“Very well, then. Let me show you,” he said.
Without a sound he started soaring straight up in the open air. Over our heads he circled faster and faster while screaming with delight and laughing.
The class all gaped at him.
“Wow!” one student said.
“Oh là là!” Mr. Grangé yelled. ”I am getting so dizzy … come on, this must be something you are all dying to try!”
Then he soared even further into the air before he let his body fall until he almost hit the grass. Then he soared into the air again.
“It is like the best roller-coaster ride you have ever tried!” he yelled from high up in the air.
None of us could help smiling. This looked really fun. I couldn’t wait to try it myself, but I didn’t want to be the first one to go.
Mr. Grangé came down and stood in front of us. He took a moment to catch his breath.
“It is a lot of fun,” he said. “But you get exhausted.”
Everyone was dying to try, but still no one said it out loud.
“Now what are you waiting for? There is a whole new world ready for you out there,” Mr. Grangé said. “At my count to three you all try to jump into the air and stay there.”
Nigel put his hand in the air.
“Oh no, not him again,” I heard Portia whisper. One of her friends giggled.
“Yes, Nigel?”
“Do we need to do anything like flap our arms or something like that? I mean how do we stay in the air?”
Mr. Grangé sighed. “My dear Nigel. You no longer have a body that can pull you down. You are nearly weightless. There is not much that the gravity can pull on. It is all in your minds. If you believe you can do it, you can.”
“Oh, okay,” Nigel said not too convinced. “Do we need to say anything? Is there a rhyme or a spell or anything we can say?”
“No, Nigel. Just think happy thoughts, like in Peter Pan, all right?”
The class laughed.
Mr. Grangé looked at us with a smile from under his arm. “Now at the count of three …”
I felt my heart racing. I closed my eyes and concentrated.
“One … Two …”
This was it!
“Three…”
All fifteen of us jumped into the air. I felt the weightlessness under my feet and as I opened my eyes I realized I was hanging two feet over the ground. I was excited and looked around to see my classmates. While Portia had soared right into the air and was hanging high above all of us, Nigel hadn’t moved at all. He stood on the grass with his eyes closed and looked determined, but he hadn’t jumped. When he opened his eyes and saw the rest of the class hanging in the air he looked sad.
Mr. Grangé tried to cheer him up. “Some people just have their feet more solidly planted on the ground than others,” he said. “Did you mother tell you to always keep your feet on the ground?”
Nigel nodded while sobbing.
“It is okay, boy. You will master it soon enough.”
Nigel kept sobbing.
“Let’s try again, shall we?” Mr. Grangé asked and signaled the rest of us to come back down.
Portia was already circling in the sky shrieking and laughing, taking dives toward the rest of us, making us scared that she would bump into us.
“Uhm, Mr. Grangé?” I asked.
He smiled at me. “Yes, Meghan?”
“How exactly do we get down from here?”
Mr. Grangé laughed. “Well, now that is the next step. Getting down.” He addressed the rest of the class. “Does anyone know how we get down on the ground again?”
The class was silent again. Only Portia was shouting in the air.
“It is very simple, really. How did you walk or jump or run in the human body? You just thought about it. You thought now I want to run and then you did.”
It sounded really simple, so I tried. I want to get down to the ground, I thought to myself. And it worked. Slowly I slid back down. And so did the rest of the class. Except for Portia.
“Portia! Get down from there!” Mr. Grangé yelled.
I looked up and saw Portia stop in the air. Then I saw her fall from the sky. I saw her face getting closer and closer. I heard her gasp and pant and try to regain control. Before I could move, she crashed right into me. Or rather she went right through me. It felt so weird, like some great force was pulling through my entire body. After she had gone through me, I felt exhausted and tumbled to the ground next to Portia.
“Are you all right?” Mr. Grangé asked bending over me.
“I guess,” I said. “A little shaken.”
I looked at Portia.
“Me too,” she said.
Mr. Grangé smiled and looked at the class. “See? Nothing will happen if you fall to the ground. You can’t get hurt, since you don’t have a physical body. But since you were a human just a few days ago, you still think like one. I have to get you to think differently. You have to let go of the earthly way of thinking. Now what made Portia fall?”
Mr. Grangé paused before he answered the question himself. “She got scared. She was afraid because she thought she didn’t know how to get down again.”
Portia snorted. “No, I wasn’t. You just broke my concentration.”
Mr. Grangé smiled at her. “Only fear and human thinking can make you fall like that,” he said.
Portia obviously didn’t agree. She snorted again and got on her feet.
We all got back in the line again.
“Now … on three. One … Two … Three …”
Again we leaped into the air. This time I had my eyes open and soared a little higher than the first time. Unfortunately Nigel still hadn’t left the ground. He looked at the rest of us with envy in his eyes. Now that we felt like we had gotten the hang of this, we started to move first in one direction, then in another. It was so easy once we let go of the fear of falling and just tried it.
Abhik especially seemed to enjoy the freedom of flying through the air. I flew with him for awhile and we were laughing and loving the tickling feeling of the air going through our bodies. I tried to spin and do air acrobatics, while Abhik danced and jumped in the air. This was wonderful. Total freedom to go wherever we wanted.
I looked down and saw Portia and her friends giggling and making fun of Nigel behind his back. His big eyes stared at all of us in the air. I felt sorry for him so I approached Nigel from the air and reached out my hand toward him.
“Grab it,” I said.
He shook his head. “But I can’t,” he said. “I don’t know how to!”
I smiled gently at him. “Yes you do. You just have to let go.”
Nigel stared at me for a few seconds looking as if he really didn’t get what I told him.
“Come on,” I said. “Just trust me.”
Slowly Nigel put his hand in mine. I looked him in the eyes. “Now remember, it’s all in your mind so don’t overthink it, okay?”
He closed his eyes and nodded. Then slowly I pulled him upward holding both his hands.
“That’s it. Just let go …” I said as his body followed me into the air. When we were about three feet above the ground I gently let go of his hands.
“Now open your eyes,” I said.
He looked at me. His eyes seemed scared.
“Now look down.”
“Wow!” he said.
I laughed.
“How did you do that?” he asked.
“I didn’t do anything; you did.”
Our teacher Mr. Grangé joined us in the air.
“Very nice, Meghan, very nice,” he said. “I don’t think I have ever seen one Ru’ach be able to pull another one into air before.”
I felt like I blushed. I hoped that no one could tell.
“I am very glad to see you helping each other,” he continued. Then Mr. Grangé left us to attend some of the other students who had problems learning how to fly lying down.
“Look who’s the teacher’s pet!” It was of c
ourse Portia flanked by her friends Mai and Acacia. She sneered. “In love with the teacher, are we?” Portia made kissing sounds with her big red lips. “He is kind of cute, I give you that, but I like them better with their heads on!”
“Leave us alone,” I said.
Portia lifted her nose and snorted again. Then she and her friends soared laughing into the air. I tried not to pay attention to their constant laughing at the others in the class. It was like high school all over again, I thought. And that was one thing I didn’t miss from my life on earth.
After class we went back inside, but no one walked on the ground any longer. We had simply discovered that it was much easier to fly or just float a few feet above the ground. Even Nigel floated, although he stayed as close to the ground as possible.
But he never walked on his feet again and neither did I.
Chapter 6
The next days were like an adventure for me. A whole new world opened up one class at a time, and soon I was getting used to this new way of life. I hadn’t had much time to think about my parents or loved ones or the fact that I was actually dead. Instead we learned so many new things that I really didn’t think I had lost my life any longer, but gained a new and much better one.
History with Mrs. Higgins still was the most boring class, but I grew fond of it somehow along the way. I enjoyed hearing about the Angels and all they had done and what they were capable of. The more I learned about the Afterworld, the more I realized that the Underworld and its demons and Se’irims played a rather big role as well.
Mrs. Higgins never wanted to go much into it, but I sensed that whatever was down there was dangerous both to us and to the humans who never knew it was among them.
“One of the things we Ru’achs can do is to guide and help the humans,” Mrs. Higgins explained to us. “We are what the humans like to refer to as their sixth sense or intuition. It is something spirits can do. We can affect the minds of humans and guide them in making the right decisions. You could say that we are like the small cricket on Pinocchio’s shoulder.”
That made the whole class laugh and Mrs. Higgins smiled as well at her own little joke before she continued. “We are like a small conscience telling humans right from wrong. But unfortunately, we are not the only ones there. The evil Se’irim will whisper things in their ears as well and give them evil thoughts. Thoughts that lead them to feel angry at someone or something, thoughts that will lead them to feel greedy or want revenge or feel jealous. For example if a couple is fighting, then I can put thoughts in the woman’s head like, ‘It is okay; he doesn’t know what he is doing. He doesn’t know he is hurting you when he says that. There is no need to make this into a big deal. Just forgive him. You know you love him.’
“But then the Se’irim would say: ‘He doesn’t love you when he says that. He doesn’t even care. No one ever thinks about you. You do all the work around here, and he does nothing. When is it your turn to relax and have some fun?’
“Now the problem is we can’t do anything more than that. We can place thoughts in human’s heads, but they must make their choice. They decide if they want to follow one advice or the other. But if they choose the Se’irim’s advice, the fighting will surely continue; if they choose ours it will stop. Unfortunately humans don’t realize that the thoughts come from us, therefore they often choose wrongly. It is in their human flesh to choose feelings like anger, hurt, and greed over forgiveness, love, and compassion. That is why they need us to guide them,” Mrs. Higgins explained.
I was wowed. All of a sudden it came to me that there was an ongoing battle between the evil forces and the good ones—the battle over humans. But I never seemed to be able to get Mrs. Higgins to talk about how those Se’irims could affect us. I asked several times but never got a straight answer from her.
In our self-defense class I got a little closer. Here our teacher—Professor Hjalte Havskäg, an old ancient Viking from Denmark—told us how to defend ourselves against demons and the Se’irims. He was huge and looked exactly as you would expect a Viking to look. He had a big beard that he told us used to be red like his hair, a helmet with horns, a big cool axe of some sort and muscles growing on top of muscles. He always groaned and roared and told us he used to have hair growing between his teeth.
He had fought many demons in his time, as well as dragons and zombies, as he said.
“We even had a poltergeist living with us on our boat when we sailed the Norwegian and Baltic seas,” he roared.
We didn’t quite know what to believe of all his many stories that got wilder with each telling. More evil creatures would emerge, like vampires and evil wizards and witches. It seemed like he had gotten it all mixed up a little bit over the years. He had been dead for more than a thousand years, so maybe we couldn’t blame him for making the stories a little more colorful along the way.
But he did know how to fight. Not only by swords, axes, and fistfights, which he was indeed quite good at, but he also told us how the demons and Se’irims will try to mind-trick us.
“First they tell you that you are no good, that you will never be any good,” he growled. “But don’t you dare believe them. It is all in your minds, you know. They will especially try to attack you now when you are fresh and new and vulnerable. That is when you need to defend yourself.”
“Pah,” said Portia. “I am not scared of that.”
Hjalte Havskäg looked at her with one eye while closing the other. “But you should be. Those who don’t protect their hearts against the evil ones will fall into their hands,” he said. “Se’irims are among the most vicious creatures. They haunt the darkest and dirtiest places. They flourish in despair and decay. They suck all life, peace, hope, and happiness out of people who are near them and who choose to believe what they say. All humans sense their presence even though they do not see them like we do. They lie to the humans and to us and they will use your own mind against you. They are nothing but the purest evil.”
A sound of shock went through the class.
“Pah,” said Portia again. “You are just making up stories again. We all know none of them are real.”
"But you must believe what I tell you. No one will go free. The Se’irims will try to make you join them on the other side. They will lure you, and tempt you into believing you are better off serving the dark side. Every year we see examples of students who make the wrong choice. We call them fallen. We even have examples of Angels who have fallen. Everybody is in danger of becoming their victim. Not even those who are closest to our Mighty God can be safe. They go after anyone who will let them in. And you are the easiest targets of all they can find. You have to remember that you are still children and you haven’t totally let go of your human nature yet. And the evil ones use that against you. They know the secret desires of your human flesh and they will use that to get to you. Don’t you let them. Argh, don’t you let them into your poor little hearts.”
Portia looked at him with contempt but I couldn’t help noticing she also looked a little frightened. As did we all, I guess.
My worst class, I quickly realized, was The Art of Transition. It was taught in the cellar of the castle. Our teacher was Mrs. Ohayashi, a small Japanese woman in a kimono. She had narrow, almost black eyes that seemed cold and empty. I had a hard time looking in her eyes because they always made me feel like they would suck me right into her.
And she didn’t like me from the beginning. I could tell right away. Not only didn’t she like me, she seemed to detest everything I did and said in class. And I wasn’t very good at this. Not at first that is. Maybe it was my insecurity, maybe it was her, I don’t know. But it took me forever to get the hang of it.
However, she seemed to love Portia and her friends, and most of her classes ended up making me look like a complete fool and then laughing at it.
It all started the day we were supposed to learn how to walk through walls. Mrs. Ohayashi had put up a thin cardboard wall for us to practice on. And of course she c
hose me to be the first one to try.
“Well come along,” she said and signaled with her long fingernails that I should approach.
Reluctantly I got up from my chair and floated toward her. I knew I would have a hard time with this. I knew it was possible, but I clearly remembered the time Portia went through me on the football field. That was not a pleasant experience.
“Put the palm of your hand on the wall,” Mrs. Ohayashi said.
So I did. I felt the wall underneath my palm.
“Now slowly press it through the wall.”
I remember being so afraid of the feeling. I smiled awkwardly and looked at the teacher.
“Just do it!” she suddenly screamed.
So I did. I pressed my hand through the cardboard wall. It felt weird but the feeling wasn’t too bad. I looked at the other side and started waving my hand. Then I laughed, a strange, insecure laughter. When I turned to look at the class, I realized my hand was stuck. I panicked and I couldn’t get my hand back. It was as if the cardboard closed in on my wrist and wouldn’t let go. I pulled and pulled, but couldn’t get it back out.
Then I heard a big laughter behind me. It belonged to Mrs. Ohayashi.
“Please, Mrs. Ohayashi,” I said. “Please help me get my hand back.”
Then the whole class was laughing.
“Help me, please.”
Mrs. Ohayashi didn’t help me, instead she addressed the class. She had a way of silencing us without saying anything, just by a look.
“Now, prove to me that you are not as stupid as Meghan and all the other idiots I normally have in this class. Please, can anyone tell me what Meghan did wrong here?”
Of course Portia raised her hand.
“Yes, Portia?”
“Meghan didn’t believe in it. She was afraid.”
“Exactly. The worst thing you can do is to doubt yourself and your own abilities. That is an earthly way of thinking and it will not work here in the Afterlife. Anyone who will believe can be mighty and powerful.”
“Ahem,” I said. “How do I get my hand out?”