He wouldn't let him think of her, or the possibility of an afterlife. Just because he had two patients, both wanting to die because of their hopes or beliefs in what comes next, didn't mean that there was "something next." Didn't it?

He closed his eyes and could see her still – blue eyes laughing, blond hair blowing in the wind. She was so optimistic, always upbeat – he'd always found that odd considering her career. She was a social worker, mostly dealing with abused children on a daily basis. She dealt with all kinds of the scum of humanity every single day, yet she always kept a smile on her face – for the kids, she'd say – they need to see a smile.

Only he'd ever seen the smile drop from her face – he was the only one who saw the frustration. It was only fair – she played sole witness to his. That was why he loved her. Sure, she was attractive and physically he had no complaints, but it was the ones who could make your daily work frustrations disappear at the end of the day – those were the keepers.

She had been working a difficult case, a mother had been poisoning her children – a toddler had died. With no husband or other family, she had placed the other two children in protective foster care. The mother had not been happy, and had gone as far as showing up at her office, threatening her unless she gave the children back to her. Building security had to physically remove the mother from the office. But what had bothered her most was the children's questions about whether their little brother was in Heaven, and would their mother still go to Heaven?

That was what had started their discussion – or more appropriately, argument – about an afterlife. He did not believe, and she did, faithfully and as unwavering as the smile she always wore. He was a med student, he believed in the science, the body, in the parts you could test and touch and see. She believed that there was a reason behind it all, that there was more than just blood and bones. He'd only believed what could be proven and had challenged her to prove him her beliefs. "Fine," she had laughed, "If I die first, I'll come back and tell you about what comes next."

"You do that," he retorted, in his daytime voice, "But I won't hold my breath."

That had caused a moment of silence, her blue eyes showing a mixture of hurt and challenge. She had never looked more beautiful to him, more passionate than at that moment. "And what if you go first?" she spoke calmly, in her daytime voice, with a small smile. "Will you come back and tell me?"

"Oh, please," he rolled his eyes and started to turn away, but she grabbed his arm. Placing her other had on his chin, she made him look at her, "Will you?"

"If you're right, I'll come back so you can say, 'I told you so'," he gave in, not really meaning it.

"Promise," she gripped his chin harder, knowing he was bullshitting her. "Mean it - you'll actually come back, haunt me and let me say 'I told you so'."

He wasn't sure that she was teasing him anymore, there was something almost wavering in her voice – as if her convictions about the possibility of an afterlife were not as strong as his that there is not one. "I promise," he finally relented, noting the relief in her expression. "But we both know you're going to die first. Only the good die young," he tried to be charming and gave her a smile of his own.

If he had known the truth of his words, he would have never said them. As if by not saying them, they would not come true. He remembered vividly the police standing in front of their Baltimore rowhouse, asking him his name and if he knew her. The mother had come back, but had not entered the building – she'd been shot leaving her office earlier that afternoon, on her way to meet with a judge about the children's case. The mother had upgraded from poison to pistol – she had actually tried to talk the mother into putting the gun down and the last bullet in the gun had got a lucky break, straight into the forehead.

She'd died on the sidewalk before the medics had even gotten to her. She'd died alone, a single bullet to the brain, because she was trying to help, because she had believed in the goodness of people. She had believed in a possible goodness in a woman who had lied to her for two months before her child died and toxicology showed the Clorox build-up in the toddler's body. His belief in any innate goodness of people died that day with her.

He'd waited, through the funeral, through the mourning, wading through his med school classes – waiting for her to come tell him "I told you so." He even got kicked out of school waiting – he was so distracted, so changed from her murder, he hadn't been able to study – and had resorted to cheating. He packed up their rental house, finally letting go of her belongings – shipping them back to her family in upstate New York – and moved on, bitter and angry at the world and it's people.

She had never come back to haunt him. He'd wanted her to, he wanted to be wrong, but she never came back. When the patient today said there was an afterlife, it had come rushing back to him, and he wondered if it was just him. Had he become so cynical that he couldn't believe in any signs she might have sent? Had there been any signs? He couldn't remember any, not a single one – but maybe he hadn't been in the right frame of mind to see them. He flipped the knife open and closed, the same knife his patient had attempted suicide with, and contemplated. If there is something, if there was a way to know – what if the patient was right?

It wasn't that he wanted to die, he reasoned, he just needed to know. It wasn't a suicide attempt, it was an experiment in the name of science. To be safe, he picked up the phone and dialed. Satisfied that he would pull through, he took one last look at the knife, whispering "Tell me, Kerry, tell me I'm wrong," before plunging it into the light socket across from him.