The Reaper's Mission- 2013

Chapter Six- My Shabby Apartment

"Hey Donovan!" I heard an increasingly familiar voice call from behind me as I left the school about a week later.

Since that day Karolyn and I had passed notes in class, I had been able to somewhat avoid talking to her exclusively. When she invited me to Dimples, I had made up excuses, and when she talked to me, I tried to end the conversations fairly quickly to avoid letting her catch my attention and curiosity too much. The most we'd talked about was what was in the missing pages of her History textbook, and about how I would let her borrow mine for a few days so she would have them. I wanted to talk to her more, and I had a strange urge to get to know her and spend more time finding out what made her tick, but I couldn't let myself fall into her trap. She was just an assignment.

However, after all of my efforts to avoid close contact with her, she finally caught up to me on the chilly day after school, and instead of ignoring her or telling her off like an intelligent Reaper would have done, I allowed her to fall in step with me.

"What's going on?" I asked Karolyn when she caught up to me. She pushed her hair back from her eyes and smiled.

"You have been avoiding humanity, it appears, and I was curious as to why," she said simply. She didn't sound angry or accusatory, just curious and open. I shrugged, not wanting to tell her that I had been avoiding people because I didn't want to let myself get closer to her.

"Just not much of a people person, I guess," I told her shortly. She tilted her head, her eyes searching mine.

"I can understand that, but you've just seemed distant compared to the first few days of school." She shrugged and adjusted her bag. "I guess I was just wondering if I said something to scare you off or something. You don't have to talk about it." She smiled and stopped to wait at the crosswalk, and I stood in shocked silence for a moment as I tried to process the immeasurable kindness and humility in the girl standing before me.

"Karolyn..." I said, but the light flashed for us to walk, and Karolyn darted across the street. I hurried to catch up to her before I knew what I was doing.

"Too fast for you?" she asked in a lightly teasing tone. I startled myself by laughing out loud at this and cleared my throat.

"Karolyn," I began again, carefully forming what to say in my mind to erase all feelings of blame from Karolyn's mind, "the reason I've been avoiding people is because... Because I have to move around a lot and I'm afraid that if I get close to people it'll be too hard to leave." It was basically true, minus the detail about having to kill her and all.

"That's what it was?" Karolyn asked laughing. I must have looked confused because she stopped walking for a moment to face me straight on. "I thought you were avoiding us all because I was too much too soon. I know I'm really outgoing, and I like making people feel welcome, but I can come off really strong sometimes, especially when... Yeah. I'm glad that's not the case." It took me a moment to register all she said, and when I did, I was the one laughing.

"Are you kidding?" I asked. "Too strong? You were perfect! I guess that's why I've been trying to avoid yo--" I trailed off, realizing what I'd said, and Karolyn blushed a deep red.

"I, um, you were trying to avoid me?" she asked, looking suddenly shy. I realized that we had made it to my stop, but I wasn't going inside just yet.

"That came out really rough," I admitted, running my fingers through my hair. "I... You're probably not going to believe me, but the only reason I've been avoiding you at all is because I'm attracted to you and... Well, that came out." I took a long, deep breath as my head spun from everything I'd just accidentally said.

"Um, Donovan..." Karolyn said, trailing off in confusion,

"I don't want to become too good of friends with you," I continued on forcefully, "because I know I'll have to leave, and letting go is hard I guess, so there. I'll see you tomorrow." I waved once to Karolyn, who was standing a few feet away flushed and looking shocked, and hurried and up the stairs to my shared apartment. Ben, fortunately, wasn't home, giving me a moment to fume in confusion without any witnesses.