DEATH IS A REDHEAD

by Christine Ritchotte © 2003

"Gavin."

"Mpfff."

"Gavin. . . Gavin!"

"Ungh?"

"Pick your head out of that disgusting pool of drool and look at me."

"Wha--?" He was awake now. He craned his neck around, looked, and choked. "Who are you?"

It was late at night. A full-bodied moon slivered through the window slats, casting an eerie glow on a very attractive, youngish woman with cascading red hair. Hanging on her right forearm from a golden chain was a sleek black purse, dangling prettily. She wore a slim black dress, cut at mid-thigh and her legs were lovely. Gavin stared openly. He couldn't help it really; he was a card-carrying member of the 'leg man' club.

The woman was shaking her head and mumbling to herself. Her words were barely discernable. "These young guys . . . such a pain in the ass . . . drag it out till you want to scream."

"Well, hi." He rubbed his eyes and took her in. After all, it was hard to be threatened by an unexpected pretty girl in your room. "You look like you're going to the Academy Awards or something. You must be a dream . . . Mm, my dream girl." He smiled and gave her the 'come hither' with his forefinger.

Dream Girl sighed. "I get no respect," she muttered. Her eyes flashed, blue behind flaming red bangs, and she stalked up to his bedside. She bent and glared into his eyes. Until then he'd been amused by her, but all of a sudden he found himself in the unfortunate position of being unable to breathe. He was held, mesmerized in horror until she broke eye contact, whereupon he executed a panicked shimmy to the head of the bed.

"Oh God, it's a nightmare; it's got to be. Your eyes, they're like black holes . . . complete despair . . . I think I want to wake up now."

The woman relaxed visibly, and Gavin's composure came creeping back to him, his breathing returning to regular. Though she seemed non-threatening at the moment he kept an untrusting eye on her. She was pacing the room and talking . . . a lot.

"You are awake, in a manner of speaking," she was saying. "Oh, I know it'll be difficult for you to believe, but you are no longer a resident in the land of the living. Yes," she chuckled, as if amused by her own depth, "you are awake, but in a totally different sense of the word."

He stared densely at her. Was his nightmare actually lecturing him? It seemed to be true, for she sermonized and expounded until he grew quite bored and put his mind to the puzzle at hand. Was he having a sex dream or a nightmare?

In mid-thought, he realized that the droning had ceased. She was waiting, looking at him with an expectant air, but for the life of him he couldn't imagine what she wanted. Uncomfortable seconds passed, then whole minutes, and finally her composure snapped.

"What are you, a moron? Finesse is pointless with you; I give up! Try to do a thing with class and what do you get? Well here it is, as Dick and Janed as I can manage." She drove a finger into his chest. It hurt. "Know what?" she said. "You're dead. And there you have it."

Gavin's face went hot with anger. The lecture was bad enough, but this was insulting. "I'm not dead; I feel great!" he shouted. "Now go away, nightmare!" He waved her off, shooing, as he would a pesky insect.

"I'm not a bloody nightmare!" she sputtered. "I am sick of that accusation. Every time I pray they'll come up with something more original and they never do."

He closed his eyes tight and shoved his fingers into his ears. "I can't hear you! You can go away now. Go and haunt some other sucker, legs."

Though he was unsure of apparitional etiquette, he was pretty certain she would leave if he ignored her. He babbled, uttering whatever popped into his head, not disbarring nursery rhymes until he had the nerve to peep his eyes open. In relief, he slumped onto his mattress. He rearranged his covers and laced his hands behind his head. A bad dream, but not so awful, really. She was pretty hot.

Suddenly grey-black smoke appeared and swelled and swirled around the room, blinding him. Tears ran down his cheeks; smoke burned at his eyes, and then, from the deepest blackest part of the smoke came a hideous hooded thing. It stepped toward him with a maniacal grin just visible underneath its hood. Hideous laughter echoed wildly, reverberating into his brain, until he was certain he was insane, for this he knew: this was no dream. The thing pointed at him with a gnawed and, bony finger; a yellowed, thick fingernail hanging inches off the end of the finger almost touching him.

"Have no doubt that I am Death, human," it hissed with menace. "Disobey me a moment longer and suffer you the agonies of hell."

Gavin screamed like a small girl, high and shrieking. "Agh! Go away, go away!" he cried. "I don't want to be dead! My body is perfectly fine; a specimen of youth it is, and I want to stay."

Instantly the wraith disappeared, replaced by the put-together redhead. "Now let's be reasonable here. My vacation is scheduled to begin in . . ." she looked down at her watch, a tiny smoky-grey hourglass, "one hour. Why are you giving me such a hard time about this? You . . .are . . . dead." Her voice staccatoed the point home.

"You again!" he breathed. "Wow, you really are Death!" He was awe-stricken. "I had no idea Death was so beautiful. I don't suppose you'd go on a date with me, would you?"

Scarlet dotted her cheeks, and she appeared to be trying not to laugh. "Now that's one I haven't heard," she said. "Brownie points for you. Now come, we have places to go."

He folded his arms and lay back in bed. "Pretty or not, I'm not coming. Just the fact that you're talking to me, even asking me to come suggests that I have a choice in the matter. And I'm choosing not to go." A satisfied smirk appeared at the corner of his lips.

Her eyes widened, and enraged she swooped at him and thrust her face into his. Her voice growled low. "Look into my eyes, fool! See the fate that waits if you refuse me. This path leads to the Plane of the Damned!"

He shrugged and began examining his nails. "Damned, schmamed. You used up that trick too early in your act; it can't scare me again."

She raised a manicured eyebrow, and changed her tack. She sat down on the edge of his bed. She was close, smelled great, though not like any fragrance he could name.

"Come, come," she said, smiling a little. "You really are being foolish. This is not a 'bad' thing. You're causing some very important spirits to wait for you; spirits you'll want to see, people you've been missing for a long time. There is nothing for you to fear from undergoing this process. Come with me and begin it." Her voice teased and tempted, a siren's song, at once both lyrical and fluid. She was too near and too beautiful. Gavin shook it off, whacking the side of his head to clear his thinking.

"I can feel what you're doing and I'm not falling for it. You'll have to drag me kicking and screaming. I tell you, I'm-not-coming." He used the same staccato rhythm she'd employed earlier. This seemed to infuriate her.

"Why you - -" she sputtered, unable to formulate a coherent expletive. "Damn it all!" she finally fumed.

Gavin watched with some amusement and a touch of apprehension; after all, one wasn't supposed to laugh outwardly in the face of Death. He had to wait to speak until the stream of cursing had stopped. Once she got going she did a pretty decent job; he'd actually never heard cursing so well executed.

"Wow," he said, his face reddened from the storm blast of her words. "That was impressive. I've never even heard of most of the things you mentioned, but they sounded just awful. Are you sure you won't go out on a date with me?"

The smile was gone. Her face had gone a good deal grimmer than he'd thought was even possible. "Gavin, I'm afraid it's time you faced reality. Do you remember saying you would rather be dead than spend your life as a cripple?"

The bottom dropped out of his stomach. How could she know about that? "Um, yeah, I guess I can remember saying that."

"Of course you can. You said it to your fiancé and your family, and whoever else happened to be around. You seemed to feel pretty strongly about it."

He nodded slowly . . . yes, it was coming to him. Visions flashed of him standing in braggart's stance and saying that precise thing . . . the many times he'd said it. And he'd thought he meant it, at the time.

"Okay, yeah. I definitely said that. What the hell does that have to do with the price of cheese?" Words. They were only words.

"Gavin, have you looked at your body? Have you really looked?"

He snorted then. "You're quite mad, my dear woman--Death--whatever your name is. I'm in my body at this very moment. Hard to speak without a body, you know."

"Is it?"

He looked down at his hands and his voice caught in his throat in a shocked gurgle. Only a wavery outline marked his presence, like looking through water. "Sweet mother of . . . where are my hands; where's my arms and legs? What's going on here?"

"You're right here with me. Your body is just behind you."

He didn't want to look, didn't want her to be right. But he turned his head--or what would have been his head--with painstaking slowness. He moved to a slim white-sheeted bed, and saw his body from a perspective he'd never seen it from--outside of himself. Young, muscular, maybe even attractive, his body was nevertheless almost unrecognizable as it was. Tubes were leeched onto and into his skin, snaking up to machines and clear dripping bags. A respirator hissed, forcing oxygen into the mangled body lying supine on the hospital bed.

"Oh no. No, no, no, no!" he moaned.

"I'm afraid so. It seems that you should have chosen better friends in life. Why a person would ever go boating with an alcohol-bloated idiot behind the wheel is beyond me, but mine is not to ask why."

"Something told me not to go, but I didn't listen." Gavin stared morosely at his body.

She came up behind him. "As you can see it's best this way. Take your time; I won't rush you."

Gavin was mute for a time and then turned to face her. "I told you before, I'm not going. I'm still alive down there, see? No flat-line; I'm still alive, dammit!"

She quirked the eyebrow again. "I thought we'd established our ground rules here. Nobody twisted your arm; you said what you said. You made your choice over and over again, not just once, but five times. Oral agreement, plain and simple."

"I'm changing my mind. I want to stay."

She shook her head. "You'd be a cripple."

"I don't care anymore."

"Pain would haunt your every moment, your every breath; a constant scourge. It would never leave in peace. You don't want that."

"Did you not hear me? Not going."

She continued. "You'd never walk, probably not even be able to bring a spoon to your lips, or get yourself onto a toilet. Totally helpless--what woman would ever want you?"

"I take it you're one of those 'glass is half-empty' sorts."

"You'd be trapped in a wheelchair for the remainder of your life. That's no life at all."

He pleaded then. "I didn't know what I was saying. Please, I beg you, I'll do whatever I have to do if you'll let me stay." A sob rattled in his chest. "I didn't live, and there's not a reason in the world I can give you to let me stay. I just didn't live."

"I'm sorry." Her voice was soft but firm. She sighed as she opened her black purse and then she reached out with a small-boned hand so white it looked like powdered snow.

Gavin knew it was over. He braced himself.

But she did not continue towards him, for her attention was now focused on the small hourglass attached to her wrist. Slowly her neck cricked to the side and a mystified expression came over her face. "This . . . yes. This is odd. I have not seen this before." She stood there for long seconds, looking uncertain for the first time since Gavin had seen her. Then she shrugged. "I really hope you meant what you said, because according to my timepiece, and it never lies, you've gotten yourself fifty."

"Years?" Gavin goggled. "Oh, thank God, and thank you Death!" He ranted and became near hysterical with laughter. "I'm sorry," he said. "I laugh when I'm nervous. And boy, am I ever nervous!"

"Perfectly understandable. After all, it's not everyone who can say he's cheated Death."

Gavin stopped laughing, his face turning stoic and determined. He inhaled deeply and blew out.

"I'm ready. Send me back, Death."

"Regina."

"Huh?"

"My name is Regina."

Now he was able to smile a little. "I'll be seeing you, Regina."

"It's inevitable," she said. "Live well, Gavin."

"I will," he said. Then, unable to help himself, he added, "See you in fifty. I'll be a randy old goat then, just hankering for my date with the foxy lady with the weird profession."

"Keep that sense of humor," she said. "You'll need it."

He closed his eyes and waited. It was only a moment before he felt her touch on his shoulder. It was incredible . . . and then like nothing at all.

*****

Ever so gently, she pushed him back into the broken body on the bed. She stayed to watch his pulse normalize, though she didn't quite know why. As she waited, she felt an odd feeling infuse her. Ridiculous, she told herself.

It bothered her sensibility a little to think how a by-the-book pick-up had changed simply because she'd come a week ahead of schedule, but she shook it off; it wouldn't do to think about that sort of thing too much in her line of work. The other entities often ridiculed her for her perfectionism and, true to form, she had not been willing to go on her trip before she took care of that one last soul on her list.

Who ever would have figured he'd have that kind of resolve? She realized now that she was glad to have been reminded that the souls she collected were more than names on a list, more than an essence she toted in her sleek black purse from this existence to the next.

"Vacation, here I come," she said out loud to no one. It had been decades since she'd had the pleasure, and she was in desperate need of repose. She drifted to the young man's bedside, and to her own astonishment, found herself pressing her lips to his. "Gavin Frazier," she whispered, "you have just received the kiss of Death."

She was still smiling when she left the Earthly Plane making double-time to reach the exotic and exclusive Plane of Beauty, where a small villa by the sea and a peanut butter and banana sandwich awaited her.

x x x

I’ve always been attracted to redheads--near fatally so. The title of this story wooed me--as did its humor and whimsy. Hope you liked this first tale of 2003 as much as I did. Comments to our BBS, please.




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