Everybody hates Death *ON HOLD*

Chapter Eight - Frying pans hurt

I left Ruby's house feeling relieved. After all, my experience with Jordan Walkers proved to me that crying girls really weren't my area of expertise. I could still smell the garlic from the spaghetti she had dumped in my hair not fourteen hours ago. It lingered there, reminding me that I still had yet to shower. I pulled my hood up over my black hair, attempting to block the scent. 

As I approached the old red bricked house, I noticed light shining out of all five front windows. I could have sworn I turned them all off when I left. In fact I did turn them all off when I left. I crouched down behind a browning bush and stared through the windows, only to see nobody inside. Slowly approaching the front door, I twisted the handle, being sure to make as little noise as possible as I stepped into the hallway, gently shutting the door behind me. 

I had my body pressed up against a hallway wall as I peaked into the kitchen. It was empty. All except for a half eaten cheese sandwich I left on the table and withering flowers in the windowsill. Hadn't I just watered those? Withering flowers usually only meant one thing. The floorboards shifted behind me and I turned to see a steel frying pan soaring towards my face before my world was consumed by darkness. 

Katherine sat next to the lake pushing lilly pads around with a stick. She was so engrossed in the action that I was surprised when she noticed me approaching her. Her image flickered like a projection as she rose to face me, releasing the stick into the dark, murky water. 

"I'm so dreadfully sorry about Ruby, but you see, she belongs with me." She twisted her mouth into a horrifying gap - toothed smile. Different from the girl in the picture. 

I opened my mouth to speak but the words seemed to get lost in the air as if a vacuum had sucked them straight from my lips. A vortex of dark grey clouds swirled overhead and the sharp "caws" of dozens of black crows filled the air. I looked down to see a large patch of blood forming on Katherine's dress. It seeped into the pink fabric and ran in streams down her white tights, forming a thick puddle at her little toes. 

"She's MY best friend!!" Katherine shrieked as she reached her pale arm into the lake and pulled out a photo encased in a shiny silver frame. It was the same picture that was in Ruby's house and yet it was somehow different. I saw now that Ruby's face had been scratched out with bloody fingernails. 

"Now we can play all the time." 

"NO!" I shot up, covered in sweat with my breath escaping in short, rapid bursts. 

"Just a dream." I whispered to myself. 

It was all a dream. 

I pushed my long dripping hair out of my eyes to see that I was lying on my bed, above the covers and the sun was streaming in through the windows. It was rare that London saw a sunny morning in December. My head was pounding and my nose felt as if it were broken. I poked it with one finger and pain shot through my entire face causing tears to sting my eyes. Yep. Broken. 

After finally showering, putting a dressing on my nose and trying to shake the dream from my mind, I crept downstairs and into the kitchen where I saw him placing strips of bacon into a frying pan. If that was the same one he had used to bludgeon my face then he really was more heartless than I had originally thought. Then again, he literally didn't have a heart and I guess that was as good an excuse as any. He wore his usual black suit and had thrown his briefcase upon the kitchen counter. 

"Are you going to stand there or give me a hand with breakfast?" He asked, with his back still turned. 

"You know, Dad, for someone who does what you do for a living you are no stealth master." I cracked two eggs into another frying pan as the dead meat sizzled next to me. 

"Mortimer, I'm a businessman not a ballerina and besides, I thought you were the landlord. This job doesn't bring so much of a "living" anymore. Well, not since spirits stopped carrying tangible objects in their pockets." He laughed at his own joke and winked at me as I rolled my eyes. 

"Bacon?" He said, holding the sizzling pan out towards me.

"Ew, no thank you." I said, lurching away in disgust as he gave me a puzzled look. 

"Vegetarian." I pushed a thumb towards my chest. 

"Since when? You crazy kids and you "PECA"." 

"Its "PETA". I think "Peca" was a unit of value in West Africa." I recalled reading it in a history book.

Death just rolled his eyes at me and began to load his own plate with meat. 

"Anyway, how was America?" I asked, taking the eggs off of the heat and piling them into a bowl. 

"They were difficult bastards but I managed. No thanks to you." 

"Hey, I would have come with you but it was the last day of school. I practically had to be there." Not true but I hated large groups of spirits. Something I would have to get used to when I picked up his job, I supposed.

"And how did that go?" He asked, shovelling bacon into his mouth.

"Um..Great. I take it you didn't have to push any spirits this time?" I said, giving him a look.

"OK, that was one time, let it go. Come on, "the Grim Reaper"? That's just insulting." I laughed at his childish reply and joined him at the dining table. 

"Anyway, the radar's been dead lately. If you'll excuse the pun." He chuckled. 

"What do you mean?" I asked, cramming buttery toast into my mouth. It was burnt but he had tried his best. 

"I mean, spirits are figuring it out on their own more than ever. They don't even linger like they used to. I haven't seen the spirit plane this dead in thousands of years. Not since the troglodytes finally figured out a mammoth hunting system. Between Candice and I we've pretty much got it covered, which is a first." 

"Candice?" I asked.

"The new reaper. Alex was good but he started getting too attached. I had to let him go for his own good. Candice just gets the job done. Shes still working now." He scraped the last pieces of bacon off of his plate and rose to the sink.

"I thought you had whole army of reapers? I questioned, washing my own plate in the sink. 

"Didn't need 'em." He seemed awfully casual.

"But why? Somebody dies every second all around the world. I know you're fast but are you that fast?" 

"Firstly, that's offensive. Secondly, I told you, the spirits are taking care of themselves. For whatever reason, they don't want to stick around. Coffee?" He offered. I shook my head in reply and leaned against the kitchen counter. 

He seemed to be acting stranger than usual. He kept shifting his body when he spoke. He turned his head away from me every so often as if he was listening for something. We rarely even spoke so why was he speaking to me now? Our "bonding" consisted of him taking me along with him on the job for "training." 

"You're sure they don't need you out there?" I could tell my constant questioning was bothering him but something just wasn't right. 

"I told you its -" He was interrupted by the sound of his ring-tone coming from the black leather briefcase. Death used to communicate with spirits and reapers by drawing blood symbols on the walls but I had convinced him to switch to mobile phones a few years ago. A lot less messy.

"Again? Damn! I'm on my way." He hung up the phone, silencing the metallic voice on the other end and swiped his briefcase from the table. He seemed nervous as he ran his bony fingers through his greying hair and adjusted his dark red tie.

"Lets take a rain check on the coffee." 

Just like that, Death disappeared from my life once again.