She stood up, almost floating off the table, her feet barely touching the ground with her new-found sense of lightness. Taking a deep breath, or at least the memory of one, she turned around and looked back at the metal table. There was a body there – a young woman covered in blood, half her clothes cut off where the doctors had tried their best to fix the worst of the broken bits. Her brown hair was limp, her face bloated from blood and bruises. The girl looked so different from the one she had seen in the mirror earlier that night, but faced with the absolute truth of her situation she could not deny it.
Becky Flynn was dead.
Suddenly she felt something – a cold dread that crawled up her spine and nestled at the base of her neck. The numbness dissolved beneath it. She glanced up and saw the shadow looming over her, walking up behind her.
Becky Flynn was dead, but she wasn’t ready to be. She still had things to do. People to see. Parents to comfort somehow.
Death wasn’t taking her anywhere. Not tonight.
“You want me, you son of a bitch?” She whirled around, forcing the fear down and replacing it with angry determination. Her hands were on her hips, a snarl in her voice, and a glare in her eyes as she faced him. It. Death. “Then you’re gonna have to—“
She froze. The glare turned into a shocked stare. Death was standing right behind her, but that wasn’t the real shock.
“Did you just diss my mom?”
She expected to see the Grim Reaper – the hooded and robed skeletal figure that she had seen in antique illustrations and window shop displays at Halloween. After all, that’s what his shadow had looked like – right?
The universe had somehow pulled a Bait-and-Switch on her and the “product” was most definitely not as advertised.
For one thing, she had always assumed Death was a dude – or at least an asexual skeleton. But no. Death was a woman. If Becky had any doubts about that they were immediately crushed by the pair of double-Ds sticking out in front of Death by at least six inches. Apparently the Afterlife had fantastic bras. They were covered by a tight black t-shirt, and although they were half hidden beneath a long black battered leather trench coat left causally open, they were unmistakable. Not only was Death a woman, she was stacked. Breasts were not the first thing that Becky usually noticed, but she couldn’t help it because they were right in front of her. Becky was a little short and Death was tall.
She wore bold, black sunglasses that wrapped around her face and disappeared into the waterfall of her platinum blonde bob, fashionably cropped in a V-shape that was short in the back and lengthened on the sides to caress her chin. A black cowboy hat decorated with a band of braided black leather and bone beads perched on her head at a carefree angle. In the front and center of the hat was a tarnished silver skull and crossbones. Her black T-shirt was tucked into a pair of faded black jeans that hinted at a strong figure full of ample curves in all the places Becky wanted curves to be on herself. A black leather belt with silver studs and a large round belt buckle peaked out from beneath her coat as she shifted her weight from one black-cowboy boot encased foot to the other. The buckle had a white skull on a black lacquered background, set in a silver circle. The skull on her belt buckle did not look as happy as the one on her hat, which was grinning at Becky menacingly.
Becky took a few steps back to see her fully, and suppressed a giggle. Death looked like a country-western singing pirate cowboy Barbie doll going through a Goth phase. The only thing that Becky recognized was the scythe – and even that looked weird. The blade was dark brown, the shaft a lighter shade of reddish brown - like a scythe-shaped chocolate bar attached to the top of a long, thick pretzel.
“You’re not—“ Becky paused, and tried to make a gesture with her hands, the meaning of which she wasn’t even sure of. “--are you?”
Death raised one platinum brow. “Am I what?”
“Are you—“ Again Becky faltered. “You can’t be—but you have to be, right?”
She smirked, curling lips colored like root beer. Becky realized she had the same shade of lipstick at home. “I don’t have to be anything other than what I am, darlin’.”
Darlin’?
Her voice was smooth and cool, like an evening breeze blowing across a desert of soft dunes. If she was a singer she was an alto, and with that unmistakable southern twang she would definantely sing Country. The accent was subtle, but it was there.
“So you’re—you’re—“ For some reason Becky couldn’t get the words to come out.
“I’m the Easter Bunny.”
“Right,” Becky said. “That’s what I thought.” Then she frowned, the words finally registering in her brain. “Wait—What?”
Death laughed, a warm, hearty chuckle that somehow conjured up images in Becky’s mind of an autumn night, huddling on hay bales around a blazing fire and drinking hot cider. In a moment the laughter – and image – were gone, although the smile lingered. She lowered the sunglasses with her free hand and peered down at Becky over them. Her eyes were swirling shades of gray and two words immediately popped into Becky’s mind as she stared into them. Autumn Rain.
“Who do I look like?”
It was Becky’s turn to smirk. “Something tells me you wouldn’t like my answer.”
There was a flash of anger in her gray eyes and Death snapped her glasses back into place, muttering something about “idiots” and “skeleton my ass”. As if to emphasize the last statement she dipped the scythe to her mouth and took a big bite. It didn’t just look like chocolate – it was chocolate. The staff was probably a real pretzel too.
“Seriously?” Becky asked, raising one eyebrow in a mocking fashion.
“If I have to carry around this stupid thing—“ Death bit off another big bite and continued to talk with her mouth full. “—just so you morons will recognize me, because this—“ she gestured emphatically to her shadow which still bore the shape of the traditional Grim Reaper “—clearly isn’t enough for people to get it, then I’m gonna make it useful!”
“A snackable scythe?”
“Chocolate calms me down,” she grumbled and took an even bigger bite. “My job is very stressful.”
“I can imagine,” Becky said with genuine sympathy. She couldn’t believe she was actually feeling sorry for Death.
“No,” Death hissed. “You really can’t.” She swallowed the last bite and took a deep breath. Becky felt a chill go through her again and knew that Death was glaring at her behind the glasses covering her eyes.
“Sorry,” Becky muttered meekly.
“Let’s go.” Death walked to the door, turned the handle and pulled it open, then gestured to Becky. “After you.”
What lay beyond the door, was not the hospital – at least not this hospital. Becky couldn’t remember much of the building she was in but she knew the walls were not warped like a funhouse mirror and the ceiling and floor did not glow and pulse in a changing palette of blues. The starkness of shadow and light reminded her of the negatives of old photographs.
Becky was afraid of a lot of things in life – really small spaces, really tall places, creepy crawly bugs – but nothing had ever scared her before like the thought of walking through that door. She finally did what she had planned to do all along.
She bolted in the opposite direction, and ran as fast as she could.
“Oh come on!” she heard Death shout as she dashed for the wall farthest away from the door. “Seriously?”
Becky didn’t stop to think about the wall right in front of her she just ran through it and kept running. Down halls, past doctors in scrubs and patients in wheelchairs, around corners – she practically flew, her feet barely touching the ground. Up stairs, down stairs, racing passed wandering pale patients who seemed lost, pioneers drenched in blood, and praying nuns in old-fashioned habits who tsked as she ran by. Gravity seemed to be failing her as the lightness of her self threatened to make her lose control of how she moved and where. She paused for a moment to catch her breath before realizing she wasn’t winded. She didn’t breathe anymore, so she could run forever, and she intended to. She didn’t want to go to the other side. She refused to spend eternity in a place that looked like that. She’d rather run.
But run where? She didn’t know where she was going or how to get there – she didn’t even know where she was. Where can you run from the Reaper?
Where can you hide from Death?
As if in reply to her unspoken question, she heard the distinct click of heeled boots on the tiled floor. She glanced over her shoulder and saw Death closing in on her with an easy, confident stride.
“There are two things in this world you can’t avoid – and I’m not with the IRS.”
The rational side of Becky’s brain told her Death was right. She couldn’t avoid her fate forever. If Death was determined to drag her soul to the other side then that would happen no matter what Becky did. That was logical. Reasonable.
But Becky was dead and being chased by a cowboy-pirate Barbie Goth who ate chocolate scythes and was going to force her into the funky colored fun house known as the Other Side, so reason really had no sway at this point.
And she sure as Hell wasn’t going to go quietly. Please don’t let there be a Hell, she thought, although considering Death’s appearance who knew what Hell actually looked like. “If you want me – then you’ll have to catch me!” With that Becky took off running again.
“Are we gonna keep doing this?” Death called after her, sounding almost bored. “Cause I’ll win. I’m taller, faster, and stronger. Oh yeah, and I’m Death!” she added, almost as an afterthought.
Becky rounded another corner, flew up a flight of stairs – literally – and slammed into a pair of double-Ds. Stunned, she flew backwards and hovered over the staircase and it became clear that gravity was no longer relevant, at least not to her. She was floating but didn’t really know how to fly, and with her feet not being able to touch the ground she could no longer run. She was stuck.
Death grinned and tilted her head down so that Becky could look past the sunglasses and see the victory in her gray eyes. She held out one hand melodramatically and snapped her fingers. Becky wasn’t sure if she plummeted to the ground or if the ground flew up to her – either way she ended up slammed into the staircase. Thank God she couldn’t feel pain anymore because that would have left a stair-shaped mark in the middle of her face.
“Gravity’s my bitch. Did I mention that?”
The smugness in Death’s voice was as thick as Texas toast. Becky couldn’t breathe – or didn’t rather – but she still felt as if all the air – the lightness – had been knocked out of her. Finally she raised her head and awkwardly adjusted herself on the staircase, trying to stand. A firm hand seized her upper arm and dragged her to her feet.
“Thanks for the workout,” Death said, “but I really don’t have time for this.”
She took the steps three at a time, reaching the top in seconds and raised her free hand to the door.
“You lost your snack,” Becky said. Her brain was in the middle shutting itself down for much needed repairs.
“I’ve got more,” Death replied. She made a motion with her fingers that started as a sort of go over there and ended with a come here. The door was thrown open by a forceful wind that dissipated before it reached them. Beyond it was clearly a different hallway – longer, narrower - but the walls still rippled and the floor still pulsed with changing blue light.
This time Becky had no choice and she knew it. She didn’t struggle when Death dragged her across the threshold and into the swirling blues of the Other Side.
