Dating : A Visit From A Man Called Death

I thought the night before I died would be different.

It wasn’t though.

I spent it the same way I spent the previous 5,479.

That’s exactly 15 years and four days, but who’s counting.

Tomorrow it would all be over. The door slammed shut on my cell and I sat on my bunk and waited for the reaper.

I laid down on the thin mattress. I’d grown used the the uncomfortable bed. I welcomed the aches and pains at this point. Each morning it took a full ten minutes before I could sit up straight.

Not that it mattered much anymore.

I got up up paced around my little cell eventually stopping to sit against the wall opposite my bed.

That’s when I heard it.

Birds.

Lots of them.

Crows maybe. No. Ravens. It was an eerie sound.

The only time I heard something like it was my one hour of outdoor time. I’d hear a sparrow maybe a blue jay.

But this was different. It wasn’t one bird. It was dozens of them. Their spectral sound rang through the halls. I couldn’t believe no one said anything. Usually the slightest the whole cell block lost their minds at the slightest provocation.

And now, silence. Other than the birds.

A second noise started. I wasn’t so much hearing it as feeling my bones resonate it was so low. It was some garbled chanting noise. Like a Gregorian chant but meaner.

The third noise was strangest of all.

Click. Clack.

Click. Clack.

Click. Clack.

I could a horse’s hooves right there in the prison.

With each step my impending sense of doom grew stronger.

Click. Clack.

Click. Clack.

Click. Clack.

I pressed my face to the small window in my door. If I pressed hard enough i could see a few feet in either direction.

And there it was.

A dark hooded figure on a white horse.

I couldn’t believe it, and at the same time I knew exactly what it meant.

I watched the figure dismount. With a wave of his hand the cell door sprung open. I jumped back landing on my and scrambled back against the far wall.

The figure walked forward and sat on my small bunk.

“You know who I am?” his voice rumbled through the prison.

“I have a good idea.”

“Good.”

“Aren’t you early?”

“Early for what?”

“I’m to die tomorrow morning. I have a few hours left.”

“I know, but I like to visit death row inmates the night before. It’s so rare to when one’s doom is coming. Most people whom I shepherd had no idea the end is near.”

“I see.”

“How does it feel?”

“Knowing I’m going to die tomorrow?”

“Yes.”

“I’ve made peace with it a long time ago.”

“Are you scared?”

“You know where I’m going should I be?”

“Yes.”

“That’s not very comforting.”

“You are a convicted murderer my sympathy only goes so far.”

“Makes sense.”

“So do you want to ask now? Or would you like to keep talking.”

“Ask what?”

“About now they usually start asking me not to take them.”

“I won’t do that.”

“You won’t?”

“No, I killed an innocent man. I’m getting what I deserve.”

“That’s remarkably honest. Why did you kill him?”

“It was an accident.”

“How does one kill a man on accident?”

“It was a mistake. He borrowed the man I meant to kill’s car. I didn’t know. I just shot through the window.”

“I see. And why did you want to kill the other man?”

“My…my wife.”

“Go on,” Death’s voice rumbled.

“Her boss was a monster. He was preying on the women at work. They were all afraid of him. My wife tried to stop it. She blew the whistle…”

“And?”

“He killed her to keep her silent.”

“I see.”

“I should have killed him before, when she first told me the stories. At least she’d still be alive.”

“I’m very sorry for your loss.”

“It’s my only regret. I knew I’d end up here. I’ll take the needle. But he’s still out there. And now no one will say anything. They’re too afraid after my wife. He’s untouchable.”

“No one is untouchable,” Death said his voice seemed angrier.

“He is.”

“Not from me.”

Then something unexpected happened.

Death pulled down the hood. Instead of a man, a woman in a black dress sat on the prison bed.

“You’re…?”

“Are you surprised?”

“Yes.”

“You don’t think a woman could handle being the Grim Reaper?”

“No, the voice.”

“Oh, yes. It helps with effect.”

“Makes sense. There’s no way you can let me out of here?”

“I thought you wouldn’t ask.”

“I know, it’s just that I can’t stand that I failed to get revenge. You can take me afterwards. I’ll go. I just want him dead.”

Death was silent.

“I can’t. You are to die. I can’t change that.”

“I see.”

“But I can help.”

“You can?”

Death leaned forward, “Give me a name and I promise that your wife’s killer will follow you to the grave.”

And so I uttered a name and spent my last hours with a smile on my face.