September 10, 2000
He used to call himself the God of Death. I thought I understood why; the blood, the clothing, always black. It was a morbid sense of fascination that drew me to him, the want to know a deity. He told me, 'I've never seen a miracle, but I've seen lots of dead people.'
And maybe I've come to find that what I understood was only him holding up a mirror. He gave me a daisy once, wilted and dying from the dry summer heat. It poured off the roofs of cars and distorted the air. My wife threw it away when I was forty. It stilled smelled like that day, like gasoline and old cardboard rotting in a puddle of stale beer, but distilled, retaining only that degenerate purity.
I don't remember when, or why I was up in the middle of the night, tucking my toes beneath the hem of my robe, watching the moon's shadow stalk his cautious figure. In a house that overlooked the corn fields, I had no idea that I could be seen as I framed the window.
He said, 'Come down.'
It was a moment that will always be frozen in ice for me, off-colored but preserved. I can still see his face, shining with an almost ethereal, unearthly glow, hands shoved deep into his pockets, that black cap curving in counterpoint to that generous smirk. He had long, scraggly dark hair down to his waist; his parents didn't believe in such things as haircuts or brushes. That was fine with me. I used to stare at it on missions; it reminded me of a waterfall falling over jagged rocks.
Leaving my tanktop, I pulled on a faded pair of jeans, ripped at the knees the way Rashid would have hated, and hurried downstairs, my footsteps echoing hallowed in my ears.
He met me at the edge of the field, regal as a velvet-clad courtier as he glared menacingly, daring me to make fun of him.
I watched him chase white moths and wondered how he could call himself Death. He seemed to be so alive, so full of energy, something I had been seriously lacking, as he raced against the wind and time.
Death--I doubt he understood the Shakespearean implications. Maybe today he thinks about his pseudonym and laughs. Maybe he's changed it to his legal name; I think I'll look it up and see if he really is Death, see if he'd mind a visit from an old friend. I like to think that some prince came and scooped him up onto a black horse, took him away, saved him from himself. And see, he's inspired that same duality, same identity crisis in me. Part of me likes to think that I know better than to believe in fairy tales.
Uh...comments welcome...
Bianca
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