Normally Weird

Chapter 2

       August felt tremors creep slowly down his spine, his hands felt icy and he turned as ghostly pale as the stranger seated next to him. His lungs still gasping for air at the momentary flood of emotions and memoirs just passed by. Remembering her still hurt, but he needed to let that go, he knew that he needed to do it, he just didn't know how. He gave himself a moment to breathe, closing his eyes shut tightly. He convinced himself that he was hallucinating. The tears almost left his eyes when he opened them to see that everything was set back into motion. He sighed in relief. The image of the stranger that used to sit next to him, clouding his mind for the rest of the period, he knew that the image would still be engraved in his mind for the rest of the day, maybe even the rest of the week. Finishing his first class was hard to do with dark soulless eyes haunting his every thought. This was harder than he cared to admit actually. He leaned against the lockers and heaved a deep breath, he noticed the air was stale and the hall, eerily quiet. His legs were like Jello, shaking even more now and he began to see the world spinning around him. He felt intoxicated without drinking any alcohol, He wanted to purge out everything inside of him. August's legs gave in and he collapsed onto the floor with a thud. That should have hurt his knee, but the ache he felt there was nothing compared to the tightening pressure he was feeling constricting his chest. It was as if there was a boa constrictor slowly squeezing the life out of him. He lay on his side waiting for the pain to stop, it was all he could do. When it finally did ebb, he noticed the familiar feeling of being stuck in the moment.

He noticed that everything was stuck inside a thin pastel yellow film, that enveloped everything as if it were a layer of dust on an antique vase. In his line of vision appeared a pair of black converse high tops. Aside from the owner of these shoes being the only other moving thing in the universe, He noticed that the person standing in front of him had a different glow from everything else. The thin film enveloping him was not a pastel yellow, but a bright cobalt blue. August dared himself to look up. He met the eyes of the same stranger he was with this morning. "Still not done staring, huh?" confused is an understatement. August managed to pull himself together, and picked himself off the ground. This was the first time he actually got a good look at the man standing before him. He was just as he remembered from this morning, except now his eyes were different, they were a bright blue, like the glow he was emanating. "Who are you?" He asked the stranger. "Well, If i told you, you'd either run away, faint, have a heart attack, or the most common reaction I get, you'd call the mental asylum down the road." "I might actually do that, now that you mention it." The stranger looked back at him and heaved a sigh, one that seemed to be burdened by a thousand years of explaining the same situation over and over again. "Well, people call me a lot of names. Grim reaper, Thanatos, Hades, Death, Anubis, the list goes on actually, I like going by Azrael personally, so call me that, instead." He explained. "You're kidding right?" August almost laughed at the hilarity, this guy was clearly nuts, then again, maybe he was the one going nuts, everything was still enveloped in the yellow film and Azrael was still glowing blue. "Nope, Dude seriously, I wish I was. This stupid job got old after the first few thousand years." August was still skeptical on who Azrael really was. He decided to jump on this bandwagon and see where it was headed. "Alright, What do you want? And Why is everything like this?" "Well, Everything is like this because of me. Everything in your universe moves at an extremely fast pace compared to my realm. This is actually why I'm thousands of years old but still look like a teenager. That's cause I sorta am, well, I'm young compared to my three aunts, anyway. So when I do travel to your universe, everything moves according to my pace, It all looks frozen but actually it's all just moving at a slower pace." What he says makes some sense, it was still batshit crazy but it made sense. "Then how am I moving at the same pace as you?" August asked, he was genuinely curious about everything now. "Well, It's because of me again. I want you to be at the same pace as me for me to be able to talk to you without going all deity and sending those weird ass signs that no one actually gets." That still didn't explain why this was happening to August out of all people. "Judging from the look I'm getting, you're still confused as hell." August agreed with him. "Confused is an Understatement." Azrael underestimated this situation too. His aunts were gonna give him such an ear full when he got home. He was breaking so many rules at the moment, but you know what? Fuck the rules, this had to be done. "I'm here to make a deal with you August Beckett." "What deal?" "You took greek mythology as an elective right?" "Yeah, so?" "You must be familiar with the Moerae?" "Yeah, so?" "Well, those three I call Aunt Clo, Aunt Ches and Aunt Atty, short for Clotho, Lachesis and Atropos. They are known more commonly as the fates. They decide when a life is made, when a life is born, when a life achieves or fails something and when a life ends. It's all in that loom of theirs. This is where I come in. I help them out by gathering all the souls that need to be gathered. This has to be done at the exact place, and exact time. How they laid it out on their loom and How it's written on the list of names they gave me." August still didn't understand. "This has nothing to do with me." If you only knew, Azrael thought in his mind. "See, There's someone who's been tampering with destiny lately. A lot of people who weren't on the list ended up dead." Adley? "This is where you come in August Beckett." This was sensory overload for a mortal, Azrael was surprised he hadn't burst into flames yet. "I will give you a chance to save a life. 31 days to be exact." This can't be real. "That's not possible. She's dead." "You're speaking with death right now and you think this isn't possible? You're more close minded than I thought." August assumed that he was implying turning back time for a do-over. "How are you going to give me 31 days, she's already dead. What's the point." "The thing tampering with fate seriously messed up my list, and is pissing my aunts off, which they take out on me. So this has to be solved." "What good will saving one life do?" "More than you think actually." "What's in it for me?" Azrael sighed, he was breaking too many rules, what's a few more. "I'll let you see her again." Azrael extended his arm for the deal. August felt his heart pounding in his chest. He never thought he'd hear those words. 31 days. 31 days was all it took. He reached for his hand. But before he could grab it Azrael snatched it back. "I almost forgot. You cannot fail this mission. If you fail to save her life, Death will follow you as well." What? He extended his hand again. August could feel his body tremble. He looked into death's eyes, noticing that they were the same color as the glow that surrounded him. He accepted death's hand.