Don't Fear the Reaper

by Michelle Muto

  “I’m good,” I lied. “Really.”

  He nodded and motioned for me to enter the room first. When we walked in, Mr. Manero was awake. He was older, eighty something I guessed. Thin wisps of baby-fine white hair clung to the sides of his otherwise bald head. His skin, pale and dotted with age spots, sagged on his skeletal frame. His eyes were sunken as though they were retreating from the world.

  Two women stood vigil at his side. One bent over him and kissed his forehead. The other held his hand. The resemblance was clear—mother and daughter. Both shared the same high cheekbones and slight frame. Mr. Manero shifted his tired eyes from his wife to his daughter. He tried to speak, but his tongue was unable to articulate and his words were more tired groans than sentences. He seemed trapped inside his ailing body.

  His eyes gravitated toward the doorway and a single spark lit his face. “Good dog, Jake,” he managed to say, his words soft and raspy.

  His wife and daughter glanced at the foot of the bed and nodded. I looked too, but didn’t see a dog. I followed his gaze to the doorway. A large, pointy-eared dog, presumably Jake, entered the room, tail low but wagging. Jake padded up to the edge of the bed and rested his head on the edge of the mattress.

  “Where did he come from?” I asked. I liked dogs. Mom never wanted pets, no matter how much Jordan and I begged.

  “Heaven,” Banning said. “Sometimes, they’ll come and wait for their masters to pass, especially when death is so close.”

  I patted Jake, who licked my hand, then went back to resting his furry head on the edge of the bed. I stood aside, waiting for the moment of death. What would it be like? Would I see his soul rise from his body? Would an angel or demon come for him? A loved one other than Jake? Did he have a brother? A sister?

  Maybe a door, a portal, or something would open. Yeah, like a doorway between the dead and the living. Because, seriously? This whole dead thing wasn’t working for me. Not that I had a choice.

  One of the women shivered as Banning wove around them before sitting on the bed. He gingerly took the old man’s hand in his. After a long moment, Banning sighed and his expression appeared pained. “We’ll have to come back.” He gently laid Mr. Manero’s hand on the bed.

  “What about Jake?” I asked.

  Banning seemed confused for a moment. “Jake? Oh!” He waved a dismissive hand. “Dogs often do that, being as loyal as they are. They come and go. Some have been known to stay close to their dying masters for weeks.”

  I looked at Jake, bewildered. “Doesn’t anyone stop them? Don’t they cause bad things to happen?”

  “Not animals,” Banning said. “Only humans. We’re the only ones who deal negatively with death.”

  I motioned to Mr. Manero. “But...but I thought you only came for those who were ready to die.”

  “Death isn’t an exact science, Keely. He’s just not ready,” Banning said.

  Banning was a reaper. How could death not know about—death? “I don’t understand. I thought that in death we were told all the answers. I know nothing! What if you were wrong about me? Maybe I wasn’t supposed to die right then!” I said.

  “With you, I was certain, Keely. I just know,” Banning replied.

  “Don’t ask why, Sunshine. It’s just the way it is. Manero’s just cheating death for a while,” Daniel assured me. “He’ll die soon enough.”

  A flood of emotions swam to the surface—fear, confusion, frustration. “Cheating death? How?”

  Mr. Manero didn’t appear strong enough to cheat his next breath, much less death. And, for a moment, I was angry with him, too. Why did he get a chance to hold on and not me? Clearly, he was suffering and it was obvious his time was near. His family was visibly tired. No doubt they’d been by his bed day and night. Yet, there he was, feebly looking between his wife and daughter as if searching for something in their faces. It’s not that I wanted him to die. Not really. But he had something I didn’t—something I wanted more than anything—a chance to cheat death. No matter how fleeting the time, no matter how short, he was with his family.

  Shame washed over me. Shame for wishing for Mr. Manero to die so I could see how it was done. Daniel was staring at me with an expression of curiosity and something else I couldn’t quite put my finger on. Pity? No. Probably just trying to come up with something to use against me later.

  “I’ll wait outside.” Daniel strode from the room without looking back.

  “I don’t understand,” I said to Banning. “Why does he get another chance? How is he doing it?”

  Banning looked out the window into a garden basking in sunlight. Where he saw flowers, I only saw a bleak horizon stretching before me—an unending afterlife as vast and empty as a parched desert. There was no hope of life on that horizon. Just the powder blue skyline with a whisper thin moon that hinted at the coming darkness.

  “The will and the soul are two of the most powerful things in the universe when there’s a reason, Keely. But they can only hold on for so long. Why him and not you? Like Daniel said, it’s just the way it works. Death is no more fair than life.”

  “But, you’re a reaper!” Tears flowed hot and freely down my cheeks. I swiped at them, furiously. “How can you not know? Jordan didn’t get a second chance. A lot of people don’t. He can’t be the only person with a strong soul who wants to live.” I sucked in a great breath, fully out of control. “Look at his family, how they’re hurting! Why couldn’t he simply decide to stay in purgatory forever? Be with his family that way?”

  Banning shook his head wearily. “I don’t have any better grasp on death than the living. I don’t have all the answers to the afterlife. Stay? Because it’s purgatory, Keely. He wouldn’t want to stay here.” He turned to me. “There’s no sense in us waiting here. He won’t be ready again for days. Leave him alone with his family. I understand your grief and confusion. You hardly had a chance to learn what it was like to live. It’s hard to learn how to be a part of death.”

  Banning walked past me, patting Jake on the head and giving a slight respectful nod to Mr. Manero’s family, although they couldn’t see him. I took a steadying breath and started to follow him, but turned back to see the faces of the two women. Mr. Manero wasn’t dead yet, but he was already there, in his own personal sort of purgatory.

  Guilt washed over me once more. Looking at the women, at their red eyes and drawn faces, I understood why Mr. Manero fought death so hard, why he clung to every breath. He didn’t know what was on the other side of life. How many times had I asked God if Jordan was okay? Every single night since her death. Every single night. It was an obsession. Mr. Manero had his own concerns—would his family be okay? From his point of view, his weary eyes staring into their frightened, grief-stricken faces, the answer was clear. They wouldn’t. Which meant he probably felt he had no choice but to keep fighting despite the tremendous pain he endured. I resisted the urge to go to his bedside and hold his hand myself. I understood why Banning looked so pained when he touched his hand. Mr. George Manero would do anything for his wife and daughter, except ask them for one thing. Freedom from whatever disease had ravaged his body.

  I swiped at my eyes again. It wasn’t Mr. Manero who wouldn’t let go. It was his family.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  I left Mr. Manero’s room. Banning had either gone outside or into another room. Daniel’s focus was on the Nintendo-playing kid who seemed less than thrilled to be visiting and was sitting several seats away from his parents. Daniel grinned and placed his hand on the boy’s shoulder. The game made a warbling noise that could only mean the boy had lost.

  “Piece of crap. I hate this stupid game!” the boy yelled.

  People from nearby couches looked disapprovingly at him and his family. The boy’s father pushed an old man in a wheelchair back into his room. Oblivious, the boy returned to his game. His mother offered an embarrassed, fleeting smile to the onlookers.

  Daniel rested both hands on the kid’s shoulders. Within seconds, the game made the
same warbling noise and the kid went on another swearing tangent. Mindful of a fresh round of stares, the mother got up from her seat, walked over to her son and snatched the game from his hands.

  “Great!” the kid said in protest. “Now what am I supposed to do?”

  Another guest leaned into the person sitting beside them and whispered, “Leave, I hope.”

  Across the room, the young black woman coughed and her family gathered closer to her. I ached all over. Right now, all I wanted was my sister.

  But Jordan was gone. Taken. Not by cancer or some other disease, but murdered. She didn’t die with the people who loved her by her side. The last person she saw before taking her last breath had been her killer.

  I clenched my fists.

  “Show some respect,” the boy’s mother was saying, recapturing my attention.

  The boy looked at her as though expecting a tiresome lecture.

  “Your grandfather...he isn’t well,” the mother continued, fervently looking at the room her husband had disappeared into.

  “Yeah, I know.” The boy stood, palm extended. “Gimme your phone. I want to call my friends.”

  The mother retrieved her cell from her purse. “Fine, but go outside,” she said, handing him the phone. The boy pocketed it and shuffled out of the family area.

  I had the urge to drag Daniel outside with me so he could teach me how he’d affected the brat’s game with mortals so close by. I wanted revenge—I wanted to find Jordan’s killer and unload every ounce of my negative energy on him. Daniel seemed to enjoy proving the bad-things-happen theory by messing with the kid’s game. But it didn’t seem all bad. Like Daniel said on the way here—spill their drinks, have a flat, break a coffee mug. In this case, lose at a computer game. If I could find Pete—the bastard who’d killed Jordan—maybe I could do something to him. Sure, it’d be small change compared to what he’d done to my sister. But, what else was there for me to do? Since I couldn’t undo my actions, I had all the time in the world, didn’t I? If Daniel got a vacation from hell, then I’d find a way, too.

  Geez, what was I doing? Embracing the afterlife? No. Not ever. I was just thinking thoughts anyone in my shoes would think. It was perfectly logical.

  Daniel caught sight of me walking toward him. “I don’t want to hear it, okay? The kid’s not exactly a sweetheart.”

  “Actually,” I ran my hand through my hair, pushing it away from my face and hoping he didn’t notice my hand was shaking. “I thought he deserved worse.”

  Daniel howled with laughter. “Well, well. Little Miss Sunshine has a thunderstorm brewing.”

  I ignored his humor. “How’d you do that, anyway? I thought we couldn’t do things if anyone living was around.”

  “Only applies to earthbounds, which I’m not. Besides, you didn’t see me move anything, now did you?”

  I hadn’t. I blinked a few times. “Well, no.”

  He eyed me for a moment. “Oh, geez! You aren’t going to cry again, are you? You can’t do anything to the little twerp anyway. Not the way I can. You’re a self-centered earthbound with issues about being dead. You’re upset and whiny because things didn’t turn out like you’d planned. Your kind don’t earn your stripes until you become one of us. Or, if Banning is right…” He made fluttery motions with his fingers. “One of them.”

  My mouth dropped at Daniel’s cruel words. But, he angered me, too. Them? Angels? My sister was an angel now, and I didn’t appreciate him talking about them like they were something nasty to scrape off the bottom of his shoe. And my kind? What did he mean, exactly? Issues? I had screwed up royally and killed myself. Since there didn’t seem to be any do-overs, I couldn’t help being dead.

  I half-seethed, half-quivered over Daniel’s statement. “Gee, asshole. I’m so sorry I’m dead.”

  Daniel smiled ever so faintly, and I wanted to hit him.

  “I get it, Daniel. I really do. You don’t like me. Well, I don’t like you, either.”

  He grabbed my shirt and pulled me within inches of his face. He smelled like a bonfire—a woodsy smell with an earthy weight to it. His irises flickered red—I thought I’d imagined it before, but up close there was no mistaking it.

  “At least I hung in there,” he said, breathing onto my face. “Something you couldn’t do.”

  So, this was it—the reason he seemed to hate me so much. “Oh, I suppose you ended up as a demon because you were so perfect.”

  Lame. Totally lame. But he’d caught me off-guard and I had nothing to say, really. He was right. I hadn’t bothered to stick around.

  He studied my face, my mouth, and I hoped he couldn’t feel my heart pounding with fear. He let go of me.

  “Jerk,” I muttered softly, turning away from him. I started off in search of Banning.

  Behind me, Daniel applauded. Hurt and furious, I spun around to glare at him.

  “Congrats,” he said. “It’s about time. I was beginning to wonder about you. Purgatory is a nasty place for newbies like you, all weak and grieving. But, I figured with the way you killed yourself, you had to have spunk somewhere.”

  Damn him! Daniel had baited me and I had been foolish enough to fall for it. “Well, I’m glad you find this so amusing.” I wheeled around to continue my search for Banning.

  “Wait!” he said, catching up to me. I backed up into a wall. “Chill, all right? I just didn’t want you to keep crying, so I figured if you got mad, you’d move on to the next step of the whole acceptance thing.”

  I didn’t answer.

  “Come on! You were bound to head that direction anyway. Just saving you some time.”

  He gently touched my arm. I didn’t move, didn’t speak. Why did he have to be so mean?

  “So, you want to find your sister’s killer, or what? That is why you were so interested in what I did to that kid back there, right?”

  Had I been that easy to read? More than anything I could think of, I wanted my sister. But I wanted to avenge her death almost as much. I raised an eyebrow. “I suppose you know where Peter Fagan is?”

  Something in his dark eyes ignited, something akin to flint on stone. “I know a lot of things. I know that he was never officially charged. So far, the cops haven’t found enough clear-cut evidence to keep him in jail and he’s out free—for now. He’s staying in the area, but not at his house. I also know you haven’t been dead long enough to do anything you’d like to do to this guy without a little demonic assistance. So, what do you say? Let me help.”

  I continued to stare at him, unable to come up with a single counterpoint.

  “And maybe you’d like a few leads on where your sister might be while we’re at it.”

  He had my complete attention.

  “Yeah, thought so.” A slow grin eased onto his face. “Look, Banning is occupied at the moment. We’ll meet up with him later.” Without waiting for a reply, Daniel headed for the double doors.

  A quick survey of the waiting area told me Daniel was probably right and that Banning was in one of the patient rooms, doing what reapers did. Watch Banning, or plan a little revenge on Jordan’s scumbag killer? Revenge won out. I glanced at Daniel. He was just the sort of guy to teach me a thing or two about getting that revenge. Sure, he was a jerk, but he had a certain…charm? Magnetism? No, I assured myself. He had what I needed—the means to punish my sister’s killer.

  Maybe this was why I was still here, still in purgatory. Maybe I’d been given a chance to avenge Jordan’s death. Maybe if I kept moving, reality wouldn’t catch up to me.

  I looked back for Banning one more time. Banning had been pretty kind to me. He’d said he wouldn’t let Daniel take me to hell. But, I had to see Jordan and I wanted to find out where Pete had been living since Jordan’s death. He deserved anything I could do to him.

  I hurried through the waiting room. I held my breath, closed my eyes, and walked through the double doors into the hallway. I blinked and exhaled discreetly. Daniel was leaning against the wall like he had all the ti
me in the world to wait for me. In a way, I suppose he did.

  He ushered me through the lobby and onto the front porch. One of the visitors walked out behind us. He reached into his pants pocket, retrieved his keys and stepped into the parking lot. The kid talking on the phone sat in one of the rockers, smoking a cigarette despite the sign on the porch railing stating that oxygen tanks may be present and smoking was prohibited.

  Daniel jogged off the porch toward a red pickup. We hoisted ourselves over the tailgate and into the cargo area as the pickup backed out of the parking space.

  “Where are we going?” I asked.

  “County morgue. Your sister might come to visit your body,” he said. “This truck driver is going to make a stop about a half-mile from there. We’ll walk the rest of the way, check things out, ask around. After that, we’ll go find Pete, okay?”

  I couldn’t trust Daniel, but he was proving useful. “Thanks.”

  “Don’t go thanking me yet,” he said.

  The driver gunned it as he pulled into traffic and I had to twist my hair in a ponytail and hold it tight to prevent it from whipping me in the face. “Banning is going to be pissed, isn’t he?”

  Daniel shrugged. “Yeah. He’s really serious about watching after you.”

  True, I was out of my element here. But Banning was a reaper—if he knew when people were about to die, surely he could find me if I got into trouble with Daniel. He’d said he wouldn’t let Daniel take me to hell. I just didn’t understand the hold up. “What’s with the waiting period, anyway?”

  Daniel stared at me like I had just grown another head. “Waiting period?”

  “You know, before you can take me to hell. Unless, that’s where we’re going now.”

  He gave me a slight, almost charming smile. “Going to hell in a pickup. We’re on the highway to hell.”

  I simply stared at him.

  “No,” he relented at last. “With the way you died, the suicide and all, there’s a bit of a controversy about what to do with you. So, you’re stuck with Banning and me until the situation is resolved. But, we’re not going to hell—yet. A waiting period? Some souls hang around for awhile and some go to their destinations a few minutes after they die.” He paused as though remembering his own death.