The departing

Untitled Part 1

 

I

 

Should I introduce myself?  You know me very well. If you don’t, you will  meet me soon, or perhaps not….  depending on the circumstances. I will someday kiss your forehead goodnight and let your spirit wander off, until your spirit is in peace, and then I shall carry your soul in my arms and  gently take you away.

 

I don’t look like most people imagine me. I am a shadow creeping in the dark of night. During the day I shift myself back and forth blowing the leaves of the trees and sometimes I pass through you and you can feel my coldness in your skin.  I’ve been doing this job for years, I am tired and I want to stop but who could replace death?.

 

Sometimes, I can’t seem to stop myself from looking at ‘the survivors’,the ones I haven’t taken. I look at their souls, their dark empty souls, and it makes me think what I would  be like if I had my own human body. I think I would have skin so pale that you could practically look through it, my  eyes would be so dark that you could see your soul rotting  inside them, my hair, the little I would have, would be ashy and rough. My voice would be almost like whisper in the dark and I would spend days in an office desk doing what humans hate the most, but do the most: work.

 

Humans are so lucky. They get to be loved, to be happy, to have fun. I get to take their souls away when I want. What’s the purpose; they don’t need me. Sometimes, all I want is to be human, and to be able to love and smile again. Then I remember what happened when I was a human.

It was spring in 1354, and due to the plague my job had become long and hard for a whole century and a half. I was young back then and I thought my job was useless. One day, I had to take a young boy. As I went  into his room, I saw his parents sitting next to the boy’s bed with tears trying to escape their eyes, as they tried to remain strong while I sang the boy to sleep.  I looked into his mothers eyes, and saw that she was old to be his mother. She was a short gray haired woman, with kind blue eyes that made you feel safe. Then I turned and saw his father. He was old too, fit for his age, and tall. He had small, kind, brown eyes, and a very strong looking jaw. You could see in his dirty, rough, big hands that he worked on a field. Then I turned to look at his mother again as a tear rolled down her soft cheek.  In that moment, I wondered what it felt like to be loved, and I did a despicable thing. As I took the boy’s soul away in peace, I snuck into his body and used it to be human.