To Have It All
B.N. Toler
To my brother, Brett.
Thanks for always being the best big brother in the world.
The first light of dawn was just leaking into the room as I drifted toward his bed. He’d just closed his eyes, and if he’d had a choice, he would never open them again. But there was still time.
Lying beside him, I stared up at the ceiling, contemplating what I should do. The man had thrown chance after chance away. He’d pushed aside any chance of happiness and love that had ever come his way. They thought him cruel. And he was. He’d spent much of his life in raging pain, like a caged animal lashing out. He wanted others to hurt as he did. He’d become a walking, talking imitation of his pain. He was ugly in all the ways a man could be, except physically.
I had known him before he became this twisted soul. I knew him as a boy with a heart of gold that wept as he held the hand of his dead mother. I knew the boy that was forgotten by his father, yet put upon to be perfect. In his life, the one’s he loved most either left or forgot him. He was rare to me, and I couldn’t give up on him, though I knew I should. There were only a few I’d felt tied to, and that I fought for, the rest got what they deserved. It was not his life I wished to save, but rather his soul. Only this time, I was limited in what I could do for him. Choices were made. He had chosen to die. Another had chosen to give his life to save him. Both men deserved my attention; one my favor, the other my wrath.
I knew he’d just been scared. I don’t think he even knew why; he just saw fear. That’s why he did it. That’s why he’d left the man that saved him to die. We all have our reasons—our excuses. That didn’t make it okay. If it hadn’t been for me and my inability to give up on him, his life would’ve been very different.
Just because I understood him, didn’t make his actions justified, and like a mother who loves her child with all of her being, a mother must still do what is hard, teach her child to do better by punishing him.
Rolling toward him, I stared at his face, his nose and jawline chiseled as if he was crafted by God’s very hands. He was a man with youth, beauty, and wealth, yet he was miserable.
“Oh, my darling,” I whispered. “What am I going to do with you?”
For a race so advanced, it still, after eons, shocks me when they fall so tremendously short when it comes to expanding their minds; to believing in what is beyond their comprehension. If they cannot see it, touch it, dissect it like a frog in a high school science lab, they label it with titles deemed preposterous such as religion, superstition, miracles, or even the devil’s work. And those who do dare let their minds reach out and brush their fingers against the preposterous are cast as cultists, fanatics, or even crazy.
There is magic in this world beyond any explanation. It exists only because a scale steadies the universe, and it is the unknown that keeps the balance. The human race needs miracles; it needs the unthinkable to happen because without it, hope would not exist.
And that’s where I come in.
I am the eyes that watch your every move, the invisible mouth that whispers in your ear, urging you to do what is right. I am the ultimate scorekeeper.
I’m known by many names, but most know me as karma—the bitch. What goes around comes around. You reap what you sow. You will get what you deserve. The expressions are endless that describe what I deliver. I could go on for days.
There is no bad luck. Bad things happen because of the choices made by one person, and that choice is like a rubber bullet; it bounces. It ricochets from person to person, connecting everyone. A simpler term would be cause and effect. One choice sets into motion a series of events that reap other choices. I’m a referee of sorts. I watch, I wait, and from time to time, I interfere. I can give you joy or earth-shattering pain. I find immense pleasure on both sides of the coin—bringing the wicked to their knees or giving hope to the kind are equally fulfilling for me.
But in cases like this, I find no joy.
Sitting up, I kissed my fingers and ran them lightly across his lips.
“I am going to let you think about your choice a bit longer,” I whispered. “Perhaps watching someone else have what is yours, you will see it differently.” Behind closed eyes, he would not find peace and darkness. He would watch, powerless, as another man took over his life—the man that had saved him. And in the end, because I loved him so and wanted desperately for him to wake up a changed man, I would let him choose. His life would be tied to another man’s as well as his fate. He would choose if they lived or died.
Standing, I went to the bathroom and checked myself in the mirror after I changed form. Straightening my name tag, I walked back into the bedroom and looked at him one last time. “Choose well, Maxwell.”
With a snap of my fingers, it was done.
The 24th of August
When I opened my eyes I knew something was wrong. I didn’t recognize the room, but it wasn’t just that. It was more. It was a dreadful feeling that threaded around my soul; something whispered inside me, prepare yourself. There was so much more to the whispered words and dreadful feelings. The last thing I remembered was pain—immense, debilitating pain, but it was gone now. I never wanted to experience that kind of pain again. But there was something else—something more.
It wasn’t until I sat up and rubbed my face with my hands, finding the course scratch of a few days-old-beard that I began to realize something was definitely wrong. Where was my full beard? I hadn’t shaved in years.