One of my earlier attempts at fiction in my early teens, maybe 13. Never finished.
Original tagline: I never wanted to become a universal symbol of terror.
Chapter One
Mr. Benno is dead, and I didn’t kill him.
I lick my thumb and leaf through the brittle pages of my book, looking for some kind of explanation.
“Robert Benno, American. Born on May the 15th in St. Marten’s Hospital, died on September 23d, just at the gates to his apartment complex. Cause of death: Heart attack.”
But that’s wrong. Absolutely wrong. I had checked on Robert during his first heart attack. He’d survived of course, and that was because the book had said he would die in a car accident. He wasn’t supposed to die until today, six months later.
But here he lays, six feet under a carpet of grass and weeds, with nothing but a small plaque to identify him. Why did the book change his date after keeping it the same for the past forty-seven years? It had never done that before.
With a sigh, I close the old tome and gently place it back in my bag. I have a grandmother to kill in fifteen seconds, and stressing about this now wouldn’t help me. A door, old and chipped and with a dire thirst for grease, appears next to me. I twist its ornate knob slowly, giving one final look to Robert Benno’s grave.
He wasn’t a very important person from what I’d seen. Just an aging man with a nasty attitude. Didn’t help people, didn’t donate to any charities or the like. No art, no pets, no family, no friends. He just existed. And because I wasn’t there to take him to my sister, he’s just another soul doomed to wander the earth.
I open the door, where the steady beeping of a heart monitor goes flat in a dark room, and I think, for a moment, that his existence is a sad one.
I suppose that makes me a hypocrite.
Hate thrives in a small town. It breeds and festers, latching onto its victim until it becomes too weak to escape from its venom. Jessica Freeman is a product of hate. The bastard child of a construction worker and a librarian, she lives with her mother and two brothers.
Jessica discovered this small house several weeks ago on one of her long walks. The place is overgrown with weeds from the surrounding forest and other vegetation I don’t care for. The squeals of newly-born rat pups echo in the old walls. Gnats and flies skitter about haphazardly, and mosquitoes bite at her constantly, knowing she’s too tired to strike them. The harsh rays of the noontime sun filters through the trees and past the cracked and broken windows, glaring at her and creating an uncomfortable humidity within this wreck of a home. The place stinks of feces and death and fear.
The garage of the house has a series of rotting rafters rather than a proper ceiling. Tied to one of the sturdier rafters is a thick cut of rope. A young girl, no more than fifteen, stands on a chair she’s brought from the kitchen. The old thing creaks and groans under her weight, but holds. Jessica is praying to her creator because she wants forgiveness. It’s not my place, but I forgive her.
The girl grabs the noose, the rope heavy and cold in her frail hands, and she carefully slips her head inside. She looks down at the floor and purses her lips, staring as a caterpillar quietly shuffles by, and she sniffs. Jessica shuts her eyes tight and takes a deep breath. She takes a step forward and falls.
The rope holds true and keeps her up, centimeters away from the floor. Jessica hacks and coughs. Her hands grab the rope that constricts her neck, pulling. Kicking. Struggling.
Then, for a moment, her gaze meets mine. She stares me with her fearful brown eyes, speechless.
“You have beautiful hair.” I say. Absolutely beautiful.
The rafter, which had been groaning under the pressure of her desperate ministrations, snaps loudly, and falls, bring her tumbling down along with it. She’s a strong girl, with good genes. She recovers quickly from the fall. She pulls at her noose, eyes trained on mine, and in seconds she pulls it off and scrambles to her feet. She backs away, making movements with her mouth but never producing any sounds to match them. Once she’s a safe distance away from me, she turns and runs, screaming as time begins to slow.
I look at the mess she’s made. Out of the rubble of rotten wood and old birds’ nests, a soul emerges, white as my brittle bones. I crouch down and extend my hand, and the creature accepts. Once it’s comfortable, I walk out of the garage and into the living room. Jessica is stuck there in mid-run, unable to move until I allow time to flow once more. I whisper softly to the small insect, “I’ll be taking you to my sister now. Your friends are waiting for you.” The caterpillar gives a small nod, pleased with the news, but continues to stare at the frozen girl. Her dress is tattered and there’s dirt and debris in her golden hair, and her neck had reddened severely under the noose’s grip.
“I think Jessica would be sorry if she knew what she did.” The creature doesn’t answer, and I let it be. A white door appears to my left, and I enter. Behind me, the screams of the girl return.
Chapter Two
I don’t dislike Estella. If anything, I have a mild agitation towards her. I suppose, for siblings who have been around long enough to know every small detail of the other, that’s as good as a relationship can get.
Estella is adored. Even the greediest souls who enter her custom-made paradises could never ask for more. The humans have their entertainment, the wolves have their fields of cattle, the fish have lakes filled with food, and even the worms have more than enough dirt to last their eternal lifetimes.
The caterpillars love her especially. In the paradise she’s created for them, they have no predators. Just healthy plants, clear skies, and new friends as far as their eyes could see. It’s really only one small section of her expansive garden, but the insects are more than content.
She’s watering a patch of tomatoes when I arrive, humming her little tunes before Jessica’s screaming behind me cut through them. She’s not fazed, though, just excited. She’s at my side in a flash, looking over the black fluffball on my finger before I’ve even closed the door behind me. “Oh! Who’s this little guy?”
“I didn’t ask.”
“Well, I’ll call you Iron. ‘Cause you’re a tough little guy, aren’t you?” she coos, letting the thing crawl into her palm. She feels his weight a moment and says in a low, raggedy voice, “Si, soy muy macho!” With a laugh she darts to her garden, the soul safe within her soft hands.
“I need some advice,” I say, pulling out my book, “Robert Benno died six months earlier than he was meant to, and the book changed to accommodate it without my knowing. See?” I hold it up and point at the entry, a crisp black over the yellow pages.
“Is that a bad thing?” She asks. She sets the furry caterpillar on some leaf– which it immediately begins eating– and comes to look it over. I sigh as I hand it to her.
“Yes, it’s a bad thing. If the book is inconsistent and changing without my knowing, I can’t do my job right.”
“Well, I dunno what to tell you. Death’s not my department.” The girl says, shrugging. She gave the book back and thinks for a few moments, tapping her foot to a silent beat on the clouds. “Why don’t you talk to that Benno guy and ask him?”
I suppose several centuries isn’t enough time to figure out how I do my job. “He’s a wandering soul now. Even if I did find him, there’s no way he’d be any help.”
“It wouldn’t kill you to try.” Estella says, wearing a dopey grin. I glared at her, which only makes her fall into a fit of giggles. She holds her sides as she floats off the clouds and into… well, more clouds. The bird souls in them twitter and tweet along with her, which only annoys me more.
She finally runs out of laughter and floats back down. She doesn’t apologize for her terrible pun, but she does say, “I never met Benno, so he’s a new soul, if that helps. Maybe he’s hanging out near where he died?”
I nod. That does help, a little. New souls typically don’t move far from where they were killed; hopefully he’s haunting his old apartment building.
“If that’s all you needed to ask, then I’ve got some wonderful news for you: Tonight’s my last night before reincarnation!” She clapped her hands rapidly and jumped in place, smiling the brightest smile I’ve seen in years.
If I could smile, I’d be doing it now, but it’s been centuries since then. So, I settle on hugging her. “I’m so happy for you, Estella!”
She returns the hug with her own, collapsing my non-existent lungs and making me gasp in pain. “I’ve already got everything planned out, too! There’s this wonderful couple in Cali. Very nice people. They’ve got a dog, too, so that’s even better! You know I’ve always wanted to see how Colombia’s grown since–”
A door appears to our left, painted in a red coat and bearing a small plaque labeled “B13.” The faint sound of an old man’s labored breathing and his family’s pained condolences emit from it, ruining our moment. Estella sighs and sets me down. I don’t miss her pout before she replaces it with a small, forced smile. “I’m really going to miss you.” She tries to keep her voice steady, but it quivers nonetheless.
“Me too,” I say. Estella only nods and turns, walking to some other corner of her heavenly realm where she can die again; this time not by the slice of a Spaniard’s sword, but in a peaceful sleep.
I watch her go, taking note of her soft sniffles. I remember when we first met. At the time, the last embodiment of Life had been Mauci, a boy killed by the Black Plague. We’d been good friends, but when he was reincarnated and replaced with Estella, I hadn’t been very nice to her. I hated her.
But where I once would have viewed her departure as a glorious event, I now feel despair and one of the worst feelings I’ve ever experienced: loneliness.
I take a deep breath and exhale where my nose once was. There was no way to stop it. I’d learned that a long time ago. She’ll be replaced by the time I come back, and when her time is up, I’ll be the one to kill her. Permanently, this time, just like Mauci.
I wonder who’ll take her place?
I open the red door and take my place to the side of the dying man’s bed, scythe at the ready, and wait for old Monsieur Crevier’s time to run out. As I look about the room at his family– his son, daughter, and their spouses, holding their hands and comforting each other as they watch the final lights of Claude’s life fade– I realize exactly why people are so scared of me.
I take their loved ones. I take their children. I take their pets, their friends, their idols. I don’t discriminate between their enemies and innocents. I take and take and take, and never once have I given back. Not even Mauci, who had been my only friend for centuries, was spared. In fact, I’ve never questioned why I kill until now. The thought had never even crossed my mind.
No wonder they fear me.
I’m a monster.