FICTION

FROM DARKNESS TO LIGHT
By; Speaker Gerald A. Polley

AS MARY JACKSON CLIMBED FROM THE CAR she straightened her halter top, smothed her jeans, and pushed her long, dark hair back over her shoulders.
"Thanks again," the man in the car said, "maybe I'll see you again, sometime."
"I'm always somewhere along this street here," Mary said., "if you need somebody again, I hope you'll find me."
She walked back to her usual corner, and was met by an older woman that also hung out there.
"Bad one, honey?" she asked.
"No," Mary answered, "not really. Just a lonely guy whose wife left him. He needed somebody to talk to more than anything else. He was real nice! Foolish bitch! The guy loves her so much he's crying his heart out over her, and she ran off with some construction jerk because he could show her a good time. Hope she never ends up having some of the good times WE have, huh? Damn, I'd sell my soul to be loved...REALLY loved, not just used. But what chance have I got, being what I am now? What man would want me?"
"You never know, sweetheart," the older woman said, "some girls get off the street. The right guy comes along and takes 'em away from all this. You MIGHT get lucky."
"More likely I'll get dead!" Mary remarked. As she was speaking, there was a commotion in a doorway down the street. Two men emerged. Suddenly one of them grabbed something from beneath his coat. The other man reached out and grabbed it. As they struggled, there was a loud "BANG!!" Mary felt something slam into her chest, knocking her backwards, and she fell, sprawled out, on the street.
"Oh, my God!" the older woman cried, "Oh, my God! Call an ambulance, somebody get an ambulance! She's been shot!"
Mary remembered somebody kneeling beside her and pushing something to her chest, and later being put on a stretcher and going in and out of consciousness as she was being rushed to a hospital. Then, she felt someone shaking her shoulder.
"Hey, sleepyhead!" a voice was saying, "Come on, sis! Wake up! Get dressed. We're all hungry. We want to stop somewhere and get something to eat. We let you sleep half the morning."
Mary opened her eyes and looked up into the freckled face of a boy about 17. She sat up and found herself in the back of a moving camper.
"It's a good thing you don't wear that nightie in front of any other boy," the freckled face remarked. "It's positively indecent! Come on, sis! Get some clothes on!"
The boy headed back to the front of the camper. Mary looked around, bewildered, saw some drawers and began opening them. In a short time she found panties, bras, a shirt and shorts, and put them on. On top of the bureau she found a card with many signatures all over it, and opened it. 'To the sweetest kid we know,' the card read, 'Hope the operation goes well. We all want you back soon!' There was also a letter with a return address that read 'Dr. William Buckley, St. Mary's Hospital, Maryland, Connecticut.' Mary opened the letter. "Dear Mary," it said, "This is to let you know your operation is tentatively schedualed for August 16th. I do not want you to worry, for I am quite sure everythign will go exactly as we have planned. You will have one more catscan the day you enter the hospital to make sure nothing has changed, and the next morning you'll go into surgery. As I have always done, I speak to you frankly because I know that's what you want. The odds are very good, the tumor in your brain is non-malignant and once it is removed, you will have nothing to fear again. See you the 16th, Dr. Buckley."
"Now, you're not reading that thing again, are you?" came a woman's voice. Mary looked up to see a quite lovely woman of about forty standing over her.
"It helps my confidence," she said. "I guess I'm still pretty scared, mom." The words came out so easily, Mary was bewildered.
"Your father wants to know where you want to stop for breakfast. He says he knows this is your trip, your week, but PLEASE not McDonald's AGAIN!"
Mary laughed. "Tell him wherever he wants to stop is ok with me. As long as it isn't a Howard Johnson's. I feel the same way about them as dad feels about McDonald's!"
As the woman turned and headed back to the front, Mary looked at a calendar pasted up on the wall. The 9th, it said. This was her week, the woman had said. A week! Suddenly a thought entered Mary's mind. "It can't be!" she said, "It can't be!"
"What can't be?" came the young man's voice.
"Oh, nothing!" Mary replied. "Just talking to myself.
They stopped for breakfast, then, after that, had an incredibly fun day. The boy's name was Jeffrey, Jeff for short. The woman's name was Francine, but Mary always called her mom. The man was named Joseph, and all day long they hugged and pampered her, doing whatever she wanted, stopping at this place and that along the way until they finally came to a campsite where they bedded down for the night. About midnight Mary slipped on a robe, tiptoed from the camper, and walked a short way into the open field nearby. It was a beautiful, clear night, and the stars shone brightly.
"All right," she said, "where are you? Come on, talk to me. Tell me what I've got myself into!"
"You made a bargain, Mary," a voice said, "you said you would give something in exchange for something else. Now you're receiving your payment. You're getting what you wanted. In six more days you give me what I want!"
The voice was coming from behind her, and Mary made herself turn around. A strange looking winged being stood there.
"Are you...." Mary asked, "are you....?"
"No, Mary," the being answered, "I'm not. I am something that is called a Lord Of Light. But I was interested in your bargain, and accepted it."
"But it's cheating!" Mary said. "I'm not being loved. THEIR Mary is being loved, and what have you done with her? Where is SHE?"
"She died in her sleep yesterday morning," The Lord Of Light said. "I put her in your body which is lying in a coma in the hospital. She was kind enough to volunteer to keep it alive for you until I bring you back. I could not do this without her consent. True, they're loving their Mary, but the bargain is being fulfilled. You are being loved, truly and honestly loved, and that is what you wanted. I don't think any power would question the fairness of the bargain."
"I'm hooked, aren't I?" Mary said, "There's no way out."
The Lord Of Light shook his head. "According to the rules I am bound by, once I fulfill my part of the bargain, you are mine. The essence that is you is mine for one-hundred years!"
"Not forever?" Mary said.
"Doesn't really work that way," said The Lord Of Light. "The most we can bind anyone for, is a century...one-hundred years. Now, someone's coming looking for you. I have to depart. I will come for you the evening of the 16th, after you've checked in the hospital."
Mary nodded, heard footsteps behind her, and turned to see her father approaching.
"What are you doing out here?" her father asked. "I woke up and found you gone and got scared. Everything o.k.?"
Everything's fine, daddy," Mary answered. "I was just out here enjoying the stars. trhey're so bright and beautiful!"
Her father looked up. "Still dreaming of being an astronaut," he said, "the first woman on Mars?"
"Why not, daddy?" Mary answered, "Girls can do anything can't they? Isn't that what you told me? That you're no chauvanist and whatever your little girl wanted to be, she could be?"
Her father hugged her. "You better believe it, sweetheart!" he said, "You better believe it!"
They stood for awhile longer and watched the stars. Then, they returned to the camper. For the next six days Mary lived like she had never lived before. She knew now what a real family's life was really meant to be like. When they finally pulled into the hospital, checked her in, went through the scans and her family said good-bye to her in her room, and the nurse came and turned out the light, Mary didn't want to leave. She didn't have to turn around to know The Lord Of Light was there, she wanted to fight, somehow, but she knew she couldn't. She felt herself being driven away and found herself in another hospital room, standing in front of a bed.
"Wait a minute!" she said. "If you can put me back in there, and make me all right, couldn't you put me back in the other body and make that one all right? No, no! What am I saying? Can't you put HER back? Please? Do whatever you want with me. I don't care; put her back. Give them back their Mary, please?"
She fell to her knees and began to cry. "Please?" she said, "Please?"
"He can't, Mary," came a sweet girl's voice, "my time ran out. I don't have any more life left. He can only restore one body, this one, or the other one. Now we're both outside, and both bodies are dying."
Mary stood up, brushed the tears from her eyes, and looked at the girl. She strongly resembled herself. "No," Mary said, "it would be a lie, all my life. Put me back in my own body. They'll cry for a while, but they'll understand. I wouldn't cheat them that way. I wouldn't make them think forever I was their Mary."
The Ancient One nodded. "It is done," he said, "it is decided."
Mary felt the world spin around her, and then ffelt herself starting to stir. She opened her eyes and found she was in the other hospital, and Mary's family was gathered around her. Her mother was covering her face with her hands.
"Sweetheart," her father said, "the doctor just told us the tests they took yesterday...you can go home, baby! It's gone! The tumor is gone! They don't understand, but it's gone! You're o.k.! You can go home!"
Deep in her mind another voice spoke. "You're not cheating, Mary, you're giving them what they need as well as having what you need. That's the first part of your payment. That's what you'll have to do for me for the next sixty-two years. You have to finish Mary's life. You have to be everything she wanted to be; everything she CAN be!"
"I understand," Mary thought back, "I understand!"
She hugged her family, and in a short while left the hospital. The years before would seem like a bad dream, that would slowly fall away, as the new life she had blossomed.

The preceeding story is fiction. Any resemblance it bears to true persons or places is coincidental and not the intent of the writer.