A Choice Wish

It was hot out again. In fact, it was the hottest day of the year. 101°F with the heat index putting it at 110. The weatherman on the television had said to expect the next three days to be “not much better” before the heat broke back down to a temperature that would not offend God himself.

Well, that last part wasn't the weatherman’s exact words, but that was how Sean translated it.

The weatherman went on to advise that anyone working outdoors have a consistent source of water and their sunscreen at the ready, or wear long sleeves to defend against the sun.

That was one thing Sean could never understand: wearing long sleeves on a hot day in the sun. He would sooner roll the dice with melanoma than wear a long sleeve shirt on a day like today. Especially if he was working outside all day.

Sean would not be working all day, inside or out, today. An hour ago, the company he worked at for eight loyal years let him go for “budgetary reasons”. He had worked his corporate job long enough to find everything about it to be bullshit, but also to wear a groove so deep in his life that it was simply just comfortable to stay. He had also been working there long enough to know that “budgetary reasons” really meant that they wanted to hire someone younger and dumber to do his job for a fraction of the salary. Hadn’t it just happened to Ol’ Bob three months ago? Ol’ Bob who worked there for as long as the offices were open?

Sean shook his head. No use thinking about it now. He walked on.

After his team leader offered her condolences--which were as empty as his workdesk was now--he drove to the park right by his favorite bakery. Once a week, he’d stop by Debbie’s Donuts and as he drove past, he would wish he had time to explore the trails. And when he had free time? He would forget the park was there, of course; mind jumping to a relaxing day at home playing video games or watching cooking shows (his one guilty pleasure).

Today, however, the park was on the forefront of his mind. He was in a weird place. Almost a daze. But not a daze. Walking sounded like a great way to clear his head. So he came to the park.

The hot air so humid it felt like breathing in soup. Pine and cedar saturating each lungful. Just walking from the car to the trail map board had sweat already starting to bead on Sean’s forehead. Now he was over half an hour into this walk and his shirt was getting darker and darker. Walking the trails seemed to help clear his mind, though.

He was maybe about halfway through the loop of the longest trail he found on the map before he felt he needed a breather. He looked for a shady spot and conveniently found one with a flat stump of a tree the park must have had cut down.

As he sat he began to hear a hum or a buzz of sorts. At first he thought he took too long before taking a rest and the heat went to his head. The sound persisted, however, even after he determined he was fine enough to keep going.

It was only after recouping his strength that he realized it was coming from not far behind him. He walked toward the sound and it became less of a buzz and more of an ambient vibration, like someone channeling binaural beats through speakers implanted in the trees.

He walked twenty or so feet into the woods. Which was when he noticed the oddest object.

It looked like a golden box, hexagonal in shape, with some swirly triangles embossed into the surface. When he picked it up, he realized the gold was a plating or a very realistic paint. The box itself felt as light as if it were made of cardboard.

He guessed it must be just that. Cardboard with gold paint.

The box seemed to have no way of opening. As if every seam was machined perfectly so as not to show. No one would put this much effort into a cardboard box.

Curiosity gnawed at Sean. He wanted to know if there was anything inside. But the angel on his shoulder reminded him that the box was not his and that he ought to just put it right back and move on.

Partly from the heat and partly because he knew that goddamn angel had a point, he let out a puff of air that could have been a sigh, it could have been a breath that grasped for reprieve from the humidity.

Either way, the air from his lungs hit the golden box dead on and the swirly triangles glowed the faintest shade of green.

The box unfolded itself until it was one hexagonal base on one side and the other hexagon at the end of rectangles that had made the sides. In the center of one base was a leaf of paper.

Sean unfolded it and read:

If you’re reading this, you figured out how to open the casket. I left it as a geo-cache prize for anyone wandering off the beaten path. I can’t tell you what this object may do for you, if anything, but I can say that there is more to it than being able to hold this note I’ve left for you. What you do with it now is obviously up to you. But I should suggest that you wait until you see whatever it needs to show you before making your decision.

C.K.

“--whatever it needs to show you--” Sean re-read aloud. “What could--”

When he looked at the open box again, the opposite base seemed to be glowing that faint green from what looked like a mirror set into the center of the shape.

He held it up to look into the glass and--

A cake alight with eight candles sat on a table with two adults across from him. There were no other people.

The woman looked tired and pale. She had no eyebrows and she wore a winter hat with pig-tail braids along the side. Which was out of place for the late-May weather. And she was…skinny. Not thin. Skinny,

The man looked tired in a different way. Stretched thin in a sense. But otherwise in good spirits and health.

“Make a wish,” said the woman. “But don’t say what it is or it won’t come true.”

The man said nothing. Just stood there smiling what could only be called a “dad smile”.

Sean knew that wishes don’t come true. He’d made wishes upon candles before. But all the same, he paused, thought of a wish, held his breath until he felt that wish deep in his heart start to burn, and blew out the candles.

The scene was gone.

Now he was laying in a field at night time. He looked over to the girl laying next to him.

“Sometimes I wonder if there’s anything to life but what we see adults do,” she said. “They get up, make sure their children are ready for the day and then they’re out the door for work only to do it all over again tomorrow. Is that all we’re going to do when we’re that age?”

He wasn’t sure what to say. He had only ever thought about enjoying being a kid; and then a teenager. Of course he had thought about the future and what he might like to do as a grownup. But beyond what job he thought he would be most happy at (an archaeologist), he never gave adulthood much thought.

“Look!” she said, pointing straight to the night sky above them. “A shooting star! Make a wish.” she insisted.

He tried to think of a wish and nothing came. He thought of other wishes he had made. None of them seemed right. None of them had ever come true.

He looked at her once more and a wish came to him. He silently cast it into the listening universe.

The vision faded.

The present faded back in. Now it was just the box…and him. In the forest again. In the forest still.

Sean looked at the box. The casket. It was still unfolded in its unique way. Everything glowed now. Not just the casket, but everything he could see as he looked around.

There was a tiny whisper in the back of his mind to make a wish, And he knew if he made a wish it would come true. He had made many wishes in his life. None of them came true. Especially the ones he thought he needed. But he knew…knew if he made a wish now. It would come true.

As he looked around at everything glowing--the box, the trees, the flowers, that squirrel--he had a clarity that he had never known before. A feeling coursed through him. Not a surge, like the stories say. More as a slow ebb and flow, like standing at the edge of a lake with the tide coming in. In that clarity, he understood the universe. Or rather, that was how it felt to him.

He looked at the casket and again knew whatever he wished would actually come true.

But all those wishes he made before were selfish. When he thought about them, even the good ones, they were made from a position of wanting for himself.

Just then, a thought floated to the surface: any wish he made now would be the same. No matter how selfless or altruistic his wish, no matter how much he knew others would stand to benefit from it, it would still be his wish. His imposition on reality.

He never believed in wishes anyway. Maybe he would just pretend he did and when nothing happened, he could simply say “that’s just how it goes.”

Weeks went by. Sean moved back to his home town. Without that soulless corporate job, he didn’t need to stay in his old town.

The day was gray, but pleasant. The heat here was much more tolerable and the humidity didn’t leave him questioning life decisions.

He stopped by the graveyard and sat by a headstone with the name Rosalind Elkner. He told her about all the things he had been absent from telling her since the last time he came. He told her that of all the wishes he had ever made, his eight-candled birthday wish was the only one that he ever truly wanted to come true. He told her he was glad to be home and that he missed her.

After visiting the graveyard, he stopped by the local diner. He wasn’t very much hungry, but some coffee and a slice of apple pie sounded fair enough.

There he ran into Ella. He hadn’t seen her since they each shipped off to college. She went to State, while he left and went across the country.

I guess it’s no wonder that wish never came true, he thought.

But then…

“Hey, do you have time for a coffee with me?” he asked.

She beamed a smile and sat down.

They talked for over an hour. Nearly two. And he almost brought up the casket in the woods.

But there was no reason to tell her about that. He’d never made a wish after all.

Before folding it back up, however, he did do one thing. He wrote a note:

If you’re reading this, you figured out how to open the casket. I left it as a geo-cache prize for any errant hiker. I can’t tell you if there is anything you can take from it, but it will give you something regardless. What you do with it now is obviously up to you. But my advice is that you wait until you see whatever it needs to show you before making your decision.

S.E.

With that, Sean set the note in the casket, placed the box back exactly where he found it and never looked back again.