Ashley
The blaring alarm beside me pierced my eardrums, jolting me awake abruptly from sleep.
I groggily reached out toward the alarm, fumbling around the bedside table for the button until my fingers finally found it and I was able to silence the irritating sound.
And that was when I realized that something felt very off.
I was not supposed to be able to touch anything since I was a ghost.
My eyes fluttered open slowly, adjusting to the light as they landed on the chandelier hanging above my head. The room seemed… different, yet strangely familiar at the same time.
The first thing that caught my eye was the old poster of the Backstreet Boys that I had kept since I was a teenager, and the purple-colored room that used to belong to me before I married Owen.
"This couldn't be," I thought to myself as I felt the softness of my bed beneath my hand.
Panic slowly began to set in as memories flooded through my mind all at once.
I shouldn't be here unless this was paradise and I had somehow been returned to my memories, because I could clearly remember how I had died. I remembered that much vividly, but now I could touch things, which meant that I was either dreaming or somehow in paradise.
But how could I have ended up here in my childhood home if I was in paradise, and how could I have been dreaming if I was already dead?
I looked toward my left where my alarm clock read 7:00 AM, but the date displayed beneath the time suddenly caught my full attention.
May 16th, 2019.
Six years earlier.
I gasped loudly as I threw off the covers and swung my legs over the side of the bed.
It couldn't be.
There was absolutely no way that I could be back in the past.
How? Why?
I had only ever seen things like this happen in books and movies. Something like this could not possibly happen in real life.
I took a deep breath and closed my eyes tightly, hoping that when I opened them again I would no longer be in my room.
However, when I slowly opened my eyes again, I realized that nothing had changed at all.
I was still there.
My old portraits from when I was a teenager stared back at me from the center of the wall, but that was not the only thing that looked familiar. On the shelf to my right side sat the porcelain jug that I had made when I was eighteen years old, and next to it were my favorite books that my sister had burnt on the day I was getting married.
I couldn't believe what I was seeing.
I placed a trembling hand over my mouth in disbelief as I continued staring around the room.
It felt as though I had somehow stepped into a time machine because everything looked exactly the way it had six years ago.
There were no changes at all.
My gaze slowly fell on the mirror behind me, and I saw my reflection staring right back at me, wearing my favorite pajamas that my grandfather had gifted to me when I graduated from college.
"I…" I slowly approached the mirror, cautiously raising my hand as I reached out to touch it.
My very first thought as I approached the mirror was the possibility that I was still a ghost, but according to myths, ghosts were not supposed to be able to see their reflection or touch anything physical.
My heart began to race rapidly with so many overwhelming emotions that I could hardly understand what was happening anymore.
Had I somehow traveled back in time?
"This shouldn't be…" I whispered softly as I touched my reflection in the mirror.
The glass felt real beneath my fingertips.
I was here.
In the past.
I continued staring at my reflection in the mirror, completely mesmerized by my dark and full hair.
I remembered clearly how I had been losing my hair in clumps after I had fallen sick. But now my hair was thick and luscious once again, framing my face beautifully with a healthy glow.
Even my cheeks looked different.
They were rounder, fuller, and far more beautiful than before.
I couldn't help but marvel at how different I looked.
I didn't appear sickly or gaunt like I had when I first fainted and discovered that I had glioblastoma.
I was still staring at my reflection in stunned silence when the sudden sound of my phone ringing startled me out of my thoughts.
Backstreet Boys' "Shape of My Heart" blared loudly from my bedside table, making me jump slightly in fright.
I looked around the room searching for the phone until my eyes finally landed on it. I quickly walked toward the bedside table, picked up the phone, and then dropped it immediately onto the bed the moment I saw the display name.
Owen ❤️
Even seeing his name again made a shiver run down my spine, and the sight of it glowing on my phone screen made me frown deeply.
Part of me wished that I could destroy the phone completely and prevent him from calling me ever again, but knowing how persistent Owen had been in the past, I already knew that he was going to keep calling repeatedly.
My eyes suddenly caught something written in the center of the alarm clock beside me.
There were words engraved on it.
When I leaned closer and read the writing clearly, I gasped in surprise, wondering how I had failed to notice it the very first time I looked at the clock.
A chance to live again.
Those were the exact words written on the clock.
I stared at them for a long moment, wondering what they truly meant and why they were written there in the first place.
Could it possibly be sending a message to me?
Or had those words always been there and I had simply never paid attention to them before?
At this point, I didn't even know what to believe anymore.
Just then my phone began beeping repeatedly again on the bed. At first I wanted to ignore it completely, knowing that it was Owen calling me again. However, the continuous buzzing eventually forced me to pick up the phone again.
When I unlocked it, my eyes landed on the display picture of Owen and myself smiling happily together.
Both of us were grinning from ear to ear in the picture, completely unaware that five years later he would end up murdering me.
Who would have ever thought that a man like Owen would turn out to be someone so cruel?
Looks could truly be deceiving.
That deception had cost me my life the first time.
But now I was never going to allow something like that to happen again.
I read through his messages slowly, gripping the phone tightly as the words brought back memories of the day we had first met.
Owen had helped me pick up one of my books that had accidentally dropped to the ground, and I had foolishly fallen for him immediately, believing that he was a good and kind man.
It was not until after I married him that I realized he was nothing more than a wolf in sheep's clothing.
Owen:
Where are you? I am at Savory Haven.
I have been calling you, but you are not answering.
I have a surprise for you.
Babe, where are you? Please pick up.
Do you remember that we were supposed to meet today? Call me once you get this.
I love you.
I dropped the phone onto the bed and slowly lay down beside it, suddenly remembering exactly what today was.
May 16th, 2019.
The day Owen had proposed to me.
The day I had unknowingly said yes to six years of suffering.
For six long years, I had lived a miserable life beside him, and in the end, I had died because of Owen's greed.
But now that I had been given another chance, everything that had been taken away from me would be recovered.
My phone began ringing again, and in my attempt to silence it quickly, I accidentally answered the call.
Owen's voice immediately echoed through the phone.
It was a voice that I had not heard in years after I married him.
He sounded so soft and gentle, like the perfect gentleman who would never be capable of committing murder.
"Hello babe," he said warmly. "Did you get my texts? I am at Savory Haven waiting for you. I have a surprise for you, so please head over here."
I didn't respond immediately because hearing his voice again brought back painful memories.
Tears slowly welled up in my eyes as I remembered how brutally I had died at the hands of the man I once believed loved me.
"Ashley," he called again through the phone. "Are you there?"
"Here," I responded softly, my voice trembling slightly with emotion.
"Oh, thank goodness," he said happily. "Great. I'll be waiting for you at the restaurant. Dress beautifully!"
He chuckled lightly before the line suddenly went dead.
The phone slipped from my hand and dropped onto the bed as I released a deep breath.
I knew exactly what would happen next.
But now that I knew the future, I was going to rewrite my destiny.
Not everyone gets a second chance at life.
And this time…
I was going to put myself first.
I was going to make my sister and the man who murdered me pay for everything they had done.