1 Graveyard Shift

by Angela Roquet

  “Do I have time to call my mom and tell her goodbye?” he asked.

  I blinked a few times, wondering if I was imagining things. This kid couldn’t see me. Could he? But there he sat, staring at me, waiting for an answer.

  “You can see me?” I took a step back and looked from Josie to Kevin. Their eyes had gone wide and their mouths gaped in a cross of confusion and terror. Saul and Coreen tilted their heads in unison, a cute admission of wonder. I would have smiled if I hadn’t been so freaked out.

  “Yeah.” Winston raised an eyebrow, or the skin where an eyebrow would have been if he had any, and looked me up and down. I took another step back while my pulse slapped at my temples. This was not how things worked. And why was he only looking at me?

  “Can you see them?” I pointed to Josie and Kevin.

  Winston frowned and glanced around the room. “No, just you. So can I call my mom?”

  “Uh, sure, I guess.” I pulled at the neck of my robe. They certainly hadn’t covered this in my Soul Communications class.

  Josie and Kevin turned their attention away from Winston and stared at me. How was I supposed to explain this? Obviously, they knew we were looking for a unique soul. But they didn’t know they were working with a unique reaper. I planned on keeping it that way. I liked my head where it was, and I was under enough thumbs.

  Winston picked up the dinosaur phone beside his bed and cradled it between his shoulder and ear before punching in his mother’s number. Dinosaurs seemed to be the theme for the room. A dozen plastic T-rexes stood guard over the blinking heart monitor, while pterodactyls nested in a tangle of IV tubing. A stuffed saber-toothed tiger was curled up at the foot of the bed.

  “Hey mom!” Winston sounded too cheerful for a dying little boy in the presence of Death. “I just wanted to tell you I love you... no, I feel great today. Never better.”

  I frowned. Most souls had a hard time accepting their death. Even suicides seemed disoriented at first. Never had I seen a soul acknowledge their own demise with such grace. He had to be the one.

  Winston hung up the phone and looked back at me. “Okay. I’m ready.”

  “Uh.” I looked up at the clock above his bed. “We still have an hour to wait.”

  “What?” Winston laughed. “Why are you here so early?”

  “Well, you see,” I stammered. I’m so not good with kids.

  “You’re special,” I began.

  “That’s what the doctors told me when I was six and they strapped me to all these machines.” He frowned at me then. “You’re not going to strap my soul to a bunch of machines too, are you?”

  “Not exactly.” I didn’t have any idea what Grim would do with his soul, but I was pretty sure it didn’t involve machines, and I was pretty sure he had to agree to take Khadija’s place.

  “What’s your faith?”

  “My mother’s a scientologist.” He tilted his head at me again. “But if I didn’t already know better, I would now.”

  “Okay.” I folded my arms and paced in front of his bed. “You can A, be dumped in a sea full of faithless souls, or B, save Eternity from Chaos by unofficially working for my boss, Grim.”

  “Save Eternity from Chaos? Well, that’s better than the options the doctors gave me. When do I start?”

  I sighed. Grim owed me big time. I looked up at the clock again. “In fifty-three minutes.”

  “I’ve been in constant pain for three years. I doubt another hour will kill me. Oh, wait,” he laughed. “It will.” He picked up his game and clicked away with a pleased grin. “You know, I thought you’d be scarier.”

  “Yeah, and I thought you’d be quieter. Most souls can’t see me until they’re out of their bodies.”

  “But I’m special,” he mocked in a squeaky voice. It would have been easier putting up with him for another hour if he couldn’t see me, but at least he was cooperating.

  I straightened my robe and paced across the hospital room to cast a menacing glare out the window at the angry Cleveland traffic below. Josie slipped up beside me and nervously squeezed my elbow, quietly drawing my attention back to her. She gave me a worried frown and peeked over her shoulder to make sure Kevin was out of hearing range.

  “What the hell is going on?” she whispered.

  “I’m not sure.” It wasn’t a total lie. Lately, there wasn’t much I was sure about. I shrugged and gave her half a smile. “But let’s make it work to our advantage.”

  “Who are you talking to?” Winston reached for his stuffed tiger and hugged it to his chest. He glanced around the room again with a skeptic frown, trying to decide if he should be afraid.

  “Since you can see and hear me,” I said, returning to his beside, “there is something you should probably know.”

  “What?” He clutched the tiger’s tail and anxiously pulled on it until the seams stretched and bits of fuzzy rump stuffing sprang out.

  “In the next-” I looked up at the wall clock, “forty-five minutes or so, we will more than likely be attacked by demons.”

  “Demons?” Winston rested his head on top of the tiger’s and bit down on one of the unsuspecting creature’s ratty ears.

  “Yes, demons.” I sighed. “So far, we haven’t lost any souls, but they keep trying to take them from us. So be careful, and if anything happens, hide. We’ll protect you.”

  “Okay,” he answered meekly, letting the soggy ear fall from his mouth.

  This was first time I was able to plot with a soul before a guaranteed demon attack. I could do better than this. I grinned down at the tiger, a deliciously deceptive scheme forming in my head. “Scratch that, there’s been a change of plans, Winston.”

  Chapter 25

  “Beware when the great God

  lets loose a thinker on this planet.”

  -Ralph Waldo Emerson

  “This is the stupidest idea you’ve ever had,” Josie rasped as my shoulder cracked into her hip for the second time.

  You would think hospital closets would be larger, or at least big enough to hold a piece or two of their bulky equipment. This one could make a mop bucket claustrophobic. Thankfully, we would only have to suffer for a few more minutes.

  I kneeled down and peeked through the keyhole again to make sure Winston was staying put under the hospital bed. His valiant tiger and company were piled into a believable lump under the sheets that also hid the IVs still attached to his arm.

  “This better work,” I mumbled to myself. The moment of truth was creeping silently closer. Over-anticipation had sent a rush order of adrenaline through me, bringing on an acute case of the Chihuahua shakes and a tingling sensation that took over my knees.

  “Maybe Grim’s announcement worked.” Kevin tugged at the neck of his robe, trying to conjure even the slightest breeze to relive the unbearable heat three smashed bodies created in such a tiny space. “Maybe everyone thinks we’ve already got the soul and the demons gave up. Maybe-“

  “Shhh,” I hissed.

  Soft and sneaky footsteps echoed down the hall and stopped just outside Winston’s door. I peeked through the keyhole again and watched Winston curl himself into a tight ball, pulling completely out of view. Good.

  The door clicked open and a young nurse stepped inside, carrying a lunch tray.

  “Well?” Josie asked.

  “Shhh.” I squeezed her leg. The possessed mailman had heard us just fine. I didn’t want to take that kind of risk again.

  Nurse might have been an overstatement. This girl looked like she was barely out of high school. A reddish-brown pony tail bobbed between the straps of her protective paper mask, and I felt a pinch of shame that I hadn’t bothered asking Winston what he was dying from. Not that I had to worry about catching it.

  “Lunch is served.” The nurse placed the tray on the bedside table and gently stroked the heap on the bed, noticing right away that the unusually squishy form was not Winston.

  “Winston?” She yanked back the blanket and clutched the front of her kit
ty-cat scrubs with a gasp. “No.”

  “It’s okay, Karen. I’m right here.” Winston sprang out from under the bed, IV cords trailing behind him like a dog chain. I closed my eyes. Crap. Guess I should have told him about possession. Too late now.

  Karen’s eyes welled up as she helped Winston climb back in bed, scolding him for scaring the daylights out of her. “I thought I was going to die, just die!” she wailed through the paper mask.

  “I’m sorry.” Winston dropped his head with a sensible amount of guilt. “It was just a joke.”

  “I can’t take this closet anymore, and we only have, what, four minutes?” Josie glared down at her watch in the dim light.

  “She doesn’t look possessed to me,” Kevin sighed.

  I tilted my head up to look at him. “Did the mailman?”

  He shrugged and folded his arms, accidentally ramming an elbow into Josie’s back.

  “Damn it!” she hissed, tensing her shoulders and casting the blaming grimace at me instead of Kevin. “It’s nearly time, Lana. Let’s just step out there and see if she can see us or not. Anything’s gotta be better than staying in here. Unless you and Kevin have some sort of sick bet going to see who can give me the most bruises today.”

  I bit my lip and squinted at the wall clock through the key hole again. Two minutes to go. It didn’t get much closer than this. “Fine. Get ready.”

  The door popped open and we tumbled out of the closet like a mountain of garbage bags in our black cowls. Josie scrambled to her feet and jerked her bow up, aiming it directly into Nurse Karen’s face. She didn’t even flinch.

  “Are we good?” Kevin asked, holding his scythe above his head like an action figure in mid-swing. I nodded. He and Josie lowered their weapons.

  “Have you been playing in the closet, Winston?” Karen walked right past me and pushed the closet door shut. “You really shouldn’t be doing that. What if you pulled out an IV or something?”

  “I’m sorry. I won’t do it again.” Winston pressed his lips together and blinked at me, giving his head a quick jerk up at the clock behind him. It was time. Any second now.

  I went to stand by the bed and rested my hand on his shoulder, ready to bolt the second his soul was ready. Karen stood on the other side of the bed, dutifully reading the machines and making neat little checks on her clipboard, humming to herself all the while. When she finished, she tugged down her mask and smiled at Winston, resting her own hand on his other shoulder.

  I wasn’t the only one disturbed by the weirdness of otherworldly symmetry. Winston rolled his shoulders and struggled not to look up at me in front of Karen.

  “Lana? Everything okay?” Josie stepped up behind the nurse, leaning around her to see what was going on.

  Karen’s eyes shot up and froze on mine with a familiar disdain. The room filled with a static tension, fading the electric hum of machines until my own panicked heartbeat was the only sound I could hear. Karen reached into the pocket of her kitty-cat scrubs and in one fluid movement, yanked out a syringe and plunged it into Josie’s stomach without even turning around.

  “Josie!” Kevin dropped to his knees to catch her fall. She slumped into his arms, twitching and wide-eyed. Her mouth gaped open in shock as she reached down, clumsily hunting for the source of her pain with shaking hands.

  “Get her out of here!” I screamed at Kevin. He swallowed and cast a nervous glance up at the nurse.

  “Now!” I reached under my robe and grasped the handle of my new axe.

  Kevin reached into his pocket to find his coin before he and Josie vanished. I wasn’t sure what was in the syringe, but Grim would know what to do.

  “What’s going on?” Winston gave up his ruse and turned to look at me. Not a good idea.

  Karen’s eyes bulged excitedly, and she finally tore her gaze off of me long enough to look down at her patient.

  “You can see her?” she breathed. “Then you’re the one. Finally, my job is almost complete. Now if you could just die.” Her fingers slid up his shoulder and wrapped around his neck.

  “Think again, bitch.” I jerked my axe free, slicing through the back of my robe, and swung at her like a lumberjack. Her free hand reached up and caught the handle right under the blade, spotting my vision with splashes of white agony as my shoulders tried to disconnect from their sockets.

  “I’m not one of those demons you’re used to swatting away like flies.” Karen laughed, high and long with a silky stream of satisfaction.

  Winston struggled in her grasp, sprawling his little hands out until he found the buzzer beside his bed. He smashed his fist into the button over and over, signaling a faint alarm in the nurse’s station across the hall.

  “You little brat,” Karen hissed and lifted him out of the bed by the neck. “Why aren’t you dead yet?” She flung him across the room and into the far wall, spraying the collage of dinosaur posters with blood as the IVs ripped free from his arms.

  With Winston out of the bed, I had a clear shot at the possessed nurse. I took it. My foot connected with her stomach and she dropped the head of my axe with a soggy grunt and staggered back a step. I lifted the axe again, ignoring the burning sensation running through my shoulders, and rushed another wild swing at her.

  Instead of trying to stop the blade again, she recoiled within an inch of losing her head and gave the handle of my axe a quick push in the direction it was already going, sending me spinning like a top. Her knees lodged between my shoulder blades as she slammed me down on the hospital floor and tangled a hand in my hair to jerk my head back. My axe clattered noisily away from me.

  “Thought you could fool Seth with your little shopping spree, did you? Well, you didn’t fool me,” she hissed as she loosed her grip in my hair long enough to crush my face into the cold linoleum. She jerked my head back again and leaned in closer, invoking the intimate sort of terror reserved for serial killers. “Your time’s up little reaper. And I doubt Grim will be erecting any monuments in your honor.” She rocked back on her heels, giddy with victory.

  Blood leaked from my lips and sprayed across the floor as I rasped, willing my throat to work despite the twisted angle of my neck. She dropped my head back to the floor, shooting sharp lines across my vision as she stepped around me and kneeled down with one hand still mangled in my hair.

  “I tell you what,” she sighed. “Seth and I will drink to you tonight. That should be honor enough for a lowly reaper. Don’t you think?” She smiled and the silvery edge of a blade came in to view as she lifted my head, exposing my neck.

  I managed a strained smirk, giving her a moment’s pause. A moment was all I needed.

  “I’d tell you to rot in Hell, but I have a feeling you’ve been doing that for most of your pathetic life,” I spat at her.

  Her face scrunched up and pulsed with a ghostly light. It was like watching a soul try to fit back into their body. It never quite works. Foggy features pressed through Karen’s skin, giving her a hologram likeness, until I finally recognized the glowering goddess Wosyet. She had manipulated a human into invoking her.

  “I had hoped you would learn some humility before I ended your worthless existence,” she sighed and lifted her dagger.

  A sharp howl vibrated through the hospital room just as the handle of my axe rammed into my hip. I rolled my head to find where my salvation had come from. Coreen sprang out from under Winston’s hospital bed and pummeled into Wosyet, sending the startled goddess-in-nurse-skin smashing into the food cart. Mashed potatoes and peas rained down on her as she shrieked with rage. Coreen chomped down on her arm, jerking the hologramic Wosyet out of the nurse’s body.

  Saul pressed his wet snout against my cheek and nudged me with a distressed whimper. I reached for the axe with trembling hands and pushed myself up on my knees. My legs didn’t want to work just yet.

  Wosyet squealed at Coreen, waving her free arm around chaotically until she remembered her dagger. She plunged the blade into Coreen’s neck.

  “No!
” I fumbled with the axe, straining to lift it over my head, and flung it with all I had. The blade squished through her chest, just inside her shoulder, almost severing her arm and pinning her to the wall. Her dagger clanked to the floor.

  “Wosyet,” I whispered. So that was how Seth and Caim always knew where to find us. I stood and jerked the axe free, watching her slide to the floor.

  “That was a cheap shot,” she hissed.

  I raised the axe again.

  “You can’t kill me,” she tried to laugh, but ended up choking on the blood running over her lips and into a pool on the hospital floor. “I’m a goddess.”

  I smiled at her and snorted. “Not anymore.” I forced the axe down harder this time. The double blade sliced through her neck, rendering her head airborne. Coreen fell back on her hind legs and with steely jaws, snatched the head by a cluster of fuzzy braids. Her tail thumped the floor like a sledgehammer. The wound Wosyet had made with her dagger was already healing, leaving a single smear of tacky blood down her shaggy spine.

  My legs gave out and I slumped back to my knees, shaking. Sunlight filtered through the window and glistened off the puddle forming around Wosyet’s lifeless body. At least the human’s wouldn’t notice.

  Coreen pranced over to me and dropped the head in my lap, giving me an anxious whine and bouncing on her paws like I was stalling a prized game of fetch. I sighed and stared down at Wosyet’s twisted face, frozen somewhere between smug and confused.

  I pulled a canvas sack from my robe and picked her up by one dangling braid. I wasn’t sure what I would do with the head yet, but I’d figure that out later. Her glazed eyes stared out at nothingness as her mouth mechanically opened and closed like she had more to say. I was done listening. I dropped her into the sack and fastened it to the belt under my robe. Coreen gave a frustrated grunt, while Saul lapped the blood off my face. I twisted away from him and tried to stand.

  “Am I dead yet?” Winston whispered. He lay slumped against the hospital wall with his tiger clutched in his bloodied arms. His eyes glistened, and he blinked them, trying to stave off tears as his breathing grew more labored.