“I can see you’re confused,” said the angel. “So let’s makethis easy. I’ve come to help you, like I said before. I can see life’s gonevery wrong for you and I want to give you the chance to confront your innerdemons. I know all about what happened in your past – about your failedmarriage and how your life didn’t turn out as you had hoped.”
Finding her voice, Kay replied, “How do you know?”
“I can see inside your mind,” replied the angel. “I wasreading your thoughts as you lay in bed this morning. And I saw what happeneddownstairs last night. I can pretty much see everything. I have the ability totravel to any and every point in time and space simultaneously and see thepotential result of every decision ever made. Though in practice, that gets abit tiring even for me. It’s a case of serious information overload if I tryand do too much at once.”
“How?” asked Kay once again.
“That seems to be your favourite word this morning,” repliedthe angel. “Don’t worry about the how because it’s beyond your comprehension.Just accept what I’m telling you and then we can move on.”
Kay quickly decided that she may as well accept it, eventhough the whole thing was preposterous. Maybe she was going crazy, but thingscould not get any worse than they already were, so why not go along with it?
Perhaps going crazy would be a relief. If she was so fuckedup now that she was losing her grip on the car crash that was her life, perhapsit would be a blessed relief. At least if she got carted off by the men inwhite coats there would be someone to look after her then.
But in the seemingly unlikely event that this really wassome sort of miraculous visitation, she may as well grab firm hold of whateverit had to offer. This angel had said she had come to help her, after all, andwhat did she have to lose? There wasn’t a lot left to lose in her life: she hadlost it all already.
“OK, I accept it,” she said. “So what happens next?”
“It’s pretty simple, really. I’m going to let you live sixdays of your life over again. Any six days you like but I must clarify, theyneed to be in the past.”
The angel specified that because another lost soul she hadrecently visited had unexpectedly asked to see his own future, which hadannoyed her no end. Even despite her all-knowing, all-powerful presence, shetook her eye off the ball occasionally and hadn’t seen that one coming. Beingcaught out by a mere mortal was humiliating.
“That’s it?” replied Kay, feeling somewhat underwhelmed.“How’s that going to help me?”
“Think about,” replied the angel. “It will give you thechance to revisit some of those pivotal moments in your life and perhaps dothem differently.”
“OK, I get it,” said Kay, her mind opening up to thepossibilities. “So I could go back in time to the day my ex-husband first askedme out and tell him to get lost?”
“You could do that,” replied the angel. “But it would be abit of a waste of a day, wouldn’t it?”
“No, I don’t think so. Because then my whole life wouldchange,” said Kay excitedly. “Without that sod I could live the life I alwayswanted to.”
“Actually, no, you can’t,” replied the angel. “I’m glad youbrought this up as it saves any misunderstandings later on. I’m afraid I can’tallow you to change anything in the past. When you travel back to the past, theday you will visit will be a temporary copy, nothing more. When you return tothe present, that copy will cease to exist.”
“What’s the bloody point of that?” protested Kay. “That’s nouse to me whatsoever. When I get back here, I’ll just be back to square one.”
“That’s what most people think to begin with,” replied theangel. “But it’s all in the application. You can do a lot in a day if you putyour mind to it. There are all sorts of possibilities. Maybe you cannot changehistory but you can resolve some of the burning issues that have been eatingaway at your soul. Generally people find when it’s all over they are in a muchbetter place to take their lives forward.”
“Everyone?” asked Kay.
“Pretty much,” said the angel. “Most are sceptical to beginwith and unsure of what to do, but no one’s ever turned down the offer. Thereare no strings attached, no consequences, just a once-in-a-million-lifetimes,six-day trip back through your own past. It’s an experience very few will everhave and something money can’t buy. It’s not something you can book down atThomas Cook.”
“Why six days?” asked Kay. “Why not five or seven?”
“I’ve found six to be the optimum number for people. It’senough for them to do the things they need to do, but not so many that theywaste days. So six days it is – use them wisely.”
“But where to begin?” asked Kay, beginning to warm to theidea. “The possibilities are endless.”
“Most people struggle with their first choice so I normallygive them a little helping hand to get started,” replied the angel.
“I could certainly use one,” replied Kay, feeling like a kidin a sweet shop not knowing where to start.
“How about this?” suggested the angel. “Do you remember whatyou were thinking about just before I arrived? Not the part about freezing yourtits off in the shower and hurting your foot, but what you were thinking aboutbefore you got out of bed?”
“Yes,” replied Kay. “I was thinking about the day Alantalked me out of flying to Finland.”
“Well, there you go, then,” said the angel. “That’s yourfirst port of call. Go and see the midnight sun. You’ve always regretted notgoing, so now’s your chance.”
“That’s an awesome idea,” replied Kay. “You’re right: Ialways regretted not taking that trip. The only thing is, I can’t remember theexact date. All I know is it was June 1995, just before the solstice.”
“Don’t worry about the details,” said the angel. “You don’thave to programme the date into a computer or anything. I already checked backto the date of your flight. It was Saturday
