Page 3 of Where Are You Now
As soon as the questions left her lips, a warm, adoring tenderness wrapped around her, embracing her in the strongest feeling of love she’d ever experienced. More love than she’d even had for her parents, which she couldn’t imagine was possible. She breathed in the affection as if it were more nourishing than air, as if the love pulsed through her veins, even though she doubted she had a real body anymore. She widened her eyes again, trying to see some sort of light, but it was as if her vision didn’t work in this place.
A gentle voice filled every space in the emptiness. “Find Lucas Phillips and live out the rest of your life, or pass peacefully—which will it be?”
“What?” Ava forced herself to make sense of the question, and when she did, a wave of peace washed over her.
“It’s an easy choice. Do you want to find Lucas Phillips and live out the rest of your life, or would you like to move on and not return to your old life?”
“Lucas Phillips? But…”
Lucas had been her best friend since childhood, one of the only kids who’d really understood her. In the days of her youth, she’d even have said she loved him. They’d found each other in the lunchroom at elementary school and had eaten together every day. And they’d spent the afternoons together after school. There wasn’t anyone better than Lucas Phillips, and growing up she couldn’t imagine spending a day withouthim. Little did she know, she’d have to. He’d moved from their town of Spring Hill, Tennessee to Charlotte, North Carolina when she was fifteen, breaking her heart.
When she attempted to sift through the many memories that were floating into her consciousness, a vision came back as clear as if she’d been watching a movie. Fifteen-year-old Lucas lying beside her in the grass after school as they talked about third-period chemistry. With her affinity for numbers and his love of science, they’d talked about it all afternoon.
“The one problem I could not get was to calculate the number of moles in eighty-eight grams of carbon dioxide,” he’d said.
“Well, first, you have to find just the molar mass of carbon dioxide,” she’d told him, trying to focus on the conversation while he played with a lock of her hair. “Then you use the formula to calculate the number of moles.”
He’d smiled at her, affection in his eyes, clearly distracted.
“Pay attention,” she’d said with a laugh, not really meaning it. She loved it when he looked at her like that.
Ava smiled in the darkness. She’d totally forgotten about that one random moment of her life until then.
“Go back? Or stay?” the voice asked as the movie in her mind shrunk to the size of a pinprick and disappeared, sending her back into emptiness once more.
Ava deliberated. She didn’t feel injured at all. While she’d most certainly missed the Spire meeting, she could probably still get to the Coleman presentation. If she landed the account the way she’d planned, she’d surely make partner, andthatwould be the ultimate in living out her life—in her opinion. Partner was everything she’d worked for. If she didn’t get back, Scott Strobel would inevitably have to do the presentation for her, and there was no way she’d let that happen. Plus, given where she was, the alternative was unknown. And deep down, while she did relish the overpowering love around her,she wasn’t sure she was worthy of it. She had more life to live to prove herself and her faith.
When she considered her reason to return, work had come to mind before anyone in her life had, and in this all-knowing, all-loving presence, guilt slithered through her because of it. She could’ve said she’d go back for her mom. Certainly her mother would be beside herself—they were the only two people remaining in her immediate family. She’d drifted away from her mother over the years, and she’d get to see her again if she went back.
She could also have returned for her friend Allison Bates. She’d known Allison since she’d arrived in New York when they’d moved into their apartment building on the same day. Allison was a content strategist for a technology company in the city. Her job involved complex, high-stakes decision-making and strategic planning, which required intensive research that would send her away for months at a time. She’d lock herself in a chalet somewhere and work for weeks, then she’d show up out of nowhere and ask to pencil Ava in for coffee. Their friendship worked because they both understood the high demands of their careers. And as soon as her friend came home from her latest trip to Breckenridge, she’d be devastated to find out that Ava was gone.
“Go back,” she said. But then, a question occurred to her. “Wait! What if I can’t find Lucas? Then what? Will I die?”
In a snap, she was aware of the intense pain shooting through her body, the shuffling of feet in a hallway, the pulsing of hospital machines around her, and the red on the back of her eyelids.
The final events of the crash slowly came back to her through the pain: the twisting sound of metal, the shrill pierce of her scream, and the agony as the interior of her car folded in around her. She’d been pinned, unsure of where she’d landed on the highway or if anything else was going to plow into her.Then, after what felt like an eternity, the sirens came—low at first and then louder until they filled her ears. People were talking around her, and someone said they were going to help her.
The beepingin the hospital room increased as the events played out in her head. She focused on the calm that had come over her in the nothingness, all her thoughts swirling around like a multicolored pinwheel, and the beeping slowed. She still struggled for consciousness.
What drugs have they given me?
But in all her muddled thoughts, the void and the love she’d felt had seemed the most real… More real than where she lay now or any of the events that put her there.
For what felt like the next hour, she lay still while that all-knowing voice echoed in her mind:Find Lucas Phillips and live out the rest of your life. She tried to force the words out of her head, convinced the drugs were messing with her, but the message wouldn’t go away, like when her favorite song came on the radio and then stuck in her head all day. She wondered again if she’d ended up on the wrong side of the afterlife. Was she being deceived? But every time she considered it, that feeling of love washed over her again and those words whispered, “Find Lucas…” In an attempt to make it stop, she finally opened her eyes again to the blurry hospital room.
A kind male voice sailed toward her. “I’m glad to see you, Ms. St. John.” There was something about it that was almost as soothing as the voice in the void. “You’re already looking better than when they wheeled you in here yesterday.”
Ava strained her swollen eyes to see who was speaking. A handsome man in a white coat stood beside her bed. He was distracted by the laptop on the rolling cart beside him, his gazemoving from the machines to the screen while he typed. She blinked in an attempt to clear her vision. His hair was short—a sandy brown—and his wide shoulders made him seem confident. She strained to read his ID badge; the letters slowly coming into focus.
Dr. L. Phillips, Neurology.
Wait…L. Phillips?She was hallucinating now.Great.
Just then, the light of his ophthalmoscope pierced her sight as he checked her pupils.
“The doctor assigned to you had an emergency, but he’ll be back soon,” he said.
She opened her mouth to speak, but nothing would come out.
