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| Photo By Gaspar Torriero |
At least until this week.
She reminded herself that she was a pro, and that she wasn’t about to let her mood (currently a touch darker than usual) affect her work. The last time she did that, it had taken her several weeks to get everything straightened out and figure out who, exactly, was supposed to be dead and, similarly, who was not.
So, Death took a deep breath, got off her motorcycle, and walked in to the shop where she would be collecting Hans Braun, sixty three. Braun was the butcher for a small town just outside of Bad Homburg in Germany.
As usual, no one noticed Death when she entered the shop. The smells of fresh meat, sausage, sauerkraut and rich spices made her stomach turn a bit, but made her appetite flare as well. She really hoped she’d have time to get a bacon-wrapped something soon.
Braun’s son was working at the counter, helping customers. Death made her way around the counter and into the back of the shop, where Braun himself was working.
Braun was a bear of a man. At the moment, he was cutting steaks. Death started her stopwatch, and observed as Braun worked. She admire his knife skills – not many people could disassemble a cow with quite as much ease as Braun.
Braun cut the last of the steaks from the piece of meat he’d been working on, and Death checked off an item on her list.
Braun left the room temporarily, and went into the cooler where a fair number of former cows and pigs were hung, waiting to be sliced or ground and made into something delicious. Death found herself momentarily distracted thinking about the many possibilities for dinner that were surrounding her. Not, of course, that she’d actually have time to cook anything herself.
Braun came back into the room carrying what must have been one hundred and twenty pounds of beef. He slammed the huge chunk of meat down on the butcher’s block, which was the size of a dinner table and well-worn. He had just started to reach for his knife when a puzzled expression crossed his face.
Death ticked off another item on her list.
Braun rubbed at his chest and shoulder for a moment, decided it was nothing, and picked up his knife. He turned to the beef and started cutting again. Seconds later he dropped the knife. It clattered off the butcher block and fell to the floor, where it spun rapidly in place.
Braun clutched at his chest with both hands, and staggered backwards until he found the wall, and slid down it to the floor. He was gasping, and trying to catch his breath to call for help.
Death’s phone rang then. She scowled, annoyed to be interrupted in the middle of a collection. She ignored it, keeping her attention focused on Braun. Not long after that, he passed away.
Seconds later, Braun was in the room with her. Death checked the last couple of items on her list, and stopped her stopwatch. She dug her phone out, and saw that there were barely two minutes to the next collection.
“You weren’t here a second ago,” Braun started to say, but then he stopped and instead said, “You need something to eat, miss. I hope you don’t mind me saying so.”
Death smiled at him, and said, “There’s no time for that, I’m afraid. You and I need to get to Detroit.”
“Detroit? Well, if you say so,” Braun said. “But you can have some sausage if you like. I’ve got plenty, and it’s the best in Germany.”
“Thank you, but it wouldn’t be right,” Death said.
Braun looked mildly offended, but then recognized that Death was just trying to do her own job as well as she could, and he could respect that.
“OK. So we’re going to Detroit, you say?”
“Yes we are,” Death said. “Would you take my hand, please?”
“Of course. I’m Braun, by the way.” He took Death’s hand
“I know,” Death said, and the two of them vanished. Braun’s son would discover his father’s body in half an hour or so, when they needed more pork hocks in the case.
Seconds later, Death and Braun arrived in Detroit. They were in what had once been a residential neighborhood, but now the houses were being overtaken by nature once again. Braun found it unsettling.
“Is this place safe?” he asked before he could catch himself.
Death smiled at him and said, “Well, it’s safe for us.”
Braun didn’t seem especially reassured. He stuck close to Death as they walked up a decrepit sidewalk and entered one of the houses.
The walls of the house were mostly bare, with the wallpaper peeling off in a couple of rooms. There were a few stray pieces of broken furniture here and there.
“What are we doing here?” Braun asked, quietly.
“Picking someone up,” Death said. She stopped walking and faced Braun. “You might want to just stay here and wait. Don’t run off and you’ll be safe.”
“Why? Is what you’re going to do dangerous?” Braun said.
“No, but you might find it disturbing. People usually do,” Death said.
Braun considered what she’d said for a moment, looked around at the place they were in, and decided that if she was telling him something was going to be disturbing, then she was most likely no lying.
“OK, I’ll be here. Are you going to be long?”
“No, just a minute or two,” Death said. “Don’t wander off.”
“I won’t.”
Death walked up the stairs, and found her next client shivering violently under a few tattered blankets on an ancient mattress on the floor. John Mickelson, forty eight, known to most as “Moxie,” had a nasty case of the flu, and was squatting in a decrepit house in Detroit, in January.
Death started her stopwatch, and observed as Moxie’s last few moments passed.
“Well, that’s a kick in the teeth,” Moxie’s soul said as it looked down on his body. “A rough end to a rough run of luck.”
Death said nothing. She made a couple of notes, and put her stopwatch away.
“Boy, it’s going to take them a while to find me too,” Moxie said. “I picked this place because no one comes out here. In a place like this, it’s the other people that are the most dangerous, you know. But no one comes out here except for me, and I’m always… well, I was always careful to make sure I wasn’t followed. I haven’t seen anybody around here for at least six months. Last time I saw someone, it was a couple kids in a pickup truck, looked like they were sight-seeing.”
Moxie stopped talking for a moment. “I guess they might not find me until this place gets knocked down.”
Death spoke then, gently, “you don’t need to worry about that anymore. Would you come with me, John?”
“Moxie, please. I’ve been Moxie for twenty years, no need to be called John now.”
“OK Moxie, would you come with me?”
“Sure, where are we going?”
“Well, downstairs to get Hans, and then I’ll take both of you to the other side.”
“Other side, huh? Like that Doors song?”
Death smiled and didn’t answer. She gestured towards the door, and followed Moxie downstairs. He started talking the second he saw Braun.
“Well, you must be Hans. Pleased to meet you, I guess. They call me Moxie.”
Braun looked surprised that he could understand Moxie, then momentarily offended to be called Hans by someone he hadn’t given permission to, then surprised again.
He didn’t answer Moxie, and instead spoke to Death.
“How is it that I can understand him?”
Moxie answered first, “Well, just because I’m poor doesn’t mean I can’t speak English.”
“But I can’t speak English,” Braun said.
“Oh,” Moxie said, and fell silent.
“It’s because you no longer have a need for language to understand each other,” Death said. “Communication is a lot easier when you’re dead.”
“How about travel? Is travel easier now that I’m dead?” Moxie said.
“Well, I guess you’re going to have to find out for yourself,” Death said in reply. She reached out to both Braun and Moxie. “Give me your hands, please.”
The three of them stepped out of the world. While they waited for the doorway to appear, Moxie tried to make small talk.
“So, no language barriers, easy travel… You must have a pretty good time meeting people and seeing new places, huh?” he said to Death.
Death considered what he said for a moment. She definitely met a lot of people. More and more every day, with increasing frequency. And she’d certainly traveled and seen a lot.
On the other hand, she moved around so much, she never really met anyone or really saw anything. Death tried to recall the last time she’d been able to just hang out with someone and talk, and couldn’t do it. It had been a very long time since she’d had a social life to speak of.
“It pays the bills, I guess,” Death said. “Could be worse. But I don’t really slow down enough to get to have fun very often.”
The doorway appeared then, and opened for Moxie and Braun.
“Well, I sure hope you can figure out a way to enjoy what you’re doing. Or take a vacation or something. Maybe you need to learn how to delegate,” Moxie said. “Good luck, anyway.”
He stepped through the doorway and was gone.
“Man that guy talked too much,” Braun said. “If you are doing your job well, then you are doing great and can be proud. Take care.”
He stepped through the doorway, and Death was alone once more.
She realized she’d kind of enjoyed having their company for the last several minutes. She checked the time, and wondered if she might have enough time to grab a cup of coffee.
