That was the first time he died., a short story by mark68. Date added: 2011-05-31. Times viewed: 1123.

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That was the first time he died

 

When Daniel’s mum was eight months pregnant with him, she was driving her car when the front wheel came off, that was the first time Daniel died. When he was four he found some orange flavoured aspirin and ate the whole box, that was the second time he died. When he was eight he suffered from severe food poisoning and this was to be the third time Daniel died. When he was nineteen, he overtook a car on a blind corner and this was the fourth time he died. At twenty-one he went on holiday to the canary island and just after take off on the way home he died again. When he was twenty-four he had health problems and the medicine disagreed with him badly and this was to become this fifth time he died. He also died in his sleep a few times, once when his neck was broken in the middle of the night, two times when he stopped breathing, and one time when he was shot. Not to mention the nights out with the boys which cost another couple of lives at least, and his water sports, which had lead to him drowning on four separate occasions. Such was it to be Daniel.

You may think he’s died far too may times for a young man, but the funny thing is he didn’t realize he had died even once, he would go through situations that were painful or troubling but he would always get over them and then forget and move on. He remembered a few bad dreams, like the feeling of having his neck broken, and another being woken by a loud bang in the middle of the night. He remembered being in a plane when suddenly it felt like the engines had stopped and the plane had started to fall, but it was only for a few seconds, no more than that. As for the food poisoning, he had been sick and sick again all through the day and night, sure he was tired at the end of it but otherwise okay.

What it was, was this; each time he had died in a universe and his spirit had moved to his own body in another universe. He sometimes felt that there was something slightly odd about life after one of these events, maybe changes in the personalities of loved ones, or situations that were happening in the news, but basically, things were just the same as they had been before.

The reason was he had quantum leapt from one existence to another, and all through Daniel’s life this would keep happening until he was old and grey and died of natural causes, like in the Bible with it’s three score years and ten, and Jesus’ message to his followers, ‘I tell you this some of you will still be alive at the end of time’. Although they didn’t realize it that’s what he meant.

And all through history, with different ages of man standing side by side, people jump from one universe to the next every time they die, and although for some reason things seem a bit odd, everything is basically as it should be, and not one of them has ever questioned it. Shedding lives like an onion sheds skins as they go. You may ask, but what of the poor loved ones who are left behind? What of the disabled and the ill who stay where they are to suffer? Well, like our teeth, nothing is perfect, for when they go wrong it can be very difficult to deal with, but the strange thing is, for complex reasons things are probably as good as they can be in a funny sort of way that I can't personally understand and sometimes find difficult to accept.

There is one other possibility, that is these were all situations where Daniel could have died, and where a small but significant number of people unfortunately have.

mb 28/05/11

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