Calliope: How To Save a Soul By Imani Wagner (Short Fifteen)

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This morning I was out on personal assistant duty. Gina called and asked me to pick up some paperwork for the new Pilates studio she was opening up here in Hyde Park. I headed over to the post office on 55th Street. As I got out of the car and walked toward the glass door, there my grandmother was in its reflection. She was following right behind me. I decided to wait to address her and ignore her for now.

“Calliope, I need to talk to you about what you said the other day. That thing you said about me being dead. How did I die?”

Of course. She could not wait. At that very moment I realized that most souls would hold off until they could speak with you in private, as they might if they were alive and needed to have a very intimate conversation about death. But my grandmother had not been that kind of person, even when she was alive.

The bell above the post office door rang as I walked in. My grandmother followed behind me and continued to ask about her death, but I remained silent. I waited until I arrived back home, although I could feel her in my mind’s eye the entire day. I had invited my mother over, and there she was waiting in the lobby of my apartment building. I did not want to spend more time than necessary with her and my grandmother on this. We had already wasted so much time not talking to each other for years, being angry and hurt, and not being a family. They both needed to heal, and so did I. It was time for us all to move on. 

In my apartment, my mom sat on the sofa, and my grandmother sat next to her. I noticed the very subtle shifting of the couch as she sat down and I wondered if my mother noticed it too. I don’t think that she did, but I had a strong feeling that she had some sense of what was going on. I thought maybe she didn’t see ghosts, but maybe she could feel them or hear them.

“Mom, we need to talk about Grandma.” I sat in the chair near the window, facing her. 

“What about her, Baby?” She asked as she sat back on the sofa. Baby. I had not heard her call me that in so long.

“When we were at the coffee shop, I told you that I could see and talk to her ghost, but you didn't really respond or react to that.”

“I don’t know how to respond, Calli. I can’t say I don't believe you, but It’s not like I can see her,” she replied bluntly.

“But you do feel something, right? I can tell that you do.”

“Yes, Calli. There is something there. I know that she’s still floating around here somewhere,” she said.

“Not somewhere, but right there,” I pointed to the empty sofa seat beside her. Her head turned to look at what seemed to be nothing. 

My grandmother somewhat marveled at my mother’s face as she turned to look in her direction. “I forgot how beautiful she is. Wow, beautiful girl,” my grandmother said. I had never heard her say anything like that. Ever.

“Are you saying that your grandmother is sitting right next to me?”

“Yes, Mom,” I replied shortly. “She doesn’t understand how she died. Would you like to talk to her and explain things?”

She looked a little nervous, another unfamiliar expression or phrase or something that I had never seen on her before; or had not seen for a very long time. There is so much newness in this moment between my grandmother, mother, and me. I wondered if I might have discovered more of these things if I had not left home. The true reality is that we might not have any moments at all if I had not gone off on my own. It seems my mother had done some reflecting as well.

“You died, Momma. You went to sleep and didn’t wake up. I don’t think there is anything more I can say,” said my mother. Maybe her healing and reflections were a bit more mild than I had originally perceived. 

I looked at my grandmother and translated her response to my mother, “She wants to know more about the autopsy. Did she have an illness or was she different in those last days?”

“There isn’t more. You were fine health-wise, and you appeared to be your normal self; mean and angry at the world,” she talked directly to Grandma now, “I don’t know why or how you died, Momma, except that you just didn’t wake up one morning. Maybe you simply died of all the hate in your heart.”

My grandmother huffed and looked away from my mom, but ultimately she had nothing to say. This was not some pretty story about ghosts solving all of their unfinished business before crossing over. This was real life, where even after death, a person’s soul could still have much maturing to do. A soul could still see no wrong in the decisions they’ve made in life. 

Grandma’s soul showed a small bud of remorse, but it would not be enough. I’m sure there are things between her and my mother that I might not ever know about. I remember overhearing hushed arguments between them about things my grandmother didn’t protect my mother from–things she allowed to happen. Within seconds of that realization, both my grandmother and I were in the black space. Everything about the human realm had fallen away, and there we stood together in the abyss. The air was still, and it was so silent that I could hear the ringing of nothingness in my ears.

“Calli, what just happened? What are we doing here?” she asked. 

“This is the spirit world. It is space and time and all of the things in between.” Suddenly, this knowledge popped inside my head, “We’re here because you’re not quite ready to crossover. You will need to spend some time here for a while.”

“Here, in the dark? No, send me back. Send me back, girl, I'm not playin’ with you. I can’t stay here. No. No,” she exclaimed.

“I don’t have a say, and neither do you. And it won’t be dark forever,” I paused and waited for the deeper understanding I knew would come to wash over me. “You’re going somewhere called the healing place, but this is where I am to leave you. Here, in this darkness.”

I could feel my mother back in my apartment. I could feel that my body was there with her. Then she took my hand in hers as she gently shook me and whispered my name. I’m sure she had no clue what was going on. There was no warning for her or for me. My spirit just popped right into a different world. “I’m okay,” I whispered back to my mother, “I’m safe, I'm just helping her. I’m still here with you.” 

“The healing place? What am I supposed to do there?” My Grandmother pulled me back into the spirit world with her. 

“Heal, Grandma. Isn’t it obvious?” I waited another second for spirit to offer more information about this place. I was learning about it for the first time too. I had never sent a soul there. The souls I’ve interacted with either crossover or they don’t. “You’ll stay here in darkness for a short time to review your life and to cleanse you of all that you’ve experienced. Then, you’ll go to the healing place which will allow your soul the deepest of rest. This place is for the recovery of your soul’s trauma; that which has been inflicted upon you and that in which you have given to others.” 

I was genuinely beginning to freak myself out, which was unfortunately becoming more frequent. It was almost like something else entirely was speaking through me. I was still in control, but I was also being submerged in a pool of knowledge. All I could do was allow it to flow right out of me just as it had been offered.

“So I have no say in my own destiny?” She asked.

“You do. You have been commanded by yourself–a higher version of yourself.” I was suddenly cut off. I could sense that there was something I didn’t get quite right. I continued, “You’ve been commanded by the higher part of yourself that decided to come to earth…to create a human life on earth. This part of your soul, this part of you, also understood the level of care you’d need after such a life.” What? Is that right? Our soul decides to come to earth? I take a moment to consider that. In this realm, I can always feel Mnemosyne here, and so I called her into my mind for confirmation and clarity of all of the things I've just learned. 

“Calliope,” She said nothing else.

“Hello Mnemosyne. Is any of this true?” I asked her.

“Yes, Calliope. We do have a lot of power to make decisions for our own soul’s pathway, furthermore, for the recovery of such a life. It is a part of what your soul needs to grow.”

“So we have complete control over the way we live our life?”

“Not entirely. Your environment and the people in it can cause things to change along your journey. Those things can convince you that you have no say. They can make you forget who you are, but you have the power to gain control again. Other times there are entities that poke at a soul, or eat away at it. Finally, there are unexplainable parts of this world that even I don't understand.” Mnemosyne left me with that, and from then on I would chew on her words and try to unfold whatever secrets lay between them.

My Mother and I parted ways after I sent my grandmother off to her next chapter, but agreed to get lunch the following week and to see each other more often. Azrael had come over and wanted to take me out to dinner. He held my hand as we waited for the elevator to get to my floor, and I told him about my mom and grandmother. 

I walked onto the elevator as the doors began to open, and my neighbor, Mindy, was already on with her pink hair and lime green glasses. “Hey, Mindy,” I quietly exclaimed. 

“Very handsome. I like him for you,” She said just as Azrael was stepping through the closing elevator doors. She looked away with a small smile. I could do nothing but giggle.

“What’s so funny, beautiful?” Azrael asked, taking his place beside me.

“Oh, nothing,” I said and smiled at Mindy.

The elevator doors opened to a lobby full of officers. Some were speaking with the front desk, and others were waiting for the elevator. Azrael and I stepped off and saw a few paramedics headed toward the staircase. I walked up to the doorman standing at the desk, not caring that the cop was speaking to him, “What happened, Joe? Is everything okay?”

“Someone requested a wellness check on Mindy. None of her friends or family have heard from her in a little over a week, and I haven’t seen her either. It’s not like her at all to be held up in her apartment,” he said.

“Mindy’s fine, I just saw her–” I turned toward the elevator where she, Azrael, and I just were. She was not there. She would have been right here in the lobby right behind us. I looked up at Azrael. “She was on the elevator with us. Just now. What are they talking about?” I could feel it in my chest. My heart sank down to my stomach slowly like a hot rock melting through layers of plastic.

He said nothing but shook his head. No. He took my hand and pulled me close to him. As I allowed him to hold me up, so that I might not fall and melt through the ground below me like the hot rock, I peeked from behind his shoulder. There Mindy stood at the opening of the elevator doorway. She kissed her fingers and placed them over her heart. “See you later, Sweetie,” she said before I felt the warmth and lightness of her spirit pass through me.