Tea Scenes: A Bready Baker Collection

The Man With the Skull Tattoo

"So your patron is the God of Death?" The woman points to the overgrown skull tattoo on the dark man's arm.

"Yeah."

"So, what's your deal? Necromancy, war..." She tries to guess his occupation.

"I'm a doctor." The man looks away from her and takes a sip from his glass.

"What?" She chuckles.

"I'm a doctor." He says with a dead pan tone.

"No you're not."

"I am. I pray every night that any patient of mine to arrive at his door is turned away, and that those who cannot be turned away are given an afterlife of comfort and prosperity."

"You're lying!" She scoffs.

"I'm not."

"I was kidding by the way..." She turns away awkwardly.

"About what?" He smiles and turns, "The necromancy or the god of death bit?"

"Um-"

"It was a pretty fun little debate we were having."

She scoffs, "You knew?"

"Of course I knew! Nobody asks about anything but Christianity in public. Not in this era!" He takes another sip of his drink.

"So..." She looks to the other side of the bar, trying to find a way out of a suddenly awkward conversation.

"I'm not a doctor," The woman whips her head around to look at the man, "I'm not anything really. I just happen to be in the right place at the right time and got rewarded." 

"What do you mean? You're obviously wearing the clothes of some businessman. Your boss?" She stares at him in an accusatory manner.

"Nope. They're mine. I saved the Queen from drowning and now I'm rich!" He chuckles before downing the rest of his drink, "It feels wrong to be this rich for something so... simple."

The woman is staring at him with her mouth agape, "Simple? Simple!? You saved the Queen of all people! That is amazing!"

"It was just like if someone else was drowning except more disappointing."

"Disappointing ?" The woman looks quizzical

"Well she has all these guards around her all the time but not a single one of them could have jumped in to save her? Smells rotten to me."

She stares at him for a few more minutes before turning away and staring at the alcohol, "So what, they planned it like that?"

"What? No. I don't think they were very happy when I pulled her out of the river though." The man rolls his eyes.

"Huh. I wonder how many of them got fired..."  The woman takes a sip of her martini and then pauses, "This tastes... off. Bartender!" She calls out but notices there's no one behind the bar. In fact, there's no one in the bar.

"Oh dear..." The man next to her gets a depressive look on his face, "I see why work called me to this bar..."

"What are you talking about? Where is everyone? What did you put in my drink?" The woman starts rapid firing questions and stands up with her eyes growing wider by the second.

"Um... I did not put anything in your drink madam, however-" The man stands to comfort her.

"Don't come near me!" She throws the drink at him and brandishes the empty glass as a crude weapon.

"Alright, um. Someone did put a drug in your drink and it seems they put a little too much..." The man looks at the ground for a second before taking a deep breathe, "Let's start over."

"What do you mean?"

"What's your name?" The man looks back up with a smile on his face and his hand outstretched for a shake.

"Barbara... Barbara Thatcher." She shakes his hand with two fingers and five feet of space between them.

"Hello Barbara, I am William. Would you like to know about my tattoo Barbara?" William continues to smile with a soft look in his eyes.

"You said you were a Patron of Death."

"You are correct, however there is a slight miscommunication." William chuckles.

"What miscommunication?" She breaks the glass on the bar and thrusts it in his direction, demanding an answer.

"I am not a Patron of Death... I am Death. And it seems that you are the unfortunate soul I have been sent to personally handle tonight."

"What does that mean?"

"Every night, I am sent one soul that I must personally handle due to extreme or strange circumstances that may prevent a swift journey to the after life." 

"And what's so strange about my circum... I'm dead?" Shards of loose glass fall to the floor as Barbara's hand begins to tremble.

"Yes, Barbara. You are dead, and this is Limbo. It is a half way point between life and your respective after-life." William responds, his eyes filled with sympathy and furrow in his brow as he mentally chastises himself for forgetting that death is not a normal thing for humans to experience. It is literally a once in a life time experience after all.

"My... respective after-life? What the hell does that mean?" Barbara's grip retightens on the stem of her broken glass. 

"It means there's more than heaven and hell," William puts his hands up to show Barbara that he means no harm and stands face to face with her, "It means that the Ancient Greeks were right but so were the Nords, and so was everybody else. There is no wrong answer to the after-life. Some people choose to live in a communal after-life full of other people who have passed. Some choose to live in a private after-life where there is no one else but them and they can live forever surrounded by their books or their paints or their jungles or whatever their heart desires. Others go between the two, using the private after-life as a bedroom of sorts. Shall we find out what your after-life is, Barbara?"

"I want to go home." A vein in her forehead pops as she shouts at the strange rambling man.

"That is not possible Barbara." William lowers his hands and his eyes soften as they are filled with sorrow and sympathy for the scared and confused woman in front of him. 

"Then die." She says coldly before swiping at him with the glass and dashing through the doors. 

She's left a deep gash on his face and he's bleeding. William chuckles as he realizes the impact of their earlier conversation. It had been so long since someone had actually responded to his witty retorts that he was just happy to have a conversation. This woman wasn't normal. It had been a long time since someone responded to him -- especially in the land of the living -- but it had been even longer since someone managed to make him bleed.