Don't Fear the Reaper

No matter where she remained, the silence of the dark was always familiar to her. While she wished to call it welcoming, it continued to be painful to embrace. Eyes wide open, she let her vision melt and sharpen in the dark. They slowly captured the ample streetlight from the outside world beyond the curtain, reminding her of everything that it had given her and she had given it. She exhaled deeply, wrapping the blanket over her head as she immersed herself in the comfort of oblivion. Although she expected sleep to dissolve her awareness, it only made it sharper and cut even deeper. 

Delving into the deepest chambers of her heart, she wasn’t surprised to find her fiancé sitting at his workshop desk shaping a little ring he designed himself with its sketch beside him. Even the sound of shaving the metal to engrave it by hand made her heart ache, feeling the needle pierce through her to crack open the emptiness that only knew how to grow. The sunlight from the window bled all over his desk, decorating the junk turned jewelry with little sparkles, the echoes of stars. As she got closer to his workdesk, to a corner of his universe, she wrapped her arms around him once again and planted a kiss on the back of his hair, as messy as his desk. Taking a deep breath in, she became drowned in an ocean of fragrance, each scent blossoming a sweet memory in her. On the stage of her grief, it had an endless amount of room to dance, sing, howl, spark, yet all of its fire only illuminated the painful truth of the void that made itself larger than she can bear. 

When she opened her eyes, his hair turned into a sea of flowers that stretched into the horizon, kissed by the starry night that enrobed her. Gazing at the stars, she could almost grasp the scent they carried as if they were the flora surrounding her. While the distance was immense, they were closer to her than anything she was able to touch, being truly touched by the beauty of the starlight. A suffocating warmth grew behind her eyes and slowly blurred her vision as she recalled the times she went stargazing with him. Once it sunk in that she can never do such a thing again, the tears emerged from the burial grounds of her flesh, blurring her vision and shattering the stars above into a million pieces. Drowned in the piercing lights, she couldn’t even hear herself cry, for the silence had taken that as well. But before she fully dissolved into tears, she was able to hear the rustling of another body beside her, along with the rattling of light chains. 

“One of the perks of being a reaper is that you don’t have to say goodbye as easily. While most only hold the departed within them, you have the privilege of holding him again, even if it takes a lot of labor.” 

Turning her head, she saw her reaper lay beside her, his silver hair flowing between the grass and wildflowers. The bright amber of his eyes captured all the stars of the night, recognizing each and every one as someone dear to him. While they seemed glossy with tears, he didn’t shed a single one. But she was unable to classify him as a stoic figure, for she felt a deep sensitivity in him, one that transmuted his every action into the shedding of tears. 

“In fact, it’s good that you grieve; it shows that you’re still alive, since only the dead know the end of suffering.” 

“And aren’t you?” 

His usual nonchalant demeanor faded when he fixed his gaze on her, searching with a hint of desperation for the answers in her eyes. 

“Still alive?” He asked, already knowing the answer.

“Yes.” 

The longer he looked, the more she saw that he was actually trying to find the answers in himself, reaching no conclusion. He broke eye contact with a derisive sigh as he faced the night sky again. 

“No, no. I died a long time ago. I don’t even remember how long, actually. Time flows differently for me, for us.” 

His little correction at the end struck her more profoundly than she expected, but it was simply a reaffirmation of something she already understood. Its weight was quickly lifted when he lifted himself up, twisting his body to face her and leaning himself on his elbow. 

“But hey, aren’t you excited for this new life? You’ll get to meet so many people from so many backgrounds, acquire so many experiences that most can’t even dream of. And to see someone you would normally never see again. What a dream come true.” 

The stars slowly shone with a different light, one that illuminated the sprouting branches of the future instead of the roots of the past. She surprised herself with the smile on her lips, twinkling with the grace of hope. 

“I can’t believe that silly ritual actually worked. If it didn’t I’d feel so bad for basically vandalizing all those gravestones.” 

“Yeah, how did you manage to pull it off?” 

She carefully recollected her memories of how she even got to know of such a thing. Going from scene to scene to auxiliary pieces of information that had nothing to do with his question, she stopped herself before going completely silent. 

“A friend at a party told me about this person she knew who ‘danced with death’ supposedly. It was just this fortune teller with a thick accent who told me a bunch of cryptic things, the steps of the ritual being one of them. I had to use some creative liberty to fill in the gaps of gibberish.” 

“My, that’s impressive.” 

The sparks of fury didn’t overshadow his astonishment upon hearing how casually she succeeded. He had seen people strive to just experience a sliver of the other side, taking years of agonizing practice and ritual. He couldn’t contain his disbelief, breaking the silence with a burst of laughter. His unrestrained cackling made his metal mask click by the hinged over his jaw, giving her another taste of a memory of her fiancé polishing his works. 

“Let’s see what you’re really made of then.” 

When the silver haired reaper got up, she slowly lifted herself while he clapped to a silent rhythm. Every clap summoned a skeleton from the fields, emerging from the dirt as if it were dust. While she took her time, upset by her disturbed comfort, the reaper jumped around and made the skeletons clap to his rhythm to summon even more of them. When she finally got up and looked around, all she could see was an army of skeletons all around her, clapping their bones together to summon more of them. When the reaper clapped in a different rhythm, so did they to produce a mystifying melody. He purposefully summoned them in a way that gave each skeleton at least one flower in their eyesocket, if they had one. Roots and dirt wrapped around their frames as the skeleton orchestra continued to perform. 

“What- What are you doing?” 

For the first time, she noticed his eyes smile together with his lips. She gave him a sharp look, realizing how much pleasure he gains from her misery. 

“Showing you the ropes, greenhorn. Come on, summon your blade.” 

In the marrow of the symphony, she was able to find the echoes of her fiancé’s metalwork. Possessed by love, he wove himself into her psyche in such a way that sculpted her universe in the image of the love he radiated. Blessed by the shadow of his presence and cursed his absence, she constructed her unique scythe in the shape of her heart. The opal beads of her rosary wove through the large ebony blade of her scythe, decorating it with a celestial gossamer. The handle, carved from the trees of Eden, was sturdy, light and smooth, wrapped around with dyed cloth to give it more durability and grip. But before she even had the chance to swing it, the skeletons restrained her, chaining her movements until all she could hear was the rattling of bones. 

Before she felt them tearing her skin off and turning her into one of them, she woke up with beads of cold sweat on her forehead. The rush of relief paired with the coolness of her sweat felt like an apology from the reaper, but she knew that that was not the case. All she was truly certain of was the sharpness of the morning light paired with the impending dread of work. There was a river of ice in her own bones when she woke up, one that flowed to the pit of her stomach to rip her from the inside out. While she grew used to the silence, her body ached to return to the paradise in his arms, starved and upset with the world. No amount of small accessories she wore that were made by his hands could replicate his touch, but it still managed to caress a part of her soul not even she had access to. 

While the mirror couldn't lie, she couldn’t help but lie to herself whenever she saw what it presented to her. Gray shadows slept beneath her pale blue eyes, sharpening their already bright color. Blinded by her own gaze, she directed it to the hollow star pendant shimmering between her collarbone. It had become a habit to gently caress the hollow star to reawaken equally gentle memories of him. Despite being oversaturated with his ghost, the intensity wouldn’t subside, but only grow as time marched on. Brushing her teeth, she recalled the feeling of the scythe in her hands and that power of death she wielded, forcing her to acknowledge how it defined her time, her life, her reasons. 

Upon renting an apartment in a city far from home and memory, she’d enjoy using the car to take her from place to place. It would be like stepping inside of a house she immediately recognized the scent of. But with all that had happened recently, she decided to walk to her work. Each step acted as a removal of a shard caught in her heart as the warm breeze mended the cracks that appeared. The louder the silence became, the more memories bled from it until it drowned her in its cacophony. Twisting her wedding ring with her thumb didn’t help, but it at least offered a temporary distraction from her mind, feeding it something other than ache. The journey there was marked by sparks of volatile hatred aroused by the looks she would receive, the agonizing length of the long shifts and an overwhelming distaste for her current life. 

She entered through the back door of the diner, dressing herself into her uniform before entering the kitchen. The outfit hugged her tightly, giving her the impression that its fibers belonged to that of a spider’s web. While there was a dimension of confinement in the simple uniform, she was able to appreciate how she blended into the style of the diner she worked in. Hair tied up and her shoes replaced with rollerskates, she together with her coworkers slowly started up the business. As the large signs shouted with neon lights, people began to roll by, each customer increasing the risk of breaking the fragile mask she wore. 

The hustle and bustle within the kitchen always aroused a mystery in her, turning the wild flow into a romantic stream. As she was always recommended to the back of the house for her lack of experience in such kitchens and her graceful exterior, she begrudgingly took the position for the sake of securing a job. And she found mild amusement in using roller skates, reminding her of her youth. But that time of innocence was long gone, its absence tormenting her with every glance she’d get from bad intentions, reducing her to nothing more than a thing. She was at least happy to be seen as someone more than a part in a machine by her coworker. 

“You doing better, Mar?” 

While she appreciated the concern, it disturbed the fragile balance of peace she tried to hold. Not wanting to disturb it any further, she gave her but a shadow of the truth.

“I’m okay.” 

As the urge to quench the fires in her nerves increased, she quickly added to her reply: “How about we chat more in the break?” 

“Sounds good!” 

Velia’s smile never ceased to amaze Marlowe. Whether she gave it to customers she knew nothing about or friends she saw the depths of, there would always be a genuine light radiating from it. It managed to embalm whatever ached within and mended the cracks in her armor in a heartbeat, giving her a small boost to continue the stageplay. That simple smile that was able to make the world less of a cruel place inspired her to work much more smoothly. With much less weight, she refilled the condiments, served food from the desk to the tables and prepared a new batch of coffee. But just as things were going well, an unfortunate encounter arrived at the door of her dreams, pulling her back into reality. 

Her misfortune came in the shape of three truck drivers that passed by for cups of coffee, one with a slice of pie and two others with eggs and toast. While she received ugly looks from most, it was those three she noticed the most. Even as she conversed with her other coworkers did she notice their conspiratorial glances and gesticulations towards one another. Wanting to do her job, she cleaned some tables and cleaned theirs when the time came. Out of duty, she asked if they wished to get anything else, not actually wanting that to be the case. The one sitting closest to her said yes, reaching his hand out to grab her ass as she took the plates and cups from the table. 

Every nerve in her body tasted the wrath of lightning as she, out of raw animal instinct, slapped a plate across the man’s red face, shattering the ceramic to shards. In that same moment, she lost balance of her rollerskates and let the plates and cups fall as she grabbed the table to stabilize herself. The deafening clattering of ceramics severed her from the world and from herself as all she could hear was the boiling of her own blood. For a good few seconds, the entire diner fell silent after united exclamations of shock. She couldn’t even see the unappealing features of the assaulted man’s face, for it was covered with dark blood and a stained hand. All she noticed were his fiery blue eyes shining like moons around a sea of blood. 

“Don’t you know how to be a decent human being?!” 

At that point, she made herself deaf with her own rage, unable to contain it in any decent way. Some overwhelmingly dark and destructive resurfaced within her, something she could recognize in the slightest. 

“Why’d you do that for you dumb bitch?!” The guy on the other side of the booth exclaimed, grabbing her by the wrist. 

Another flash of lightning struck every part of her being, igniting a wild fury she could only let devour her. 

“Don’t you dare fucking touch me!” She roared as she grabbed a mug by the ear and punched him in the face with it, shattering that too into a million pieces. Yet the impact of the mug wasn’t to be compared to the intensity of her heart that dissolved the world around her, her composure, her humanity. Before she could throw the broken ear of the mug in his broken face, multiple staff members rushed in and restrained her and the other men. She wasn’t even fully aware of what was happening, viewing everything like a collection of pictures fluttering before her eyes. She wasn’t able to understand what was being said to her or to the other three as they were being escorted to the washroom and outside of the diner. The last thing she saw were the many eyes of the shocked customers piercing her as she was unable to understand what they were looking at, she being unable to understand what she herself was at that moment. 

She blinked as though waking up from a frenzied dream, its scenes coming back as the lights in her azure eyes twinkled. But beyond the stars of remembrance, that dark void of the night engulfed her heart. The deeper she stared into her own pupils, the deeper she fell into her own abyss, finding it harder to recognize herself with the twinkle of each memory. In her universe, those stars continued to bleed for what felt like infinity to her. Splashing water on her face couldn't quench the stars whose blood pierced her like acid with every second, growing in a softly vicious way. Behind her shoulders was something darker than any image of death than her mind can receive, sinking its barbed claws through her shoulders. 

The muffled sounds of concern bubbled through the walls and into her head. Despite their softness, every note stabbed through her skull, giving her pain the voice of a storm. With a blind and rage-drenched desperation, she struck her balled fist against the sink as if it was meant to be split open and freed from its shell of flesh. No amount of breaths eliminated the dark promise of how her anxiety swallowed all of her and dissolved her into nothing. The attitude of the men, the job, the impressions of others, the repercussions, the injustice, the blindness; she could see her own corpse in the mirror, staring into herself until there was nothing left but a raw and unrestrained will not a single star could ever bear. Before her rage uprooted her entire nervous system, she heard a knock on the door paired with a familiar voice. 

Behind the diner, Velia and Marlowe leaned on the back side of the establishment, staring out into the hills beyond the parking lot and dry fields. The wind offered the perfect comfort she could have asked for; a complete juxtaposition to the wild fires in her veins. Eyes closed, she did her best to diffuse her dark internal world with the light of the external, appreciating how the warmth of the sun massaged her disturbed spirit. She heard the click of a pen right beside her and felt the slow entrance of a smile over Velia’s lips, together with the rustling of a small paperboard box. 

“So did the ritual work?” she asked as she ever so gently applied just enough pressure on the cigarette to write something on it. In an instant, Marlowe’s eyes grew wide and brilliant, seeing the entire ritual unfold before her again in less than a second. Still dealing with the event of before and crushed by its possible consequences, she could only silently nod as a reply. After a slow but deep exhale, she tried to formulate the experience. 

“Surprisingly, yes. He gave me a simple rundown, but I’m still lost as to how I get what I want from all of this.” 

Marlowe turned her head when she heard Velia’s distinct giggle of five hops within her throat, with a crescent moon of a smile to add to the sweetness. Yet in spite of the charm, there was a heavy shadow that crawled over her, giving her the feeling that she was just a child waxing philosophic to an experienced scholar. 

“You don’t see it as philanthropy? Or justice in motion?” 

All Marlowe knew of her time in that field was that she had been exposed to that macabre culture since her early teens and only thrived in her adolescence. With the wisdom that she had, she was able to make Marlowe feel like a greenhorn with her innocent laugh. She thought about it deeply as she let the wind cool her down, turning the beads of sweat into sprinkles of refreshing cold water. 

“It definitely is, and I’m also happy that I’m able to help others. I just don’t want to be lied to, that’s all.” 

“Nah, it’s cool. It’s more than natural to want something like that so badly, especially when it seemed so impossible before. Just… Stray strong, okay? This is only the beginning of a grueling process.” 

Wiping her hand over her forehead, Marlowe nodded with her gaze crystalized into the distance. Without putting a single foot forward into the realms described by her or her reaper, she already grew lost in the possibility of them surrounding her, devouring her. It was unfathomable to her, to most, what it meant to carry the weight of a life and all of their experiences. Laboring her own experiences was difficult enough as is, and imaging the hills and valleys carved out of her heart already suffocated her in her own hostile landscape. When she took a glance at Velia, she used the hand that protected her skull from cracking open to take the engraved cigarette from her.

“Memento mori? Nothing else original you can think of?” Marlowe jokingly commented. 

She couldn't be too disappointed, melting when she saw the overwhelmingly radiant glee in Velia’s face. She smiled as if she finally found someone she can trust the most, mixed with that dark shadow Marlowe couldn’t fully comprehend. But despite the mystery, she enjoyed the bright innocence radiating from her, finding a friend she can trust in a foreign land. She was afraid that ever since she left her hometown after his death that she’d forever wander the earth like an emotional exile. Even if it made her question her sanity, she was happy to have found a fountain of hope in her endless desert of despair. 

“Do you need a lighter?” 

Just as Velia asked her this, Marlowe felt a strange sensation in her body as if recognizing a limb that she never noticed before. She followed her curiosity, trying to locate the reason for the oddly familiar feeling in her pocket. When she got it, she saw that it was a dark silver lighter engraved with the same phrase as her cigarette. As if captured by a magic trick, Marlowe couldn’t avert her eyes while the woman beside her giggled to herself, having once been in her position.

“Your reaper is also a bit of a trickster, hm?” 

A profound feeling filtered her full smile, leaving it weak in the wake of her disturbed heart. While there was an intimate comfort in knowing that there was someone by your side, she was unable to get used to the way it warped her reality every so often. She tried to diffuse her own worry with a laugh as she flicked the lighter on and took a deep breath in, flicking it shut before an equally deep exhale. Puffs of smoke followed the beat of her words when she spoke to Velia. 

“Is your reaper the same way?” 

There was an electricity sparking in her brown eyes which Marlowe recognized to have always owned a calmness until that point. It was even weirder to her when that same calmness returned as if it never left in the first place. 

“Oh, my reaper is pretty… special.” 

“In what way then?” 

She took a breath in, making the tip of the cigarette glow like a star before letting the smoke dance with her words. 

“All reapers share a commonality, even though they can vary so much. It’s hard to explain.” 

In the silence that followed, Marlowe massaged the weighty lighter in her pocket, wondering if it would disappear just as randomly as it appeared. With eyes half closed and mind half disappeared like smoke, she could see the shimmering of his scythe’s edge as he sat perched on one of the many pillars of bones in her vision. The upside down engravings on his scythe blade began to bleed, falling into a misty abyss as she saw the skeletal pillars stretch endlessly into the horizon. At the end of her visions, she saw a skeleton laying down in a field of flowers whose ribcage split open like a blossoming flower. As it continued to grow rows of ribs that spread open like petals, she took a deep breath out and skated towards her own smoke, skating in circles in the parking lot. A warm smile grew on Velia’s lips as she joined her. 

The wind combed through their hair as they made little circles around each other and went their own ways. Marlowe studied how the sunlight sparkled on the glossy surfaces of the cars and howled with light on the windshields, stinging her with its beams. While she enjoyed the raw sensation of motion and life, its kaleidoscopic shadows sunk its many rows of teeth into her, reminding her that she could lose her job. The possible injustice that can follow the event ignited another fury in her, one she tried to quench with nicotine and skating. Effortlessly, she was able to skate backwards while blowing smoke in a squatting position, mimicking a malfunctioning car engine. Velia’s giggle immediately fed her with new life. She slowed down and followed her path, skating right beside her. 

“Are you sure that you’ll be able to work your late shift? I can take over if you want.” 

Velia noticed the blank anxiety rippling behind Marlowe’s pale blue eyes. 

“No need,” she replied with a smile to forcefully scrub away the worry, “I need the money anyway, and I don’t mind at all. I need to keep my mind occupied in any way I can before I lose it.” 

“If you ever need anything, I’m always here. Whether it’s dealing with the living or the dead.” 

In the middle of Marlowe’s last inhale, she looked at her with wide eyes, showing Velia how her eyes were brighter than the shining embers of her cigarette. Smoke melted from her smile as she flicked the burning end on the floor and let the sparks fly under her roller skate's wheels. The warmth of the morning light saturated Velia’s attitude towards her as she rolled over the end of her cigarette.