Page 161 of The Fifth Life of Alicia
“I suppose until you’re ready to go back. I’m hardly forcing you to be here, although I will complain if you start taking advantage. And just to let you know, I can’t stay forever. I do have things to do, you know.”
“Duly noted.” I wriggled my toes and looked out at the water again. “It’s nice here. I can think. I feel like there’s something I need to remember.”
God’s lips quirked up into a small smile. “Then perhaps you should stay until your mind is clear.”
“Is that all right?”
“Of course. I am quite fond of you and your soul, after all.”
“Hmm. Okay. Thank you.”
***
I jolted into a sitting position, rubbing one of my eyes.
Oh. I was still on the beach.
“Good morning, dear.”
I jerked to the side to see the once-in-a-lifetime image of God reading a racy romance novel.
“Don’t tell me you forgot about me.” God pouted over the top of his book.
“No, of course not,” I lied.
“It’s blasphemy to lie in front of God.”
“I would be more inclined to feel bad if I didn’t know you were keeping a bunch of stuff from me.”
He flipped his page. “That’s a very fair argument.”
“Hey. Can I ask you a question?”
“You can ask. My ability to answer it is another matter.”
“Yeah, yeah, laws of the universe and all that. You really should revise those once a millennium, you know. Put in some legal loopholes. I’ll even offer my legal services if you need them.” I sat up and crossed my legs before resting my hands in my lap. “In my original world, there’s a bunch of different religions and cultures that worship more than one god. Does that mean you’re not the only one?”
Slowly, he closed his book and turned to look at me. “Whatever goes through your mind when you sleep, child?”
I opened my mouth to respond, but I really had nothing to reply. It was an excellent question, so I settled for shrugging as my response.
“That’s a tough one. I suppose you could consider me all of them and none of them at the same time,” he mused, tapping his finger against his chin. “After all, I am simply God, and I take the form of whatever you believe in as your divine power.”
“But I haven’t been to church since I was a child, so why do I see you as a man?”
“Probably because it’s the form that’s most comfortable for you. Christianity in your old world depicts God as a man, so that is who I am to you.”
I was pretty sure Christianity didn’t depict God asdaddylevels of handsome, so maybe it was somewhat open to interpretation.
“How do you appear as multiple gods, then? What about the Ancient Greeks or even modern-day Hinduism?”
“I’m not the only divine being in the universe, dear, although I am the boss. For you, you would see my underlings as angels, because that’s what you’ve grown believing them to look like. To use your example, Ancient Greeks from your world would see me as Zeus and my underlings as the various other gods and goddesses they also worshipped. Those who follow the teachings of Hinduism would see me as either Brahma, Vishnu, or Shiva, depending on who they consider their principal god.”
How did he remember so many names of gods? And all from one world, too?
If I thought I’d had a minor issue with having multiple personalities after waking up as Alicia Vermillion, it was really nothing to what God went through on a daily basis.
“I suppose a simple way of explaining our existence would be young children who believe they’ve seen fairies. They’re all merely a manifestation of divine power. Magic is easier for young children to believe in, and ‘fairies’ are usually a child’s first experience with a greater power. Even then, they believe in a fairy queen who rules them all. That would be me.”
