The Death Date

chapter three

I could have made a million cups of coffee the next morning and I wouldn't have had any recollection of doing so. Every motion was second nature, my body on autopilot. The world was hazy, each part blending into the other. My mind was trapped, repeating the same words as if on a conveyor belt: January eighteenth, two thousand and eighteen.

The woman's misty eyes were the only clear thing I could recall. They haunted me. Two clouded orbs bored into my soul and handed me my future. How could I die in less than five months? I was only nineteen years old. My life was just beginning.

I shook my head, but the haziness didn't dissipate. Snapping the lid onto an iced coffee and sliding it down the counter, I braced myself against the back edge of the shop. Maybe the woman had been senile. Maybe the date she had spouted was simply a date she remembered – a birthday, anniversary, or something else.

That must be it.

But a date in the future? That part was more difficult to rationalize.

Something chipped away at my insides, and the date lingered. I knew deep down what I had been given because I had been given them time and time again. Justifying the date was useless. The woman had told me the day I was going to die.

I dipped my head and arched my shoulders, pressing all my weight into the counter. If I pushed hard enough, maybe I could push the date away.

"Are you okay, Delia?"

I jumped upright. Jackie was watching me with a puckered pink mouth. Her tiny braids tumbled in a gathering over her slender shoulder.

"Uh, yeah. Fine. Just need a bathroom break." The words sounded even more helpless than I felt.

"Okay," Jackie said slowly. "You sure you're feeling okay? There has been something going around recently – a cold or something."

I nodded. "Yeah, no, I'm fine. Just need the restroom. I'll be just a second." I skidded past her and threw myself inside the breakroom, veering right towards the restroom.

Once inside, I flipped the switch and fluorescent light spilled over my every curve. Bracing myself against the sink, I took in my reflection. My usual peachy skin was now sallow and lifeless, and my chocolate eyes were void of any dimension. The fullness in my cheeks was flattened; in fact, I looked like a cardboard cutout of myself – one that featured me as a zombie.

I snapped my eyes shut.

I might as well be a zombie.

Heaving a sigh, I twisted the faucet and splashed cool water against my skin hoping it would restore some life. It didn't. I now looked like a wet zombie.

Stealing a final look, I took a deep breath and flipped the switch to emerge back into the boisterous shop. Before I returned to the bar, Nadia handed me a coffee and asked if I could place it on the counter. Without even thinking, I did as I was asked. Autopilot was the name of the game.

"Warner!" I called out after reading the label penned neatly on the cup. If time travel existed, I would have used it without a further thought. One second. That was all I needed to avoid the next sequence of my life.

Wearing his Navy digitals and that same smug smile, Warner approached the counter. While his coffee sat on the countertop, my hand was still wrapped around it. I was frozen in time. It was the second-best thing to going back and avoiding this situation.

"You going to hand that over?" he asked, his voice piercing my protective barrier. Time was moving forward again.

My hand shot away from the coffee as I met his steely eyes, his mouth still curved into an arrogant grin. How many times had this exact occurrence happened in the past? Hundreds to be sure, and each time we were in close quarters I thought I might finally be given it, the death date that never came. It wasn't as though I actually wanted it. I didn't really care when Warner was going to bite the dust. What I wanted was confirmation that he was like everybody else, a person with a set date they would leave Earth. But I knew no matter how many times we suffered a close encounter, I would never be given what came so freely for everyone else.