I opened my eyes and saw my body lying face up on a yellow gurney. My left sleeve was rolled up to the bicep. Smeared blood covered my inside elbow. I tried to stand and yell at the paramedic that I was still there, just a few feet away, prone on the kitchen floor, but the pain in my side rushed to my head and pounded against my temples. I forced air up my throat, bubbling through viscous phlegm. Before I could form words, my throat closed, and my vision became hazy. My body lay unmoving on the gurney, but I—whatever I had become—spasmed against the tiled floor.
Abuela limped down the stairs, out of breath. Her hunched body tilted to the side as she landed on each step. She stood over my body as tears streamed down her face, then slapped the fresh puncture wounds on my arm, yelling, “Por qué hicistes esto?”
The floor was freezing, and I didn’t have enough energy to get up to run away. Even if I did, I would still hear her screaming, blaming me for accidentally killing myself. I managed to bring my hands to my face, but soon realized she couldn’t see me. The paramedic signaled Abuela to move away from the gurney, and despite her anger and desperation, she did. He placed his shaking palms between my breasts, and using his entire weight, compressed my chest, then placed two fingers on my neck. His face tensed.
Abuela followed the paramedic as he rushed me out of the front door. Ambulance sirens wailed, disappearing down the street as I lay on the cold tiles.
It took a long time for the shock to wear off, and even longer for me to lose all hope of being revived or returning to my body. I was able to sit, pain, disbelief, and stress all present. Yet something I had when alive was missing, a force so strong that I considered it an emotion. The desire to get high when things got difficult, to steady a downer with an upper had disappeared. I died, but I was free of my addiction. Abuela would feel better when I told her. Like some Puerto Ricans of her age group, her religion combined Catholicism, Santeria, and several forms of magic, sprinkled with her own unique beliefs. I could only imagine how concerned she was over my so-called soul.
My hands didn’t pass through the walls like in the movies, nor did I sink through the floor into oblivion. I was invisible but solid. I’d be able to write a message on the wall with the paint we kept on the porch. She’d freak out, but reading a message was probably less disturbing than hearing me speak. My footsteps were silent as I walked towards the screen door leading outside, where my real body had crossed through the porch and then to the ambulance.
I didn’t see any cars parked on the street, but soon enough, the neighbors would get home from their jobs, find out I overdosed on heroin, and run over, crying to Abuela.
I’m so sorry for your loss. Alicia was such a bright girl. Then they’d pat Abuela’s wrinkled hands and say, I’m sure God has a reason for taking her so young. Of course, when they went back home, out of earshot from the outside world, their tongues would fall off with the weight of hot gossip. I knew something bad was going to happen to that girl. Doing drugs all the time. To make matters worse, she was an atheist. I don’t want to say this, but I’m afraid that if she didn’t embrace Jesus before departing, she’s in a bad place now.
Cold air blew into the house. I hugged myself and shivered. It reminded me of vacationing in Boston during winter. The temperature in Puerto Rico never dropped this low, so the cold had to be a consequence of my condition. It was sunny outside, and after writing my message, I could take a walk to warm myself up.
I pulled the screen door’s handle. It didn’t move. I grabbed my wrist with my other hand, pulling until I trembled in place. The flimsy screen door designed to stop flies and vermin didn’t budge. I tried other doors that led to the bathroom, kitchen pantry, and backyard. None of them moved. Smaller items, like the pen I found under the sofa, were also infinitely heavy. I kicked and punched every object around me, begging for something to at least stir, and acknowledge my existence. I didn’t get fatigued but eventually became bored of taking my anger out on the house. I wandered aimlessly until I found myself in front of the living room mirror.
Nothing. I had no reflection. I waved my hands, but sunlight coming from the windows passed through me, uninterrupted. My pale and naked body was only visible to me.
Abuela came back hours later, giving me enough time to figure out the nature of what I was. In a nutshell, I had no mass. Without mass, I couldn’t exert force, explaining my inability to move things. Light didn’t interact with me either, further supporting my assumption. Yet I had awareness and could interact with objects, even if it was just to be hindered by them. Dr. Miguel Suárez, the man who was shepherding me towards earning my Ph.D. in biochemistry, would be proud. Even in death, I still approached problems with a scientific mind. Unfortunately, he’d never find out.
“Alicia…” Abuela said. Her voice cracked as she said my name. “Te suicidastes con una sobredosis. Estás en el infierno.”
I turned and saw her standing on the threshold to the kitchen. I tried to speak and explain to her that I hadn’t killed myself and that overdosing could hardly be considered suicide. Instead, I became dizzy as the words formed in my throat. I felt like pulling my hair from the frustration of not being able to communicate. I needed to tell her. My being here was what mattered. Her religion was giving her more grief than closure. Chances were, Hell didn’t even exist.
Tears ran down her wrinkled face. Her eyes focused on the living room wall as if expecting a miracle to occur. A string of wooden beads, her rosary, was coiled around her forearm. The room grew colder still. I tried to force words out but lost my balance and landed on my knees. No sound left my mouth. It took several seconds for me to recover.
She raised her shaky arms to pray and lowered her head.
I got closer. A barely noticeable substance surrounded her like an aura. Translucent, yellow gas rippled from her arms. I hovered both hands over her forearm. The gas was hot. She warmed me like a campfire. I ran my hands through the colored heat, parting the waves, absorbing some warmth. The back of my hands prickled. Her heat diffused into my body, relaxing me. My mouth salivated. The energy was delicious. Without thinking, I grasped Abuela’s wrist, squeezing as hard as I could. She screamed. Abuela’s gaze locked with mine.
“Alicia!” She flung her arm loose.
I stumbled back, catching a glimpse of myself in the living room mirror before disappearing again. She looked at her wrist with wide eyes and crossed herself with her other hand, the wooden Jesus dangling from the string of beads. My body itched for more heat.
“Un demonio enmascarado,” she said. “Padre nuestro, que estás en el cielo, santificado sea tu nombre…” She darted upstairs, repeating the Lord’s Prayer in a loop. Abuela had lived in the states for more than a decade before moving back home and was fully bilingual, but she always prayed in Spanish.
I rushed after her, pushing the curtain at the base of the staircase; instead of acting as a concrete wall, the stringed beads moved aside. Abuela looked back at what had to look like the beads moving from their own volition. She whimpered, cradling her wrist against her chest, and ran. The cold gripped my legs again, and I stumbled on the steps. She prayed louder, rushing into her room, then slammed the door shut.
When we connected, I wanted to hug her, tell her I loved her, to say, “Everything will be alright, Abuelita,” but the feeling of euphoria had overwhelmed me, and speaking, at least trying to, knocked me off balance. Despite my effort, my situation had gotten worse. After seeing me, Abuela now believed I was a demon in disguise since in her head the real me—my soul—had to be somewhere in Hell being poked by some little red man with a pitchfork. None of this made sense to me, but in the end, everyone’s religion was whatever they wanted it to be.
I heard her door open but still didn’t climb the stairs. How could I? If I couldn’t talk, there was no excuse to get close and touch her except for how good it made me feel. And touching her also hurt her. Despite her pain, I didn’t trust myself to not grab her again if I came too close.
On the second floor, echoes of Abuela’s weeping filled the hallway. She stomped around. The house went silent after she finished whatever she was doing, shutting her door again, and I mustered enough courage to go upstairs.
The other rooms and bathrooms were open. Abuela insisted on airing the house, keeping the doors open when a room was unoccupied. She claimed the smell of stuffiness and used socks accumulated otherwise.
I found my room as I had left it. Every piece of clothes, make-up, and my school backpack in their usual place, as if expecting me to come back from the dead and continue my routine. The bottom drawer in my dresser, where I kept my stash—and hid my special spoon just before the heroin kicked in and killed me—was closed, unexplored. Yet Abuela knew I had drugs. Maybe not in that specific drawer but somewhere.
During the last few years, she’d thrown around enough innuendos about how bad habits can shape a person into something they’re not, a collection of warnings to persuade me to quit, to stop coming home with bloodshot eyes and slurred speech. I ignored her, thinking my vices were under control.
Drugs, especially stronger stuff, were only for special occasions, like when the stress of lab work threatened to drive me crazy after years of sixteen-hour workdays, running experiments six days a week while being unappreciated by everyone outside of science.
I’d started with alcohol like everyone else, then marihuana when too much booze ruined my digestion. I skipped through cocaine and—only on special occasions—landed on a needle. The whole thing felt like a repeating series of accidents as if I was tripping on the same rock on my walk to school every day. But I wasn’t going to use drugs forever. The plan was to quit right after graduation.
I sat on my bed for hours, fidgeting while thinking of my situation. It never made a sound, the creaking of worn, rusty springs absent. Instead, a chill spiraled up my spine like fingers flicking air out of a syringe. The clock on my room wall read seven.
Eventually, I stood to look outside my window. Black bows hung from the front door of every house, a sign of respect to the recently deceased. Two black ribbons stretched from each bow and piled into small mounds. They must’ve bought them in the same store, or probably one of the neighbors bought one for everyone. I wouldn’t be surprised if it had been Abuela who gifted the bows, asking nicely that they be hung. All traces of Abuela’s heat left me, and the pleasure went with it. Only the anger after seeing the neighborhood’s hypocrisy lingered.
The past few years, I’d managed the drive home while intoxicated more than once, only to park too far from the sidewalk, open the door, and vomit on the street as tears ran down my face. On a few occasions, the neighbors called the cops. The neighbors hated me, called me a negative influence on their kids, despite the fact I never talked to any of them. None of them were perfect either. I always urged Abuela to call the police when the loud spousal fights or drunken parties stretched late into the night, but she’d just shrug. God rewards those who turn the other cheek, she’d always say, as if her patience was a down payment for going to Heaven.
Something caught my foot as I turned from the window. A red seven-day candle with a drawing of a saint on it stood beside my bed. In a wooden frame beside the candle, I saw a picture of me as a little girl, missing my two front teeth and wearing a proud smile. Abuela must have set this up after I touched her. I crouched down until my knees reached my head. Red, blood-thick wax pooled below the burning wick. The flame flickered in an uninterrupted, random pattern. I waved the back of my hand near the fire.
“Te amo, Alicia.” Abuela stood in the doorway. This was the second time she addressed me after my death as if a part of her knew I was close. I brought my fingertips closer to the flame, then rested my cheek on my left knee, waiting for her to turn and leave. If she thought I was a demon, I couldn’t imagine how she’d react after seeing me, spine taut against my skin, slouched in front of my proffering. She turned, and I closed my eyes, then cupped the flame in my palm, but nothing happened. The flame felt cold as metal. I hadn’t considered the possibility that only human heat affected me.
The need for a satisfying high only increased after the failed attempt with the candle. Abuela shut my door before I reached her. I considered calling out to her, but the thought of speaking made me nauseous. I stood in front of the door. Unlike when I had a body, and worked long hours standing in front of a lab bench, my legs didn’t fall asleep, the stiffness in my neck never came. Still as a statue, I waited. A gnawing need to get high kept me company.
The next morning, Abuela slowly turned the doorknob as a voice came from outside, stopping her before she fully opened my door.
“Voy!” Abuela yelled. She left the door ajar. Even turning my body sideways, I wouldn’t fit through. Outside my window, I saw Cynthia, one of the neighbors from across the street, walking from our mailbox with a package cradled on her side. Bringing Abuela her mail? She had to be up to something. I squinted, looking at Cynthia’s house.
Aluminum screens behind the window panes blocked my view. But I knew they were there: Cynthia’s sisters, Amanda, and Carla—what I called the gossip patrol— keeping watch. I heard Abuela swing the porch gate open. Cynthia walked into the house.
If I found a way to get close to Cynthia, I could feed on her heat. Abuela felt something when I touched her, surprise and pain filling her cataract filmed eyes after I grabbed her wrist. I was dead but not unfeeling. The fact that it felt good to grab her only added to my guilt. However, Cynthia’s health wasn’t my concern. And I wouldn’t surprise myself after becoming visible. With enough heat, I’d probably be visible for a while. I could smile and wave to Abuela, convincing her I wasn’t an evil demon. Maybe we could even leave the house together and find others like me. Statistically, I couldn’t be the only one; no one was that unique.
I had to admit I was also curious. Cynthia was around my age. Perhaps if I touched her, my high would be different. The experience might be more intense, the difference between a few sips of beer or pounding several tequila shots in rapid succession, or maybe, a young person’s heat changed the high altogether, and I’d trampoline from the drowsiness caused by Xanax to the jaw twisting strength of cocaine.
I grabbed the doorknob, then pulled with both hands. Nothing happened. A way for me to move objects had to exist because I’d been able to move the curtain earlier. I concentrated, willing strength to accumulate in my fingers. A paralyzing cold spread from my toes, feet, and up my legs as if I was slowly dipping myself into an icy lake. White vapor rose from the doorknob as I squeezed it. I pulled. The door started to open, moving towards me at a snail pace. I leaned back. The door swung towards me, and I fell backward.
After sitting up, I realized my knees were locked in position. I tried to stand, but my legs didn’t move. I cupped my right knee with both hands to force the joint to bend, but my palms sizzled with a freezing burn.
What I was became clear. Words like ghosts, spirit, angel, and demon were useless, blanket statements so generalizable and loaded with preconceptions that the terms themselves lost meaning. A rigorous definition was more useful. I had died and become a Carnot engine of sorts, an instrument that transformed heat into mechanical energy.
The heat I extracted from living people also made me visible. I smiled, thinking of my research on fluorescent molecules. The shiny dots became brighter as the temperature of their environment increased. Not even the dead escaped the laws of thermodynamics. Still grinning, I flipped onto my stomach, dragging myself out of the room like a slithering snake.
“Hola, Doña Amelia,” Cynthia said, her voice echoing up the stairs.
“Gracias por venir,” Abuela said.
“Claro.” Cynthia giggled.
What was so good about Cynthia coming over? I’d told Abuela a thousand times not to trust the neighbors, but every time I gave her a reason, she’d just say that talking about people who gossip counted as gossip. She claimed a better approach was to be the best person you can be and give nothing interesting to talk about. Then she’d give me that look that said she knew I gave too much to talk about.
I slapped the floor with my clammy hands, pulling myself towards the stairs. My paralyzed legs dragged like the tall gas cylinders in my lab. If Cynthia came upstairs, I’d grab her ankles and absorb all the heat I could. I needed to warm up my legs, in addition to a nice buzz.
“El mapo está en el pantry,” Abuela said. Cynthia made a ruckus taking the mop out of the pantry. I paused. Maybe I was being too harsh and overconfident in my judgment. It was hard to imagine Cynthia volunteered for housework just to find things to create a scandal over. I lugged back to my room.
When I was alive, cleaning was my responsibility. Looking for patches of dust that I’d missed, like a crime scene investigator, was Abuela’s favorite hobby. She hadn’t given me cooking, yard work, or any other chores. I didn’t even pay rent. She told me to focus on school, saying she was proud I’d be the first doctor in the family. Unlike the rest of my family and friends, she never cracked a joke about a Ph.D. in biochemistry not being a real doctor. At times, her belief in me was the only force keeping me in pursuit of my career. And now, I’d never graduate, never make the only person who really cared proud. I was only missing one experiment to have enough data for a publication, immortalizing my name among the scientific community. My work was wasted, or worse, another person in the lab would finish it, and push me down the author list, maybe even take my name off completely since I didn’t need publications to advance my career anymore.
Back in my room, my kindergarten self-smiled back at me from the framed picture. Most worries I had when alive had disappeared. Things that kept me up at night like the search for jobs after graduation, how I’d struggle to kick my drug habits when the time came, were unimportant. The question of how long it would take to save enough money to rent my own place seemed absurd now. Yet, I still couldn’t imagine being as happy as I looked in the picture. So much had been left undone. The happiness I saw in the picture stemmed from a child’s ignorance and not a sense of professional or personal accomplishments.
Cynthia grunted. She stood outside my room, barefoot on the tiled floor, using both hands to carry a large bucket with a mop inside. Water splashed on the floor when she set it down. Abuela hadn’t entered my room after leaving the candle and my picture. She hadn’t cleaned any part of the house either. In fact, I couldn’t remember the last time I saw her eat, her body had abruptly become frailer since I died. The hunch on her back curving a few degrees in less than two days. I didn’t need to like Cynthia to recognize the favor she was doing Abuela.
I crawled under my bed to avoid bumping into the mop, starting to accept my condition as permanent and unfixable. Cynthia sat on my bed with a creaking sound. Her ankles released a faint blue vapor. I leaned my head in, the energy caressing my cheeks. The hairs behind my neck stood as I inhaled silky ribbons of blue, gaseous heat. A prickling sensation ran down my legs. Cynthia giggled and shuffled her feet. For a second, I thought she felt me close, but instead of looking under the bed, she stood and walked towards the window.
She laughed louder, then mumbled something about a ridiculous old lady.
I pulled my upper body from under the bed and saw her standing, hips tilted, pointing her phone at the candle and my portrait, snapping pictures. She knocked on the metal window panes, calling out to her sisters, who no doubt came running to their own windows like drooling dogs. I started to tremble, biting on the inside of my lips. She lifted the phone to the window—as if her idiot sisters had long-range vision—telling them how much they were going to laugh when they saw the pictures she was taking. Did she not care that Abuela might be within earshot?
She turned to leave, still sliding her finger on the phone, probably looking at the picture through different filters, or adding sparkles around the candle, increasing the juiciness of her find. I slammed my fists against the floor. How could she be so disrespectful? Cynthia skipped from the window, still laughing. It was clear she had no intention to clean. I lunged, grabbing both of her ankles. She squealed, then dropped her phone. Pleasure rippled through me. Every cell in my body excited simultaneously, the first time high of every drug I’d used when alive, mixed with the gut-clenching spasms of an orgasm. Cynthia screamed. I turned my head, stared straight into her eyes, and bit her calf, sinking my teeth deep into muscle. Her heat flowed down my throat, a sweet and warm liquid that filled me with bliss.
She screamed senseless dribble. Thick strands of saliva flew from her mouth. Her arms swung wildly over her head as if wanting to defend her but not knowing how.
Ceramic boxes on top of my dresser shattered against the floor, spilling jewelry everywhere. I held for a long time, but the high only got better, not limited by the bioelectrical saturation limit of a nervous system.
I whispered her name: “Cynthia.”
Dark blotches formed at the edge of my vision. My strength seeped away, and Cynthia freed one of her legs, then the other. I heard her name from far away. Her sisters must have heard the racket and were calling to her. I reached out, trying to grab the cell phone, and text Abuela while the tingling heat ran through my body, but everything went black.
It was nighttime when I woke up. Cynthia must have rushed back to her house. Hopefully, she would spend the next few years crying herself to sleep in terror, visiting psychologists until she convinced herself that what she’d seen wasn’t real; perhaps some residual drugs were lying around in my room, and she’d hallucinated after inhaling them; maybe the stress from a neighbor dying had made her brain fabricate illusions. Whatever lie eventually comforted her, the bite marks guaranteed it would take a while for normalcy to set in.
My legs worked again, so I walked around the second floor of the house. Abuela was in her room, reading her bible while she lay on the bed. I couldn’t tell if her hands were shaking from old age or because of the aftermath of what I had done. The ten o’clock news blared on the TV that sat on a table across from her. On days that I came home drunk or high, which lately had become every day, she cranked the TV volume even higher, giving me a small hint that I had done something wrong and didn’t deserve to sleep in peace.
Seeing her made my eyes water. How was I supposed to deal with the loneliness of death? The despair in my heart climbed my throat and quivered in my lips. She was so close but unreachable, untouchable. I had taken so much for granted when I was alive, thinking that she would always be there, that I’d have the rest of my life to discover and share new scientific phenomena, that dying of a drug overdose was something that happened to people who weren’t careful, and not to scientists in training who measured micrograms daily. I’d also managed to be irresponsible with my high during death. Knowing that talking somehow ruined my vision and balance hadn’t stopped me from whispering to scare Cynthia. The lesson of self-control was lost on me.
Now I was dead, and the high was gone. Only the guilt of the recently sobered who realized they had fallen off the wagon remained. I was trapped in a house where the only way to get around was to suck heat off a living person. Instead of a sophisticated machine, an efficient engine, I had become a parasite, feeding off living things for pleasure. I existed in a vacuum with no purpose. No ecosystem.
Abuela had been right. Everyone had stress, and sometimes the difference between swimming in an endless ocean of anxiety or drowning in a glass of water was the perspective we took. What I missed about life now was exactly that stress, the uncertainty, the challenge to be a successful scientist, a better person.
I stood in Abuela’s doorway and resented her. She could’ve been more aggressive. If I didn’t want to see, she should have pried my eyes open, even organized an intervention. She could’ve been more direct.
I shook my head. It was time I took responsibility for my actions. Blaming my problems on anything except myself, dealing with them immaturely, such as numbing my mind with drugs, had already killed me.
Abuela had been right in other ways as well: we only had the power to change ourselves. What had I gained by hurting Cynthia? Abuela would only be ostracized by the community. Whispers of her being a witch, the house being haunted, running up and down the gossip wire. Tears ran down my face, taking the last of my heat with them. The cold filled me completely.
I sat at the foot of the bed, careful to be far enough from Abuela so she wouldn’t stretch and accidentally touch me. We watched the weather until a coughing fit made her sit up. She covered her mouth with her white gown. Fresh blood stood out stark against the whiteness of the cloth. The urge to touch her clawed up my stomach, then concentrated in my temples. I resisted. Addiction had beat me in life and followed me into death, but I wouldn’t succumb a second time—
Abuela coughed again. And it occurred to me: she might join me soon. This time I’d follow every piece of advice to the letter. She had always been curious about what I did at school. There would be enough time for me to teach her science. And together, grandmother and granddaughter, we’d explore this new phase of existence.
As if by design, Abuela died that night. I first noticed that her chest had stopped rising and falling, then I grazed my fingers over her cheeks. Touching her was the same as any other object in the house. Lifeless. Her heat was gone.
The beaded curtain at the bottom of the stairs jingled. She must have learned how to use her heat already. Impressive. Or maybe people that died at different ages became a different kind of ghost. I couldn’t wait to learn about it.
I stood from the bed, thinking as fast as I could. How could I communicate with Abuela? I needed to be as loving as possible and not demon-like.
Abuela stood naked at the top of the stairs. Loose skin hung from her body. She looked the same as when alive, but I knew she felt no pain. I smiled, then waved at her like a parent waves at a child. Her jaw hung open, her eyes full of recognition.
She gagged, making a wet sound deep in her throat. I moved a bit closer, with my index finger on my lips.
“Donde? Demonio.” She said slowly, like someone struggling to speak through a heart attack. She fell on her knees. I kneeled in front of her.
She whispered, “Paraíso…” The wrinkles on her face squeezed together. “…mi paraíso.” Her eyes locked with mine. She pointed towards the ceiling.
I understood. She had died and not gone to Heaven. Instead, she thought she’d joined a shapeshifting demon. Still kneeling, she clenched her fists and punched her thighs as if punishing her unresponsive legs. I tried to catch her attention by waving my hands. I looked into her eyes. Instead of my Abuela staring back, I only saw rage. I tried to stand, but she lunged at me, pushing me by the neck until I fell on my back.
She yelled, “Tu culpa!”
Abuela sat on my stomach and slammed my head against the floor, repeatedly, until I heard my skull crack. I felt no pain, but she was draining my energy.
I tried to suck some heat back, but I was too weak. She had too much of an advantage. Her tongue ran over her lips, like someone remembering how delicious food was. I tried to wiggle from under her, anything to resist the efflux of heat from my body. Abuela moved her hands from my neck to my face, threatening to squeeze out the last of my heat. I looked at her, begging her to stop, but the patience she had in life was extinguished. She buried her thumbs into my eyes. Vitreous liquid mixed with tears ran down the side of my head. She slammed my head against the floor again. When the last drops of my heat diffused into her, I plummeted through the floor like a traitor cast from paradise.
I have yet to find an escape from this place. I walked in the cold until I found the wall. As far as I can tell, it stretches to infinity on either side. A sense of satisfaction is the first thing I’d feel if you told me you were able to read this writing. I had to rest my wrist on my forehead to try and keep the sentences level. I still can’t see and don’t know if my blood sticks to the wall or just runs off. I’m not even sure if the wall is white or another color light enough to serve as a good medium for writing on. At least, my blood seems to never run out.
It took me a long time to think of biting my thumb open and using the blood to write—no, to publish—my story. Unfortunately, this never occurred to me while in Abuela’s house.
Please, if you find this, call out to me. I’ll call back. I can speak now, scream even, but no one hears. I don’t want to be in this Hell by myself. I can’t tell if the rheumy running down my face is from weeping or something else. I am so cold, but I won’t touch you. I’ve learned my lesson. I promise.
I need to find a way out of this place and tell Abuela that I love her! I don’t blame her for what happened. In a way, I was part demon in life already. She’d spent her life knowing that suffering and pain were rewarded with an unimaginably happy afterlife, but after dying, she hadn’t entered through golden gates into a garden of infinite bliss; she only saw me. She had no reason to behave like a good Christian anymore.
If you are reading this, Abuela, I’m sorry. This is not Heaven. But I’ve confirmed there is a place that can be called Hell, opening the possibility that an opposite realm exists. If we meet here, let’s pray together. I hope I can make you proud.
Alicia M. López
Ph.D. Candidate in Biochemistry
Draft #177 of “A 25-Year-Old Woman Experiences Life After Death: A Case Study”
