by Scott Colby
“Hi, Nella.”
A tendril of water reached out from the spire and slapped Driff across the face with a sharp splash. The elf took the blow without flinching.
“You asshole!” Nella screamed at the elf. The gills in her neck flared angrily. “You didn’t have to drag him into this!”
Driff shrugged. “Probably not, but if you would prefer I tell the local reaper you broke off your engagement for this stiff…that can certainly be arranged.”
She shook her head and stepped forward onto Fornication Point. Behind her, the tower of water lost form and plummeted back into the lagoon with a thunderous splash. “That won’t be necessary.” Nella ignored Driff and walked purposefully to Kevin. “I guess it’s time we discussed a few things.”
That, he thought, was a severe understatement, but the best he could manage was a weak, “Okay.”
Nella took Kevin’s arm in hers and led him into the forest.
— CHAPTER SEVEN —
Neither Kevin nor Nella spoke as they made their way through the thick woods. The things they had to say to each other were private and Driff had big ears. A little distance would make them both more comfortable and give them time to organize their thoughts.
Kevin’s mind was a chaotic whirl of questions. Never had he seen Nella’s face sagging with melancholy, her bearing defeated. She’d always been so confident and carefree, but now she walked as if heading for the gallows. Seeing her in that state was a bit of a shock to Kevin’s system. His thoughts raced even faster, searching for a means of addressing the issue at hand without being mean or nasty about it. The last thing he wanted to do was scare her off.
Is she in some sort of trouble? Kevin wondered. Why did she pretend like she had no idea what was going on? Why was she so afraid that Driff would tell the reaper about us? Does she ever put on any damn clothes?
And, perhaps most importantly, one question desperately repeated itself again and again, louder and more insistent than all the rest: We can still be friends, right?
They walked for fifteen minutes before stopping. Nella lead Kevin down into a sandy hollow beneath the boughs of a gnarled, towering oak tree. She sat gingerly upon a mossy log and rested her clenched hands atop her knees. Kevin remained standing.
“The first time I saw you was atop Fornication Point,” she said softly, her eyes glued to the loose earth at her feet. “It was late at night. The moon was full. I remember it had a sort of blue aura around it, as if it were the center of a great flower. Three or four of your idiot friends were lined up along the edge of the cliff with their pants down around their ankles and their asses aimed at my lagoon. They thought it would be hilarious to all shit over the edge at once and listen to the sound their excrement made when it hit the water after falling thirty feet. You told them they were gross and stupid, and then you whacked one of them on his bare ass with a switch and chased them all off.”
Kevin remembered that night—vaguely. There were mushrooms involved. He was glad to hear that he’d maintained a bit of dignity even while stoned out of his teenaged skull.
“I came to you the next night,” she continued. “I know it sounds silly, but I wanted to reward you for having a heart. Pretty much all the people who visit my lagoon are giant fucking assholes. But not you. Not you. Each time I came to visit, you were so nice to me, and…well…I love my home, but it gets a bit lonely out here, so I kept going back for more.”
When she didn’t go on, Kevin spoke, “I didn’t think you were real.”
She smiled sadly and looked up at him for the first time. Tears streaked down her blue cheeks. “When did I say I wasn’t?”
He smiled back. “Fair enough, but you could’ve at least given me some sort of hint.”
She shook her head. “It wouldn’t have made any difference. They put shit in the water supply to preemptively suppress any memories you humans have of our kind, and then they use the television and the radio to trigger it. If I had told you, you would’ve forgotten the next day—and you may have forgotten me altogether. It was better that you thought I was a dream; they don’t use the dust to erase dreams.”
“Driff shot me,” Kevin said. “After I…came back…he used some kind of dust to remove my mother’s memory of it.”
“Same stuff.” She sniffled. “By the tides, those elves are a bunch of assholes.”
“I haven’t been impressed with the one I’ve met.”
She hesitated before responding, clearly debating whether to give voice to the words in her mind. “Kevin, you should run. Get far away from here. If Billy catches word that I left him at the altar to be with you…”
He raised his eyebrows. “Billy? The reaper’s name is Billy?” He’d been expecting something a bit more ominous, something long and vaguely Biblical.
Nella nodded. “He was human once. Now he’s just cold and dead inside. I started seeing him two years after you left for college. Without you, it felt like a part of me was missing. There was a Kevin-shaped hole in my heart. Billy could relate. We hit it off, and…”
“And now, two years later, I’m back for more than just a holiday weekend.”
“He’s not doing his job right now, but if he finds out about you, he’ll kill you—and it won’t be pretty.”
That explained Driff’s threat. If the reaper killed the man who stole his fiancée, he might go right back to work. So why had the elf dragged Kevin out to the Works to see Nella instead of dropping him off on Billy’s doorstep? Driff was certainly a no-nonsense kind of guy. It didn’t make sense.
“I can’t run. I don’t have anywhere to go.” He paused, gathering the confidence he needed for his next statement. He couldn’t believe his words even though he knew them to be undeniably true. “And I don’t want to leave. This morning, I wanted to get the hell out of Harksburg as soon as possible—but this morning, I thought you were just a dream.”
Nella’s face flushed an even darker shade of blue. “That’s sweet, Kevin. It really is. But they will never let it happen.”
He wasn’t so sure of that. Ren seemed to know way too much about what was going on to have only learned about all these hidden fairy people just recently. Kevin suspected there was a way to counteract the narii dust and that his friend knew exactly what it was. “We’ll cross that bridge when we get there. For now, we have to deal with Billy.”
“How? I doubt even your elf friend has any experience with heartbroken avatars of death.”
Kevin scratched his chin, thinking. “We’ll find him someone new. Avatar of death or not, he’s still male and he was human once. He’ll never be completely over you until he finds someone new.”
She shook her head. “That’s the dumbest idea I’ve ever heard.”
“It’s brilliant, actually,” Driff said, materializing to their right. He stood nonchalantly, hands in his pockets, as if he’d been a part of the conversation all along. The garbage that had covered him previously was gone, his coat somehow spotless. “Even if I served him Kevin’s head on a silver platter—I’ve been considering that, by the way—he might still refuse to do his job. If we find a woman who can pull him out of his rut, that problem’s solved.”
“Fuck you!” Nella snapped at the elf. “Were you listening the entire time?”
“Most of it.” Driff furrowed his brow. “Did you really think I wouldn’t be?”
Kevin shrugged. He had a point. “We’ll need Ren’s help.” If Ren could hook a loser like Flanagan up with a beauty like Lily, surely he could find someone for a reaper named Billy.
Driff nodded, his attention still on Nella. “We’ll need to know where Billy is.”
She glared at Kevin. “I can’t believe you’re considering this. I’m not going to let you walk right up to him so he can kill you. He’s a reaper. He can pull your soul out through your nostrils and tear it up into a million tiny pieces.”
“He doesn’t know about our relationship,” Kevin said, “and we’re sure as hell not going to tell him.”
/> “No,” Nella said. “No way.”
Driff shrugged and turned to go. “I’ll get the other bag of garbage. I’ll be back with a whole dumpster tomorrow.”
“No!” Nella sprang to her feet, tidal waves roiling in her eyes. Kevin was glad he’d never made her angry. “Fine. I’ll give you his address if you promise me that nothing will happen to Kevin.” She extended her right hand for a handshake that would seal the deal.
The elf paused. He considered Nella’s offer for what seemed like far too long. It was a simple enough promise to make—unless Driff had other plans in mind for Kevin’s fate that he hadn’t mentioned. “Deal.”
He took Nella’s hand then, and the blue woman pumped it three times with what seemed like enough force to yank his arm free from its socket. When she let go, Kevin got just a glimpse of the new green hue to Driff’s fingers before the elf shoved his hand back into his pocket.
“Lordly Estates,” Nella said with a wicked smile. “Lot 22.”
Driff nodded and headed back the way they’d come.
“What did you do to him?” Kevin asked when the elf was out of earshot.
“My kind take our promises very, very seriously,” she explained, “and we have the power to enforce them.”
“What…uh…what exactly…um…” Kevin stumbled over his words, embarrassed by his next question.
Nella took him in her arms and leaned in close. “I’m a water nymph.”
A water nymph. Of course, Kevin thought sarcastically. He still had no clue exactly what that was, but it seemed to fit. His heart racing, he kissed her as hard as he could. Kevin had a reaper to visit, and he was going to be damned if his last kiss wasn’t absolutely fantastic, just in case.
— CHAPTER EIGHT —
Had construction of Harrison Metalworks continued as planned, Lordly Estates would’ve teemed with the vast cadre of middle managers necessary for the facility’s proper operation. Harksburg may have had a reputation as a great place to raise a family, but it was not even remotely on the radar of your average corporate ladder-climbing douche bag. To encourage its best and brightest to voluntarily relocate, Harrison purchased several dozen acres of land on what would become Plastic Hill and started building McMansions which it planned to include in its relocation packages. Like the industrial park it had been built to support, Lordly Estates stood incomplete, a vision of progress half-realized and half-baked.
Unlike the Works, Harksburg had found a buyer for Lordly Estates, a mysterious British gentleman known around town as Mr. Pemberton. Rather than completing the project and selling the finished homes, Mr. Pemberton lived there—alone, by all accounts, though Waltman often theorized that he had strippers and prostitutes airlifted in during the dead of night. Once a month, Mr. Pemberton drove his big black Lincoln into town to run errands. He’d stop at the post office to collect a massive heap of mail. He’d swing into the library to exchange last month’s batch of seedy romance novels for an armful of new releases. Sometimes he’d visit the hardware store to procure various odds and ends. At his last stop, Herman’s Grocer, he’d purchase several boxes of cereal and enough TV dinners for lunch and dinner until his next supply run. By all accounts Mr. Pemberton was a nice enough fellow, a quiet man who rarely started a conversation on his own but always responded politely and intelligently when spoken to. He always wore a crisp black suit, paid in cash, and adhered to the speed limit.
As far as the general populace of Harksburg was concerned, Mr. Pemberton was a complete fucking loon. Flanagan tailed him whenever he came into town. “That weirdo’s up to something,” the officer claimed, “and whatever it is ain’t happening on my watch!” Kevin wondered what his friend would make of the news that Mr. Pemberton was consorting with the local avatar of death.
“We jokingly call them ‘reaper keepers,’” Driff explained during the short drive back up Plastic Hill. He was careful to keep his hand in his pocket the entire time. “Helping friends, family, and even casual acquaintances accept death is not a fun experience. Most reapers withdraw from regular society to live as hermits. They’re well paid for their work and each is assigned a servant to see to his or her needs and represent the reaper when interaction with the general populace is necessary.”
“Hence why Mr. Pemberton’s name is on the deed to Lordly Estates,” Ren added. “Billy provided the capital, but he didn’t want his name on record.”
“Why does he care?” Kevin asked. His head was still swimming from his meeting with Nella; he suspected he was missing something obvious, and he wanted to know what.
“He was human once,” Driff said. “He probably doesn’t want to be tracked down by anyone he used to know.”
“That could be a bit awkward,” Kevin agreed. Telling people he hadn’t seen in years that he was “in between things”—his preferred alternative to “unemployed” because it felt a little less desperate—was bad enough. Having to explain to someone that you’re the avatar of death or look a friend square in the eye knowing that you’re the only reason Grandma didn’t climb right back into her body after that stroke would be absolute hell. Kevin certainly didn’t begrudge the reaper his need for privacy.
A massive wrought iron gate set into a pair of towering stone pillars kept the riffraff out of Lordly Estates. Beyond, the forested road snaked around a corner, keeping the development itself out of view. The proletariat wasn’t even allowed to catch a glimpse of the luxury inside without explicit permission.
Ren stopped the car in front of the gate. “I’ll get us an invitation,” Driff said as he clambered out and approached the intercom set into one of the monolithic supports.
As soon as the car door slammed shut behind the elf, Kevin leaned forward and took firm hold of Ren’s shoulder. “What the hell’s going on, Ren?”
His friend shifted into the contemptuous tone Kevin had only heard him use when he’d been caught red-handed. “Whatever do you mean?”
“You. Me.” He pointed at Driff’s back. “Him.”
“He’s our employer. And we’re his exceptionally well-paid employees.”
“I get why he wanted me along. But why you? Why’d he go to you first?”
Ren pursed his lips and considered this for a moment. “My reputation as a shrewd-yet-fair businessman must run deeper than I thought.”
Ahead of them, hidden machinery pulled the two halves of the gate apart. Driff turned to make his way back to the vehicle. Their only chance to talk wasted, Kevin slapped the back of his friend’s head. “You’re an ass, you know that?”
“Yeah, but I’ve got a great car.”
Driff yanked the passenger door open and climbed in. “Billy will see us.”
Kevin rolled his eyes. “I’m glad he’s willing to take time out of his busy schedule of not doing his fucking job.”
“He knows who pays the bills,” Driff said as Ren pulled the car forward. The gate closed behind them with an ominous clunk.
“You elves?”
“Among others. Anyone who doesn’t want a world full of immortal humans—and elves—who refuse to let go when it’s their time.”
“Humans and elves. But not, say, water nymphs?”
The elf shook his head. “The fae do not need a reaper’s help. They understand the way of things and they’re at peace with it. When you live as long as they do, death is a lot easier to accept.”
That explained why Billy, a recluse who spurned all human contact, was willing to become romantically entangled with Nella. Kevin found himself wondering what the reaper’s work was like. How exactly did you go about helping someone die? A couple of days ago, his answer to that question would’ve been blunt and to the point. When blades and bullets aren’t enough, what then? He flashed back to his own out-of-body experience after Driff shot him, to that overwhelming, all-consuming desperation with which he’d clung to life. What force on earth could possibly overcome such a powerful instinct? He wasn’t sure he wanted to know.
The road banked sharply to t
he right, bringing them to the first row of homes. Lordly Estates was, above all else, a physical representation of the abstract social levels its intended inhabitants expected to climb. Smaller homes for lower-level executives were carved into the first row. Houses grew bigger and grander with each of the six tiers, culminating in the sprawling manse at the very top reserved for the regional vice president.
“My family’s house is bigger,” Ren said nonchalantly. Nobody cared.
Kevin shivered. Something about Lordly Estates didn’t feel right. The empty driveways and curtainless windows made the place seem stillborn. Vacant overgrown lawns should’ve been strewn with tacky ornaments and forgotten children’s toys. Halloween was only a few weeks away, and yet there was nary a scarecrow nor jack-o-lantern in sight. An eerie silence settled heavily over it all, interrupted only by the soft purr of the Jaguar’s engine. The place felt dead—appropriate, Kevin decided, given its master. Nella never would’ve been happy in a place like this.
Ren took the direct route, easing the Jaguar up the wide street that bisected the lower tiers on its way to the reaper’s abode. The number 22 beckoned in bulky gold figures on the marble mailbox at the head of the mansion’s winding driveway. The building itself evoked memories of a Civil War era plantation Kevin had once seen in a movie: tall and white and foreboding and propped up with gargantuan white columns. Ren’s family’s home may have been bigger, but its silly postmodern lines weren’t nearly as grand and imposing as those of lot 22.
As the car rolled to a halt before the front porch, Kevin leaned forward between the seats and looked to Driff. “So…uh…anything we need to know about dealing with a reaper?”
“If he goes for your nose, run,” the elf replied as he clambered out of the vehicle.
Mr. Pemberton awaited them on the mansion’s expansive front porch. “Good morning, gentlemen,” he said, his deep voice emotionless and precise and annoyingly British. Narrow eyes and the pencil-thin mustache that traced his slender upper lip combined to give him a perpetual condescending frown. His age was as difficult to judge as his attitude. His long face was clean and unwrinkled, but his short black hair was flecked with gray and rapidly receding from his forehead.