Already Been Dead

Chapter One: Dealing with Death

Everyone said that Imogene was a stoic. At her parents' funeral, their friends looked down at her with tiny sandwiches in hand and said, “Well, what a stoic she is! Definitely a Carol, that one.” Imogene looked back up at them with her deep blue eyes without understanding what they were saying. But the word had stuck with her until she was old enough to look it up.

A member or adherent of the Stoic school of philosophy. She looked up more about the Stoics, and remembered how her father would stand in his study with his suit on and his hands folded behind his back while he talked to her. The professors Carol were influential scholars who studied death. Or something like that. They would have had to be Stoics to deal with such a serious topic all the time. Imogene decided that she liked being a Stoic.

Malcolm Carol didn't share her views. He was just a baby when his parents died, and so couldn't be expected to understand that the Carols had certain standards to uphold. Also, his grandmother spoiled him. Perhaps Imogene spoiled him a little bit, too. He was the one weak point she would allow herself. If anyone else had been harassing her in the middle of her homework, she would have lost her temper entirely (Stoicism is difficult sometimes for a 15-year-old girl), but not Malcolm.

“Frogs! Frogs! Frogs! Come on, Immy! Frogs!!” the boy wailed, tugging on his sister's arm.

“It's too hot,” she protested. “And humid. You could practically swim in this air. Wait until I'm done with my homework. It'll be cooler then.”

“But you promised!” Malcolm said. He forced his face in between Imogene and her book. Imogene, who was lying on her back on the front porch, rolled over onto her side to escape him. Malcolm got behind his sister and began pushing her towards the edge of the porch.

“Let's go frog hunting!” he grunted as she slid closer and closer to the edge.

“Imogene, why don't you just take your book with you to the pond,” their grandmother said from the porch swing. “You can read it just as well there as you can here.”

Imogene sighed and rolled down off the porch of her own accord, landing neatly on her feet. Her thigh muscles bulged slightly out of her shorts as she straightened up. Knowing how to control one's body was part of learning how to control one's emotions, and so Imogene was less concerned with being skinny than being toned.

“Go get your shoes on,” she said to Malcolm. The boy scurried off into the house with a shriek of excitement.

 

“Hey! Hey! I caught one!” Malcolm came running along the bank towards Imogene, a large bullfrog in his hands.

“Yup,” she said before glancing back down at her book. It was getting difficult to see it. “I think it's time for us to be heading back, Mal.” she said.

“Just ten more minutes?” the boy pleaded.

“Fine, but that's it.”

He ran back into the shallows of the pond to deposit his catch before trudging off to the reeds where the frogs were chirping away in their evening chorus.

“Hey! Immy!” She looked up to see Malcolm staring at her expectantly. “What's that over there?” He pointed towards the trees on the other side of the pond.

Imogene glanced up in the direction indicated. There was a shadow sliding along just behind the treeline. It was just barely darker than the twilight around it.

“We're going now,” Imogene said, standing up suddenly.

“But what is it?” Malcolm insisted.

“It's just a deer,” Imogene lied. Deer were a commonplace occurrence in their neighborhood, though, and nothing that Malcolm would feel the need to hang around and witness.

“You said ten more minutes.”

“And now I'm saying right now, so come on.”

Malcolm trudged back up the bank, whining about how incredibly unfair his sister was. Imogene ignored him.

The walk home shouldn't have taken more than a few minutes, but that evening it seemed to take forever. Malcolm went on and on about his school the whole time. Imogene hardly listened. She was too busy thinking about the shadow by the pond.

Something off to the side of the road caught her eye, and she whipped around, startled. By that point, night had fallen completely. There were no streetlights along their road because people had felt it would be a disturbance to local wildlife, and there was a thick cloud cover that evening. Imogene could hardly see the trees on either side of the road, let alone anything beyond them. So how had she seen something moving in the trees?

Malcolm took his sister's hand and pulled on it, but she was too focused on the trees to notice what he was saying. Then she saw the lights.

Imogene barely had time to see the car before it hit her. The corner of the hood struck her hip, sending her spinning off the road. She rolled down the small slope towards the edge of the trees and lay there perfectly still for a moment, trying to figure out if she was injured. Back on the road, the car stopped. It hung there for several minutes, idling, and Imogene wondered if perhaps time had stopped. Then it started moving again, disappearing into the night as quickly as it had appeared.

Once it was gone, Imogene carefully got to her feet. From what she could tell, she hadn't broken anything, though she had aches and pains all over her body. Her hip was going to be one big bruise for a while.

“Malcolm?” she called. “Mal, are you okay?” There was no answer, so she climbed back up the slope to the road. She had dropped her book when the car hit her, and she nearly tripped on it at the edge of the pavement. When she stooped to pick it up, it was covered in something wet and warm.

A light suddenly fell across the book as though someone behind her were shining a lantern on it, illuminating the bloodstained pages and reflecting in the pools of blood surrounding Malcolm's body. Imogene stood frozen in front of the scene. For a moment, her vision went blank and she was instead watching the scene from somewhere back above her own body. This wasn't real. These emotions she was feeling—she had to control them.

“You promised,” she said, turning around to the source of the light. Behind the lantern, there was a shadow. It looked more solid than it had sliding between the trees by the pond, but it was still more reminiscent of a shadow than a being. “Seven years ago, you promised you wouldn't take anyone else from me,” Imogene said, trying to keep the anger out of her voice.

“I did,” said the shadow. Its voice could have belonged to either a man or a woman. Or perhaps a child. “I cannot control the actions of mortals, but since I did promise you, you have a choice. I can take you instead.”

Imogene blinked at the shadow. She told herself that it was surprise and had nothing to do with the lump rising in her throat. She turned to glance back at Malcolm.

“What happens to me after I'm taken?” she said.

“I don't know. It's different for everyone,” the shadow said with a shrug. Imogene nodded, and turned back to the shadow.

“Okay, then. Take me. I wouldn't want to make you a liar,” she said with a bitter laugh.

“Very well,” the shadow said. It reached out a hand, which it laid on Imogene's forehead. She felt a strange tugging behind her navel, and then the shadow disappeared, leaving only the darkness of night around the two siblings.

        Except that it wasn't darkness to Imogene anymore. Sure, it was still dark, but she could see everything now. Malcolm was still lying on the pavement where he had been, but the blood was gone. It was as if he was just sleeping peacefully. Far more problematic was the other body lying beside him. Her own body.