From Beyond The Mind

         As the red Toyota sailed through the outskirts of Orlando the voices of two newlyweds could be heard with a tone of carelessness.
         “What's the name of this beach again?” Nothing was particularly funny but for some reason Jeff Hanlon couldn't stop smiling. Maybe it was just being in the Florida sun without worry or perhaps it was just being with somebody he loved.
         “Um, I believe it starts with C, Crackle beach? Coco beach? Cocoa beach? Yes I believe that was it.” The second voice was that of his wife Emily Hanlon, formally Emily Kennedy.
         “Of course.”
         The young couple was in fact headed to Cocoa beach. The beach itself was about an hour's drive from Orlando, which was where the hotel they were staying in was located. If a passerby seen the young couple here on the popular beach they might make the assumption the two were on their honeymoon. The two were in fact not on their honeymoon, but in fact just out for a good time with a second couple, David and Sarah Adams.
         As they dove across the St. Johns River a flock of twenty or more crows were sitting on a telephone wire that crossed over the highway. Below the telephone wire a carcass from a decaying animal could be clearly seen, although the species was long unrecognizable.
         “Yuck. Such dirty animals.” Emily crinkled her nose in disgust.
         “When are we meeting Dave and Sarah?” asked Jeff.
         With a tone of playfulness Emily said “I told you all this at the hotel, we’re meeting them in front of the surf shop on Primrose avenue”.
         “Right, Ron Jon's surf shop, the one across from the holiday inn.”
         This was not the first trip the two had made to this location, some may even say the trip has become routine. It wasn't the first time the two couples have traveled together either. Throughout the years the four friends had essentially seen the four corners of the world together. From the Great pyramids last winter, to the Great Wall three summers ago. Money was essentially endless, due to an unfortunate ankle injury in Jeff's senior year of college that resulted in a decent settlement. Coming out of college Jeff was one of the most scouted football players playing in the NCAA. The injury was devastating to Jeff but without it he would have never met his wife who was one of the interns working on him. Within two years they were married.
         David was also a former football player for Florida State, only his story didn't end so tragically. After school David gave up football and took up a career of medicine and in a turn of luck won a sum of money through scratch cards. He didn't win the jackpot but won enough to stay excited over, $250,000.00 after taxes. Every last cent of the winnings was put into a savings account he and his newly wedded wife agreed would be used for traveling expenses.
         After several minutes of silence Jeff spoke. “Did I tell you I had a dream about you last night?”
         “No, what happened in this dream?”
         “I don't remember exactly, I think there was like an accident or something.”
         “What kind of accident, like a car accident?”
         “Yeah, you died in a head on collision I think”
         Emily paused for a second to get her words correct. “Well that sounds like a nightmare.”
         “It was a nightmare”
         As they reached the waters edge a surf shop with a big welcome sign appeared.
         “Is this it? I think this is the surf shop!” As soon as the words left his mouth the image of Sarah and David caught the corner of his eye.
         “There they are! Pull in here.” The parking lot was almost completely filled but like a gift from the heavens one open spot remained.
         “Hey, long time no see!” A smile ear to ear appeared on Sarah's face.
         “I know! I don't think we've seen you two since you moved to Buffalo two months ago,” responded Jeff. “When are you to coming back to Newark anyway?”
         Dave, walking over with a bag filled with towels and umbrellas, joined in on the conversation. “Well you know Buffalo has been too good to us and with the practice and all...”
         “Yeah I understand, but at least come and visit every now and then.” Jeff broke a quick grin “It is only a six hour drive after all.”
         “Well the way Dave drives we would be lucky to make the trip in a week.” Sarah grabbed David's arm “And that's on a good week!”
         The jaunty conversation continued as the four longtime friends walk towards the beach. This particular day was about how one pictures Florida near the end of March. Hot, sunny and people everywhere, mostly tourists but with the occasional local thrown in.
         Jeff with his swimsuit in hand began to walk towards the changing rooms “I'm going to go change quickly; be right back.” The day was perfect and Jeff's mind was rushing with emotions ranging from excitement to impatience. For some reason a feeling of nervousness began to override all the others. Jeff started to count the years back. This is the fourth year in a row he stood on this same sand. There's something about this beach, almost a feeling of being home.
         Born and raised in the quaint town of Danbury. Small on its own but only sixty kilometers from New York City, it was a place for youth. Close enough to the city for mall runs but far enough away to avoid crime and vandalism. By the time Jeff reached the age of 18 he went straight to Florida State to further his education, with a full athletic scholarship of course.          After his injury at the age of 22 he moved back up north to get back to the life he left behind. He and his fiancé moved to the industrial city of Newark.  He had family there and it seemed like as good a place to live as any. Jeff often considered moving back to Florida but Emily had fastened down hard in the city of a quarter a million people. Perhaps one day in the future he would come back, retire perhaps to Jacksonville and try his hand at fishing.
         Returning back to his three friends, Jeff seemed lost in thought, distant in his own world.
         “What's wrong?” Asked his wife in concern.
         “What? Oh, ahh, nothing... I guess I'm just lost in nostalgia.”
         “Well come on we're on vacation, lets go swimming.”
         “A nice cool down sounds absolutely heavenly,” he replied with a slight smirk.
         A cool down might have been nice, perfect to relieve the sudden wave of stress, if the water maintained a range around 15 degrees, but at this moment in time the water registered at nearly 23 degrees.
         Wading into the ocean the original shock that usually comes after first walking into the water seems completely nonexistent. A quick breeze from a southern wind began to blow a small stream of water through the air.  Jeff shivered slightly at the sudden drop in temperature.
         “Come on, a little water scares you? Emily slowly bounced with the water's current fifteen feet in front of him. Jeff sucked it up and dove in. Ever sense he was a child he hated the feeling of salt water on his skin but for some reason when he was here it just seemed different. The water brought nothing but calmness.
         Jeff quickly swam the last 15 feet and broke through the waters surface within arm reach of his wife who immediately fell into his arms.
         “Finally,” Emily said with humor in her voice.
         As the sun went behind a cloud Jeff froze.  It felt as though someone took a knife and pushed it through his ribs, twisted, then pulled it out again. Jeff floated in a daze, his head bobbing over and under the water's surface.
         “Jeff?” Emily tried to pull Jeff's head from above the surface of the water. “Jeff! What's wrong?” This time her voice was nearly at a yell. “Somebody help, he's drowning!” With desperation clearly filling her voice she used all her might to keep Jeff's mouth above the surface.
         From Jeff’s location all he could hear was a muffled yell, everything seemed so distant. He opened his eyes to see blackness, everything was dark. The only thing he could feel was a distinct falling feeling.
         Emily called again, “Somebody help him!” Nobody looked, not even David and Sarah who were clearly within earshot. “What's wrong with you people? Can't you see he's drowning?”
         As Jeff continued to sink everything went from supernaturally peaceful to agonizingly painful. He would have screamed if he could, but it was as if he was separated from his body. The blackness that surrounded Jeff slowly began to fade into white; a heavenly white.
         Surrounded by a light, memories from Jeff’s life began to flash before him. Three separate events came to him.
         The first of the three wasn't a moment Jeff remembered, the only reason he knew it happened was because he could see himself as the apparition in his dream. He was at his dorm room in Florida, slicing a carrot from side to side. His roommate appeared in front of him and with a tone of anxiety said, “Come on man! You're going to miss the game!”  Jeff looked back at the carrot fixated.  The almost neon orange of the carrot began to fade into a crimson and so were his hands.  He dropped the knife and turned his hands so that the palms were visible.  Underneath his thumb on his left hand, a deep slice roughly two inches wide was pumping blood.  In a matter of seconds his entire hand turned a dark shade of crimson. 
         The second memory was one he remembered well. It was the moment his football career was ended forever. It wasn't on the field the devastation happened but at the most quaint of bus stops. Jeff was waiting for the bus to take him back to the university when a 2007 Ford Ranger went off the road, completely deteriorating both the bus stop and Jeff's future aspirations. Nearly a quarter of a million dollars later along with almost 2 years of rehabilitation and slowly the pain began to fade.
         The final memory was one that he once retained but had long ago forgotten. He saw himself at the age of seven, standing lost and alone on the New Jersey streets. The particular memory brought up feelings of bitterness and anger. He stood upon that street for nearly 3 hours before someone came and found him. Long forgotten, but somehow that moment still defines him; it taught him that nobody is truly trustworthy.
         As quick as it came as quick as it left, the white light dissipated and suddenly the darkness was back. The feeling of falling stopped and a part of Jeff's brain far from conscious told him he hit the bottom. Still being only semi-awake he pushed the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean with as much muscle as he could manage. With lunges burning time stood still, the seconds faded into years.
         Finally he broke the water's surface and instinctively started gasping for breath. In a pitiful state of coughing and wheezing he began opening his eyes. “Emily?” He began another coughing fit. The sun burned his eyes; it felt like he was looking straight into the sun from mere feet away. “Emily?” His voice was starting to come back.
         If at this point in time Jeff could scream he would have, he would have screamed until his lunges were raw and his throat was carved red. For at that moment in time Jeff stared directly into the dead eyes of his wife.
         Jeff took the lifeless body and swam with it under one arm to the shore. He moved with speed Michael Phelps would be impressed by. With adrenal glands pumping at full force he got the body to the shore. With the initial shock beginning to wear off he began to break down into tears. Staring at the lifeless face Jeff turned his attention southward to her neck. Above Emily's shoulders were two red hand prints with gashed and bloody wounds from what was assumable as fingernails.
         “What happened to you?” The way he asked was that of someone expecting an answer. Staring at the two hand shaped wounds Jeff began looking at his own two hands. “Was it...” Placing both his hands upon her neck they fit perfectly. “I didn't; I wouldn't...” As he murmured to himself the pieces began to fall into place. As everything started to fit together his feeling of sadness and pity turned to anger and adrenaline. He had killed her, he had killed his wife.
         Jeff took a quick look around; there was nobody in the nearby area. The closest person was about 200 meters away, and surely nobody was paying attention to what he was doing. With the blinded logic of a man just steps away from suicidal he began to do the first thing that came to his mind, he began to dig. With no instrument in his hands it would have to be a shallow grave, if that's what one would call it.
         Within two minutes he had dug a rectangular plot about six feet long, three feet wide and two feet deep. Jeff gently placed the body into the hole, and stared into those eyes once more. Emily's eyes were once full of life but now they were faded. With a deep breath and a look far from apathetic he slowly pushed the sand over the deceased.
         “Goodbye, goodbye forever...” His voice trailed off almost as if one part of him thought they would meet again. From a distance a passerby would never notice the sand was ever disturbed, only Jeff new the secret held within.
         With so many emotions running through his head slowly Jeff started to walk towards the part of the beach he had last seen Dave and Sarah. Not far did he have to walk before he found them lying under an umbrella holding hands.
         “Hey Jeff where were you?” Asked Sarah, “You were gone for a long time.”
         “Oh, I was... I went for a swim.” As the words fell from his mouth only one thought ran through Jeff's mind. “You killed her .”
         “That sounds relaxing, is the water warm?”
         “You killed her.” Jeff's mind was pounding. “Ahh, yes the water is quite warm, it's almost too warm.” “You killed her .”
         “Well I think I'm going to go anyway. Dave, you coming?”
         “No I think I'm just going to stay here with Jeff.”
         “You killed her. ”
         “Okay, see you in a bit.” Sarah walked into the water until she was waist deep and then dived in.
         Dave reached into his shorts pocket and pulled out an Ipod and started to listen to music as he lied on his back underneath the umbrella. Jeff looked at Dave and then to the North where his late wife was buried. For Jeff the silence was as awkward as anything he had ever experience.          “You killed her. ” The silence was unbearable. After nearly 20 minutes Sarah came back from her ocean voyage.
         “The water is so perfect; I don't know what you mean it's too warm!”
         “Oh, well... You know...” Jeff's voice trailed off.
         Dave stood up “Hey, I'm going to go get the snacks from the car.”
         Sarah looked at her watch “That's a good idea, it's almost two o'clock.”
         As Dave walked away Sarah sat down next to Jeff, still dripping wet. “What happened to your hand?”
         Jeff looked down at his hand. It was covered in blood but he wasn't bleeding. “I killed her; I killed my wife Emily Hanlon.  I did it with my bare hands not 200 meters from here. I have no recollection of doing it but I did it, I don't regret it either. I loved her very much, with the bottom of my heart but I killed her not 200 meters from here. Do you want to see where I did it? ” He looked into Sara's eyes, swallowed and said “I cut it when I was swimming.”
         “Oh really, on what?”
         “I didn't cut it on anything and if you looked closer you would see the blood is not even mine.” Jeff looked up, “I'm not sure, it was something underwater .”
         At this instant a Dave returned with a small cooler. The three friends ate the sandwiches Dave had packed in silence.
         Dave was the first to break the silence. “Jeff is something wrong? You seem distant.”
         “I killed my wife .” Jeff finished off the last of his sandwich. “Nothing; nothing that I can think of.”
         “You've been quiet since you came back from swimming, are you sure nothing happened?”
         This was the breaking point, Jeff couldn't take anymore. His head was pounding, nothing was real anymore. “Can you follow me? I need to show you something.”
         Dave looked slightly puzzled. “I guess so.”
         Jeff took the young couple to the spot he buried Emily. He dropped to his knees and began to cry.
         “Jeff?” Sarah had a tone of concern in her voice.
         “It's right here... It's right here... It's right here...” he was mumbling like a complete insanic. Jeff began to dig using his two hands.
         The burial plot was empty. “It's right here, she's right here, why isn't she here?”
A look of horror was plastered on David's face. “Jeff are you sick?”
         “I buried her right here; I know I buried her right here. Jeff was frantically digging searching for the body of his wife who had been dead for less then an hour.
         “I buried her right here!”
         “You buried who here?” asked Dave in a way well beyond concern.
         “Emily.”
         Dave and Sarah looked at each other in complete horror. Dave stepped forward, “Jeff, Emily died three months ago in a head on collision, you knew that.”
         “What? What do you mean she died three months ago? Who do you think I came here with?”
         Dave and Sarah looked at each other again, “Jeff, you came here alone.”