Heaven

• Yoanna Kim, Grade 8
• Short Story
• 2016

This is new. I don't know where I am. I try to remember, but I can't recall me walking or travelling anywhere.

Maybe I'm camping. You know, when you wake up in a tent, spending the next few minutes freaking out and panicking about where you are, but then you remember then think "Oh.....".

I look around. No tent.

Then my surroundings change.

A piano, set in front of me. A young child sitting on the stool, playing an all too familiar song. There was a young woman smiling.

"Play it again! Play it again!" The young woman exclaims, as the child beams, playing the simple piece again and again, everytime looking more proud and more happy.

Then my surroundings changed, again.

A boy. A baby, looking up at me. The baby holding my pinky. I smile.

Then my surroundings change, again.

This time it's a different boy. Older. Taller. Much more musculine. He holds my hand. There's a door.  A young boy opens it, looking very angry. Then a woman walks beside him, ushering him away, and smiling. Then a man, looking very protective approaches. The woman once again pushes him aside, laughing and letting us in.

I feel the older boy's hand gripping mine more tighter, as if nervous.

Then my surroundings change once again.

A man. The same man who looked protective.

"Now, where are those rascals?"

I hear giggling. It's the younger boy. We are under a table, and was clearly in full view of the older man.

Then my surroundings change.

It's black. I can hear shouting, crying, shouting again.

"Bring my daughter back. You're a docter, why can't you help her? You can save her. There's still a chance."

"Tabitha, please." A older, deep voice pleads.

"But Dil..." then their voices fade away.

"We will all rememeber Katherin Howlter." I hear a stranger's voice.

"And we will have Tabitha and Dil Howlter say a speech." He continues.

I hear sobbing then a 'Sorry'.

I think I know what happened to me.

"Katherin will be layed to rest next to her grandfathers, Daniel James Lester and Philip Michael Lester."

I'm dead.

So there was no God. No Satan.

Your Heaven wasn't in Heaven, hanging out with God.

In your life, you are making your Heaven or Hell.

It's a place where you are surrounded by the moments in life.

You were alone, but weren't at the same time. You had your memories.

No one judging you, like what it said in the Bible.

Away from anything sad, from anything bad.

Away from anything happy, from anything good.

I have made my Heaven.

And maybe, just maybe, you might be making your own Heaven too.