Chosen

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the written prior permission of the author.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of either the author or the publisher.

Previously published 2011 by Fiction Studio

Copyright © 2013 by Paula Bradley

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The bottle in her hand felt heavy.

One more time
.

Mariah Carpenter replaced the bottle on the nightstand and padded silently through her shadowy apartment. Moonlight cast uneven shadows on everything it touched. No need to turn on the lights: she could walk here blindfolded.

When the police hammered down her door, they would not notice that all the wooden surfaces gleamed with a thin patina of Old English Furniture Polish. Nor that every mirror and glass surface had been Windexed free of fingerprints and smudges. Dusting and vacuuming would not impress them either.

Leaving her apartment in this pristine condition was the same illogical reasoning behind wearing clean underwear when you went out, just in case you got into an accident.

You’re stalling
.

Back in her bedroom, she glanced at the clock on the nightstand. It glared balefully back at her: 3:05. She didn’t need the faint light provided by the red LEDs. She knew exactly where everything else was.

Taking a deep breath, she grabbed the prescription bottle of sleeping pills and unscrewed the lid, dumping the contents into her left palm. Twenty-two thirty-milligram tablets of Restoril. It had to be enough.

Dropping the lid on the nightstand, she seized the glass of water so forcefully that some of it sloshed over the edge. Tossing the pills into her mouth, she gagged as she swallowed them and the entire eight ounces of water. The waterfall would hasten the journey of the white capsules down her esophagus and into her stomach.

Screwing the lid back on the pill bottle, she placed it on the empty twelve-ounce bag of M&M’s. When the coroner examined the contents of her stomach during the autopsy, he would discover her next-to-last conscious act was one of pure gluttony.

Climbing into bed, she lay on her right side, drawing the sheet and blanket up to her neck as she curled into the fetal position.

A slight breeze coming from the fan at the foot of her bed blew on her face. It droned every night regardless of the temperature outside, providing the circulating air Mariah needed to combat her claustrophobia. It also acted as white noise, blocking the sound of cars that stopped and started at the corner of the street directly below her bedroom window.

The hallucination began twenty minutes later, obviously the first stage effects of the pills.

It began with a soft
swshswsh
behind her, followed by the shimmering of undulating air that was displaced as a hole began to grow—a hole filled by a man surrounded by a blue—white glow. He hovered a few inches above the floor then floated down as the light dissipated and the breach in the air was sealed.

His dark brown eyes, shot with flecks of gold, gazed down at her, radiating compassion and love and a deep sadness. His full lips, nearly hidden behind his beard, thinned slightly. With what appeared to be a sigh of resignation, he unclipped a metal tube from the belt around his waist and pressed it against the back of her neck.

Heat immediately spread through her body, accompanied by such serenity that Mariah briefly thought the pills had done their job and, somehow, she was in heaven. But it was quite the opposite: she felt more alive than ever. Unconsciously she straightened her legs, every muscle, every tendon, every bone relaxing as her mind began to register a myriad of other sensations.

She felt her heart valves open and close rhythmically as blood coursed through her veins. The hairs inside her nostrils shivered as oxygen drifted past them to inflate her lungs. Supercharged red blood cells fought against harmful bacteria in the marrow of her bones. Electrical impulses coursed from her brain and spinal column. Zapped across synapses, they were converted into millions of instructions which kept every piece of her biological machinery functioning in accord.

Mariah became an observer to the wonders of the universe within her as her body experienced the cessation of physical and mental pain. Contentment enveloped her, and she floated in its embrace.

Buoyed by these sensations, she almost missed feeling the mattress sag as the man laid down behind her, his arms enfolding her in a protective, loving embrace.

In an instant, her brain was bombarded with images too rapid for her mind to process. Nevertheless, they became imbedded in her subconscious, there to await the precise moment in time when they would emerge to bewilder herself and a world unprepared to receive them.

And then she heard a voice. The words—Peace, my child, I am with you. I have always been.”—were clear and precise, the hallucination taking on a frightening reality. Mariah began to struggle, but a different, yet just as startling, sensation caused her to stop. Energy began to flow into her body, apparently coming from the man who held her. It felt like his soul united with hers, the strength of his spirit an ally in restoring her sense of self.

The exhilaration it brought was short-lived. More afraid than ever, she fought his embrace; however, peace descended, and she surrendered to it. In this state of euphoria, Mariah never felt the pressure against her back recede.

Just before she slipped into a deep and dreamless sleep, she observed, again in a haze, the man smiling down on her. Clipping the metal tube onto his belt, his eyes betrayed not only sorrow but apprehensive.

He shook his head and pressed a button on the belt. Mariah heard a soft sucking sound: the last thing she saw was the man bathed in a blue-white glow.

And then he disappeared.

Sunlight filtered through the vertical blinds, gently touching Mariah’s face and awakening her from a deep and restful sleep. She yawned, stretched luxuriously, arched her back, and smiled.

It’s Saturday. Great. No work. I think I’ll
...

Her eyes flew open and she leaped out of bed. The clock radio beamed gaily at her: 11:25. Her heart, beating a staccato rhythm in her chest, Mariah’s eyes locked onto the pill bottle balanced on the empty bag of candy. She grabbed it and shook it, her brain refusing to believe what her eyes told her. Yup ... empty.

What the hell
...

Frowning, confused, she dropped the pill bottle and strode into the bathroom to stare at her reflection in the mirror.

Alive. And, apparently, well-rested from an unusually long, uninterrupted sleep.

She turned on the shower, shedding the new pajamas she had bought (based on the same clean underwear theory) then stood under the flow of hot water, letting the heat relax her muscles.

Sanity returned and her wrinkled forehead smoothed out. Evidently the pills were expired, or else twenty-two of them just weren’t enough to put her to sleep permanently.

As the water slid down her body, images of a bearded man flitted through her mind. Something in his hand...

Turning off the water and jumping out of the shower, she felt the back of her neck. No bumps. She picked up a mirror and angled it so she could see the back of her neck in the vanity mirror.

Nothing there. Nothing to bear witness to the sensation of liquid spreading out from that point to every cell in her body.

But an odd feeling of well-being settled over her as she remembered the rest of the—dream? Vision? Drying off and throwing on a tee shirt and jeans, she headed for the kitchen. For the first time in a long time, she was ravenous.

For the remainder of the weekend, Mariah’s mood alternated between elation and fear. Having mucked around in a psychological swamp for so many years, she was skeptical of this feeling of contentment.

Why hadn’t twenty or so sleeping pills killed her? And there was that voice in her ear, and the arms holding her...

As if the
Visitation
(as Mariah thought of it) wasn’t enough, something equally as disconcerting happened. Evelyn Stillwater, Mariah’s manager, was out of town when
it
occurred, so she had several tension-free days to stew. Unfortunately, she was no closer to solving the mystery by the time Evelyn returned. Summoned by Attila the Hun’s twin sister, she dragged herself down several corridors until she reached Evelyn’s office.

The harpy was wading through outdated correspondence, obviously irritated that her department had the gall to function efficiently in her absence. Mariah knocked on the partially opened door. Evelyn glanced up then motioned her to enter with an imperious wave toward the chair opposite her desk.
Ah, yes, the ploy: invite you in and ignore you, the objective being to make you sweat as you waited for the Sword of Damocles to fall.

Slumping in the guest chair, Mariah took a deep breath and instantly felt at peace. Not the same euphoria as the morning of the
Visitation
, but still pretty awesome. She straightened up as the knot in her stomach uncoiled and the tension in her shoulders lessened.

The Wicked Witch of the West finally looked up ... and their eyes locked. Mariah’s breath caught in her throat as adrenaline caused her to feel slightly light-headed. At the same instant, Evelyn’s eyes widened and she gasped, her body jerking as her hands pushed herself away from the desk. When Mariah finally exhaled, Evelyn’s body relaxed, the last vestige of fear dissipating as Mariah broke eye contact.

Clearing her throat, Evelyn glared at the crushed papers in her hands. She muttered a few half-hearted orders, waved the papers dismissively, and Mariah found herself on the other side of the door.

What the hell just happened
? she thought. Not to mention that, for the first time in the eight months since she started working for Madam Stillwater, she had not felt intimidated or anxious. Damned if she knew why Evelyn reacted the way she did—and if she had any sense, she wouldn’t question her good luck.

Back in her cubicle, Mariah stared at her array of multi-colored African violets blooming under the fluorescent bulb attached to the underside of the cabinet. They usually cheered her up, but not today. That encounter with Evelyn just added to the list of extraordinary events.

Questions remained unanswered, an intolerable situation for
The Most Inexhaustible Interrogator This Side of the Mississippi
, title compliments of her brother. As days went by, she knew she had to talk to someone about what happened the morning of the
Visitation
. She became obsessed with the need to know if she had crossed into the
Twilight Zone
or had just succumbed to delirium. Oddly, this fixation was never accompanied by fear, one of her constant companions. The foreign yet delicious sense of peace was as unfamiliar and mysterious as everything else that had happened.

There were few people she could talk to about this. Most of her friends would listen out of respect for her feelings, but dismiss it as a case of prolonged stress. Maybe it was; however, before she accepted that, she had to discuss it with someone.

The cubicle across from hers was occupied by Ben Van Horten, a nice guy she enjoyed talking to. While a practicing Christian, he was, thankfully, no recruiter. She didn’t need to hear God mumbo-jumbo right now.

At the age of ten, Mariah failed Religious Brainwashing 101. Her parents, Rachel and Saul Carpenter, were asked not to send her back to Hebrew school because her teacher, Miriam Feinstein (whom her father labeled the
Zionist Zealot
) found Mariah’s latest round of questions bordering on blasphemy. Miriam had martyred herself and suffered Mariah’s presence up to this point, but no more. Just asking where God lived and why he never showed himself meant Mariah questioned His existence, Miriam said. Her tone of voice was meant to chastise Rachel and Saul Carpenter for encouraging this disrespect. The child just wanted to know, was it such a big deal? Saul asked Rachel.

So Mariah Adele Carpenter, cut adrift from God without a soul-saving paddle, formulated her own hypothesis: Once you surrendered your independent spirit and satisfied God’s demand for blind obedience and pointless ritual, you were saved from the fires of eternal damnation. Furthermore, religion was based on mindless compliance and ignorance rather than worship and sacrifice, and the Jews were in a holding pattern waiting for the Messiah to come and vindicate their suffering.

Ben listened without interruption. Mariah told him about her debilitating depression and the pills then launched into the
Visitation
, elaborating on the stunning physical and mental sensations: of being held, hearing the words of comfort, and finally the serenity. She also told him what happened in Evelyn’s office and that every time their paths crossed, the harridan repelled from her as if they were like-pole magnets.

Deep in thought, Ben’s eyes had lowered. When he finally looked up, his hands reached out to clasp hers in an uncommonly familiar gesture, and his face lit with a huge grin. “Mariah, you’ve
got
to talk to the minister of my church, Michael Jenkins. I
know
he’ll want to meet you, and he’ll be able to explain things a whole lot better than I can.”

“I’m not a member of your church, Ben,” Mariah pointed out, frowning at the mention of clergy. “Of
any
church. I’m not a Christian or even a practicing Jew. Why would I want to talk to someone who’s only going to try to convince me this is spiritual?”

“You don’t have to be a member of my church to talk to the ministers. It’s nondenominational and everyone is welcome. I’ve known Michael for years and I know he can help you.

“Please Mariah, let God finish what He started in you,” Ben said.

She smiled at his eagerness and accepted the phone number of the church. For the next few days she thought about what he said. Why did he think God had started something in her? It was not a welcomed theory; she was not about to become a convert over something that was probably just a self-induced delusion caused by many sleepless nights, a lot of stress, and an overdose of M&M’s.

But there were those sleeping pills...