A/N: Thank you to everyone who has favorited, alerted, and reviewed. I am glad you like this story- it's something that I have been working on in my head for some time now and am just now putting it into words. I will say, however, that my updates on this won't be fast. There are a LOT of things that I have to sort out and thumb through to make sure everything will make sense enough. I appreciate your patience on this one. The Bar and A Love on the Water will be updated regularly. :)

Thanks again! :)

Chapter 2

My grandmother had left a short bit ago, but not before telling me that I had to spend the rest of the evening by my lonesome. My mental exhaustion, coupled with her promise to return by sunrise, allowed me to be strangely okay with the idea. I couldn't have protested even if I had wanted to. Every new departed spends their first night alone. I'm still not quite sure what this place is. Perhaps it's heaven. It seems familiar and safe, warm and calm. No pearly white gates though. Or St. Peter. I make a mental note to myself that my first question when I see my Grams again involves me asking her where the fuck I even am.

I sit in the same sandy spot at which I found myself a few hours ago to gather myself, my composure, and my will. My Grandmother had said I would need it. But instead, my thoughts are of Calliope.

Not the conversation that I had just shared with my grandmother that had made absolutely no sense to me at all. Or my parents. Not once since all of this has happened have I thought of them. What sort of daughter am I not to worry about how they are holding up? My parents and I, we were close. Even before I admitted to them that I loved Callie, they knew. And they were loving, accepting, and there.

Even the growing list of questions that I have for Grams is not on my mind, as it should be. Callie, everything about Callie, was consuming my thoughts right now. Surely by now she knew. I wonder who was the one that had to tell her. I hope it hadn't been a stranger, like some police officer or fireman just doing their job. For this kind of news, I'm wishing it was someone who could comfort her properly, someone who knew the story of our lives and just how much she loved me. Maybe it was Cristina. She would know what to say. The brunette had been Callie's best friend since they were five. Aside from me, she knew her better than anyone. And she knew us. She knew our love. Hopefully it was her that had to do it, that had to tell my wife that I was...dead.

My thoughts pause on that word. A lump forms in my throat and I begin to wonder if any of this has even sunk in yet for me. Sure, I've cried. But were they even actual tears? I've felt angry, but I don't quite think it has hit me yet. I'm waiting for it. I want it to happen so I can get it over with. But right now, looking ahead of me into a sunset that I don't even know is real, I just feel unbelievably sad.

I walk for a bit along the shore of the beach, hoping it will take me to some place I'll recognize. If I can figure out where I am, maybe I can find a way home to see Callie. After a mile or so, I realize it won't happen. Not tonight anyway. I use the little mental energy that I have left in me to lay some brush on the sand to sleep on. I roll onto my side and play with a single daisy that I had found on my walk. Callie's favorite flower. I twirl it between my fingers before lying it down next to me on my makeshift sand pillow.

Your life starts now. No it doesn't. My life is over.

A single tear trickles down my cheek as I close my eyes for sleep. I want tomorrow to come. Tomorrow, answers await.

Grams had found me exactly where I had slept, right at sunrise as she had promised. We made ourselves comfortable on a small, weathered pier off of the beach after wandering the sands with some small talk. Now we sit Indian style, facing each other with the water moving below us.

"So, how did you fare last night?"

I shrug my shoulders and offer an honest reply. "It was okay."

My grandmother smiles. "If you are anything like me, which you are, you have, by now, a long list of questions for which you want answers."

"So many, Grams."

"Understandably so. And you will get them. Most of them today, even. But allow me, my dear, to tell you everything I need to. After that, I'll answer any questions you still have. Deal?"

I confirm with a nod.

"Right then. So first thing's first. I'm your watcher."

"Like an angel?" I ask.

"Hmmm, I suppose. Except I'm not an angel and from the looks of me, you can see I don't don any wings."

There is a hint of amusement in her voice and she offers me a soft smile accompanied with a look that tells me I should just let her talk.

"We were taught a certain way of thinking when it comes to death, Arizona. All of your life and even mine, it was always thought among ourselves that when we die we go to some magical place and we see all of our loved ones and it's white and pretty and eternal."

My cheeks and eyebrows raise with a puckered smirk, knowing the picture she is painting right now is all too familiar. She continues.

"Not true. If you're wondering, this isn't heaven. In fact, there is no heaven. Or hell, for that matter. Everyone, good or bad, comes here when they've died."

"Here?" I ask.

She ponders the question carefully, wondering how to answer. "It's still earth, love. We aren't up in the sky somewhere. We just aren't alive anymore. But our souls are – they never die. This place in particular," She motions around with her hands. "is probably somewhat unfamiliar to you because it's my favorite place in the whole world. It's where I met your grandfather."

"I'm in the Phillipines? You brought me all the way to Asia? Really?"

My grandparents met in 1945, just near the end of World War II. My grandfather had been stationed on the tail end of the Pacific Theatre in Mindanao. Grams had been a member of the Women's Volunteer Service and was there aiding the men in battle. After the libertation of surrounding areas and the capture of Davao City, the men of the Army's 19th Infanty Regiment, including my grandfather, were cared for by the women. And on a warm May afternoon, a young nurse tended to the wounds of a battered and exhausted Russell L. Robbins. In an instant, love was born.

"Well, Arizona. I couldn't have just taken you somewhere close by, somewhere familiar to you, now could I? You would have meddled prematurely. You would have gone to Callie and broken your own heart a few times seeing her and trying to talk to her. And since you don't know how to travel yet, I brought you somewhere far away so you couldn't do that."

I carefully observe my surroundings and I now realize why I felt in a familiar place last night. The beaches and the water and the trees around me I now recognize to be the backgrounds of the photographs that use to litter every bookshelf and wall in her home. In the forefront of every photo were my grandparents, here in the Phillipines, falling in love. I manage a sincere smile, knowing what my grandparents had. True, undying, requited love. The kind of love that I shared with Callie.

My frustration causes tears to well in my eyes. I look down between my entwined legs and pick at the liquid in my eyebrows. I miss some of it and it spills on the dock below me. Looking up to the woman in front of me with a pleading, stare.

"Arizona. I know you are in agony. I am not trying to cause you more hurt or anger. I promise you, everything I am about to tell you will make you realize that this journey is not going to be as painful as you think it will be. Things will begin to make sense, pieces will begin to fit together and fall in place. You have to trust me, my love."

"Anyway. I'm your watcher. When someone dies, they are paired with a watcher. I chose you and like I said before, I was the one responsible for bringing you to this place. I make decisions on your behalf for the first day or two. From then on, my job is to teach you about life after death and to help you find your way from here. When I told you last night that your life begins here, I was telling you the truth."

I furrow my eyebrows in protest but I let her continue.

"Do you know what reincarnation is, Arizona?"

I nod. "Sure. The being re-born stuff."

"Right. Everyone is reincarnated. Everyone goes back. But before you can do that, there are four things you must do. Four choices you must make. Very, very hard choices. And once you have completed these tasks, your soul is put back out into the world in mortal form."

This was my way back to Callie. I can go back. And even though I have no idea what my Grams is talking about, my heart blurts out the question before my mouth can stop it. "What are the four things?"

"Ahh, not so fast my dear. I know exactly what you're thinking. Believe me, I do. But it's not that simple. It really isn't and you will understand this very soon. Before we get into any of that, what haven't I covered so far for you?"

I contemplate for a moment and scroll through my mental list of questions I had memorized to ask since this whole thing started. "What is real?"

"Everything is real, of course. What you feel is real. Your pain is real. All of this," she pointed at our surroundings. "is real."

"I cried last night. I felt my tears. I'm crying right now. Real too?"

"You felt tears because that is what you know. It's what you associate with pain. Could anyone else see them? Of course not. No one can see us, so everything you do and say and feel, is real. But only to you. Is your pain real? Of course. What you must understand Arizona, is that the world you are in now is the same one you were a part of yesterday.

"I'm so confused, Grams."

She smiles sincerely and picks a handful of blueberries from a basket next to her. She hands one to me. "Here, eat these."

I take a few from her palm and shove them in my mouth. "So good." I mumble as I take the remaining pieces of fruit from her.

"Yes. I remember them being your favorite when you were a child. Always stole them from the neighbor's orchard." For the first time since yesterday, I manage a smile that wasn't covered with worry or doubt. It's funny how reminiscing of a simple childhood memory with my grandmother can bring me peace in my current state of mind.

"You don't need to eat food. You're dead and you don't need sustenance to survive anymore, Arizona. But you can still enjoy things like this."

"But," I pause, while I gander an attempt at logic. "Where did you get these? Surely you can't go to the store and buy them. And even if you could, you would have to have money. Where do you get things?"

"Well, I picked these from a bush just down the way. I'm keeping an eye on the couple's home while they are on vacation." She smirks. "They would have rotted by the time they came home. I wouldn't steal from someone who would actually use these, though some would."

"So, if I wanted to walk all up into someone's garden and pick some strawberries, I could? I could just take a bottle of Gatorade from a convenience store if I wanted?"

"In theory, sure. But I wouldn't advise you to be that bold. Not for something so minute as food. People can't see you, but they can see their things. Unless it's something very important, don't mess with it. That's something that you need to remember."

"I understand. But why would it be okay to take something important, but not something like a hamburger?"

"Well, again, we don't need food. But at times on this journey, you may need to take something. Something to keep on you to remind you what you are doing or something to give someone. You will know it when you see it and more often then not, it's really not considered stealing. Still, take carefully."

I am wondering so many things right now that it is all starting to blend together just enough for none of it to make any sense.

"You're being all decrypting and stuff, Grams. 'Take carefully' this and 'your life begins here' that. Watchers and the Phillipines and blueberries. I don't mean to be mean to you, but you're confusing me! I'm dead Grams, I wanna see Callie. I'm in Asia of all fucking places, you're giving me blueberries that I don't even need and I am more confused than I was yesterday when a motorcycle literally cut me in half on my way home to see my wife because some damn soccer mom couldn't stop texting on her phone. I'm thirty and dead. Stop telling me about food and tell me about these four things so I can judge for myself just how miserable this so-called journey will be!" I exhale sharply. "Please."

"I'm sorry. I was just being thorough." She stopped short of whatever was to follow those words when she noticed the look on my face. It was a silent plead to respect my wishes, even if it wasn't a part of her plan.

"Alright, you win. But you will have more questions, my dear. Lots and lots more. And when you do, I will help you. "

"Okay. So, these four things?"

"I can only give you the first one."

"But we agreed you would tell me everything."

"Arizona, there are rules that I cannot break. Not even for you. Yes, there are more. But I can only give you one. It's one decision, one choice you have to make. Once you have completed it, you will get the second. You can take as long as you need, within reason, to make these decisions."

"Alright. So what's the first one?"

"You must pick one person who is still alive and go back and make peace with them."

"Make peace? But I loved everyone, I had no enemies."

"True, my dear. But there may be someone that you didn't get a chance to say goodbye to or someone that you may want to talk to who may be mourning. It's your choice who you see. And they will see you too. It's the explanation for why people see ghosts, as they call them. It's just us in our own little world, completing our tasks."

"I wanna see Callie."

"Hang on. Before any of that, you must know that whoever you pick to go back and see is out of the running for the next three choices. And you already know that I can't tell you what they are, so choose wisely. But, even if you don't choose her for this one, you can still go to see her, she just won't be able to see you."

I smile through my tears and nod. "I would very much like to see Callie."

My grandmother stands up and grabs my hands to pull me up. "Alright then, it's time to teach you how to travel."