Where am I? I woke to nothing but endless waves — the ocean stretched past the horizon, churning and mute. I stood and realized I was on a small boat. I looked down: my hands were pale. Have I always been this pale? Probably not, but it was what it was now.
"Have you found yourself?" a deep voice said from my side. I looked over. A man sat in the boat with me, draped in cloth. He smiled kindly. His face was unrecognizable.
I sat to face him. "Who are you?"
"I'll be whatever you think I am," he said.
"God?" I offered.
"If that's what you think." He laughed — soft, like wind. Was it funny? I couldn't tell.
"Wouldn't you know everything? How could you be?" I asked.
"Indeed I do. I can; therefore I did."
"You're just making up sentences now."
"Maybe." We fell silent.
"So… am I dead?" I asked.
"Yes."
I understood the answer without it needing elaboration. Another silence.
"Am I going to hell for what I was?" I asked.
He smiled. "Take a walk with me."
We rose. The ocean quieted: the surface hardened beneath our feet as if the sea had become shore. We walked. I waited for him to answer but he only smiled. "You didn't answer me yet," I said.
"I am," he replied. "Can't you hear?"
Hear what? I thought — then I heard it: my birth, my life, my death. Not images, but sound. Every choice I made and every path I didn't take unfurled in voices and small, impossible echoes. I heard them all.
"So, what do you say?"
"I don't know," I admitted.
He smiled again. Why so many smiles? What if wrinkles appeared then, like cracks in porcelain?
"Are there wrinkles on my face?" he asked, touching his skin as if testing its texture.
"No, I was just thinking."
"I know."
"So where am I going to end up?" I asked again.
"Wherever you want to be."
I thought about it and walked forward, leaving him behind. I couldn't resist and glanced back. "Will you come with me?" I asked.
He smiled. "Am I not with you right now?" His voice came from beside me, and there he was — always there. So we walked together. Forever together.