Page 31 of Where Are You Now
He turned around, got into his vehicle, and pulled away.
“Where’s Lucas?”Martha asked when Ava came into the kitchen with the plate of crackers, balancing both glasses of wine against her body with her arm.
“He couldn’t stay.”
“You didn’t even fish, did you?” She set down a swatch of fabric she was sewing.
“No, we just talked.”
Her mother got up, pulled out a container, and filled it with the cheese slices. “And how do you feel after talking to him?”
“Even more baffled.” Ava took the glasses to the sink, dumped the remainder of the wine, and then rinsed them. “When I’m with him, he brings a part of me to life. I don’t know if it’s because we were inseparable as kids, but it’s like I’ve known him forever and always will no matter how long we’ve been apart. I never realized how much I missed him until we were together again. But he’s not the same.”
“Maybe just give him some time.”
Ava put the glasses in the dishwasher. “Yeah.”
She hoped he’d show at her next appointment. Ava didn’t think sticking to business was a good idea at all. If he wasn’t helping her with her job, and he wasn’t trying to save her, then what was the purpose of finding him? He was only serving to muddle her own mind.
Chapter Nine
Ava lay on her back, floating in the lake, the stars shimmering above her. The wind blew in, and on it was a message:You’re not done yet.
Then, suddenly, the force that had kept her afloat sucked her under the water, and she sat up in her bed, gasping, her torso aching with the movement. She grabbed her side and winced.
It took her a second to orient herself to the dark guest room in her mom’s cabin. For a minute, she’d thought she was back in the void—except she’d felt a presence when she was there and, here, she was definitely alone. Beads of sweat sat on her forehead, and she was breathing as if she’d run a marathon.
She’d heard the same voice as before. God’s voice?
But she’d just been dreaming this time. She wasn’t on a hospital gurney. Her heart had been beating the whole time. She told herself, again, that it had only been a dream. Right?
Ava swallowed and waited until her breathing became more normal. With a yawn, she checked the time on her phone: 3:12 a.m.
Her mouth was bone dry, so she pushed the blanketsoff her legs and got out of bed. She padded into the kitchen, pulled down a glass, and filled it with water.
You’re not done yet, tickled her ear, startling her.
She fumbled the glass, dropping it into the sink, and quickly grabbed it to keep it from rolling around and waking her mother. This time, she’d heard the voice while she was awake. And the same voice from her experience. Had this episode only been her imagination, an extension of the dream in her groggy state?
Frustration took over. She’d done what was asked of her—she’d found Lucas Phillips. She was given no stipulations as to what to do once she found him or how to live out the rest of her life, as the voice had said she could do. So could she assume that the remainder of her life was up to her? What could “You’re not done yet” mean? Not done yet withwhat?
There was still the possibility that the accident had impacted her brain, and the voice wasn’t real, no matter how many coincidences happened. She wondered again about the source of the voice. Did the voice belong to God if her dad wasn’t there to vouch for it? Was it God at all? Or something sinister?
Her father went to church. He impressed upon her how Jesus had died for their sins. Surely he’d been let into heaven and would’ve been there.
But in her inability to understand what she’d been through, she kept coming back to the love she’d felt in the darkness. That indescribable love was most definitely God’s.
The experience was too heavy a concept to consider, however, at this time of the morning.
Not entirely sure she was cognitively okay, now, Ava was glad she had an appointment for the rest of her testing. Should she tell Lucas about the voice? She should probably tell him about all of it and let him make a decision as to her sanity.Ultimately, she trusted him. But a tiny part of her was afraid he wouldn’t believe her either.
She tiptoed into the office and sat down at her mother’s computer. She did a search forhearing voices. She clicked on the first of the results—“The Top Reasons People Hear Voices”—and read it. The first reason explained that a very high temperature can cause a person to hear voices, and as she wasn’t sick, she read on. The second reason caught her attention:Some people can hear voices as they’re falling asleep or waking up due to their brain entering or emerging from a sleep state. That would make sense, except that she’d heard the voice again at the kitchen sink.
She read on.
Drugs, stress, abuse … None of those seemed to hit the mark. Then she landed on number seven: traumatic experiences.People who have been through traumatic experiences might develop post-traumatic-stress disorders and can experience hearing voices. Had the accident caused PTSD? That might be worth mentioning tomorrow. But before she closed the article, she noticed number ten on the list: spiritual experiences.Some people experience voices they believe to be from God. This is an unexplained phenomenon. They usually provide comfort during a stressful situation, a warning, or guidance.
She’d been given a choice to live or not, under a condition. What would that be—comfort, warning, or guidance? It didn’t seem to really fit any. But if the voice she heard was as real as she believed it to be, then what would the earthly author of this article even know about that?
