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to understand any of it until you clear your head a little. You’ve built up a lot of pressure. I’ll give you your face for a while.”
    Without another word, my tears escape from their prisons, and I’m happy to leave them behind to nourish the trees. I open my mouth, but it closes again before I have time to speak.
    “That’s all I can give you,” she says. “I’m sorry, but any loud noises you might make could attract attention.”
    I think to her, “What is this place?”
    “In terms of physical reality, it’s your average forest. But as I said, you’re sleepwalking. Your eyes are open so you can technically see where you’re going. But in terms of perceptual reality, this place is anything your mind makes it.”
    “Why is this happening to me?”
    “Because I made it happen. Jack put you in a coma of sorts, and now I’m taking you where I want you to go.”
    The mention of Jack’s name forces me to connect this reality to what I’d like to think of as my real reality. More than anything, I don’t want them to be one and the same.
    “I’d like to clear things up,” she says. “But I’m unlikely to succeed in that task until we meet face to face. Even then, I doubt you’ll ever be able to fully rationalize this experience. The problem with the way we’re speaking to each other is, I can’t hear what you’re saying and you can’t hear what I’m saying. Not directly. What you’re hearing right now is your mind’s translation of my thoughts, and vice versa. You’re interpreting my message in reference to your own consciousness and memories. This means that you won’t hear any words that you’ve never heard before. This also means that it’s difficult for me to explain the intricacies of a phenomenon that you aren’t already somewhat familiar with. In other words, it’s better if we continue this specific conversation once we meet in person. Until then, I suggest we change the subject or enjoy the scenery.”
    Aubrey and I hike together, her backward, me forward, and the trees poof into clouds. The floor dissolves into sky, except for my path. This trail of gold extends with every step I take, so that I don’t fall.
    Not that it would matter if I did.
    I’m dead.
    Aubrey’s my Guide. Soon she’ll be pointing out the main attractions of heaven. Here’s the cabin Jesus was born, she’ll tell me. And here’s where he chopped down the Tree of Good and Evil, and immediately told God what he’d done. And Aubrey won’t tell me that Jesus never did chop down such a Tree, and that such a Tree never existed, and that Jesus owned angel slaves, and that God actually wanted Satan, Jesus’ brother, to become King, because Satan was a lot smarter and kinder.
    No, she won’t tell me shit like that.
    This is what I’d like to believe. But even now, with the clouds drifting around me and the halo and wings on my dead sister, I know that I’m only seeing what I want to see. Believing what I want to believe.
    Almost believing. But what other kind of believing is there? Faith can’t exist without doubt.
    The clouds morph into faces of disgust and shake their heads at me as the wind blows. These faces—my faces—are sickened by how easy it was for me to give in to Aubrey’s possession of my body. I no longer fight back. I no longer want to fight back. How quickly I allow myself to be manipulated when faced by the fear of the alternative.
    To fight for my freedom would mean clowns and monsters and dead loved-ones. And according to Aubrey, this fight would be pointless. Freedom from her control is unattainable.
    Better to let go.
    After an eternity or two, I’m at the Gates. My fingers dance on a keypad in a pillar inscribed with cherubs.
    Better to believe she’s doing this for my-own-good.
    The Gates creak open.
    Better to not think about it at all.

Part 7
    God disconnects the tubes from my outstretched arms, then places a hand on my chest, and his skin buzzes with white light. Here’s the