One Death

Sixty seconds. If you learned that you have sixty seconds left on earth, what would you do?
Without any help to get to your relatives or something like that, you’re just standing on the street, in the park, taking a bath, you find out that you have sixty seconds left of earth. Would you scream at the top of your lungs? Would you kiss a stranger? Would you dance on the top of the statue of liberty? Maybe throw that way too sweet cupcake on your bitch mother-in-law (if you have one that is), maybe laugh hysterically and not give a fuck about what anyone else think.
Sixty seconds can be a long time or awfully short. Sixty seconds can tick away endlessly or suddenly slip between your fingers like water.
My last sixty seconds seemed endless; I was stuck, pinned to the seat of my father’s truck with a pole stuck through my chest.
The pain was consuming, I remember that, the world was blurry and the only thing that I felt was he pain, I also remember thinking “dad’s gonna kill me” he didn’t have to do that since the pole sticking out of my chest did that for him.
Then when I’d died and walked into the light –I can’t really say anything about the afterlife, or about god, or about anything, I woke up in a bed in a room that looked like an ordinary teen girl’s room. Green walls, a closet full of clothes hanging pell-mell so that you couldn’t see where one piece of garment began and ended, a big mirror with photographs stuck to it, a desk with a laptop some makeup and a jewellery tree, shoes, and lot’s of them.
I looked down on myself, the first thing I noticed were a pair of (in comparison to my own) huge pair of boobs. Then I noticed that my skin colure was just that much more tanned, my arms just a little longer and so were my legs. And I was wearing a pair of lace panties and a mini tank top that read “Sweet as candy” over the chest.
Something was not right. I swung my now very much longer legs over the side of the bed (my toenails were for some reason pink) and walked over to the mirror.
“Oh my god…” I gasped as I saw myself in the mirror. I was tall, tanned and gorgeous. Just that it wasn’t me in the mirror. I was short, pale and defiantly not gorgeous. I raised an arm and waved, the images in the mirror did the same. I poked at my cheek. Blue eyes looked back at me.
Oh. My. God. What the hell was happening? I had been in a car crash. Was I in some kind of coma and had created my ideal world? Was this my dream body? I wondered as I walked closer to the mirror pinching myself.
The door opened, a short woman came in, she stopped to look at me and gave me a funny look, “What are you doing Veronica?” she asked, it was my name she was saying so she must mean me, but who was she? I pointed at her with a confused finger,
“You’re my mom?” I asked, she looked at me with a concerned look,
“Veronica, get dressed and come down, your teachers waiting downstairs and he says it’s urgent” then she walked away muttering something that didn’t sound very friendly.
A teacher? What the hell was happening? I looked at myself again, I needed to find out more, but I wasn’t going out in the lace panties and mini tank top, no way, dream or not I wasn’t going down there practically naked.
I threw on a pair of jeans and a shirt and then I walked out in the hallway.
The walls were covered with diplomas and pictures, Little miss Minnesota, four of those, Miss pumpkin, two of those, Miss falls, five, Little Miss USA, only one of that. All with photos of the girl I’d been in the mirror, in different ages of course. But then at fifteen she seemed to stop with the beauty contesting, cheerleading took its place and after that swimming? Veronica Denver was a beauty Queen, that’s for sure. And somehow I’d ended up in her body.
This must be a dream, a coma dream, I’d made this up, all of it. This couldn’t be happening for real.
On the other wall were photos of a boy, a couple, the woman was in most of them, some old articles.
“Veronica! Get down here!” A male voice suddenly braked from downstairs, I jumped in surprise, I hurried towards the stairs and when I came down I spotted the woman sitting in a couch beside a tall and very large man, his shoulders must be as wide as a doorframe, I thought as I looked at him.
Someone couched a little and I saw a man sitting in the couch opposite of the man and woman. He looked to be middle age, brown hair with some strands of grey in it. He stood up to look at me, he smiled, his eyes were in a soft grey-blue shade.
“Hello Veronica, I needed to speak with you” he said and smiled even wider, he had a pair of glassed that seemed to cling to the tip of his nose for dear life. “Can we talk on the porch” he asked looking at the couple, the man didn’t seem very ken on that idea but the woman patted his arm and stood up.
“Breakfasts in the fridge” She said and then walked into what looked like an office. The man grunted something and disappeared into another room.
“Shall we?” The teacher said and motioned towards the door.

Out on the porch he got a very serious expression, “Veronica, you have been chosen, I know it can be confusing finding yourself in another body but it will be fine” He said, I felt a little overwhelmed, a little crazy too, okay a whole lot more crazy than overwhelmed.
“What are you talking about? How do you know about the fact that this isn’t my body?” the question blurred out of me before I could even stop myself.
“It is your body now, the old Veronica is gone, not a trace of her left in that body”
“What do you mean by ``you’ve been chosen´´” I asked,
“To be a guardian”
I felt a little like one of those cartoon figures, you know when they get so surprised that their chin falls to the floor. My chin didn’t fall that far but it felt like it did. Then I went over to feeling like a fish since my mouth closed and opened like the goldfish my little brother had on his nightstand. I couldn’t come up with anything to say, this had too be some screwed up dream.
“A what?” was all I manage to say.
“Yes, a guardian, every town in the whole world has at least five, no matter how big or small, the guardians keeps the town safe, keeps the people safe, you died just as we needed a replacement, you were on top of the list and now you’re Veronica Denver, a guardian” The teachers says and claps his hands together,
“And who are you?” I ask,
“I’m Mikael, your mentor”
If I only could wake up from this weird dream.

I didn’t. Wake up that is. Mikael left with the words “Just act normal”, how the hell was I going to do that when I didn’t even know anyone in this family, or how I were suppose to act, how they expected me to act.
But I learned pretty quickly that Veronica Denver’s family wasn’t very social, so I had tons of time to think about the whole “you’re a guardian and since you died you’ve moved into a new body” thing.
I mostly sit in front of the mirror and look at myself, Veronica, it doesn’t feel any different from before, except that I keep knocking things over by accident with my long arms.
But I can’t shake the feeling of discomfort, it wasn’t that I was uncomfortable as I was, it was more than I was in a house that I didn’t know, I was suppose to act normal when I didn’t even know how.
Thoughts of my family constantly popped up, if this wasn’t a dream, then I was really dead. Mom and dad would probably have gotten the call by now, Jon was probably in his room, mom was probably crying.
I wanted to go home. This wasn’t home. This was just some bazar dream. But as I tried to picture them in my mind I came up with nothing but a blurry mess. I couldn’t even remember how I had looked. This was so frustrating!
I didn’t understand anything. Mikael had said that he was going to meet up with me at school the next day, I didn’t even know where the school was.
I had figured out that I was in a small town in Minnesota, Creekhills. That Veronica, I mean I’m, a cheerleader and have lots of friends. Not that I knew how real they were, I had just seen the pictures.
Then there was a photo that disturbed me, Veronica, I, was kissing a boy, I had no idea of what his name was, but since there were several pictures with him having his hands on very inappropriate places on Veroni- MY body. I just couldn’t get used to this changing body thing.

Two unpleasant surprises

The next day found that I had a car. It was just that I couldn’t bring myself to open the door and start to drive to school. As soon as I tried my legs locked at the knee and my feet seemed impossibly glued to the floor. My mouth went dry and my heart sped up. I couldn’t get into the car. It was a nice car, it really was, it even looked expensive and new, I just couldn’t move my body at the thought of sitting behind the wheel and drive.
“Screw this” I just said and found a bike standing leaning on the wall in the darker part of the garage.
Then I set out for school, no idea of where I was going and just hoping I wouldn’t end up lost in the middle of no where.
I cast a quick glance towards the big house, it’s positioned just in front of a lake, it was huge. The house, just like the car, looked new and expensive. But lonely, I hadn’t noticed that until now, as soon as I turned out on a bigger road and left the house behind I felt lighter somehow.

For some reason I managed to find the school, and I wasn’t even tried, I had rode a bike to school before but it had never been a very long to school for me, now it had taken me almost an hour.
But when I came and placed the bike in the stand on a spot that wasn’t taken I heard someone call my name:
“Veronica!” it sounded more like a woohoo and it was so high pitched that I almost held my hands over my ears. I was glad that I had the same name as before since if someone called out, for example Lisa, I wouldn’t even react.
The girls coming towards me were without doubt cheerleaders; they had that glow about them, they also wore Juicy Couture cat suits, which I found odd. Then I noticed that they looked like the people in the photos, so these people must be my friends.
The one who had called my name looked at my bike, and then me “Where’s your car?” she wondered with raised eyebrows, then she gasped, “wasn’t it Juicy-day today?” the next question was.
Crap, had I missed something important? Come on Nica, I told myself; I had to come up with something. How did the cheerleaders as my old school act?
I tossed my hair over my shoulder and smiled, “The bike is for exercise, you should really try it, and I didn’t feel like Juicy today” I explained and hoped that I was smiling a dazzling and confident smile. They were silent for a moment with confused looks on their faces, then people began to look at the one who’d called my name, she seemed ready to say something and smiled:
“Of course, I totally get it” the others followed with similar comments and then I turned to walk into the school.
“We should get to class” I said and started to walk towards the door that would hopefully get me away form these people, but then everyone hustled to follow me, people began to compliment me on my clothes and make-up.
I looked down on myself, I had taken a skirt that didn’t show off half my ass and a tank top that was bare in the back, I didn’t have any make up on and the only thing I’d done with my hair was so wash it and brush it with that odd looking round brush. I wouldn’t call this a Oh-my-god-I-love-you-outfit-you-look-like-a-move-star outfit. I just threw it on this morning, maybe I was being modest.
After a moment I realized that they were all following me, then I also realized that everyone was casting glances my way and stepping away as I made my way through the corridors. Was I the queen bee?
If that was the case I felt two things: 1, exited, my ego leaned back and laughed. 2, panic, this wasn’t what I was used to, and I wasn’t even sure that I wanted to be the queen bee.
Then I saw Mikael, I almost ran to him but instead I smiled, said that I was going to be right back and then I calmly walked over to him and followed him into his classroom.
“I’M freaking out!” I burst out as soon as he closed the door.
“That is understandable”
“I have boobs!”
“I can see that”
“What is going on! You have to tell me! I wake up in this freaking mess in someone else’s body after experiencing a car crash! A CAR CRASH! This is not normal! I must be dreaming because some girl just complimented me on my hair style when I didn’t even do anything!” out of breath I sat down on a chair. Mikael took place behind his desk and then calmly folded his hands over the desk.
“I can see why you’re upset, it’s very understandable in your situation but you will get used to it, I promise. Now, first before you do something stupid I’m going tell you about some of your abilities” he said with a smile. I gave him a `´huh?´´ look and he continued: “As a guardian you will have this sensibility to when someone is going to get hurt. You will need to control the urge to help the small incidents, like a paper cut or someone falling and bruising their knees, but we will get to that later. Then sometimes you can have visions, I don’t know if it will happen to you just yet but just in case it does I want you to be prepaid” he said all that with a smile.
I just looked at him. Was he crazy? Was I crazy? If this was the heaven my grandma always spoke about then I didn’t want it.
“Am I dead?”
“Yes you are”
I swallowed hard. So this wasn’t life then. I was dead. I had died from the car crash and were now in some surreal heaven or afterlife or whatever you wanted to call it.
“Your last body is indeed as dead as a doornail. But this body you’re in now, you’re just as alive as you ever were before, with some new abilities” Mikael said and open one of the drawers in his desk and then placed a small fabric pack on his desk in front of me. “That is yours now, this will alert you whenever there’s a big emergency as well as resuscitate you in case you die from injury” the last part had my chin dangling down by my knees. In case I die form injury? He was expecting me to die? “No Veronica, we all expect you to die to protect the humans,” Mikael said as if he’d guessed my thoughts.
“But…” I began but he held up a hand.
“No more questions, you’ll be late for your next class, take this, put it on and don’t take it off, never” he instructed pushing the pack closer to me.
“But!”
“Shh!”
“Bu-“
“Shh”
“B-“
“Off to class Ms Denver.” Mikael ordered. I got up, stuck my tongue out like a little kid, snatched the pack and stormed out of the classroom.


At first I thought that I would never be able to find my locker or my way to my classes but oddly enough I did. I found my locker and opened it without any trouble and then found the right classroom. It was a miracle!
As I sat in the classroom I got time to think about what was really happening. I came to the conclusion that I wasn’t crazy, just dead, or reincarnated (if that was the case then that had happened awfully fast). I did feel different but in a good way, I knocked over the occasional thing with my new longer arms.
I was ether in the real world or in a dream world were you should feel pain. The pain of stabbing my arm with my pencil was very real. Ether way, I was popular and not sure if I was comfortable with that.
As I stood by my locker with the other bees (I had without noticing it begun to call them that, the other girls that hung around me) a guy comes up to me, he’s fairly hot, a football guy, big and broad shouldered and to my dismay a little dirty hair.
Before I could say anything the bees parted like the red sea and the guy, the name Preston flue over my mind, pressed his very slimy lips to mine.
With an “oomph” I was pressed back towards the locker. Flattened to the extent that I couldn’t even breathe without pressing myself even harder towards his body. The very unpleasant sensation had bile rising in my throat and I quickly pushed him back. There was only so much I could do not to wipe my mouth with the back of my hand.
“Hi babe” the guy said smiling.
“Hi” I said and pushed him at arms length from me.
“Are you mad or something?” He asked. That’s when I realized he was the guy in the pictures, I particularly recalled one picture with his hand firmly parked on my rear. A shudder went thought my body at the memory.
“N-no, I… You just surprised me” I said and cringed just a little before adding “babe”.
He seemed satisfied with that answer, game me another slime snail kiss and then he and his buddies were off to do whatever they were going to do.

Impressum

Tag der Veröffentlichung: 23.03.2012

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