Second Chances by Rodney Cook

SECOND CHANCES

Rodney Cook

Synopsis

An inebriated Dan Ransom is driving home from a party with a beautiful, young woman, whose name he can’t remember. As he drives he becomes distracted when he catches a glimpse of the unconscious woman’s panties. He pays less and less attention to the road as the young woman’s anatomy captivates his attention and leads his mind astray.

His shameless manipulations result in the woman becoming aroused, further feeding his lustful desires. A tractor trailer coming from the opposite direction permanently ends Dan’s interests in the young woman as it sideswipes the car that Dan frantically tries to remove from the path of destruction. After the accident, Dan awakens amid the underbrush near his wrecked Porsche. The car is resting on its side well off the road. Dan gets up and goes to the car looking for the young woman whose name he now remembers is Sandy. He searches the car’s interior and finds no sign of her.

As Dan searches the surrounding bushes, he notices a light near the road at the end of the path through the foliage that his car left in its passing. He begins walking toward the light, searching the brush as he makes his way down the tunnel-like path. A cursory glance over his shoulder reveals a thick blanket of fog that soon envelops him. Dan runs through the fog-shrouded forest until he trips and falls, becoming unconscious. When he awakens, he hears a voice and follows the sound through the fog until he comes upon a hotel. He leaves the fog and goes to the hotel where he is met by a female night clerk.

Dan wants to use a phone and is informed that they have no phone. He quickly learns, after entering the hotel, that he is trapped in this place. A large, mysterious, and beneficent hotel manager, who introduces himself as Clarence Graves, calms Dan down and shows him to his room. Dan goes to bed and is troubled by a dream of a hospital operating room. He awakens the next morning to find a pair of teens trying to break into his room. After speaking with them shortly, Dan decides it’s time to get to the bottom of this mystery and heads down to the lobby where he meets with Clarence Graves.

Dan and Clarence discuss the reason Dan is here. Dan is forced to watch/live through a couple of his life experiences that were somewhat shameful. He is then told that he must choose to either pay for his sins or cease existing. Dan is told to return to his room and decide. Dan reads the book in his room and finds that it is about his life. Max Brewer, one of the teens, talks with him and tells Dan about a third choice – fixing the problem – getting a Second Chance. Dan studies the book more and goes to sleep. He awakens to find himself in the back seat of his own car, watching his actions just prior to the accident.

Dan, with his new knowledge and considerably altered sense of what is right and wrong, successfully avoids the accident only to find himself confronted by the husband of the beautiful young woman from the party. Dan doesn’t live through the encounter, however, his actions were enough to tilt the scales in his favor and he is able to avoid the choices offered him at the hotel and enter the Light.