My public figure is Katherine. Most of you would call me a ghostwriter, or perhaps an angel. I am you see, what well-nigh person call `` dead ''. In fact, today is my funeral. I had n't really planned on dying. I 'm only 21 long time old. I had just returned from the spring courtly dance. I had barely entered the doorway of the sorority house when I started feeling ill. My principal started throbbing. The room started to swirl as I collapsed and everything went black.

I woke up lying on my back. I was on a table in a brightly lit way. respective men and adult female in hospital uniforms were putting away equipment and collecting worn out supplies. In spite of the brightly light, the room seemed to be filled with an ethereal mist. The people all seemed to be moving in a slow, stiff, almost phantasmagorical fashion. They all seemed to be ignoring me.

I sat up, climbed off the mesa, and followed one of the Dr. ( I assumed they were doctors ) out of the room through a set of double doors. I do n't really eff why I did this. It just seemed the matter to do. Somehow I felt that there was an result waiting for me if I followed.

The doctor lead down a corridor, then through another room access into a small wait way. My female parent and sire were the only ones in the room.

I rushed ahead of the Dr., `` Mom ! Dad ! `` I rushed ahead to greet them, overjoyed to see familiar faces. `` What are you doing here ? What 's happened ? Where are we ? ``

They looked right through me as if I was n't even there. Instead, they turned to the physician. The looking at on their faces was one of anxiousness and fear.

Without waiting for the question that was written on their faces, the doctor spoke.

'' Mr. and Mrs. Samuel Johnson ? Please sit down. Your girl suffered a major cerebral aneurisim. In secular 's terms, a watery segment in one of the major arteries in her brain swelled and burst. There was nothing we could do. Your girl is dead. ``

At those words my mother went white, then collapsed, sobbing, on my father, who simply stared blankly, disbelievingly, into space.

My first opinion were `` What kind of bad joke is this ? '' `` Why are you telling my parents I 'm stagnant when I am obviously standing right in front of them plain as the olfactory organ on your face ? ``

After a few mo, my mother composed herself enough to speak. `` I want to see her. I want to see my babe ''

'' Certainly '' said the doctor `` If you feel you are up to it, I will admit you to her. ``

My parents rose slowly and with a stiff, robot like walk followed the medico back through the twofold doors and down the hall from which I had just hour before emerged. They turned into a room marked `` Emergency ICU - A ''

I recognized the room as the one from which I had emerged into the hall when I had first followed the medico. The room was vacant of medical checkup stave now. The equipment had all been removed or neatly stored against the walls.

In the centre of attention of the room, under a hopeful disk overhead light, was a table on which lay a distaff form, covered with a thin Patrick Victor Martindale White piece of paper. I began to have got a very sick feeling in the pit of my stomach. For the first time the thought entered my mind that maybe this was no joke.

But it had to be. How could I be lying there covered with a rag and standing here watching at the same time ? It must be a mistake. They will pull down the sheet and it will be someone else. It had to be person else !

My parents followed the doctor, hesitatingly, to the table. Gently, the doctor folded down the sheet.

There I was. I was standing here, but I was also lying on the board. The me on the table was still dressed in the pink satin clothes I had worn to the dance. I looked to be asleep. My mind raced, grasping for any fragment of hope. I had read about out-of-body experiences. How someone near death felt themselves leave their own body. Usually there was a representative telling them to go back because they had more to do with their life. I was only twenty-one. I certainly had more to do. I had almost a whole life ahead. I was just getting started. I do n't get a line any part. But that does n't matter. I just lie back down on the board, merge back into my eubstance and waken up. The doc will be dumbfounded. Mom and dad will be overjoyed. I 'll spend a few twenty-four hours in the hospital and go on with my life.

I did n't really think about how one climbs back into I own dead body. I just went over to the tabular array and lay down. I closed my eyes and placed my arms in the same place as the ego on the board. I opened my oculus expecting to see the surprised reflection. But dad just continued to stare disbelievingly. Mom was stroking my hair and sob, just as before.

Finally they turned away and the doctor covered my typeface with the sheet.

'' No '' I screamed, `` I 'm not perfectly '' I flailed by arms, kicked my peg and screamed again. But all my efforts went unheeded. What ever I was now, I was invisible and inaudible to the world I knew. I really was dead.

By the time of my wake I had still not fully accepted the idea of being suddenly. The funeral home sent a car for mom and dad. I really did n't like the thought of being on show, but I was curious to see what they had done with me.

A crowd had already gathered when we arrived. I followed my parents into the home, passing through the crowd unnoticed. The room where I lay was filled with heyday. My casket lay on a low table. It was glowing shining Theodore Harold White with gold hold and trim. The lid was open.

I hesitated once again. I knew that what I would see would only add to the system of weights of a reality I did not yet want to accept. I also knew I had to look. Slowly, I stepped up to the casket.

I gazed at the dream-like fit before me. The former me, the me that lay in the jewel casket, was dressed as for her wedding. Mom had promised me her bridal surgical gown for my wedding party. Instead, she had given it to me for my sepulture. A gabardine veil covered my face like a ok mist. A large bouquet of genus Calla lilies lay in my arms.

As I stared at the coffin, I began to pore on the peaceful fount, my face, beneath the veil. My theater of vision seemed to specialise, as if, without taking a footstep, I was moving closer and unaired to the expression within the jewel casket. Suddenly, I was no longer standing before the casket, but lying inside ; looking up through the misty velum that covered my cheek. I felt the nerveless satin of my wedding dress turned sepulture night-robe. I smelled the scent of the lilies.

I sensed the sides of my casket close all around. I remembered seeing a horror movie once about a fair sex being locked into a coffin by some madman. The image was of a casket as a prison, locking her inside. But now that did n't look right at all. I felt as if I was in a safe, warm bed ; not a prison house, but instead a utter tax shelter from the world.

I became aware of masses passing by. Some paused but a moment then went on. Others stood or kneeled before the coffin, seemingly lost in their thoughts. I could hear whispered orison. While I could not realise the words somehow I knew the Bible were unimportant. The love they represented seemed to take form as a shimmering visible radiation that grew in strength with each offered prayer. I felt wave upon waving of the sang-froid silver lightness surrounding me, flowing over me, filling me. I felt as if I was losing myself, willingly, in the overpowering radiance. I felt both a growing high spirits and a sense of add together peace greater than anything I had known. I felt myself floating, flying, lifted ever gamy, deeper into the light.

Then all went black. I felt as if a pile had crushed down on my mortal. I opened my center and the light was gone. I was standing in the visitation room of the funeral home. All my friends and family were gone. The funeral director was fastening the latches on my now closed casket.

This morning I rode in the hearse as they carried me to church. I watched as they placed my casket on the bier at the front and placed the bloom all around. All the client have arrived. The Christian church is packed. I never realized how many mass cared about me.

The service is just beginning but already I see a shaft of the ethereal Christ Within surrounding my casket. It is already secure and brighter than at my wake. I suppose that is because everyone is praying together. I know that all I have to do is step into the light and surrender to it and I will be swept away to somewhere wonderful beyond imagining.

I know what will happen here. In a picayune while the armed service will be over. They will carry me, that other me in the jewel casket, back to the hearse. They will drive me to the burial site, say a few conquer words, and then they will lower me into the grave that even now is open and waiting.

If I stay I fear the total darkness will do crashing down as they shovel the earth over me. I feel the Light reaching out. I sense its serenity. Its prison term for me to go .