A day in the life - scomiche

The Angel

Be careful with yourselves <3 I love you   ~ Rue
* * *

- An excerpt from the autobiography of Mitchell C.M. Grassi, Life Beyond Death

Through a haze of pain, I looked up and saw a figure, standing far away. His head was bowed and his hands were clenched into fists at his side. From where I lay, battered and broken, with pieces of my wrecked automobile surrounding me, he looked like an angel, a saviour. I called to him.

At the sound of my voice, he looked up, moving towards me, his movements heavy with deliberation. It was at that moment that I knew without a shred of doubt who he was. He was no saviour, and an angel only in the loosest definition of the word. My insides curdled and froze, twisting in my stomach. This was it, the moment everyone knows will happen eventually and simultaneously imagines never will.

My personal call from the Angel of Death.

They say that he is gentle sometimes, almost sweet. At other times, ruthless and cruel. They say Death has no heart, or if he does it is blackened and broken beyond repair. He is cunning, and the more you try to avoid him, the faster he will come after you. He takes no prisoners.

I'd heard stories of people who'd seen him take a soul from afar and who still had nightmares. Stories of people who'd looked Death in the face and walked away, damaged but alive. I was about to find out what he looked like.

He was tall and wore no shirt.  His pants were black with a sinfully low rise and the midnight cloak that sat on his broad shoulders seemed to swallow light. He moved sinuously, like a cat or maybe a snake; I cast my eyes to the ground, deathly afraid.

His leather boots stopped three inches from my face, and I could feel his eyes raking over my crumpled form. His face was cast in shadow but I thought that if I looked straight up, maybe I could see his face, his eyes. I wondered what colour the eyes of Death were.

"Do you know who I am?" His voice was that of any regular mortal but it chilled me to the bone. I didn't trust myself to speak so I just nodded, trying to fight the waves of ancient power that rolled off him. If he touched me, surely he would sear my skin. He knelt fluidly by my head and I instinctively curled in on myself, my eyes still unable to raise up passed his boots. "I don't think you do."

Two fingers tilted my chin up and I almost screamed at the contact. It was like lightening, achingly cold and blisteringly hot. The longer I stayed in his presence, the faster I died.

"Look at me," the Angel of Death whispered, and I could not disobey. I raised my gaze slowly, knowing that I would see the entirety of my life flash through his eyes and then it would be done. Blackness, darkness, death. I steadied myself.

Steel grey. The eyes of Death are steel grey, so dark they almost swallow you, with streaks of icy blue. Our gazes met and locked, and I was struck by how much depth his held. There were oceans and rivers and valleys and storms of memories upon memories: lost love, happiness stolen, crippling grief, and so much pain. I couldn't imagine bearing so much at once, alone. I felt my soul pulling towards him, away from my body, and I propped myself up on one elbow and reached to touch his face. It did not hurt nearly as badly this time.

"What's happened to you?" The question seemed to startle him, as it should, for who pities Death? He always wins, eventually.

But not this time. I tried again, my voice a little stronger. "What's happened to you, Scotty?"