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The Last Ticket by Les Ey
Copyright 2010
Independently published.
Chapter 1 (First draft 17/11/2010)
Corey Blakely was the kind of guy most folks took an instant liking to.
He was polite, unassuming, had a warm smile and seldom had a harsh word to say about anyone or anything.
That’s not to say he didn’t have any faults, just not the kind that were immediately annoying to most people.
He was one of those guys who would come to mind whenever you heard the expression,
“It couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy.”
Unfortunately something did happen to Corey; that something being the death of his wife Holly and 5 month old son,
Jayden.
It was all due to an accident involving a drunk driver from out of town who failed to give way. Corey escaped with a
broken leg. Barely two weeks had passed and his leg was in plaster but that was the least of his concerns, not only
had he lost his wife of 18 months and his only child but the other driver was uninsured and driving without a license,
the fact that the drunk had died was no consolation; the drunk had been unemployed and was virtually destitute and
Corey’s insurance did not cover accidents caused by uninsured motorists.
Corey sat in his rented home that had seemed
so full of life only two weeks ago but now felt more like a morgue. Corey could not even go back to work to do light
duties since he worked as a park ranger and needed to be able to drive the SUV. It was heading into winter and most
of the tourists and all of the seasonal workers had left the Park, there just wasn’t that much that he could do.
All his friend’s had said much the same thing after the funeral, “just call us any time for any thing at all” but
company was the last thing he wanted right now since company meant being with happily married couples who just
reminded him that he was now a widower. His freezer was full of frozen meals that were cooked by the wives of
sympathetic friends from Church, the mantle piece was stacked full of sympathy cards, including cards that were
hand drawn by his Kids Church class, yet his life was so empty now and even hours of watching Oprah and Dr Phil
could not help him to deal with his grief. But more than that, there was his walk with God. Only two weeks ago
he felt like he had everything and like he had a handle on everything including pain and suffering.
He could explain his theological views on it quite clearly and often thought about how suffering was just a means by
which God built character in our lives but now Corey -at just 31 years of age- felt like he did not have a life.
Not one that was worth living at least. He thought he knew all the answers but he was still left with one question,
“Why?”
The very question he thought he would never ask but that was back when bad things were things that happened to other
people.
Corey hadn’t spoken to God much at all in the last two weeks. Something snapped in him, like a dam bursting.
Corey exploded with tears.
“Why God, why me?”
Silence. Nothing but empty silence, Corey sat there sobbing.
“God my life is completely pointless. I have no reason whatsoever to live any more.
I just want to die. I mean that will all my heart Lord, you know it’s true, I just want to be with Holly and
Jayden. There is nothing at all left in this world for me, I’m just a park ranger, I’m not a hotshot evangelist,
I have no ministry, I’m too shy to evangelize, I’m just not good at speaking publicly and my finances are a mess.”
Corey became aware of his leg itching again and it was just driving him insane.
If it had to happen, then why at least couldn’t it have happened to leg I injured in Iraq?
It started him thinking again of the accident, his own concussion and Holly crying hysterically when she realized that
Jayden was dead. He thought about how she started losing consciousness; it was about the time that he realised that she
had broken ribs and may have been bleeding internally. He had been a medic in Iraq and had tried lying her down and
elevating her legs but he knew all too well that she desperately needed a surgeon. He pleaded with her to stay with
him as they waited for the paramedics. But help arrived too late to save Holly.
Corey burst into a fresh round of sobbing.
“You know what God, I’ve suffered enough, I want to skip the pain part, I wish it was as easy as hopping on a bus.
I think I could almost run -even with my bad leg and this plaster cast on- to catch that bus.”
Corey glanced over at the family portrait. Holly was holding, Jayden at 2 weeks, her blond hair contrasted his dark
hair. Her sparkling blue eyes and beaming smile cut right into his heart. Behind them was the picturesque scene of
Yellowstone park late Spring. It reminded him of the garden in Heaven called Paradise. Holly loved beautiful trees.
He just knew that Holly and Jayden would be in that garden right now.
“Why can’t I just be with them Lord? Why can’t I be with them in Paradise?”
Corey grabbed the crutch and hobbled and limped towards the light switch and then to the sleeper sofa and tried to
find a comfortable position. He lied there sobbing, hoping for sleep to come.
“I mean it God. Is it really too much to ask in the great scheme of things, just to let a small minnow like me escape
the this stagnant pond that my life has become?”
In what seemed like an eternity later, sleep finally came.
Chapter 2
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