maybe I dozed off in the chair and had some weird ass dream, but I believe there was a man, and he spoke to me.

The woman has gone back to typing on her laptop. I try to read my book again, but I can’t shake the image of the man staring at me. It’s time to get out of here. I put on my coat, hat and gloves and leave the coffee shop. Looking up and down the street, I’m hoping the guy isn’t outside, but I don’t see anyone.

My phone rings, startling me. I grab it out of my coat pocket and see Barney’s name.

“What?” I ask.

“Where the hell are you?”

“I told you I was taking a walk.”

“For three hours?”

“It hasn’t been three hours.” I glance at my watch and realize three hours have indeed gone by.

“Get your ass home. I want dinner.” Barney hangs up.

“Fuck you, Barney,” I say to no one.

I don’t understand how three hours have passed. It took me twenty minutes to walk to the shop and I couldn’t have sat there for more than a half hour. First, I imagine a guy talking to me and now I’ve lost a couple of hours? Maybe I am bat shit crazy.

The snow is coming down fast and furious, and the wind is blowing hard. The snow hurts my face and I cannot keep my head up, and the wind makes it hard to walk.

“I said you can never get home.” The man’s voice makes me jump. Out of nowhere, he is standing right in front of me.

“Who are you?” I ask.

“You can never get home.” He says it again. His blue eyes stare right at me, but something about them seems familiar.

Now I’m freaking out. I have to get away from this guy. When I turn to go back into the coffee shop, the building is now vacant, and there is a “For Lease” sign in the window. What in the hell? I was just there. Maybe I turned the wrong way when I left the shop. I’ll turn around and walk that way and I’ll find it.

The snow is covering my ankle and slowing me down. I take my phone out and push Barney’s number. It rings once and then the computer generated voice says this number is no longer in service. That can’t be right. Pressing it again only gets the same result. I dial my mom’s phone and it, too, is no longer in service. It must be from the snowstorm disrupting the airwaves, I reason. Why else would both of their numbers not go through? I dial 9-1-1.

“9-1-1, what is your emergency?”

“Hi, I seem to be lost out here in the snow and my family’s phones don’t seem to work. I don’t know which way I should walk to get to my house.”

“9-1-1, what is your emergency?”

“Can you hear me? I’m lost in the snowstorm and I need help.”

“9-1-1, what is your emergency?

Fuck! What is going on? I put the phone back in my pocket. The snow is now almost up to my knees. My legs are getting tired from trying to lift one foot at a time out of the drifts, but I keep trying.

I stop for a second and look up at a dark object ahead. It should be a store. This gives me hope, and I trudge on.

As I get nearer to the building, I see people standing in a line. It seems weird, and I wonder why they are there. I finally make it to the back of the line.

“Thank God I’m not the only one out in this bad weather,” I say to the woman standing in front of me. She doesn’t turn to look at me. I’m sure she had to have heard me.

“Hi.” I tap her on the shoulder. She turns around, and I’m startled because it’s the woman from the coffee shop.

“You can never get home,” she says to me and turns back around.

This can’t be happening. What should I do? I get little time to think about it because some is pushing me forward, and I look back to see more people are in the line.

“Hey, why are you guys pushing? We can’t move,” I yell, but they keep pushing until we are moving along. But I’m not lifting my legs at all, and it’s the strangest feeling. I look down, but I can’t see my legs because the snow is up to my waist.

My phone rings and I’m so relieved to hear it. I take it out of my pocket, but I don’t recognize the number.

“Hello?”

“You can never get home.” It’s the man’s voice.

“Who is this? Is this some kind of sick joke?” Panic takes over and I’m frightened.

Suddenly, the line of people stops moving, and I slam into the back of the woman in front of me, and the people behind me slam into me. It makes me drop my phone, and it disappears into the snow. I turn my head to look at the person behind me, and all I see are blue eyes staring at me. Oh God, help me, I have to get out of this line, but the snow is now chest deep. I’m going to die here in the snow. Damn you, Barney. If you hadn’t driven me crazy, I wouldn’t have left the house. It’s all your fault.

Tears roll down my cheeks. The snow is now up to my neck and I’m suffocating as it continues to pile up over my face. I regret I didn’t get to tell my parents I loved them. There was so much more I hoped to do in life, but I put things off. Now it’s too late. The snow has completely covered me.

Then complete silence. There is no wind or snow biting my face. Am I dead? I don’t know, but I’m not afraid anymore. Instead, I feel a sense of calmness. My mind is clear of any thoughts. I like it.

But what is that low beeping noise? I look around, but all I see is white. The beep continues to getting louder. I’m losing my peace. Without warning, I'm hit from behind and propelled into the air, tumbling like an astronaut in space. The man with the blue eyes comes into view and his arms are outstretched like he just shoved me. My arms and legs are flapping around me and I feel panic rising as I near the wall of snow in front of me. I reach out to stop myself, but I can’t and I crash into the white wall and it hurts. God, it hurts everywhere.

“She’s back.” I hear someone say. Who’s back? I look around, but there aren’t any around me.people

“Good work people. Let’s get her closed up,” someone else says. What? Who are they talking about? Why is that beeping noise so close to me now? I see black creeping in to my mind. No, I want the white place back. I don’t want to…

My eyes open up. Everything is blurry, and I blink a few times, but I only see a white ceiling. My head feels like someone is pounding pegs into it. Someone is in the room, I can hear them.

“Where am I?” It doesn’t sound like my voice, and it hurts to talk.

“You’re awake! You are in the hospital. We were worried about you. Let me call Dr. Harp.” A young woman is smiling down at me. Do I know her? Why does she look familiar? She said hospital, is she a nurse? Wait a minute, she is the woman from the bookstore! Why is she here?

The light hurts my eyes, so I close them, trying not to panic.

“Carrie, I’m Dr. Harp. How are you feeling?”

I open my eyes again and a man wearing a white coat is looking at me.

“Like I was hit by a truck,” I say.

The doctor chuckles. “That would make sense, but it was a bus, not a truck. Can you remember anything about what happened?”

My eyes close again while I make sense of what he just said.

“Traffic was bad after work. No one was moving. I was stressed out because I had to pick up Matt and go to Cake and Coffee to choose our wedding cake. I could not get home in time, but I lost my cell phone that morning, so I couldn’t call. Then everything went dark.”

“Your car was hit by a bus. It crossed into your lane and hit you almost head on.”

“I really was hit by a bus. How appropriate.”

Dr. Harp laughs. “I see you have a sense of humor, but you have some injuries. We had to operate on a collapsed lung and your spleen burst open. We removed that. It was touch and go for a moment, but the internal injuries were repaired. You have a broken ankle, a couple of broken ribs, and a concussion too, but I’m confident you will have a complete recovery.”

“What do you mean, it was touch and go?”

“Your heart stopped for a few moments, but we got you back quickly and there weren’t any problems after that.”

“I died?”

“Technically yes, but it was momentarily.”

“Interesting. That might explain my bizarre thoughts of being in a snowstorm. Either that, or I am crazy.”

“I don’t think you’re crazy. No one knows what our minds do during a crisis. Your parents are here, so I’ll send them in now. I’ll be back to check on you later.”

“Thank you, Doctor.”

I close my eyes again and replay what he told me. So I died? The white wasn’t snow, I think it was the place between here and heaven. I wonder if anyone would believe me? I don’t know if I believe me.

“Oh, Carrie, I’m so glad you’re awake,” my mom says. She leans down and kisses my forehead.

“Hey kiddo. About time you woke up,” my dad says.

“What day is it?”

“Do you remember anything before the accident? Dr. Harp said you have a mild concussion, but he didn’t think it would cause any permanent damage. You’ve been in here for five days. The doctors felt it was best to keep you sedated for a few days to let the swelling in your head go down,” Mom says.

“Five days? Where is Barney? Did anyone check on him?” I try to sit up, but the pounding in my head gets worse and everything is spinning.

“Carrie just rest. Barney is fine. We sent Cathy to pack him up and bring him to our house. He has made himself at home. His favorite place to lay is on Dad’s lap.”

“Yeah, that ball of fur thinks it’s funny to pull my newspaper down while I’m trying to read,” Dad says.

“He is a sweet cat, and he makes me laugh at some of his antics. After we come home from the hospital, he’s always waiting at the door.”

“Thanks for caring for him. Uh, Mom, Dad, you’ll probably think I’ve lost my mind, but this seems real. I just having to share it. Maybe it will make sense.”

“What is it, Carrie?” Mom says.

“Did we have a snowstorm?”

“No, it’s August, not likely to snow,” Dad says, chuckling.

“Well, I was taking a walk in a snowstorm. I went to a coffee shop in town. The storm kept getting worse, so I left to walk back home. The snow kept getting deeper, and a man appeared in front of me, telling me I couldn’t get back home, but he wouldn’t tell me what he meant. He frightened me, so I went to open the door to the coffee shop, but it was now vacant. Panicking, I tried to run, but the snow was up to my knees. I came upon some people standing in a line. I asked the person in front of me what was going on. When she turned around, it was a woman that had been in the coffee shop. She told me I couldn’t get home like the guy had. I swear she was the nurse that was here when I woke up.

“My phone didn’t work when I tried to call for help. By now, the snow was up to my neck, and I knew I was going to die buried in the snow. Then everything was peaceful, and all I saw was white. It was beautiful, and I felt calm. That didn’t last very long because I got propelled through the air and I crashed through the snow, and now I’m here.”

“That’s quite a vivid dream you had,” Dad says.

“But was it just a dream? Dr. Harp said my heart stopped during surgery. I was dead. Was I between earth and heaven?”

Mom and dad just look at each other with concern. I know they think I’m losing my mind.

“You took a nasty hit to your head. But I’ve read stories of people who say they died and were revived and they tell similar stories,” Mom says.

“Well, if it was real, it meant I wasn’t done with my time on earth. I had to come back.”

“Carrie,” my fiancé, Matt, says, walking into my room. “You’re awake.” He walks up to the bed and gives me a kiss. “Welcome back, baby. I was so afraid I was going to lose you before we could start our life together.”

I stare at Matt. I now know who the blue eyes belong to.

“Carrie, what’s wrong?” he asks.

“You were the guy telling me I couldn’t get home. I couldn’t see your face, just your eyes.”

“Am I missing something?” Matt asks.

“I don’t think you would believe me if I told you, but you saved my life. I couldn’t get home on my own, so you made it happen.”

“Matt, Carrie was telling us what went through her mind during surgery. I’m sure she’ll fill you in later,” my dad says.

“Well, whatever I did to save you, I’m glad I was there. I wouldn’t have survived without you.”

“I owe you one for life."