Good Friends

One summer four friends went to the beach. The group was made up of two men and two women. Let's say the men were called A and B, the women C and D, where C was A’s girlfriend, and D was B’s girlfriend. The four friends had known each other for a long time and lived in the same apartment block. B, C and D went into the same car. A had a motorbike and rode on his own. When it was time to go home, B said “Shall we have a race and see who can arrive home first?” A agreed, and the motorbike and the car started a race. The car was the first to arrive. B and his girlfriend D were thrilled that they had won. But C, who was A’s girlfriend, was not so happy. She knew A was a very skillful rider, and had been so sure that he would win the race; as it happened, A was still nowhere in sight. He never came home that day. The next morning B and D went to C’s room to tell her sad news. “Well… I really don’t know how to say this..” B started. “I got a call from the police earlier this morning who told me that A had been in an accident. He was speeding when he hit the guardrail… He died in an instant.” This was terrible news to C, who loved her boyfriend very much, but B and C had something even more shocking to tell. “I said before that we had a phone call from the police. But well…now, don’t be upset… immediately after the call we had a visitor.” “A visitor?” “Yes. And when I asked who it was, guess who answered.” B paused. C could see the two were now visibly shaking as B opened his mouth again. “The person said… that it was A.” C was not sure if she’d heard right. She just stared at them incredulously. “We thought it was some kind of sick joke, and I was about to go out and give him a piece of my mind. But then I realized, how could anyone know what had happened to A, when we were the first to receive the news? No one could have thought of playing such a joke. I thought of that, and then I got really scared. I couldn’t open the door. Luckily, after waiting for a few minutes he went away….” B and D then warned C not to open the door if the same sort of thing happened to her. They believed that the person who came to them was A’s spirit, and that the accident came so sudden that A was unaware of his own death. If C opened the door, they said, he might try to drag her away with him to the next world. After B and D left, C spent the rest of the day crying alone in her room, remembering all the wonderful time she and A had shared. Then the night came. C woke up by a loud knocking on her door. “It’s him….!” C tried to stay calm and ignore the knocking. But it would not stop. “Hey!” said A. “It’s me! Open up!” C went to the corner of her room and covered up her ears. But after a while, with all the wonderful memories still fresh in her mind, she could not resist anymore. “Please! Open the door! It’s me!!” The knocking was getting louder and louder. C went to the door silently. Through the curtain, she could see the outline of A’s form. He was standing right there in front of her, just beyond the door. C nearly opened it, before remembering her friends’ warning. A was dead. He had to understand that. Shaking and crying, she shouted in a desperate voice, “A, please… you …dead…….” The knocking got even louder. C thought that she could at least help him see the truth and leave this world in peace. Mustering all her courage, she finally pushed the door open. ”A, you are dead!!!!” “No! You are the ones who are dead!!!!!” - At that, she lost consciousness. When she next opened her eyes, she found herself lying on a bed in hospital. To her amazement, A, who she thought had died, was standing beside her. He was crying with joy. C did not know what was going on. A started to explain: “After I’d done the race and arrived home, I waited for you three to turn up but you never did” He told her between sobs. “So I rode back the way I came, and saw your car, all smashed to pieces… B and D, who were seated in front, were dead on impact. You got away with only few injuries, but somehow you’ve been unconscious all this time.” As all the facts started to sink in, C began to understand what had really taken place and went deathly pale. It seemed B and D, who had met an instantaneous death, had stolen into her mind and, through the dream, tried to lure her away from this world. If C had done as they had asked and not opened the door, she too would have been dead - for real.