Not My Grave (on hold till June)

Chapter 2

My name is Raven Miller Oxford, I'm 16, and this is the story of how I died. Well, technically, I lived, but I died before that. I've had a lot of experiences but none as strange as this one.

"What! What the hell is going on?" I exclaimed in indignation.

"What, are you stupid?! We just had the entire conversation in front of you, dumb ass!" came Life's arrogant reply.

"Well, excuuuse me, if I was mourning over the loss of my dreams and hopes that can't be fulfilled thanks to you and your buddy over here." I retorted.

"It was a M.I.S.T.A.K.E" she said pronouncing each alphabet separately. "We had no intentions of getting a snob like you and letting you sit on our precious heads and cluck."

"A snob like me!? You're the one to talk!"

Before Life could reply, Death intervened and broke up the squabble, "Now, now ladies, we don't have to fight. You're both snobs and I'm sexy. Now, Raven, I brought your soul by accident and I can't go back at the moment. So, we're forced to...no, no, 'forcing' you to go back to Earth and get Cindy Mallark's soul."

"But, this isn't fair! I had nothing to do with your mistake! Why should I put my soul on the line? And can't Life retrieve Cindy's soul and you give me back my body?" I protested.

"Uhh, hello, can I talk to a brain? I'm 'Life', I don't take souls, I give them." Life said.

"Fat lot of good that does the people. About half of them are suffering from depression, and the rest are mentally ill. Amazing!" I said sarcastically.

"Well, I-",

"Ooookayy!" Death interrupted again, "Back to business. Life, you take back Raven back to Earth and put back her soul in her body and please explain her the rules as well. I'll be on my way now. Ezekiel's mad about something, he'll practically yell my ear off if I don't go now. I'm guessing it's the blue-throated droshes. Buh-bye, ladies. Enjoy!"

"Wait!" I called after him. "What's in it for me?"

"You get your life back. All the wishes and dreams and whatever you were talking about. What more could you possibly want?"

"Well, a lot actually. I-".

"Tut, tut, tut. Off with you." and with that Death vanished in a puff of black smoke leaving me with Mrs. I'm-so-perfect here.

She looked at me, I looked back at her, then we both turned away with an arrogant "Huh!" This woman was getting on my nerves. Who did she think she was anyways?

"Let's go, the sooner I get you off my shoulders, the better." she grumbled.

With that, she did that floating thing, that Death did, and we started travelling back towards Earth.

I glanced at her a couple times -don't ask me why- but, she never looked my way once. No wonder people are always so miserable back on Earth, she never smiles. It's true what they say, "Life's a bitch", and now I've seen it with my own eyes.

As we landed on Earth, Life's feet gently touched the soil, while I remained afloat. I glanced around and found myself stan- floating in a graveyard. It seemed like a pretty old graveyard. Not like the one near my house which is covered with neatly mown grass and has ponds with ducks in it. This one had withered trees with naked branches sticking out in every direction and tombstones sticking out at odd angles. Exactly the kind of thing you'd see in a horror movie. But, weirdly enough, I wasn't scared of it, probably because I was already dead and had nothing to lose. Just a few feet away, Life was standing on someone's grave and softly chanting something. As I watched, she began to glow, and gradually started levitating.