The Other Side

It was dark outside, and Randal could see nothing but the glow of the streetlights across the city. He wasn't quite sure how he got there. Truthfully, he couldn't remember anything that had happened recently in his life. The closest thing that he could remember was sitting at home in his recliner, watching the News flash across the television. Now, he was here, looking out at the city in which he was born, and raised. "It would be hard for me not to recognize Los Angeles," he said rather smugly.

Randal was born on the 21st of January in 1989, in the Harbor-UCLA Medical Center in Torrance. Born into a normal, working-class family, he had a rather simple and easy childhood. He graduated High School as an average student, and instead of going to college or technical school he went to work as soon as he could. He worked various service industry jobs until he turned 21 when he could finally enlist at the academy to join the LAPD. He worked as an officer for nearly 45 years before he retired. He had married a young woman that he met a[[fter High School, Lauren. Lauren was a strong, independent woman who moved to California from Montana. She had first moved out there to take care of her grandparents, who were getting on in age. She also worked various jobs in the service industry just for a little bit of extra spending money, she was already getting paid for taking care of her grandparents.

Together, they had three children and lived a quiet, yet sometimes interesting, life in Los Angeles. He wasn't sure how they managed to keep their three children from growing up to be absolute menaces to society, but they did it. He always said that he owed it all to Anabelle who took care of the kids as they were growing up. Randal always felt that he never did enough for his kids because he was always working, or at least that's what it felt like to him. Shortly after he retired Lauren had fallen ill to respiratory disease and died not much long after. He felt guilty that he never spent much time with her leading up to his retirement, and her death.

At the thought of his late wife, Randal began to look around the room that he was in. He recognized it as one of the morgues in the Medical Center. He was confused, what was he doing there? The lights were off, and he started to feel strange standing there. He made his way to the nearest door and stood in a well-lit hallway. He began to hear footsteps when he saw a doctor walk by. He recognized the man as his Oncologist, Doctor Campbell. He started to remember a little bit more, he went to the hospital because he began to cough up blood. "How ridiculous of me to forget, it must be the drugs that they put me on. I should tell Doc that." Randal began to walk after him and call out his name.

He rounded the corner and saw Doctor Campbell on his phone. "I guess he didn't hear me," he said as he picked up his pace and shouted for Doctor Campbell once more. "Hey! Doc!" Nothing. Doctor Campbell continued talking on the phone, not noticing the man shouting at him. Randal was surprised, by no means did he become slow or fat while working for the LAPD. Yet it seemed like Doctor Campbell was almost getting further and further away from him. "So you're going to make an old guy like me run after you, huh?" Randal began to lightly jog after the doctor, catching up to him just as soon as he walked into an open patient's room. His kids were sitting in the room, and they were crying. "What the hell is going on in here?" Randal asked while Doctor Campbell pulled out a piece of paper and handed it to his oldest child. "I'm so sorry, your Dad, he put up a good fight. His body couldn't hold out in the end, I'm afraid. We did the best that we could. The cancer had just been too much for him." Doctor Campbell walked out of the room, right past him as he walked over to his children. That's when he saw what was written on the paper. It was a Death Certificate. His Death Certificate with the time of death is 10:58 PM on the 1st of October in the year 2058.

This can't be happening, he thought. He slowly began to walk backward out of the hospital room. He began to look around and noticed darkness slowly starting to envelop him. He noticed that it started creeping in, closer and closer. As it grew closer he heard a violent ringing in his ears. It felt like this world that he was in was about to collapse in on him. He dropped to his knees, trying to remove the ringing sound from his ears. Right as he thought his head was going to explode a hand appeared in front of him. He looked up and his eyes immediately became blurry. He couldn't believe it. His wife was standing there with a hand out to help him onto his feet. He reached out, and as soon as he touched her hand the ringing disappeared. The world was once again as it was. "You would think I'd be used to you keeping me waiting!" She said with a smile on her face, a smile that he had not seen in years. "How is this possible?" Randal asked, but confused and delighted as to what was happening. "Well, I guess you could say this is Purgatory... although I'm not too sure. It could be that I've been here because I wanted to wait on you." "Wait on me for what?" Randal began to feel lightheaded. Lauren immediately grabbed onto his arm and whispered, "well to cross to the other side of course, or to explore this...whatever this is.."

They slowly walked down to the first floor and just stared at the doors. The "EXIT" sign shines brighter than what they do in the world of the living. "Are you ready for this?" Randal asked his wife. "You know, you would think with all this time I had that I would be ready, but I'm just happy to have you by my side." Together they held each other's hand as they pushed the doors open. A brilliant bright light blinded them, unable to see what was on the other side. Their grip tightened as they both walked forward, ready for whatever waited for them.