The Light Will Guide You: I

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            “I love you, Mark.”

            “I love you too, sugar.” Mark purred in her ear. They started kissing, and then making love.

            “Are you ready my love? Are you ready to be together forever?” He looked deeply into her lively brown eyes and he knew her answer, but needed to hear it for himself.

            “I’m ready Mark. I really do love you!” She smiled stepped on a small wooden stool placed under a thick branch on a bare oak tree. Her face quickly contorted into confusion. “Aren’t you going to do it the same time as me?” Mark smiled trustingly up at her porcelain face.

            “There is only one stool my dear. I will follow you soon after.” She still didn’t look pleased.

            “But Mark…” His face changed from loving to a hateful sneer, like fire to ice.

            “Do you not trust me, after all this time? After all I’ve done for you? Or are you chickening out? You know our parents would never let us be! We have no other choice!” His cold words stunned and frightened her into tears. He lowered the noose over her neck and held her hand, wet from overflowed tears and nervous sweat. He calmed down and said in a much lower, softer tone, “Don’t worry, I’ll see you in heaven.”

            “Wait, I changed my mind! I don’t want to die!” She tried taking the course rope off of her neck, but Mark did not let go of her hand. He kicked the stool and she hung.

The forest air was cool and damn that starless night. The full moon completely exposed the hanging body with the expression of regret and pure horror on it. Mark sighed, smoothed back his greased blond hair, pulled out a wet cigarette and took a long drag.

“Stupid bitch.”

            “This is the fifth this month! What’s wrong with kids nowadays, always thinking this is the way out of hard times?” Investigator Loddesdale shook his head and stepped over the flimsy yellow “caution” tape that really held no one back if they wanted to waltz in. He looked up at the girl with lifeless brown eyes and sandy hair cob-webbing over her face. “They’re all so pretty too, what problems could these girls have besides deciding on which dress to wear for their date?”

            “I was gonna talk to ya ‘bout that Mister Loddesdale, sir. I did research to prove this is a murder, an’ I came up with some’n…”

            “Roger, this is a suicide report. This is not a murder case! Why can’t you seem to understand that?” The tired in investigator shot down his country-oriented, young partner. “S-U-I-C-I-D-E Roger. Can you comprende?” Loddesdale spelled it out.

            “Clear as crystal, sir, but I did a little research with the families. I wasn’t sure at first, but as the cases multiplied my positive-ness did too. They all ‘ave certain things in comm’n, like their hair color, their status, an’ their age. But most of all, the one thing that absolutely links them all together is their boyfriend.” Rogers thin-framed glasses slid down to the end of his long nose when he got excited about his discovery and he moved them back up when he was done with his revelation.

            “That’s the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard! Its preposterous!” Loddesdale fumed. He looked back at the once lively girl who could have been a future doctor or scientist. She was nothing but a sack of meat hanging from a lonely oak tree bowing to the weight of its passenger now. “But I suppose it wouldn’t hurt to check up on this boyfriend.”

            “Where am I? Where’s Mark?” a girl appears in front of me, exposing color to my grey world. “Where’s Mark?! Why does my neck hurt so bad? Who are you?” The questions piled out one after another, I decided to start off easy.

            “You are dead and in front of the Gate of Souls. I am the soul guide; I guide murdered peoples’ souls to their destination of choice.” Immediately the girl dropped to her knees and burst into tears, the normal reaction. I leaned forward to make sure she heard what I had to say next; this was my favorite part of the job.

            “You have three choices.” I talk over her loud bawling. “You can go through the path to heaven and be reborn, you can stay a wandering soul forever on Earth, or you can haunt and kill the person of your choice, may it be your murderer or anyone else. But be warned, those who choose this will be sent to eternal torture in Hell.” Her sobs suddenly stopped and she scrunched up her nose in confusion.

            “I was murdered? No, you’re wrong, I committed suicide. I did it for Mark, he should be here soon and we can go to Heaven and be together forever!” Poor girl, I would almost felt sorry for her if it wasn’t for her sheer stupidity.

            “Your little ‘Mark’ ditched you. You probably don’t remember wanting to quit last minute before he hung you. Technically, that’s murder.” I glare at the sad lump slobbering on the dirt. “So what do you want to do?” Normally I like killing time with the victims, but this girl was just annoying.

            Eventually her face cleared, but instead of it going back to its usual innocence, a look of pure hatred overtook.

            “Getting that bastard back will be worth suffering for all eternity!” She screamed ferociously and slammed her small fist into the ground. I smiled and got up.

            “Then let’s go.”

            “It turns out that he is the killer, or at least an accomplice to all of the suicides. He has the same grey-wired rope that was used to hang all five victims and pictures of all their dead bodies hanging on his wall. Don’t let it go to your head, but good intuition, Roger.” Loddesdale nodded to his masculine, farmer-tanned partner. “This case is closed.”

            Investigator Loddesdale looked back on more time at the room with “caution” tape that really didn’t keep anyone out of the room. Mark Holloway was hanging from the rafters in is ceilings by the same grey-wired rope he used on his victims. On his face was a look of regret and pure horror.

            “Always trying to find the easy way out.” Loddesdale shook his head and shut the lights off.