The people you meet in Heaven

This story was written as part of my GCSE, and is loosely based on Mitch Alboms 5 people you meet in heaven. Just to let you know I'm not religious but the idea of heaven is a nice one. Enjoy!





As I lay in bed staring up to the dark ceiling with the stars twinkling out of the window, an immense feeling of fear suddenly filled my thoughts and all I could think of was my life, my past. Emotion filled my entire being as everything I had ever regretted took over my vision.  Blackness.  An infinite blackness. Nothingness... then suddenly a bright blue light appeared and I could hear people, smell food, and I could feel stone. I got to my feet and staggered over to what I assumed was some kind of bar stool. I had no idea where I was. I heard a soft voice coming from behind me,

“Hola señor!” I turned apprehensively to see who the voice belonged to. The voice, it turned out, belonged to a Spanish woman, long flowing brown hair and stunningly blue eyes.

“Bienvenido al el cielo del hotel!” I stood there unsure what to say. I wasn’t exactly in the mood for pleasantries, as what I really wanted to be doing right now was sleeping, so I just rudely asked,

“What?” At a closer look at the woman I noticed she was glowing, a soft, white glow and had large feathery wings folded behind her, a golden halo shone above her head. I had just been so rude to this woman and I felt awful but before I could apologise she had continued,

“You are in Hotel Heaven señor, I am sure you will enjoy it here.” I stood back slightly to get a view of what was behind the woman. When I saw what was there my jaw dropped, my eyes widened and my hands fell to my side, limp from the sheer beauty of what was there. A hotel towering into the clouds made from some sort of gold, studded with brilliant white, glowing diamonds filled most of my view. In front of the fantastic hotel was a massive turquoise pool reflecting the magnificent light from the sun. The pool was surrounded by beige stone tiles and thousands of sun loungers. More glowing people went around the pool serving drinks and food to yet more people. A giant archway through the hotel showed a stunning blue sea and palm trees lined a long walkway. I turned back to the woman who was now drinking a piña colada with a little pink umbrella poking out of the top of it. She started to speak again after having a sip from her drink,

“As I have said this is Hotel Heaven and the island it is on is based on the Canary Islands of Earth. My name is Angel Sara, and I will be your hotel representative and will be making sure your stay here is as comfortable and pleasurable as possible. The hotel as you can tell is large and you will take a while getting used to it. Please feel free to explore the island, but be aware of the cave just off the coast of Golden Sands beach. You will be staying in our deluxe Redención Suite, número five. All restaurants serve all food, all day, every day. All bars serve all drinks, all day, every day. Please ask any questions that you may have.” She stood there smiling at me, waiting for me to say something. My mouth was dry from hanging open for so long, so I took a glass of water from a passing waiter and had a sip. Although I was in complete awe at the place, I didn’t particularly appreciate being taken into Heaven without, what I assumed was the reason people went to Heaven, dying.

“When and how the Hell did I die?” From the moment the words left my lips I realised the stupidity of saying ‘Hell’ when I was in ‘Heaven’, but nonetheless Sara replied,

“Well, you died about half an hour ago and you died because my manager poisoned your drink to kill you and get you up here. Any other questions?”

“Why would your manager want me dead?”

“Simple, you made cinco very bad decisions, and we all know that cinco bad decisions mean muerte.” I was beginning to get annoyed at Sara constantly throwing Spanish words into her sentences as I didn’t understand a single Spanish word.

“Who is your manager?” Sara looked at me, as if trying to work out whether to tell me or not. She stood there for five long minutes, whilst the sun shone down onto the back of my neck. I suddenly felt extremely embarrassed; I looked down at myself and saw that I was still wearing my pyjamas. I went red as I noticed some of the people glancing at me and then pointing me out to their friends. Sara continued,

“My manager is Sir Death; I cannot tell you where he resides, as I don’t know myself. But I do know that you don’t want to meet him, for if you do then you will surely die, and you would go to the after-death.”

“How can anyone die again, this is Heaven.”

“Well, I don’t know, no one knows, all anybody can tell you is that after you die again there is nothing. But what I do know is that Hotel Heaven has been designed to ensure maximum comfort and safety. You may go to the reception to book any excursions you want, if you need me I will be in there too. Before I go I need to sing the personalised Hotel Heaven jingle,

‘When you’re in Hotel Heaven,

You’re no longer in Devon,

But if you do die,

Please say good bye!’” I stood there as she headed off to the massive hotel; she turned round shouted,

“Catch!” and threw my room keys at me.

         I entered my hotel suite to find that I had to squint, because of how bright the room was. The walls shone a brilliant white, as if they were made from pure light. I continued into the bedroom where I found that my jaw dropped open so fast that it actually kind of hurt. The bed spanned the entire width of the room; spearmints lined the bed and the pillows were soft and puffy clouds on top of a sky blue mattress. I went back into the living area to find that a welcome basket had appeared there. In the basket were juicy fruits, sticky toffees and many other foods that I’d never seen before. The smell filled my nostrils, it felt like I was in Heaven, until I realised that I was in Heaven, which made me remember I was dead, which in turn made me feel slightly depressed. That was until I entered the restaurant for brunch.

        The restaurant was a vast open space with seats placed around a large conveyor belt, with all manner of food rotating around it. I took a seat next to a ginger man with a pencil like moustache. I thought I recognised his face but couldn’t recall from where from nor could I think of his name. I went to get some toast but the man next to me shouted out,

“It’s you! It’s really you. I’ve been waiting for you to die and come up here. Oh, I’m so pleased that you’re finally dead!” I was slightly taken aback by his manner, as unlike me he seemed positively elated by my being dead. When I noticed that most of the restaurant was looking at me and the ginger man, I decided to ignore him. A platter of sausages came around the conveyor, and I took a few for my plate, a large gold bowl of baked beans rolled around and I took a big spoon of them, eventually the toast came around again and I took two slices. I went to take a bite from a sausage, when the ginger man slapped me on the back and shouted,

“Don’t you remember me?” I would’ve answered, but I was too busy choking on the sausage. The ginger man stared at me as I swallowed the sausage, and then took a long swig from a glass of water,

“No, should I?” I replied, probably sounding quite annoyed at the man. The man’s eyes widened menacingly, which unnerved me slightly, he picked up his fork, looked at me, then smiled and laughed,

“Got ya!” he laughed, I gave a nervous laugh in return, the man continued, “You thought I was going to kill you didn’t you? Just like you killed me.” I looked at him, wondering if he used to be a lunatic, before he died.

“How did I kill you?” I asked, the man looked up to the ceiling, as if in deep thought and then he spoke,

“I was homeless and I decided that I would sleep outside of a business building as I thought that all the rich business men and women would give me enough money to buy a blanket and a bottle of water, I wasn’t going to go to one of the shelters for the homeless, I didn’t need any sympathy, just money. Everyone was giving me a couple pennies and eventually I had three pounds, all I needed was two more pounds and I’d be set for the night. It was getting quite late and everyone was going home and then you came out, the last one and by the looks of it the wealthiest. You looked at where I was sitting and just walked on. I grabbed your leg and started pleading for some money; you swore at me, told me to stop dirtying the streets and then kicked me hard in the chest and I fell backwards onto the floor. That night it snowed heavily and the building didn’t have much shelter nor did any of the surrounding buildings, I wandered the streets in the cold and bitter darkness. I was struggling to walk because of your kick and I eventually collapsed in the street and died of hyperthermia. The reason I am so happy that you’re here is that I wanted you to know what a major part you had in killing me, because of your kick and ‘wonderful generosity’ you killed me, thanks!” I couldn’t think of what to say in reply, so I simply said,

“I’m sorry about that.”

The conveyor continued to rotate, but then it stuttered causing a gloopy pink blamanche to fall off the belt onto the ginger man’s lap. Despite every instinct in my body telling me to hold it in, I laughed out loud and instantly regretted it as the ginger man got up and left the restaurant, leaving a trail of blamanche behind him. I turned to face the man to my left and asked,

“Should I follow him and apologise?” The man who I had asked was wearing a black hood which shadowed his face. Rather than a reply he waved a hand, “I’ll take that as a definite maybe then.” The man in the hood showed me the back of his hand and then slapped it around my face, and then pointed at a mop against the wall and then at the floor,

“Can’t you do it?” The hooded man turned to face me and despite not being able to see his face I felt as if his eyes were boring into me, “OK, no need to be pushy.”

         Later that day I went to find the ginger man. I found him sitting by the pool; I sat next to him and dipped my feet into the cool pool water,

“Look, I’m sorry about earlier” The ginger man looked at me and seemed perfectly happy again,

“Don’t worry about it. Anyway, I have someone here who wants to meet you,” A man with grey hair walked over. It was my old boss, Mr. Roland.

“Good to see you again Mr. Roland, how are you?”

“I’m dead, nah, I’m fine, you?”

“I’m good, if you don’t mind my asking how did you die?” Mr. Roland looked into the pool, as if he was studying an interesting artefact. He looked up and replied,

“Stress, pure and simple stress. You know when you worked for me we became good friends, didn’t we?” I nodded in agreement, “Well I promoted you to be my executive assistant. You did a great job, anyway a new post came for you in another business that paid double the price and was pretty much next to where you lived. You would’ve been stupid not take it, and so you took it. You taking that job put me under immense pressure as none of the other workers were anywhere near as good as you were. The business plummeted into the red and it demanded all my energy to keep the business going. Then one day I snapped like stick, I just couldn’t take it without you there to help me, so I went home, got a rope and hung myself, though, like the business, I failed at killing myself and the rope snapped. I went crazy, I couldn’t control myself. I was a monster, lashing out at anybody and everybody. Then, it got to a stage when I couldn’t take it anymore, and my friend couldn’t come to comfort me, so I jumped off the top of my company building and it all ended. No more stress, just peace and Heaven.” I was speechless; it was like somebody had removed my ability to speak. The sun bore down on me, the pool reflected in Mr. Roland’s glasses and the light made the ginger man’s hair give off a slight orange haze. On the other side of the pool, I saw the hooded man walk by and look at me. I looked around and saw that Mr. Roland and the ginger man were laughing with each other. It seemed that talking about death didn’t really bother Mr. Roland much, so I joined the conversation, until I realised that they were laughing at me because I hadn’t rolled my trouser legs up when I had put my feet in the pool. Embarrassed, I left as red as a tomato.

         I threw myself onto the soft bed, and lay there thinking about all that had happened in the last few hours. I decided that I should get off the bed after I realised there was a lump beneath me that seemed to be moving. When I got up and looked at the bed, I realised that I had been lying on top of somebody who was in a heavy sleep. I couldn’t quite work out why there was somebody in my bed, until I realised that I was in room six, not five. Obviously the occupant had left the door unlocked and I wasn’t paying close attention to the room numbers. I tried to sneak out of the room quietly and quickly, but I wasn’t looking where I was going and walked straight into the closed bedroom door. I shouted out in pain, and woke up the occupant who then screamed when they saw me. I turned to face them, and then I realised that the person I was looking at was a blonde woman I used to know in secondary school, Amy White. The moment she recognised me she blushed. She was the first to speak,

“Hi, what you doing on my bed?”

“Wrong room.” She looked at me with a quizzical look, “I’m telling the truth.”

“I’ll believe you, but should I forgive you?”

“I think you should, I got the wrong room and thought that it was my bed. Seriously, I didn’t think you would be asleep in what I thought was my bed.” She shook her head and laughed,

“What?” I asked,

“I wasn’t talking about that. I meant should I forgive you for getting me into Heaven in the first place?” My thoughts suddenly turned back to what I was thinking moments ago, was I to blame for Amy’s death as well? Amy saw that I was in thought and so waited before continuing,

“Remember when we got together at the high school reunion… that was the night I died. Me and my mates were going to go to a bar after the reunion, and I was going to ask you out there as well. But when I invited you to come you said that you needed to be into work early the next day and so you couldn’t come. Before I could give you my mobile number the old head teacher started his speech. After he had finished, you went off to the loo and when you got back I was talking to an old mate of mine who had recently lost his assistant and his business about to go bankrupt. Then before I knew it the reunion was over and you had said your goodbyes, for the very last time. When me and my mates went to the bar we had a laugh, but then one by one they left, until it was me and nobody else. The visiting DJ for the bar changed the music to a slow song and called for lovers to come up and dance. I ordered a drink and downed it one. I kept ordering drink after drink, until I was completely bladdered. I staggered out of the bar and it was nearly five in the morning. Drunk, I crossed the road and got into my car, I drove and drove; I went past your house at least five times. I fell asleep at the wheel and my car stopped for some reason on a railway line. I woke up only when I heard the ‘ding ding ding’ noise that told me that a train was coming. That was that, my life was over, all because of a petty little crush and one too many to drink.” I stood there in absolute silence; I could hear my heart thumping so fast it was as if it was trying to escape. I was glad the room was dimly lit, as I would have hated for Amy to see the tear drop roll down my cheek. I gave Amy a sad goodbye and then left back to my actual room. The ginger man came running up to me,

“Guess what?!”

“What?” I replied miserably, the ginger man could sense I was upset and so continued in a slightly calmer manner,

“Tonight there is going to be a live performance by Elvis Presley himself. It’s sure to turn that frown upside down!” I gave a fake smile and stupidly responded,

“Elvis is dead; it’ll be some impersonator or something…”

“Where are we…? I’ll give you a clue- it’s where dead people go. You know sometimes it’s better to keep your mouth shut and appear stupid than open it and remove all doubt!” I laughed at my stupidity and agreed to go and see Elvis perform. The hooded man walked past and glared at me. It felt as if he was digging deep into me like a mole digs deep into the ground.

“See you tonight then,” He left back in the direction he came from. I entered my room and looked in the entertainment brochure to see that Elvis was performing on the top floor of the hotel at eight o’clock.

         Eight o’clock came and I headed to the lift with the ginger man. The lift was extremely spacious and the walls were made from a glossy mahogany wood with golden trimmings and the ceiling was decorated with diamonds, twinkling like the sky at night. It reminded me of what I saw through my window before I died, it had been a clear night then. Before I could continue studying the lift someone else walked in. It was Dominic Taylor, one of my best friends from work, until he went missing on New Year’s Eve that is. I had a terrible feeling that he was about to tell me how I was in some way responsible for his death as well. Dominic walked over to me squeezing in-between the ginger man and an old man of whom I didn’t know.

“So, how you been holding up then?” Dominic asked,

“I was doing fine until this morning,”

“What happened this morning?” Dominic asked in reply,

“I died” I stated simply. Dominic gave an apologetic smile,

“What I wouldn’t give to get my life back.” The lift stopped and with a soft ‘ting’ the doors slid open and the old man left. Now it was just me, Dominic and the ginger man. The doors slid closed with a quiet ‘hiss’ and the lift continued up wards. The lift suddenly shuddered to a halt halfway between the top floor and the 9999th floor. I looked at the control panel and saw that the lights were all of, and the help button had broken off somewhere. The ginger man noticed a hatch at the top of the lift,

“Give me a leg up” I helped the ginger man up to the top of lift and he opened the hatch. The ginger man climbed through it and then called for me to get out as well. I put my hands on the edge of the hatch and started to pull myself up. Suddenly the hatch door slammed shut on top of my fingers and caused me to fall to the floor like a dead fly. The hatch buckled so we could not get out and we were stuck in the lift. Dominic slid down the lift wall to sit on the floor and I followed suit. The light flickered and Dominic started to speak again,

“I was on a walk one day and it started to rain heavily. I hailed a taxi and asked for a lift to the friend I was visiting; he’d recently gone bankrupt and was going a bit crazy, so I was going to comfort him. You called me and said that you desperately needed me at work. So, I rang up Peter Roland and said I would meet up with him at another time, and told him not to do anything stupid and then went to help you at work. That was a hard day’s work, so I went straight home afterwards and fell to sleep. The next day I rang up Peter and left a message saying that I’d go and see him that night. So, I went at around nine pm knowing that he had slightly nocturnal habits. I knocked on his flat door and he didn’t answer. I asked the landlord to check his apartment, and the he said it was empty. I decided to check his company building, where I was shocked to discover his body at the bottom of it. I ran over to him, and was pleased to see he was still breathing, even if very slowly. Stupidly, I had left my phone at home, and there was nobody there, they were all celebrating New Year’s Eve. I ran across the road and kept on running until I found somebody. Then out of nowhere a car being driven by a drunken blonde woman crashed into me and I was rammed over a railway line, then I was hit by the flying debris of the car after it was hit by a train. That was my life over and all because I didn’t comfort Peter the day before.” I gave a long sigh, yet another death that I was to be blamed for in one way or another.

“I’m sorry mate. I didn’t even know you’d died. I had heard on the news about a train-car collision, but they said that all victims were unrecognisable.” In the distance I could hear the ‘Elvis Heaven’ performance being announced just as the lift sprung back into life. The doors slid open and the ginger man came to greet me. I heard my keys drop so I turned around to pick them up. In the corner of the lift I could see the hooded man looking down at me. I left the lift and the doors slid shut.

         The next day went by with no more stories involving me causing someone’s death. I ate breakfast and lunch at the restaurant I had eaten at the day before. Afterwards, the ginger man and I went down to the pool and grabbed a couple of sun beds to catch a bit of midday sun.

“Is this what you imagined Heaven to be like?” I asked the ginger man,

“No, it’s not. I went to the library after breakfast and found a book on the myths of Heaven. There was one myth that said that just off the shore of golden sands beach is a mystical cave; in the cave is an orb which can grant one wish to one person just after the sun sets. It also says that to get to the orb two people are needed. It didn’t say what you’d have to do to get it but it did ask ‘What will you decide?’ at the end of the chapter.” I sat there for a while thinking that if this place really existed then I could wish that I could go back to before I made those bad choices, before I died.

“Do you want to go tonight” I asked, the ginger man smiled.

         That evening, just as the sun started to set, the ginger man and I hired a boat from the aptly named ‘Golden Sands’ beach, named perfectly as the beach was actually made from gold dust, which shone a brilliant golden glow; in the distance I saw the hooded figure. We got into the boat and sped off in the direction of the cave. After about five minutes we parked the boat on the shore in the cave. I turned around to see a beautiful orange sunset over the horizon, a cloud floated past as the sun dipped out of view. The only light came from a misty pool at the back of the cave. We climbed some rocky steps and when we reached the top we saw that the cave went on almost indefinitely. I turned to see the ginger man’s jaw had dropped, like mine had when I had first seen Hotel Heaven. I heard a loud thunderclap and I turned around to see that the calm night had quickly turned into a thunderstorm. We carried on walking along a rocky walkway and found another set of steps that went down into a large space that echoed loudly. I could hear the slow dripping of water coming from all around me. We reached the bottom of the steps and walked across the long cavernous space towards the misty pool. As we reached the pool we heard a whooshing sound. We looked up to see that at the end of the cave was a glowing orb. We ran up another set of steps and then across a rock bridge and finally down yet another flight of stairs. We were confronted by a golden gate that materialised in front of us and it loomed above us. It made me feel like an ant standing next to a skyscraper. We walked up to the gate and found that we couldn’t open it. I noticed a golden podium with a slightly raised standing platform. I pointed it out to the ginger man, who then went and stood on the platform. The gates opened just enough to allow me through; I wandered through them, wondering what lay ahead of me. I turned and called the ginger man over. The moment he stepped off the platform the gates slammed shut, echoing around the large space. I knew then that the ginger man wouldn’t be able to get in, unless I stayed out. I considered letting him take the orb, but then I remembered, that my wish would mean that neither me nor the ginger man would have died in the first place. The orb glowed on top of a stone pedestal, which was on a ledge with no clear way of getting to it. I turned to face the ginger man who just shrugged at me.

“There’s no way of getting to it” I called to him; he pointed to his ears and shook his head. He couldn’t hear me. I turned around and was shocked that a golden staircase had appeared without a sound. I climbed the staircase my legs like jelly and my arms feeling weak. I stood behind the pedestal and picked up the orb and raised it high above my head. I looked down and saw the ginger man slap his forehead. I realised that it was because I had actually picked up a piece of crumbly stone instead of the orb. I laughed to myself. Despite the moment being a once in a death time opportunity I had managed to make myself look stupid. I picked up the actual orb and raised it high above my head,

“I wish that I could go back to my old life, before I made all the decisions that killed all the people I have met!” Nothing happened; I heard footsteps coming from above me. I looked up to see that the hooded man was on a platform high above me. He spoke in a low deep voice,

“You can’t do that. Time travel is impossible.” I put the orb down and buried my head in my hands. I looked up,

“Who are you?” I already had an idea of who it was, but when he answered he confirmed my fears,

“I am Death.” I remembered back to the day before, Sara had spoken about Death, ‘for if you do then you will surely die’, Death continued,

“I understand that you have met the four people who you killed, they’re the reason your dead. Four deaths, how can you live with yourself… oh that’s right you’re not. I killed you!” I gulped,

“Sara said that I made five very bad decisions. My guess is that four of them were those people I… I… I killed. But what was my fifth?” Death chuckled to himself,

“Your fifth bad decision has not been made yet. It doesn’t have to either, you will decide. You’re with the orb and that orb has the power to bring you and only you back to life, remember one wish only, and the orb cannot be tricked. You have already killed four people. You are the reason four people cannot live on Earth. Did you know that the day after the ginger man died a philanthropist came to the building where you had kicked him and this person was giving thousands to the poor? Did you know that the day after Mr. Roland committed suicide an investor was looking into buying some of his business? Did you know that the day after Amy White died you would have met her again in a chance encounter and she would have been able to tell you her true feelings? And did you know that if you hadn’t called Dominic Taylor that day he would’ve met the love of his life at the support group he would’ve taken Mr. Roland to and then get happily married? NO! You did not consider anybody’s feelings or possible chances in life when you made your seemingly small decisions. All you had to do was give two pounds, a helping hand, a mobile phone number and not make that call for help, and nobody you killed would be dead, and you would be at home tucked up in bed, not in a damp cold cave feeling sorry for yourself. Take a moment and think what you have done and then make your choice!” Death vanished. I started to think about what he had said, but then there was a loud crashing noise and I saw that one of the walls of the cave had burst open and water came rushing in. Being so high up I was fine, but the ginger man was being swept off his feet and struggling to stay afloat. I felt water drip onto my back and saw that a crack was forming on the wall behind me. I could wish my life back and go back home, go to my job, and tell others of my journey. I could live again, and I could make sure I made no more bad decisions. I saw that another wall had burst on the other side of the gate. The hole on my side of the gate sealed itself, and a clear barrier was forming in the gaps of the gate. I was safe but the water kept on rising and I could see the ginger man thrashing about in the water, struggling to stay above the water. I could wish the water away and save the ginger man. I could start a new ‘life’ in Heaven. Make up to the people who I had killed. My brain urged me to save myself, but my heart screamed for me to save the ginger man. It suddenly occurred to me that I didn’t even know the ginger man’s name. My heart managed to push my brain away. I grabbed the orb, and the wall behind me burst and water flooded out from it, I clung onto the orb and as I fell from the platform I yelled,

“I WISH THAT THE WATER WOULD GO AWAY!” Nothing happened for five long seconds, and then the water began to rapidly disappear. The ginger man fell onto the raised podium platform and the gates opened. Soaking wet and emotionally exhausted, I ran towards the ginger man. I fell to the floor next to him, his eyes were closed. He was not breathing. The orb formed into a string of golden light and flowed into the ginger man’s mouth. He stuttered and coughed. He was alive. The ginger man had survived.

         The next day, both the ginger man and I entered the restaurant for breakfast. We ate an excellent breakfast of scrambled egg, bacon and toast. Mike Badrin, the ginger man, couldn’t stop smiling after he had told me his name. The conveyor belt stuttered and a blamanche fell onto the both us. We both laughed. My life in death had just begun.