I’d been leaving the scythe at home the past days. I liked to dress according to how people would expect me to look, but this one part of the outfit always seemed too hostile to me. The black robe must suffice. I’ve learned that people accept the truth easier if they figure it out themselves, not by me just telling them. Still, it’s always a very… difficult situation. Even after countless times I have confronted people with this truth, it’s still not easy, not just a job. I hoped my daughter would never have to replace me, struggle with this burden the first few centuries. I had no doubt she would be strong enough but she would endure emotional pain I could not bear to see her suffer.
She would point this scenario out as ridiculous. “Why should I replace you?” she would ask. “You’re immortal, dad. You worry too much.” But I knew people are capable of a lot. Capable of killing the immortal. They’ve done so much more impossible things.
Again I found myself in the black room, no end to it, to no sides, neither up or beneath. It’s my entrance hall, I would summon my next client and work out their case. As I said this isn’t an easy task. But this one was worse. I had not expected to see a familiar face.
I reacted with confusion. How’d she get in here? Confusion in her eyes too. Then we both understood. She looked at her hands and laughed. I reluctantly joined in. This had to be an error, right? I knew her, she couldn’t die just yet. Just a mistake in time that caused her death. I would have to fix that. She needed to fulfill her purpose before dying. That’s the rule. Everybody fulfills their purpose in life, until then, every death they experience will be undone. They were simple things, being there for a certain other, stopping a certain something. We all have a purpose. I knew her. I knew her purpose. She had fulfilled it five years ago.
My faint laughter turned into sobbing. She fell into silence and tried to read what’s going on in me. I was bringing her back, right? Why is he acting like that then? I began thinking of her father. Right here, I was confronted with my worst fear. She just stood there, asking if I was okay. How surreal, the deceased comforting the Reaper, kneeling, sobbing before her.
She reached out to me. She knew when she touched me she would no longer be able to block it out. The truth. I wiped my tears, tried to stand up, I am the one comforting here, not some pathetic old man on the ground who can’t accept finality. Despite that being my task. My essence. The end of life.
As soon as I stood, the hand reaching out fell behind my back to join the other, arms wrapped around me as dry tears were wept into my black robe. I did not dare take my eyes off the top of her head, to remind me who it is. If I looked away I knew who I would see in her stead. Her face left the black cloth and looked up to me.
I saw her smile.
“It’s all my fault.”