The Chaos Art

The Day I Became God

Başak Ünal

Part 1

The day I died was the last day I was free, and I had no idea. As a fanatic atheist, I was absolutely sure that the life I used to live was my final one. As a result, I was deeply in shock when an angel came near me and whispered to my bodiless soul,

“Wake up! Your time has come.”

I still am not able to describe this new afterlife look. Those old ghost movies were not completely wrong. Here, you can’t identify items as solid, liquid or gas but you can still comprehend figures and shapes. The closest state of matter might be plasma. The first second I opened my non-existent eyes -I don’t get how this is possible- I thought everyone in the waiting room looked like flames.

The waiting room was just like the ones I used to wait right before my auditions. Being an actress is one of the only things I can remember about my previous life. While writing these lines, I am still not sure whether I was a successful one or not. I don’t remember fancy villas nor wardrobes full of designer clothes. So, even if I was a good one I guess I wasn’t a rich one.

When I got up and started floating, the angel on duty gathered us around and made a line. He was holding a notebook and noting down our names like a white collar employee. I can define him as a him, because he looks like one. All the angels here, in the afterlife, have human-like bodies. Later that day, I learnt that it was because they want to keep the humans sane and not to scare them.

If I had a heart at that moment, I am sure I would have a heart attack. I knew I wasn’t worthy of heaven. I was thinking about all the torture they would do to me. I was in horrible despair when I heard that bizarre noise, and HE left his room with dismay.

I laughed like I heard an unfunny dad joke. He was just like they portrayed him in every renaissance painting. His hair and beard were dirty white. He had a grandpa face which gives you discipline and candies at the same time. I couldn’t believe that God really looked like Santa Claus and that was one of my antithesis to disprove HIS existence for my whole life. Perhaps as a punishment, I also remember how I was disrespectful to him while I was alive, even the details of it.

He started yelling in the middle of the waiting room.

“I can’t do this anymore. Because of these evil creatures -humans- I will lose my mind someday. I want to retire. I have to quit this soul-sucking job and never come back. Just take me to the place I deserved before I became God and please, just please let me live there forever and ever. I don’t care if that’s the bad place. Hell is better than this, I am sure.”

He looked at what he created for one last time, and disappeared in front of our eyes.

The mighty crowd got filled with whispers. As curious as a cat, I asked the angel next to me.

“What happens now? Will one of the angels be the next God or something like that?”

He laughed at me scoffingly.

“Oh dear child, no unfortunately it isn’t possible. Because of our natality, we as angels can only obey to a greater creature. We can’t make decisions nor take responsibility. The same thing happened before, don't worry. He isn’t the first one who quitted this job. We all understand the burden.”

The fact that being HIM is not a private name but actually a position -almost like being a patron- ruined everything they taught us during religious education classes for me. I was waiting full of wonder and out of nowhere, an angel asked this odd question.

“Who wants to be the God?”

I knew already that it was a great responsibility, maybe the greatest one but this could also be my ticket out of hell. Still, I waited a couple of seconds to see if there were other volunteers. Shockingly, the room was speechless. I timidly raised my hand.

“I guess… I mean I can do this. I volunteer to be the next God.”

Every angel in the room started applauding. The bodiless humans- as they couldn’t use their hands- were whistling. The dark, boring room got filled with joy and celebration. A very beautiful angel held my hand and dragged me into the room HE left.

Part 2

After a very intense training, they all decided that I was ready for my tasks. They also gave me my body back as I became a staff member- actually the boss, but I want to be more humble- in the afterlife. The job itself didn’t seem very hard at first. Everything had its own department. In the beginning, creating humans was God’s job but they already had a lot of combinations now. So, the department of babies is handling all the processes and shows them only for confirmation. The meteorology, the diseases, the animals… I only needed to be involved if there was a problem.

My only real job was to decide whether someone is going to hell nor heaven. Even for that, there were some filters. For example, I never needed to check a pedophile’s file. Some very evil sinners went automatically to the bad place. The procedure was similar for those who died as kids. Souls younger than ten went directly to our heaven.

The worst part of this job was the prayers. They told me that as the human population was out of hand now, the answering to prayers section got shut down. I was cursed to hear every single cry for the rest of my life- which is eternity- but my hands were tied. I even tried listening to loud music. Everyday, every second, there are whispers in my head. The voices of fathers who can’t feed their children, little girls who are getting married to their uncles, young lovers who lost their soulmates in wars…

When I first felt the madness inside me, I was in this business for around seventy years. Of course, time is different here but a long time ago, I decided to keep a track on the human calendar just to keep myself calm and collected. Besides from the voice in my head, also the moral dilemmas gave me hard times. I remember like it was yesterday, in my first years, I had a case of a murderer. I didn’t understand at first because normally, murder is one of the greatest sins and the files go immediately to hell. After examining it, I realized it belongs to a mother who killed her daughter's rapist. I wanted to send her to heaven. Unfortunately, one of the main angels came to me.

“Don’t worry, you are still new to this but you should know, we only accept killers if it is self defense or in wars. This case is neither of them. She shall go down.”

I should know, that day wouldn’t be the last one that I made a decision outside my will.

It was only a week ago that I found a strange bottle on top of my desk. I don’t know where it came from. Under the bottle, I saw that note written with perfect handwriting.

“This is the solution. Take this and close your eyes for all eternity.”

I started to enjoy my last week as being God, or we can even say as a ‘being’. I wasn’t depressed anymore. I knew that in a couple days, that unbearable weight of being the omnipotent one would end.

I am writing these lines as an explanation. I know, you will always remember me as the God who committed suicide. I just wanted to let you know that I am so much more. My time has come. I don’t feel my feet anymore. A warm feeling is filling my human-like body. And finally, I guess I remember how I died in my previous life.

omnipotent: having the power to do anything