Restitution

I look to the sand-clock tensely. It's almost half empty.

Think halfway full, Bernice.

I mentally smack my palm against my forehead in silent chastisement. I can’t be a walking box of pessimism while attempting to combat pessimism itself. I’ll never win that way.

A darker thought still challenges the optimistic counsel, and I scoff aloud. Who is to say that I'm combating pessimism anyway? That's awfully right-thinking of me. I also can't afford to be totally rid of my despair, not when I'm not yet entirely sure if life itself is not, indeed, the trap.

I take a step forward, and, without pause, the two ghouls mirror the movement. The green drool trickling down the corners of their lips sizzles and evaporates as soon as it touches the ground, and an icy chill wraps around me like a fist.

I look to one and then the other, trying to decide. The air is death-still, the only sound to be heard being the soft sifting of sand through the compressed tube of the clock. The sound of my time slipping away, my life ebbing.

“Come on, come on now, dear one. Would you not like to see my jewels up close?” the one to my right coos endearingly.

I turn and focus my gaze on it, my brows scrunched in full concentration. It is tall and spindly, teetering on its feet like it's struggling to maintain its balance, whereas the other one is plump and stocky—firmly rooted to the ground. There are thick layers of gold adorning its neck and a slew of precious stones affixed to multiple piercings on its vomit-green skin.

Flashy and alluring. Could that be life?

"Not all that glitters is gold, my child," the plump ghoul calls out in gentle reproach like it can read my shameless attraction to spindly's superficialities off me. "Life is rich in spirit, boisterous like me, and quite ordinary in its most basic form," it goes on. "Is it not true that many a man have met their deaths in the earnest pursuit of that which now consumes your fancy?"

Ouch. That’s a pretty convincing pitch, Bernice.

I sigh wistfully and swivel my head, so I'm looking at plump. It is stuffed almost to bursting limit. Puffy cheeks, bulging forehead, pudgy nose; everywhere I look, there is a drooping mass of glistening skin encasing flesh. It has on no fanciful jewels to draw attention, but it is not particularly plain-looking either. A soft glow emanates from it, kind of like the fading whiteness of dying eyes. It's like a pulsing cloak wrapped around the ugly figure, and it entreats me to draw closer, just a few steps further.

In the pitch blackness that surrounds us, plump stands out like a beacon of hope. It takes all of my fast-waning strength to keep from running into its outstretched hands to have them shield me from the chill that's seeping into my chest and forming a vice around my heart.

My whole body is screaming out to me to make the choice that is so clearly right, but I hold back still. This is the Nether Bridge, the divide between the domains of life and death, the few heartbeats between both where restitution is still possible. Right isn’t supposed to be won without a darn good fight.

Two weeks ago, Tim Mayfield of Maple Street, two streets yonder from mine, attained restitution. He was the very first one, and now will probably be the only, I would ever encounter in my lifetime. It had always been a jolly good tale for the kids’ Halloween bonfire, the myth of an ethereal dimension—an in-between—that confronts a dying person in his transition from the realm of life to the place where there are no mornings or nights, dreams or loves. Just unbreakable silence and stifling darkness. What an exciting tale it had been, up until dear old Tim died and came back a few minutes later professing it to be no more a myth than the fact that he is a dwarf.

Restitution was as real as air, as was the Nether Bridge. He carried on preaching this gospel to as many as cared to listen, telling that the trick to winning right was to love life. To truly want to have it. Well, no wonder it's proving to be quite the exhausting task for me. I am not yet even clearly decided on what is 'right,' how then can I hope to decipher which is life?

I picture myself stretched out on the hospital bed with the warm sheets, in the room with the cuddly pink walls, my heart itching to be done with the final lap of its life-long countdown already, and I sigh.

Is it right for me to want more life when I have done next to nothing with the twenty years of it that I have already had?

Well, that’s not exactly accurate. I have done quite a number of things. Just not anything particularly good or praiseworthy, nothing deserving of restitution.

But you’ve been offered it anyway, idiot. Focus!

I try, but the dour thoughts are persistent.

I have done things like sleep with my best friend's boyfriend just to prove the point that I am the world's best example of a dick, burn my mother's priceless collection of tarot cards because she made an offhanded joke about my being fat, and drive while obviously drunk because I had a fleeting thought about painful suicide and it sounded adventurous. Well, I am the world's best example of a dick and here is where my adventure has led me to. Now, why should I be given any more opportunity for any more terribly impulsive adventures? Why should I have more life?

The rising shiver in my bones is the immediate reply.

Death is cold and unflinching, the literal end. Life too is cold (or at least, has only ever been so to me), but it has one significant advantage that the former lacks. It is flexible. There is always the possibility of sunshine in it. My peripatetic spirit recoils at the thought of spending more time in this valley where nothing grows, so I look back to the two reapers with my choice set on life.

I turn my gaze from one silently beckoning eye to the other.

Which is life, Bernice?

I place one shaky foot forward, a little more in plump's direction, and it bares yellowed teeth. It is evident that it would snatch me and be off in a blink if my inherent freewill did not have its limbs wound up in invisible bounds.

Which is life, Bernice?

I throw a glance at spindly. Its spiny frame is quaking almost imperceptibly like it is also struggling against the realm’s harsh climate, and it has on a mightily bored expression. It doesn’t call out to me or make further moves to entice me with its finery. It seems to have already resigned itself to its loss.

I feel my pulse slow to the pitch of the beep before the flatline on a hospital monitor, and panic seizes me.

I’ve got two more heartbeats.

I blink twice in rapid succession, and my eyes dart from one ghoul to the other. Squeezing them shut, I swing around and make a giant leap for the bejewelled one. I feel its warm claws latch onto my wrist and together, we hop into the waiting whirlwind, leaving behind the enraged curses of the one stuffed full of the flesh of those who chose wrong.