Smitten With Death

by Sharon Saracino

  Coffee slut that I am, I pulled the carafe out to refill my Mornings are Not Pretty mug before the brew cycle was complete. The sizzle of liquid on the hot element and the sad, distinctive aroma of burnt java filled my open plan kitchen-office-fine dining area. Note to self—the Bible says thou shalt not waste the coffee. Okay, maybe it isn’t the Bible, maybe it’s the gospel according to that South American farmer and his coffee bean bearing burro, Paquito.

  Yes, I have named the donkey. A little compassion would not be unwelcome here. Addiction is an illness, people.

  My very independent and morbidly obese cat, Sir Chicken Caesar finally decided to emerge from the bedroom. He arrogantly strutted—okay, he awkwardly waddled—across the expanse of the living room and collapsed at my feet wearing an expression that clearly asked, “Where’s my breakfast, biotch?” With a sigh, I retrieved two cans from the pantry cabinet and held them up for his inspection. He sniffed the air, then daintily licked a paw and began to wash his face. Okay, then. Apparently, he was leaving the choice up to me. As I popped the ring tab and dumped a gelled and foul smelling portion of tuna surprise into his blue pottery dish, I pondered the reason for the sudden reappearance of my insomnia. Honestly, it didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure it out. After tactfully leaving me to my grief for what they considered an acceptable period of time, the supernatural community had apparently decided my sabbatical was over. Why is it every time I think I’ve got my shit together, some fool comes along and flushes the toilet?

  I mean, c’mon. I died, came back, filled in for the Superintendent of Spiritual Impediment aka SSI, successfully resolved the unfinished business of the reluctantly deceased, and learned a whole lot about myself in the process. One would think that should be enough for any one person to experience in a lifetime. One would think that would be the end of it.

  One would, as you may have already suspected, be wrong.

  Just when I thought it was safe to chalk my entire untimely demise up to a rather creative hallucination brought about by a nasty knock on the head and an unhealthy dependence on commercially prepared convenience food, Alicia, the SSI, showed up in the middle of the night. Glowing like a nuclear reactor, she informed me I was, in fact, a supernatural super-being and it was time to put on my shiny cape and twinkling tiara and hoof it on over to the Grim Reaper’s place. Time to learn how to venture into the afterlife to retrieve souls. Not only wasn’t I provided with an instruction manual or quart-sized travel mug of coffee for the road, I got caught in a blizzard. Then I hit a tree, nearly froze to death, and was ultimately rescued by a renegade Hellhound in the person of Morgan Kane, the Grim Reaper. A Grim Reaper who launders panties, makes a mean cup of Joe, cultivates dogwood trees, and is hotter than a billy goat’s ass in a pepper patch. And people say I need a hobby. Seriously? When exactly am I supposed to pencil in an origami class?

  Bottom line? I hadn’t been able to retrieve my ex-husband, Roger-the-Proctologist from the afterlife. Sure, realistically I understood that knowing in advance, retrieving him was never the intention, wouldn’t have changed anything. But reasonable or not, I was still pouting about the injustice of it all. Woman’s prerogative, right? If it’s true that what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger, I figure I should be able to bench press the entire defensive line of the Hamilton High School Porcupines by now.

  I snagged my coffee cup, stuffed my arms into a hoodie, wandered across the living room to the French doors, and let myself out onto my small, covered deck. I left the door open a crack in case Caesar decided to lower his standards enough to join me. I had no expectation he would. After all, I was just the staff.

  I set my steaming mug on the flat arm of one of the two hulking Adirondack chairs that took up the lion’s share of the space and lowered myself into the seat. Despite my ongoing resolution, I still hadn’t taken the time to scrape and paint the peeling wood, and loose paint flecks poked my legs as I settled myself. Maybe I could just buy some nice cushions? I propped my bare feet on the railing and stared out at the woods behind the house. It sure as hell beat staring at my bare feet propped on the railing. Given it was late March in Pennsylvania, socks may have been a wise choice.

  Perhaps I’ve mentioned I have my father’s feet?

  Well, in case I haven’t, I do, and I try to keep them covered at all times. There isn’t a pedicure or a cute pair of sandals on the planet that can totally disguise the fugly.

  I sipped my coffee and clung to the brief serenity of the morning. It wouldn’t last. Nothing ever did, so I’d learned to take what I could get when I could get it. I listened to the sweet trill of morning birdsong and tried hard to concentrate on anything other than the reason Morgan Kane had unexpectedly appeared at my cousin’s wedding. I might have had more success in not thinking about him if the potted dogwood he’d sent hadn’t been sitting in the corner of the deck daring me to ignore it. I swear the damn thing mocked me just by its survival. Hence the reason it was outside on the deck.

  When I’d met Granny-Apple-Head, aka the Timekeeper, in the Between during the course of my unsuccessful foray into the Great Beyond to save Roger, she told me that according to legend, the dogwood flower is a symbol of healing and sacrifice. A plant that appears fragile but with a stem that’s tough and resilient, resistant to damage. In other words, it bends, but it doesn’t break. I hadn’t understood the significance at the time. After all, I was on a mission and said mission did not include lessons in horticulture. Then Roger had said the same thing about me as I stood before him facing the reality of his loss with my heart shattered, unsure I could withstand the grief. I bend, but I don’t break. I hadn’t believed him. Actually, I hadn’t given the comparison much actual thought until I returned home the night before Roger’s funeral and found a vase of dogwood waiting for me.

  Have I mentioned supernatural and subtle are apparently incapable of co-existing?

  Admittedly, at the time I’d both needed and welcomed the reminder. I’d also needed and welcomed the bottle of gin the Grim Reaper had left along with it. I’m not sure whether or not he intended it for medicinal purposes, but it’d sure cured what ailed me for a couple of hours. And the resultant crying jag left me feeling refreshed, restored, and ready to face a new day. Yeah.

  In any event, it turned out everyone was right. I’d bent nearly in half, but I didn’t break. I survived. Sure, it still hurt, but I’m healing. I’m moving on. It’s what Roger had wanted, and to be clear, I didn’t have much of a choice. I was getting all my ducks in a row. I took a big slug of java to wash down the uneasy feeling that the sudden reappearance of the Grim Reaper in my life was the prelude to open season on ducks. Given my history, it seemed a reasonable assumption.

  Hey, I said my outlook was improving, I never claimed I’d attained the rank of cock-eyed optimist.

  I heard the unmistakable crunch of tires on gravel and realized Dad and Gail must already be home from church. It meant I’d been sitting here far longer than I thought, and the Logan family Sunday morning post-church coffee klatch was imminent. The get-together was an unofficially scheduled event that never varied. Attendance was mandatory. For a long time, I’d avoided all that one-big-happy-family groove by showing up late, wolfing down a bagel, and slugging back a cup of Joe just in time for the entire affair to break up. I’d embraced my black-sheep status with open arms and a complete limited-edition collection of defense mechanisms, certain every moment I spent with my family was a moment I was being judged. And I was. But it turned out I was the lone member of the jury. Everyone else was simply tiptoeing around me, trying to figure out how to get close. Yeah, self-sabotage and I are old friends.

  These days, I usually had the kitchen set up and ready to roll by the time Dad and Gail pulled in with the baked goods, and well before Denise, Brad-the Famous-Vascular-Surgeon, the terrible twosome, Mick and Vick, and Clinique, the howling wonder-dog arrived.

  Yes, my sister named her dog after a cosmetic company.

  I tossed back my la
st shot of coffee, indulged in a jaw cracking yawn, and dropped my fugly feet back to the deck. I must have been more preoccupied than I thought to have so completely lost track of time.

  I shuffled back inside and gave my coffee cup a quick rinse in the sink, leaving it next to the coffee pot. I find it saves time in an emergency. You know, like a sudden life-threatening drop in my caffeine level. As I skipped toward my bedroom to get dressed…Okay, perhaps I didn’t skip exactly. In fact, I don’t skip. I’m not that coordinated. I actually paused to glance out the window. There was Dad’s beat up blue pick-up with Logan’s Hardware stenciled in white on the door, there was Roger’s luxury German SUV, which had replaced my poor ten-year-old Ford, and there was Morgan Kane’s impressively decked out fire-engine red four by four. My stomach began to churn with the force of the heavy-duty cycle on an industrial washing machine. My family was due to arrive any minute, and the Grim Reaper was sitting in the driveway with rock music blaring through the open windows. Wucking fonderful!

  Despite my apprehension, I couldn’t stop my lips from twitching as the song ended and I heard the distinctive opening strains of “Don’t Fear the Reaper.” Like me, Morgan Kane had obviously graduated from the American Academy of Subtlety. I had to hand it to him, the guy knew how to make an entrance. At least he’d ditched the cape today. The morning temperature was a hovering in the low forties, and he was wearing nothing but flannel, so maybe that whole being a Hellhound thing gave him some peculiar ability to generate his own heat. I know being around him had a tendency to jack my temperature up a couple of degrees.

  Kane’s fingers tapped on the steering wheel in time to the music. He stared straight ahead and didn’t appear to be in any great hurry to hike up the stairs to my door.

  If you’ve ever seen my stairs, you’d understand why.

  Although he may have conquered Everest, I suspect even Sir Edmund Hillary might have thought twice about tackling the ascent to my place. Thankful for small favors, I sprinted into the bedroom to throw on some clothes.

  I’m pretty sure my high school gym teacher would have been awestruck by the agility I exhibited in hurdling my cat who lay sprawled out in a patch of sunlight in the middle of the living room floor. Sir Chicken Caesar was less than impressed. He rolled over with an irritated grunt at my audacity in disturbing his nap. It takes a lot more than a sudden burst of coordination to excite my feline. In fact, in fourteen years, I’m not sure I’ve discovered anything that does. Perhaps if I hung Maryland Crab Cakes from my ass and did the Macarena?

  Since I’d planned to schlep next door in my oversized sleep shirt, a pair of flannel lounge pants, and some pink bunny slippers, I hadn’t bothered to peruse my available wardrobe. Sadly, my available wardrobe currently consisted of one pair of jeans and a wrinkled blue sweatshirt. My unavailable wardrobe consisted of nearly every other item of clothing I own. Remember how you felt when you found out Santa Claus wasn’t real? Well, that’s pretty much how I felt when I discovered there was no Laundry Fairy. Still, every morning I wake up and look at that laundry basket with hope in my heart, doomed to endure the crush of disappointment yet again. My laundry avoidance skills are epic.

  I quickly threaded my arms and legs through my awesome fashion finds and turned to regard my reflection in the full-length mirror on the back of the bathroom door. Why is it that the image of myself I have in my head bears so little resemblance to the one in the mirror? Gravity is a heartless bitch. Everyone knows mirrors don’t lie. Most days I’m simply thankful they don’t laugh.

  With one ear cocked for the slam of Kane’s truck door and the other wide open for the crunch of my stepmother’s compact pulling into the drive, I quickly combed my fingers through my hair, wincing at the painful tugs on my scalp when they snagged in the tousled waves. It was uncomfortably stiff with the residual hairspray required to hold it in the elaborate up-do my cousin Mary Ann insisted on for the wedding party participants, yesterday.

  I didn’t have the energy for a shower by the time I got home and wasn’t planning on seeing anyone other than my immediate family first thing this morning, so I thought I was safe. My loved ones know better than to expect much from me on Sunday mornings.

  I finally gathered the whole tragic mess into an untidy ponytail and secured it with an elastic band. Why I was so worried about my appearance, anyway, I don’t know. It wasn’t as if the Grim Reaper hadn’t already seen me at my worst. Cyanosis and incontinence? Shouldn’t be too hard to improve on that kind of first impression.

  I gripped the hem of my shirt and tugged it down over my hips hoping to stretch out a few of the wrinkles. As soon as I released the tension, it sprang back into creases, just like an accordion. Lovely. Thus, cleverly disguised as a semi-responsible adult, I took a deep breath and headed for the door while mentally bracing myself for my second encounter with the Grim Reaper in less than twenty-four hours.

  Chapter 4

  Pausing to take a deep breath and blow it out again, I clenched my teeth and flung open the door. The sight that met my eyes made me want to scoop them out with a melon-baller. I try to be a “glass half-full” kind of girl. Unfortunately, some fool keeps slapping the damn glass out of my hand before I even get the chance to take a sip.

  There in the driveway, my father was shaking hands and chatting semi-amicably with Morgan Kane. Furthermore, Gail was waving the white waxed-paper bags in front of his face in a tempting manner that indicated she was inviting him in for coffee.

  If anyone asks what’s for breakfast? Death and doughnuts, I guess.

  With three sets of eyes glued to my sadly rumpled form, I began a graceful descent from my one bedroom over garage. After Roger died, I’d given serious consideration to keeping the condo. I’d even tried it on for size for a week. In seven days and nights, I never once dunked my bare ass in the toilet in the middle of the night because the seat was left up, my toothpaste was always squeezed from the bottom of the tube, and I didn’t find a single toenail clipping in the bathroom sink. Funny how someone’s quirky little habits that set your teeth on edge day after day when you live with them are the very things you miss most when they’re gone. Yeah, that. Bottom line? It just wasn’t the same, and I decided torturing myself wasn’t worth it simply to acquire additional square footage and upgrade my zip code. Besides, I also discovered, surprisingly I wasn’t really that girl anymore.

  Just when I thought I was going to make it to the bottom of my stairs agilely and uninjured, I was foiled by a conglomeration of woven gossamer strands dappled with dewdrops glinting in the sun that some eight-legged bastard had constructed between the wall of the garage and the stair railing during the night.

  Have you ever noticed how walking into an unexpected spider web turns you into an instant ninja?

  I slapped myself in the face, did a passable imitation of a windmill in a hurricane, and provided a short demonstration of the Argentine tango. Then I stomped the spider into a mashed splat. I left the corpse where it lay to warn off any of his friends who might have ideas of picking up where he left off and jumped the final two stairs to the sidewalk, twisting my ankle in the process. Clearing my throat, I tossed my ratty ponytail over one shoulder with a deliberate air of insouciance intended to plainly communicate to my audience that I totally meant to do that. Anyone can be good. Awesome takes practice.

  Once Gail established I’d landed on my feet, as opposed to my ass—my stepmother is well acquainted with my challenged coordination—she saluted me with a grin and a white waxed-paper bag, then headed for the house to prepare the kitchen for the pending arrival of my sister and her brood. Walking slowly and rolling my hips in what I fancied was a seductive manner, in an effort to detract attention from my limp, I absently wondered if there would ever come a day when Morgan Kane would see me at my best. All things considered, it wasn’t looking promising.

  “You okay, kid?” Dad asked as I approached. I deliberately ignored the way Kane’s lips twitched while he struggled to maintain what I as
sumed was supposed to be a concerned expression. For the record, he was failing miserably.

  “Fine, Dad.” I shifted my attention to the Grim Reaper. “What are you doing here?”

  “I told you last night, I wanted to talk to you.” At least he’d left the cloak and scythe at home this morning or, at the very least, in his truck. Of course, the way the black tee stretched tautly under the flannel shirt accentuated the heavy muscles of his broad chest. I didn’t even want to think about the appeal of the faded denim molded lovingly to his rather fine ass. This morning’s ensemble made me even more nervous than his official work garb did for reasons I chose not to dwell upon too closely, at the moment.

  “About?” I prompted, feeling relatively secure in the knowledge that whatever his business, he wouldn’t discuss it in front of my father.

  “The stages of psychosocial development,” he announced with a smug grin. It was then I noticed both corners of his mouth curled up. His scars were nearly gone. A faint white discoloration remained to assure me they’d actually been there, but the difference was astounding. Intellectually, I knew it was impossible. He’d been attacked by Cerberus, his distant Hellhound cousin and the Guardian of the Gates of Hell, while attempting to rescue his sister Alia. The battle had left wicked scars on his face and torso, not to mention half of his ear had been torn away. Realistically there was no way in Hell, or anyplace else I was aware of, scars of that magnitude could magically disappear. Then again, any preconceived notions I may have had about reality were shot to hell the day I died, and any others I might have been clinging to have continued to crumble like stale cookies in the interim.