I was awoken to the sound of two students screaming in terror as they saw me. As I opened my eyes, all I saw was their backs, quickly running away. "Wow, what a night," I said to myself as I stretched. I got up the floor, I needed a fix, I needed to see my friends, and my stash was too far away for me to reach. Before I could choose what drug I would start my day with, I heard the noise of two men rushing to where I spent my days. I hid the drugs the best I could, but when the men arrived, they weren't looking at the drugs, they were looking at me, lying on the floor, right across from where I was standing.
"This is some trippy shit, I'm seeing myself," I said. One of the men stook out their hand, touched my arm, and told the other man, "No pulse." "We'll take her out of here when break is over. I don't want the students seeing this. Go call the Coroner, I'll stay here and make sure no students get close," said the man who touched my arm to the other man. I stood there watching the man, I even stood in front if his, and he didn't even notice me. The bell rang, and all the students went to their classrooms. The other man arrived and they picked up my body and took it with them.
Why did they want my body? I chased them, and screamed, "Hey, put down my body, you assholes!" They took my body to the nurse's office, and laid it on the bed inside. All of the school administrators stood around, talking about how it "finally happened." I screamed at them, and kept waving my hands in their faces, but they would not respond to anything I did. Eventually, my parents and Susie arrived, I knew they would respond to me. As soon as my dad saw my body, he broke down, and began to cry. Susie ran over to my body, got on her knees, squeezed my hand, and cried, "Why, oh why! You could have gotten help! I could have gotten you help!"
I couldn't take it anymore, my Bipolar side came out and screamed, "Seriously, you guy are really pissing me off! Now, start paying fucking attention to me!" It was after I made that comment, and I noticed my dad and Susie hugging while crying, that I heard a voice, a voice I had not heard for a long time. "Can't you tell, you're dead, dumbass," the voice said. I turned around to see who was talking, and the first thing I said, "Is it you, is it really you?" The voice then morphed into a person, while saying, "Yes, it's me, your mother, Cynthia." I had been waiting for this moment for 10 years, I ran to her, and embraced her. "Oh. mommy, oh, mommy," I cried out. "It's okay, it's okay," she said, patting the top of my head, "Also, sorry for calling you a dumbass, I just had to to it to get your attention."
As the Coroner took my body away, and my parents and Susie left the school, I stayed behind with my mom, sitting on a bench outside the school. "So, I'm dead, I'm really dead," I said. My mother turned around and said, "Yeah, you are. You overdosed, just like you mom before you." I didn't know what I would do for, well, eternity. I turned around to my mom and asked her, "So, is this the afterlife?" She looked at me and said, "Well, not exactly. Your "case" still needs to be determined to find out where you will spend eternity. Plus, you also need to accept your death, or something like that, cause them, you just roam the earth forever." "You mean like Heaven or Hell," I said. "Yeah, pretty much. But if you end up with me, you could join me in a card game with Idi Amin Dada every Tuesday," my mother offered. I turned around, looked at her, and said, "Wait, you're in Hell." "Well, yeah. But it's only cause I might have tipped over some candles, burning down my distance relatives mansion, thus killing my first cousin thrice removed's wife and my second cousin twice removed's husband at their Christmas party in 1972. But, in all fairness, my first cousin thrice removed's wife is also in Hell, so you know I must have done some good by getting rid of her," she said casually.
After a while, the silence was a bit awkward, giving my mom the perfect opportunity to leave. "Well, it's getting late, I better be getting back. If you're not back for your eternal punishment, you get punished twice. I'm not sure how that works, but I'd rather not question it," she said getting off the bench. I got up and followed her, "Wait, wait what about me. You can't leave me here all alone. And, where are my friends?" My mom came back to me and tried to explain it to me, "I guess since you are no longer alive, you are no longer Schizophrenic. Yet, you were quite Bipolar inside, so I really don't know what I'm talking about." "See you soon, well, hopefully I don't see you, for your sake," she said as she walked away, into a different plane.
That was it, I was alone, completely alone in this world. I made my way to the back of the Cafeteria, the place I had died. I thought that if I got high, I would be able to see my friends again. I got my hands on every drug I had, but nothing worked. I got so frustrated, I threw everything everywhere. I screamed from the top of my lungs, "Ah, why can't I hallucinate! Hallucinate, you! Hallucinate!" I lied there, crying on the floor, completely lonely, until my wish was granted in some way. Phil asked, "Why you crying?" I got off the floor to see the entire gang standing there. "You came, you actually came," I cried out. "Yes, you need us right now," Tommy said as he put his hand on my shoulder. We all stood next to the wall, talking about my situation. "Well, Angelica, I think you have learned your lesson about drugs," Chuckie said. All I could do is look at him and say while slightly chuckling, "No, no I haven't." "That's our Angelica," Lil remarked.
They managed to comfort me for quite a while, but just like my mother, they vanished as well. It was late, so I decided to return home. I slept in my room, my parents had no idea, well, maybe my dad could sense the presence of his little girl. For the remainder of the week, my dad did not go to work and Susie did not go to school, they stayed all day at my home, organizing my funeral. Susie felt as if she had some responsibility to take part in the funeral arrangements, if only I could thank her from beyond the grave. The funeral was scheduled for next Saturday, all of my reletives came, even some I didn't know that well. Come Saturday, I stood in the back of the crowd at the cemetery. Many of the people who attended spoke at my funeral, many of them my fellow students. It appeared as if only most of the adults and Susie displayed any emotions, the rest of them stayed quite silent. I don't know what came over me, but I felt really disrespected and screamed, "How dare you guys not show any emotions, this is the worst funeral ever!"
I listened to everyone give the same generic cliché funeral speech about how the departed one will be misses. Hell, not even Sean Butler could make me feel anything, and I'm pretty sure I had a short fling with him, I was high for the majority of the last couple of years, so don't blame me for not remembering. All he did was talk about how life would now be even tougher for his infant daughter, which he held in his arms through his entire speech. I just couldn't take it, I knew nobody could hear me, but I just had to scream, "You know, now I am really pissed I died, because you showed me how much my funeral sucked! It seems you accomplished to show me how little you cared about me, because that is the only excuse you guys have for this atrocity you call a funeral!"
As I stood in the back, trying to control the anger I had at the people at my funeral, a blond, wheelchair-bound man in his early forties approached the podium. I didn't know who he was, but I decided to give him a chance to redeem my funeral. He got up in front of everybody and said, "Hello, everyone. My name is William Anderson, and I am the third cousin twice removed of the departed, Angelica Pickles." "A very distant relative who came all this way to come to my funeral, maybe he could save my funeral," I thought. The man continued to speak, "I never met Angelica, I didn't have the opportunity. You see, I lost my contact with my family when I was young, and in an attempt to reconnect with them, I found out about Cynthia. But, when I found out she died a few years ago, I decided to track down any living relatives, and all I could find was Angelica. I had to come to Los Angeles for a business meeting, and I decided to come to Yucaipa and meet Angelica, but it appears I was too late," William said nearly breaking down.
He turned his attention from the podium, and turned it to the people in the audience, he said, "Like Angelica, I don't have that many memories of my mother, or at least good memories. I wanted to have a relationship with Angelica, but now, all I can hope for Angelica is that she can fine peace wherever she is. She might have made some mistakes in her short life, but, I will always remember Angelica. she will always have a place in my heart. She reminds me that I must continue looking for my family, no matter how many dead-ends I end up in." "Also, it's not easy to forget someone who owed so much money to different international crime organizations. Never before have I met someone who brought Mexicans, Chinese, Russians, and Blacks together in a hatred of a young White woman who owed them for so many drugs," William said nearly chuckling.
William's speech really moved me, he was a bit of a self-centered smartass for awhile, but he still moved me. He spoke some more about how his life experiences made him feel as if he had a connection with me, he even sang a song at the end. After my casket had been lowered into my grave, William comforted Susie, who expressed the most emotions. Even after Susie stopped crying, William was talking to her about me. Susie would tell him stories about my childhood, and William would learn something new about his family, even if it was a distant branch of his family. It was William's speech that helped me accept my death, I was finally able to move on. As the gravedigger filled my grave with soil, my ghost transcended from this world to the spirit realm, I guess that my "case" had finally been determined.