The first thing he pictures when he thinks of Grim is her grin, wide and thin and pointed. The third thing that comes to mind is her hair, constantly spilling and shifting, sometimes floating wisplike in the air, sometimes flowing like wine pouring into a dark glass.
The second thing he always sees is her hands.
He'd sought her out, after that bloodstained debacle of a party. She wasn't in her gown from earlier, but she had still been dressed all in red- a suit, this time, with ruby-colored buttons on the jacket and vest. Even her shoes had been a brilliant scarlet, the shade only slightly muddied by the crust of blood and dirt lining her soles.
She'd been standing in the middle of some makeshift graveyard, crowded with mounds of dirt topped with large, rough stones. In her hands, she'd been twisting a green stem, its small white flower heads tapping against her pale fingers. He'd spotted a red stain on her wrist.
"I thought you didn't bleed," he'd said.
"I don't," she'd replied. "These are raspberries."
She'd opened her palm to reveal the crushed remains of said berries, juice seeping into her skin. The stem fell to the ground, and she'd covered it with her heel as she took a step forward.
"It might surprise you to know that I can feel regret," Grim had remarked, as casually as if they'd been discussing the weather.
Her eyes had been too bright, too intense. Instead he'd focused on her hands, long and nervous and thin, fiddling with the hem of her crimson vest.
"I'm sorry," he'd muttered.
She'd scoffed. He can still picture the lines of her mouth, pressed tight and terse as her words. "Don't pity me, dear. I know the consequences of my own actions."
The Reaper wiped her hands on her jacket, leaving twin dark streaks running down her front. His gaze was drawn to the graceful flick of her wrists as she dismissed his next attempt to speak. "Don't say it was your fault too. It was, but that hardly diminishes my own role, does it? Anyway, I get the impression neither of us are particularly sorry about those deaths last night."
He frowned. "What's there for you to regret, then?"
She'd laughed then, the sound as hollow as her eyes. "Staying after the party was over. Humans say there are fates worse than me, and I suspect a three-bottle hangover is one of them."
There was another expression in her eyes, something that pierced into him. Something that said, We both know I'm lying. Something that begged, Let me lie a little longer.
He whistled. "Three full bottles?"
"And a few not-full ones. It's not as if the other guests were going to finish their drinks, so I finished for them."
"Sounds like a cause for regret to me."
Her next laugh had been weak, but genuine. He'd smiled, focusing on the expansive gesturing of her hands and not on the broken look lurking behind her eyes.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
"Gloves or no gloves?"
Bunny had rolled his eyes and sighed. "Does it make a bloody difference?"
Grim had turned to the mirror, straightening her dress indecisively. "I want to look my best. Besides, we've hardly gotten to spend time together since you've become a Guardian- it won't kill you to be in my presence a few more minutes, will it?"
"We're going to miss the movie if you don't hurry it up, Grimace. Pick and get a move on."
She'd pulled off her gloves. "No gloves, then. I don't want to accidentally claw you if I need to hold your hand, after all."
"Uh-huh. I seriously doubt a movie about birds is going to be as scary as Psycho."
"Are you underestimating Mr. Hitchcock's abilities, Pookie?"
He'd rolled his eyes again, making certain that Grim saw it that time. "Do y'have to call me Pookie? I'm not even sure if I'm a proper púca anymore."
"If you can still call me Grimace, I can still call you Pookie. Now, are you really going to go out looking like that?"
Bunny glanced at his fuzzy arms and paws and shrugged. "I'm the Easter Bunny. This is how I look. Besides, I dunno if I can even shift anymore. Don't really have a reason to, now. Only reason I ever tried looking human was for the opposable thumbs."
Grim sighed. "I miss when you were a cute wittle fluffball."
"'Wittle?' Really? Put a 'wittle' effort into pronouncing your consonants, Grimace."
She punched him in the arm. "You're mean."
"Mm. We heading out now?"
Grim hooked an arm through his, laying a thin white hand near his neck. "You're paying for the popcorn."
He smiled down at her as she squeezed his shoulder. "Uh-huh."
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
It's a surprise to see her again. Ever since what Bunny's mentally labeled as 'The Incident,' he hasn't spotted hide or hair of her. It's even more of a surprise to see her hanging around Jack Frost, of all people. They seem to be chatting amiably, so he doesn't butt in.
Grim notices him. She doesn't call him over until after Jack has flown off.
"Hey, Grimace," he says. "Been a bit. Almost thirty years now, yeah?"
"Thirty-one," she corrects him.
His eyes are drawn to the movement of her hands. She's nervous, and so are the twitching fingers plucking at the collar of her robe.
"About that little...incident-" she begins.
He feels a knot tie itself in his stomach.
"Look, can we just not talk about-"
"It shouldn't have happened," she says, and the knot tightens.
"It's not your fault, Grim."
She laughs, brushing a stray wisp of hair out of her face. "Please, darling. Don't pity me."
"I'm not pitying you, I-"
"I made a mistake. Let me admit that much."
He draws in a sharp breath. "And that's all it was, a mistake. Now can we-"
Suddenly he's flat on the ground, looking up at wild white eyes. He can feel fingers tightening around his neck. He reaches for his boomerang, but she kicks it out of reach.
Bunny scrabbles at her fingers, but before he can get a firm grip, he hears a voice.
"Hey!"
There's a flash of crackling blue magic, and Grim darts off of Bunny in a puff of black smoke.
Jack lands where Grim had been standing and extends a hand to Bunny. Bunny takes it, gets up.
Jack's eyes are blazing as he glares at Grim. "What the heck-"
"You see, Bunny?" the Reaper says. "You're still-"
"Why were you-"
"Mistake or not-"
"Cottontail can be annoying sometimes, but-"
Grim manages to hear this last statement, despite talking over Frost's furious questioning. "Cottontail? Oh, how sweet, Pookie, you two are friends!"
She claps her hands, genuinely delighted.
"Sometimes," Bunny jokes, and Jack punches him in the shoulder.
Grim's smile lingers, though it softens into something sadder.
"A fellow Guardian, too. Someone you can trust."
Bunny sighs. "It was just a mistake, Grimace. You don't have to have your knickers in a twist about it."
"Were you frightened?"
He should say no. He knows he should, and then everything will be fine, and he won't ever have to think about The Incident again. He opens his mouth. "N-"
He sees her teeth first, small and sharp and far too close. Then her face, pale and thin and framed by raven hair, spilling around her like a rush of dark water.
He can feel her fingers around his throat, squeezing, squeezing-
She sees him hesitate. Her smile widens as she pulls her hood closer around her face, but he still catches the track of a tear on her cheek before she turns around.
"You can trust me, you know," Grim tells him. "You might not believe it, but it's true."
Of course I know I can trust you, he thinks. I'm not angry.
Before he can say so, she's gone.
Jack exhales deeply, leaning on his staff. "What was that all about?"
"Ah, just catching up with an old friend. She's a bit of a larrikin, that one."
His fellow Guardian raises an eyebrow. "Ok, then."
Something else occurs to Jack, and he grins. "Wait, Grimace? Pookie? You and the Reaper have pet names for each other?"
Bunny groans. "I'm never gonna live this down, am I?"
"Nope. So, Pookie, what's the story here?"
"Call me Pookie again and I'll job you, ya nong."
"Ok. So what's the story here, Kangaroo?"
Bunny punches Jack in the arm and laughs, trying not to think of thin white hands clutching around his neck.