Date Night Stories

Life And Death

Across me lived Life, she wore jeans and a blouse today. She was coming home from a long day at work. She had to see women giving birth, patients coming out of a coma or people surviving cancer and she's present when miracles are happening in different parts of the world. Miracles happen in times she steps in to stop me from working. I loved her for years now and we've been neighbors for as long as we've been around.

Time stops when I'm with her, sometimes I wish I could stay near her at all times but we both know we can't be together. It's just not possible in this lifetime. This never ending lifetime we were given. What assures me is that I get to live across the street from her for as long as we exist. I know she can protect herself, she is Life after all, but it comforts me that she's nearby even though we aren't beside each other. We are like parallel lines travelling the same direction for eternity but never meeting. I can only stand by her side but I can never be more.

She noticed me staring at her through the window and she waved. I waved back. She opened her front door and entered her house. Lights flooded the rooms, she always liked it bright in her house. She loves to collect paintings from different decades she's lived. She loves baking and she loves to sing in the shower. I listen while I sit in bed. It calms me down after a long day at work. She never aged despite the centuries that passed. I've told her I love her many times in my sleep... Never to her face. I think she knows that I love her anyway. Sometimes words are unnecessary. We may be Life and Death but love is pure and everyone can feel it.

Being Death isn't easy. I had to constantly be around accidents, in hospitals, in alleyways, in weird places. There's usually a lot of blood and a lot of crying. There's screaming from those alive and sometimes even from those dying. Suicides are the worst because half of them still wants to live, especially those jumping off bridges and buildings, but they can't stop the fall. I'll be there to catch their souls before they land, that's why they don't remember dying. But the sight of their lifeless body is horrific and it can take days before someone sees their body. Overtime, I separated myself from feeling. Knowing that some bodies would never be found, buried in the snow or in the forest, dumped in an abandoned building. It makes you numb just thinking about it, the amount of souls I've taken back. The amount life that could have been wonderful. Especially infants who came into the world and in a matter of minutes or hours, I have to take them with me. It's heartbreaking.

I don't know why I was given this job or duty. It feels like a punishment. I can't be with her and I wish I can hold her at night comfort me through the amount of deaths I've seen, be by my side before we start working again. Be my safe haven. Sometimes I want her to hold me tight, even just for the night. So I could sleep soundly and know that she's right there and everything will alright.

Someone being born, someone dying and a miracle happening is timeless. We don't really get a break but time stops for us and it's tempting to just let it stay still. For time to stop and be still. For us to have our moments together. I never had the courage to ask her that.

To just stay with me and let time stay still. So that we could just be together for eternity. But there's consequences to actions like that. I have to go work tomorrow, maybe I'll offer to cook dinner and invite her over. I don't how much time had passed since I was created. But it's so lonely and I wish she was right here beside me because it would been better. But I have centuries ahead of me to gain courage and ask her to stay. For time to stay still. Be selfish for once. Just allow myself to love her and be with her even though she's Life and I'm Death and even though we are not meant to be together.