What would happen if you didn't wake up?
My name is Natara Williams. I'm 33 years old. I like Chinese food, especially Mongolian Beef, and I died today.
I know, I know, way to drop a bomb. I like Chinese food, I died? They don't really go together. Except, in this case, they do. I died today doing something as ordinary as brushing your teeth, or eating your favorite food. I died doing something that I love, so at least I have that. It's something, when I don't seem to have anything. It'll always be something.
I was shot in the chest. Very noble, I know. The creep popped me off and fled as soon as I fell. My partner stayed with me for the few minutes I lived with a gunshot wound in me, trying desperately keep me alive, to no avail. When he realized her couldn't save me, he personally made it his mission to teach this jackass a lesson. When they caught the guy about 3 miles up the road, Mal punched his lights out. Very satisfying.
We'd been investigating a series of serial murders for a few months now. The leads kept pouring in, and I finally thought, Wow, this is the case where we'll actually get to bring him back in handcuffs. We'll actually solve this one without someone dying or something going wrong.
My mistake.
Edgar Daniels. My personal murderer. It sounds like a butler when you say it like that, but I guess that's what he is. My killer. You see, it was Mal who was supposed to get shot. Not that I wish it had been him instead of me, but Edgar didn't mean to shoot me. I kind of got in the way, you know, saving Mal's life.
It was what I had always wanted to do. That is, die protecting someone's life. When I joined the FBI I swore that I would always give my life for an innocent, and that's what I did. So in a way, I don't think I was really murderer. It's more like, a work related accident. Like an unfortunate situation in which a construction worker is buried under a pile of his own ruble? Yeah, been there done that. Turns out it was the jealous co -worker who didn't get the promotion.
I know I died. I'm dead. I look down on the life I used to have and I can't believe it. I never thought people would care so much if I died. I mean, people die everyday. I personally have viewed hundreds of murders in my life, and have conducted a few myself. But only to the scumbags who deserved it.
People do care. They care so much more than I ever could have thought. My sister is pulling out her fingernails, screaming and tearing things apart. My mother won't leave her room. And my father, whom I had no idea cared for me at all, is weeping. Real genuine tears. It's amazing.
And Mal. He's not the same. I doubt he ever will be. I miss him. I see him throwing a television and hurting himself, and ruining his life, and I want to help. I want to go all psycho mind-freaky on him like I used to, and convince him that his life is worth it. If it wasn't, I wouldn't have had any good reason to jump in front of that bullet that was meant for him.
Everyday I'm up in this strange new world, I wonder what I would be doing if I was alive. Right now, I'd be going over the case files with Mal over lunch at the deli, and he'd make some kind of a joke about how these murders really worked up an appetite, and I'd swat him and laugh, and be so glad that I had him.
No more.
He's worth it. Mal Is worth more than I've ever known. He wasn't just a partner. He was a friend, a best friend, or even more than that. I'll never really get to know now. But that's okay. I don't need to know. I just need to know that if I took my last breath on earth, and my blood drained into a pool around me, that everyone else would be okay. Everyone that I love and care about.
For now, I'm getting along fine. Sometimes it hits me all at once and I want to scream and cry and wonder why it had to be me. But those are the worst times. On good days, I'm thankful that I went out protecting someone I love, and that things on earth are moving right along, even without me. I know that Edgar's getting a life sentence or 2 for the 5 murders he committed, including mine, and it's enough. It's enough to know that because of me, he won't be able to kill anymore girls, ever again.
And that'll always be good enough for me.
Would it be okay?
