Where is Emma Butler's Life Plan?

Where is Emma Butler’s Life Plan?

Copyright 2015 Julia Wilmot

Published by Inspiring Stories

Smashwords Edition License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your enjoyment only, then please return to Smashwords.com or your favorite retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty One

Chapter Twenty Two

Chapter Twenty Three

Chapter Twenty Four

Chapter Twenty Five

About Julia Wilmot

Connect with Julia Wilmot

Dedication

To my mother and father who think I can do anything. It’s always a joy to prove them right.

Acknowledgements

. I would like to thank: Josie Williams, Ann Key, Liza Wilmot, Brigitte Williams and Harriet Devine for being my first readers and giving me such encouragement. I am also indebted to Harriet for her professional help, comments and proof reading. Mark Ecob (mecob design) who read my book, got it and designed a great cover, for which I am very grateful. My husband who nagged me relentlessly to finish this book, and then worked on getting it published, while I moved onto my second book! My son, who says he’s proud of me and didn’t mind too much when I told his friends I was a writer. That means more than anything.

Chapter One

It’s not possible for there to be a mistake in a world governed perfectly by the Divine. Mistakes are what we humans perceive when our vision is obscured. Everything is as it should be in the Universe once you comprehend the bigger picture. But, for those of us who can’t quite read the plan, there can be room for much confusion while we wait for the clouds to clear and the true objective to unfold. This is also true in the heavenly realms where a mistake could have much more serious ramifications for those affected. So it’s a jolly good job that mistakes never happen.

Archangel Gregory had the top job. Gregory was the number one. Well obviously not THE number one, but as near as an angel was going to get. Gregory, had he chosen to take a human form, which is another story altogether, would undoubtedly have been something very big in the civil service and would have not looked out of place in a pin-striped suit, shiny black brogues, gold cufflinks, and possibly even an old school tie. He was establishment, and served his master with devotion, dedication and attention to detail that were unsurpassable. Today he was also a very busy angel, and Josh, his angelic young assistant, was having a little difficulty keeping up with him.

It was Gregory’s regular meeting with GOD to review the progress of those people on earth whose lives, it had been decided by the Office of Life Plan Compliance, might need a little extra help or attention. Mostly it involved souls who were not keeping to the schedule that they had designed for themselves before they had returned to earth for another try at life. What made the whole thing so very difficult was that having designed the challenges, the joys and opportunities that you want to experience next time round, you then promptly forget the plan as soon as you are re-born. So sticking to the plan can be a bit tricky, as you don’t remember what the plan is, or that indeed there is one. Some people spend the largest part of their lives just trying to remember what it was they wanted to achieve in this life. Without even knowing that they had decided this before they were reborn. It can be a very confusing situation. This is where a whole bevy of celestial helpers comes in. Your guardian angel, supported by a cast of deceased friends and family from every previous incarnation, will help steer you through life, following your original plan, keeping the score as it were while you innocently get on with living. Ignorant for the most part that the plan exists or even that your angel and the team are there to make sure that you get through as many of the experiences as possible before your time is up - well for this time round. It is not uncommon for people to deviate from the script almost completely, ad-libbing their way through life, and sometimes extra help is needed to bring them back to the original plan before too much time is lost.

This was one of those occasions when GOD had decided to do a spot check on the status of a few of his creations and therefore it was going to be a very busy morning. Gregory had all the information at his fingertips, well actually at Josh’s fingertips. Josh was his bag carrier. He had collected all the files from the ‘Office of Life Plan Compliance’ on everyone that GOD had requested to discuss with Gregory, and as heaven wasn’t computerised this amounted to a mountain of paperwork. Teetering folders and sheaves of paper threatened to swallow Josh in an avalanche of celestial stock-taking while he sat attentively waiting to respond to Gregory’s next request for information. Young Josh had once foolishly mentioned that they could do away with all these files and folders if only they were computerised and Gregory had made his own views on the subject perfectly plain,

‘How in heaven, dear boy, do you think that computerising everything will reduce the number of files that you have to carry or the amount of paper that is produced?’

Before Josh could go on to explain how huge amounts of information could be stored on very small memory sticks that could just fit in your pocket Gregory had already begun to demonstrate an impressive knowledge and insight into the nonsense of the ‘paperless office.’ Plus angels don’t have pockets. They do however have ready access to ‘clouds’ but Gregory wasn't interested in finding out about such new fangled storage ideas.

‘Have you ever watched someone at work at their computer preparing a report?’ Gregory asked.

‘First they print out a draft without even bothering to check their spelling, so immediately they begin to realise all the mistakes they have made as their report emerges from the printer. Even before it has finished being printed they are correcting the spelling and the typographical mistakes and then they start to print it out again. This time they realise that parts of it don’t make sense and need rewriting, so again they make some changes and try once more. The changes they have made have now messed up the formatting of the material and so when they print it out this time the page breaks are all in the wrong place and none of the tables make any sense. Finally by the time they get it right they have at least eight copies of the report in varying degrees of unreadiness on their desk and the floor of their office and they will never throw any of them away despite the fact that the only one that is of any use is spewing out of their overworked and by now rather bored printer. This, my dear boy, is not a paperless office but a sea of discarded fonts, misaligned tables, misplaced bullet points and phantom page breaks. Now can we get on?’

Josh had not mentioned it to Gregory again but he did feel very strongly that Heaven needed to embrace the ‘cloud’ in a totally different way very soon and on this day he felt more keenly than usual that a bit of computerised cross-referencing would not go amiss.

Gregory and Josh made their way to the Celestial Quarters for their regular meeting. Josh was always amazed at how serene the Quarters were, despite the amount of work that took place there. He loved these meetings. To be in the presence of GOD was tremendously, fabulously, awe-inspiringly magnificent. As soon as you walked in through the huge doors of the Celestial Quarters you could feel the warmth, the light, the energy humming all around you. It was like walking into the warmest embrace. Sparkly and deliciously sweet. The angel at reception waved them into GOD’s meeting room with a huge smile. They sat down in their usual places and waited for GOD to appear, which he did in the blink of an eye. Josh was still thinking of the issues surrounding data storage and had in fact gone off into a little daydream involving multi level databases, interactive tracking systems and voice recognition software when he heard Gregory’s voice coming as from afar.

‘Boy, are you awake?’

Josh started from his delicious reverie, scattering a pile of files that had been balancing precariously on his knee all over the floor in front of him, and not just in front of him but in front of GOD too. In some embarrassment and confusion Josh bent down to gather together the stray papers. GOD was chuckling but Gregory was not.

‘Don’t worry about all that now, you are wasting time. Didn’t you hear what I asked you for? GOD would firstly like to review the file of Emma Butler, reborn 12.4.87, living in London, England. Find it quickly, boy.’

Josh hunted on his hands and knees on the floor for the appropriate file, his cherubic countenance becoming rosier and rosier as he felt Gregory’s eyes locked on him. Gregory was losing much of his angelic composure. He couldn’t bear GOD to think that he was anything less than 100% efficient but this boy was a liability, always daydreaming, never keeping his attention on the job in hand. He would have to think about replacing him.

‘Hurry, boy,’ he hissed, hoping that GOD would not hear the growing menace in his voice. This was of course rather a vain hope, as God isn’t known for being hard of hearing. GOD gave Josh an encouraging smile and didn't seem concerned about the delay at all.

GOD was in fact using the time to look in on a developing situation elsewhere in the Universe, to answer some prayers, and to send some back unopened, as the senders hadn’t really expected a reply.

‘Why oh why do they send them when they don’t expect a reply?’ he muttered quietly to himself, shaking his head while the angels sprawled at his feet trying to re-establish order out of the chaos before them. Finally Gregory grabbed a file marked ‘Emma Butler’, pushed the papers on the floor around it back in and tried to regain his composure before coughing gently and politely in GOD’s direction.

GOD looked up and smiled,

‘So, are we ready to see how Miss Butler is progressing?’ His voice was like warm sunshine on a spring day.

Gregory turned to the first page of the file. It was all out of order, and some of the pages were upside down and back to front. Gregory was looking for the life plan. It is somewhat like the plan a woman puts together before she goes into labour saying what she does and doesn’t want to happen during the delivery of her baby etc., but in the case of the life plan the idea is to keep to it.

At last he found it.

‘Yes master, I think everything is in order now, let me see.....um.....well from what I can see here she is due for recall on the 19th September 2015 and so far she has completed...’ his eyes scanned the pages to see how many of her self-allotted tasks she had left to do in the short time left to her on earth. He gasped. She had nearly everything left to do and only a week to do it in.

‘Oh my, well I have no idea how the situation was allowed to get so bad, but Master, she hasn’t completed any major task on her list yet.’

GOD looked up from answering another prayer and smiled.

‘Well, see that she makes the necessary progress before she comes home, Gregory. We can review the other files another time I think. I shall go now, as I imagine you have a lot to sort out.’

With that GOD winked at Josh and was gone, and Gregory was left staring in amazement at the mess before him. Not just the remains of the papers that Josh was trying to return to their files but also the mess of the life of Emma Butler. How had it been overlooked? What had her guardian angel and his team of spirit guides and helpers been doing? He would have to go and find out immediately, no time could be lost.

‘Josh, when you have finished tidying up go to your room and I want you to meditate on what has happened this morning and see what lessons you can learn from it.’

That was as harsh as ‘telling offs’ got in heaven, but it was a tough one!!

Somewhere close by and at the furthest reaches of the universe GOD chuckled. Josh however was already meditating on the fact that had everything been stored in the ‘cloud’ none of this would have happened. He knew Gregory would blame him for this disorder but he really had tried to introduce a foolproof system. It was Gregory’s resistance to change that was really the problem. Josh wondered where GOD stood on the matter, but it was unlikely that he would get a chance to ask him. He only really ever got to be in GOD’s presence with Gregory and then it was Gregory that did all the talking. Josh dreamt of some day being able to present his plan to the maker of all plans, but for now it was off to his room as instructed by Gregory, who was already on his way to find out exactly what had happened and to decide how to put it right.

***

There was a general fluttering of wings as Gregory marched into the 'Guardian Angels Control Room'. He had the definite air of an angel who has had his not inconsiderable feathers ruffled in a not inconsiderable way.

‘Good morning, Archangel Gregory,’ chorused the assembled host in perfect harmony, with just a hint of celestial harp music to be detected in the background for good measure and to show appropriate respect. Normally this show of deference warmed Gregory’s heart and made his halo glow that little bit brighter, but today it had no effect on his scowling demeanour.

‘There has been a serious oversight and I want to know who is responsible for it.’

He stood, wings fully extended, an imposing figure, sending the assembled throng into a rustling of agitated feathers and a lowering of angelic eyes. Now Gregory should have had enough experience to know that a mistake is a rare thing in Heaven, but he was rattled and didn’t stop to examine the situation too clearly. Maybe that was part of the plan too? Gregory was advancing into the room brandishing the file he carried in what would have been described anywhere else as a threatening manner.

‘Here I have the life plan for one Emma Butler.’

He was speaking quite softly now. This scared the throng even more. The more serious the situation the more control Gregory exhibited and the sweeter his voice became.

‘She is due for recall in a week’s time, and would anyone like to guess how much of her life plan she has completed?’

It was obvious to all present that this was a bit of a trick question as he wouldn’t be there if she had done it all, but all the same somehow no-one wanted to guess. Gregory seemed to realise that there would be no takers for this particular game so he continued even more sweetly,

‘None of it - absolutely none of it.’

Well, they all knew that this was sure to be an exaggeration. One begins to work through their life plan as soon as they are reborn - but somehow no one wanted to point this out and they got the drift. She still had all the major events to go through, so with only a week to go, something must have gone terribly wrong. That was becoming obvious to them all. Around the room there was a collective celestial intake of breath and a rearranging of plumage.

An angel appeared in the doorway and surveyed the scene. It was Anthony, who was in charge of the Guardian Angel Control Room. What he saw was an obviously agitated Archangel and a rather cowed workforce.

‘Good morning, Archangel Gregory. Is there something I can help you with?’ he asked, looking concernedly from one angelic face to the next.

‘Indeed, Anthony. We have a very serious situation. A recall date of a week and no life plan compliance to speak of. We have much work to do.’ Gregory continued.

This was looking like a bit of an understatement, as angel looked at fellow angel but no one looked at Gregory.

‘Anthony, I want you to recall the guardian angel of Emma Butler and suspend him until I have a chance to deal with him. I am going to have to take control of this myself and I will need every facility we have available here.’

Anthony's mind was racing, trying to process the information that Gregory had just given him, but he was aware that this was not the time to ask questions. Gregory wanted action, so he nodded and tugged twice on one of the sixty billion ribbons that cascaded around him. In a trice a young angel appeared with the other end of the ribbon worn around his waist. His hands were clasped deferentially in front of him, eyes downcast. He looked up to smile at Anthony but immediately sensed the less than convivial atmosphere. He looked around uncomprehendingly at the accusing, but still sympathetic, eyes until his glance alighted on Archangel Gregory and he felt his halo begin to slip involuntarily under the forceful gaze.

‘You are suspended,’ bellowed Gregory, forgetting for a moment that speech should always be uplifting and sweet.

The young angel, whose name was Edmund, put his hand up to his tilted halo to stop it falling off completely, and then, when he was sure it was secure, he bowed his beautiful head, sending a cascade of golden curls falling around his ears, and disappeared.

It had not occurred to Edmund to ask what his crime had been and therefore he had had no chance to question the veracity of Gregory's concerns. He knew that Gregory’s word was final - unless you wanted to appeal to GOD, and Edmund would never have thought himself worthy enough for that.

Although he could think of nothing that he had done to warrant such a reprimand he had no doubt that it must be justified and that he would have to spend time in deep meditation to find his failure and make amends. He felt a little sad, however, as he had been enjoying his guardianship work and he would miss Emma. He felt that he was beginning to re-establish a relationship with her like the one that he had had when she was a child. He felt sure that she was beginning to feel his presence again and that this was helping her to adhere more closely to her life plan. She was developing a greater sense of who she was and where she saw herself in the world. She was currently feeling a bit stuck but that was always a great precursor to making a move in a new direction and Edmund was looking forward to seeing where that move might take her. She wanted to be in a relationship but found it difficult to find someone who matched her needs, and he knew she needed to expand her horizons and increase the flexibility of her thinking. But for all those challenges Edmund was enjoying seeing Emma grow and had great hopes for her.

He had enjoyed helping her put together her life plan before she was reborn and it had been a joy to see her progressing through it and offering the odd nudge when she seemed to be deviating from her path. Now for some reason he was being taken away from this work and although he was confused by the speed of events he trusted that they would be for the good and that he would soon gain an insight into where he had so unwittingly gone wrong. It did not for one moment occur to him that maybe there had been a mistake which he was not responsible for. That actually Gregory had mixed up the jumbled files and had put together the life plan of Emma Butler with the recall date of someone much older. It would not have occurred to anyone that Gregory could have made such a mistake, especially not to Gregory himself. Somewhere close by and also far away GOD smiled.

After Edmund’s dismissal, most of the other angels felt shocked, and had quietly returned to their tasks. Nobody wanted to draw attention to themselves, as they had a sense that today the sensible thing was to keep one’s head down. Anthony however had no such choice. Gregory was looming over him. Anthony was in charge of the Guardian Angel programme and if Gregory was really going to take control of this particular case, the next week was going to be both challenging and busy for him and his team.

‘Right, Anthony, we really need your best team on this. I can’t remember a time when we have had so much to do to meet our deadline.’

Gregory looked down the list of events on the life plan that he was going to have to ensure were completed quickly.

Anthony needed to know what was going to have to be achieved before he could decide who he should put on the job, but he was reticent to ask too much as he knew that at some level he and his team could also be implicated in this dreadful error. He tried to rack his brains for the details of Edmund’s last report but could think of nothing that should have given him a clue that things were so wildly off beam. Edmund was a young angel who had previously worked in the Office of Life Plan Compliance, under the tutelage of Angel Tobias. But this had brought him into daily contact with guardian angels and eventually he had realised that his calling was to join their ranks. His work had always been of the highest standard and he had come to Anthony's office with a glowing recommendation from Tobias who, it appeared, was sorry to lose him. Anthony was still in awful shock and couldn't believe that Edmund could be responsible for such a gross