Orchard of Osiris

It feels like I’ve been waiting my whole life for this moment. 

I’m standing on a hill at the most majestic apple orchard you’ve ever seen. The trees rise so high and it seems like there are thousands of them, all in perfect green rows. I haven’t done this since I was a little boy, and twenty some year later it feels very different. Almost important. 

Who could have guessed something this simple could be so divine?

Jess is here with me. She has never looked more beautiful or at peace. The light bouncing through her brown curls makes her look positively angelic. She bounces through the orchard in her favorite cowboy boots, the ones with the embroidered rose stitched into the well worn brown leather. Her purple plaid shirt and designer jeans pop in a sea of autumnal colors, even if it gives her away as a city girl.

I hang back a little just to watch her. She has a method to her picking. She never takes the perfectly round apple. Those are for everyone else she says. Her basket is filled with wonky apples that are just a little oblong on one side or the other. A menagerie of imperfection. I sometimes wonder if that’s why she picked me. Does she see me as the apple that no one else would want? 

I guess it doesn’t matter because I can feel her love through to my core. 

She sees me watching her, and with hands on her hips flashes that megawatt smile that she’s famous for. My basket is empty, so I better catch up!

Off to my left, a tree catches my eye. In the middle of its trunk it seems to have an intricate carving. I move closer to inspect. It’s a large circle with many smaller overlapping circles inside. The pattern is mesmerizing. There are triangles and flower patterns and eyeballs. I can’t look away. I put my fingers over the indentation and the marks are so precise. This wasn’t done with a knife or a branding iron. This is something else. Something special.

I look up at the apples and they’re all pink and plump, like the kind they use for gourmet caramel apples. I want to take them all, but they’re just out of reach. As I try to pluck a big fat one, I slide on the mulch and feel a dull thud to my right. 

I look at the ground and see something extraordinary.

It’s a light blue apple pulsing with a soft glow. It’s so clear, it almost looks like it’s made of crystal. It sits on a crater in the mulch and beckons me to pick it up. It’s surprisingly heavy and almost cold. On the bottom it sparkles with tiny flecks of gold. The spot where it landed reveals a glittery gold paste beneath the mulch that has the consistency of mud. I stick my fingers in it and it’s gritty warm and wonderful. I have the urge to taste it, but I don’t push my luck. 

Jess is a few trees away, and completely oblivious to what I’m doing. She just keeps picking and picking, humming a harmonic tune to herself. I can’t wait to show her what I’ve discovered. I look up to see if there are any more, but the tree is now bare. No apples of any kind. The circular pattern on the trunk pulses a soft white light with the same cadence as the glowing blue apple.

Then I feel a large hand on my shoulder, almost like a paw. 

“Hello, Nick,” says a booming voice behind me.

I turn around a see an older man about 6’8” tall. He has long hair in a crude pony tail, a frizzy salt and pepper grey. His eyes are set wide and immediately grab your attention. He has the leathery tan of an outdoorsman and the crackling skin of a 30-year smoker. He’s wearing a Navajo coverall, tattered jeans, and some unlaced worker boots. Despite his appearance, he smells like honey. I have never seen anyone quite like this before.

“Hello,” is all I manage to get out, despite a flood of questions in my mind.

“Are you enjoying yourself?” he asks with a smile.

“Yes! I just saw the most incredible…” 

He cuts me off. “I know. But you have to go.”

“Why? What did I do?” I ask.

“It’s not your time. You have more work to do,” he says tilting his head to the right.

“Work? What work?” 

“Nick. It’s not your time. You have more work to do,” he repeats slower so it sinks in.

“Nick, it’s not your time.” It’s Jess. She suddenly appears at his side in a white sundress. There are no apples and she casually twirls a yellow lily with her right hand. “You have to go back.”

“Back? Back where?” 

Jess smiles and nods to a tree behind us, but it’s consumed by a brilliant white light. “We will see you again, but you have to go back now.”

As the word “now” leaves her lips, the large man and gently rests his hand on my chest.

I’m immediately sucked into complete darkness and feel like I’m moving at the speed of light. Then I’m falling through a tunnel of emptiness occasionally illuminated by streaks of violet or blue light.

Boom! In one giant crescendo I fall back into my body.

And I hurt. Badly.

It’s night time. I’m slumped over the steering wheel of my mangled SUV and can’t move. A cold winter rain softly spatters against the fractured wind shield and a fireman’s blue flashlight pulses through the raindrops. I can hear the chaos of a live rescue operation, and it appears I’m the star attraction.

I’ve just been in a devastating car accident. It seems I’m going to survive, even if these paramedics don’t realize it yet.

I’m alone. Jess is not with me. She’s been dead for many years, of course, which should have been a sure sign that something was wrong. It’s weird though. When I saw her I forgot everything. It was like we were always together and always will be together. Connected some how. There was no time or space, just us. 

And I want to go back more than anything. That is reality. I don’t know what this is.

In that place there is no pain. No stress. Just love. Unconditional love.

But they said I have work to do. I don’t know what that is, but I must do it.

And no matter when my time comes I have no fear. 

Until then, Jess.