The bile in the back of my throat burned as I swallowed it back down.
Today was my appointed day.
The day that I would pass from this life.
The Reaper told me so himself, that dark creature of the shadows – collector of the souls of the damned.
You can't see him, but I did. Oh, how I wish I hadn't.
Quieter than the silence of the grave, I crept into old lady Brennan's house.
Planning to steal her fine silverware, I was.
She sat at the table; eyes locked into eternity.
The Reaper stroked her face with his boney hand. His breath spreading the mist of death upon her.
I froze in the doorway, unable to move, and his presence evaporated as Ms. Brennan's head drooped.
I turned to run but found myself standing before that harbinger of oblivion.
Not a word did he utter.
An empty coldness shivered in my soul, darker than a starless night.
And I knew what no man should know – the day of my demise.
My limbs became weak and failed to hold my body upright.
The void wrapped itself around me, pulling me into the pit.
But I did not acquiesce.
One plan alone arose in my mind – cheat death himself.
Hide from the Reaper and live.
Someplace enclosed and dark, I found.
Crawled into Brennan's airtight chest freezer, I did, and heard the latch click.
The air grows thin.
And I know, with my last breath, that his hand strokes my face.
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