I wrote it in a blur today, which was a pleasant sensation. It's been over a month since I've written more than a couple of thousand words in a go. The following fungacious emperma weighs in at just under a thousand.
Hope you like it mrgreen
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DEATH BE NOT
by V. Wolfe
It was peaceful, down here at the bottom of the pool. Even given the fact that he was undoubtedly drowning to death, there was a warm floatiness to the whole experience. It was all blue and sparkly, and the water murmured in his ear in a near comforting way. There was less and less air as he lay there, drifting across the bottom, but for some reason the burning feeling in his lungs had stopped, panic replaced by contentment.
Tommy was old enough to know the cliché about his life flashing before his eyes, and felt disappointed that it hadn’t. Of course, at four, he hadn’t had much life at all. Not yet, anyway. Well, maybe not ever, given the whole drowning thing going on right now.
Given an absence of a ready made movie of his life, he tried to think of one. He was born. Everyone was, though, so that was kind of boring. He tried to think of something unique about himself. He had a happy childhood, that was something not every child had, or so his mum told him every night when she tickled his belly and stuffed him into bed. “Oh, my chubby baby!” she’d coo. “Time to go nappy wappy!”
Mama talked like that all the time, so that was a happy thing, too. Tommy must have had a father, as all happy children did, but the image wasn’t coming to mind right now. Instead, he was filled with thoughts of Mama lounging about the pool, carefully turning herself slowly in the sun like a rotisserie chicken, cooing at Tommy, and cooing at friends.
Tommy was so lucky to have a Mama who loved him, and so lucky to have a fun pool to sport about in while Mama dealt with all those men who visited during the day. Today had been no different, except that she had been just a bit disappointed in Tommy for his continued failure to swim. “Chubby babies ought to have an easier time of it, dear heart,” she said, smiling as she said it, but rough with her hands when she put his clothes back on after another fruitless session in the deep end. Tommy cried without knowing why.
Mama had to answer the door just then, for the Postman had come back for some reason. Tommy would sometimes pretend to be the dog he had always wanted and bark at the Postman, but something about the way Mama slammed the glass door of the patio made Tommy hang back, dangling his feet over the deep end. He stared at his reflection in the water, surprised that it didn’t look particularly happy. He leaned forward to touch it, to remind it how happy they were. But even happy children can be clumsy, in a cute sort of way, of course. Tommy tumbled into the depths, too surprised to scream and wheel his arms about as he ought.
Which brought him full circle back to the bit about drowning. Tommy ran out of life to review, so he lay there for a while longer, waiting for some further event. Nothing happened. He started to create a dramatic scene in his head. Mama and the Postman would run out and find him at the bottom, then the Postman might dive in after him, dragging him out while Mama wept at the edge of the pool. There would be lots of hugs, and perhaps some ice cream later. He was sure his father could figure into the story somehow. Perhaps he would take Tommy out to a baseball game. Tommy had never been. But he’d heard they were fun.
None of that happened. Tommy just lay there, drifting about in the quiet warmth. It was getting boring, actually. So he sighed, walked out of the pool and went to bed. He probably even had dinner at some point, he wasn’t sure. But he never did get ice cream.
#
Although Tommy had little to reflect on leading up to his fourth year, in retrospect those were the most exciting days of his life. Perhaps it was just the dramatic letdown of the pool incident. He felt that a near death experience should have changed his life. In his teen years, he would play with his pencil at the back of the classroom, thinking to himself, “What a wonderful pencil this is! Why, when I was little, I nearly died, yet now I have been given this chance to gaze upon this pencil. I should treasure this moment forever!”
But Tommy didn’t treasure the pencil. It was quite boring, and thoroughly undeserving of the his overblown thoughts. He realized that he would rather be thinking about Laurie Phelps a few desks up, but he couldn’t bring himself to. Sending his thoughts that way, much less his gaze, seemed too awkward. Even in his fantasies, she rejected him. That was better than real life, however, where he was simply ignored. So he kept his gaze on his pencil, trying to work up the nerve to scrawl his name or even just a repeated witticism on the desk. But the nerve never came.
His parents died at sometime or another, and he found himself living in the same house. He had the sort of job one gets without trying too hard, and kept it with an equal amount of effort. He abandoned pencils for computers, but never came up to the standard of the anti-social computer geek. He was far too clean for that, and frankly, he had no greater love for computers than he once had for pencils.
It was a living, though. It kept him in take out pizza, the empty cardboard boxes stacked neatly out front for the garbage men to take. He contemplated getting a dog, but the animals he met would give nothing more than a puzzled sniff before loping off to play with someone interesting. The thought of owning an animal that only would prove to be indifferent was more than he could deal with. So his house remained empty and very neat.
Tommy became older, because that’s what people do when they don’t die. He was no longer happy. He realized this. He had tried to hold onto the happiness of his four year old self, but as the years passed, that happiness faded to be replaced by boredom. And now boredom was becoming replaced by loneliness, which was becoming replaced by despair. For a while, he hoped that the despair would be interesting, but it turned out to be still boring. And one day, the pizza delivery man failed to come.
Tommy took the absence of pizza as a sign. He wasn’t sure what it meant exactly, but he was willing to interpret it to his needs. He stopped getting older, and went with the alternative and died. How exactly, he wasn’t sure. But it wasn’t very interesting, either. He kept waiting for some bright white light, a tunnel, trumpets, scantily clad angels, or something. After a day or so of being dead, Tommy would have welcomed hellfire and demons with pitchforks. At least they would break the monotony. But they never came, either.
Really, being dead was no better than being alive. He appreciated the fact he didn’t have to take care of the pizza boxes every day, but at the same time he missed the pizza delivery man. So, when a moving van pulled up in front of the house, Tommy became excited, or as excited as a man without nerves and hormones could be. Which wasn’t very, but wasn’t much less than his excited state when he’d been alive.
The arriving family looked pleasant enough. The father was well fed, the mother well dressed, and the young boy was well. The boy seemed to be everything that the four year old Tommy had wanted to be—energetic, outgoing, not afraid to voice his opinions to mother or father, and most of all, tremendously self confident. If a too loud voice resulted in a cuff across the head, the boy would never cry but only run off with an impudent grin, chased by the indulgent shakes of his parents heads.
Tommy decided to befriend the boy. He played the part of a poltergeist, picking up the scattered toys in the house and making the boy’s bed in the morning. The lady of the house didn’t seem to care a rat’s whisker about the additional housecleaning, but after a while the boy noticed. Pacing up and down the length of his bedroom (Tommy’s own room, or at least former room), the boy patted his neatly ironed bed sheets. Tommy drew his ectoplasmic self up, quite satisfied for the first time in a long time.
“Mother!” the boy cried.
There was a muttering of distant acknowledgement from downstairs.
“I HATE my bed like this!” The boy took a running leap at the bedspread, landing on it with two muddy shoes. “Hate hate hate hate hate!” he elaborated, stomping up and down.
“That’s nice, dear,” his mother said. “Come downstairs, now.”
The boy shrugged, his energy gone. On the way out of the room, he kicked over his toy box and broke a lamp.
Tommy was alone again. He watched the family pull away in their stretch SUV, headed to parts unknown, but certainly interesting. Tommy watched the clock tick, it’s large Marty Mouse hands moving slowly, but still the only movement in the room. Tommy started to pick up the Romper Ranger action set, trying to cry but completely unable to. As he was lifting the Action Alan Commando jeep across the room, he felt a surge of anguish, and the miniature steering column snapped. Tommy looked at the jeep for a long time before letting it drop to the ground. Even as a ghost, he was a failure.
He wondered if a ghost could commit suicide. It seemed unlikely, but it would pass the time. With uncharacteristic inspiration, he headed out to the pool. It was one of the many constants in his life, unchanged after all these years, however festooned it now was with overpriced plastic floaty toys. He’d almost drowned once, so many years ago. Maybe it would work this time. He walked carefully into the depths of the deep end and laid down.
#
After a few hours, a thought occurred to him. He wasn’t going to find eternal peace here, no matter how warm and quiet it was. Ghosts had to haunt where they died. Nobody ever toured a haunted house and said, “This is where the tormented Lady Twistleshack almost fell out the window before going on to endure forty more years, three marriages and seven children who would write on alternative Christmases.” That was not the way things were done.
On the other hand, protocol hadn’t exactly given Tommy much satisfaction in life or death. With a strong feeling of petulancy, he crossed his ghostly arms and screamed in an almost ghastly gurgle, “Aaaaawwwwwwooooooooo!!!!! I am the ghost of Tommy Johnson! I am haunting this pool, whether you like it or not!!!”
“Whether who likes it?” asked a sepulchral voice with perfect diction.
“Huh?” asked Tommy, startled out of his haunting.
“Oh, up here. Look up here. I’m not swimming down there. That’s Davy Jones’ job, recovering folk from the bottom of the sea.”
Tommy looked up. Death, looking like Death, was sitting astride a pale inflatable horse, working a Blackberry with two long, bony thumbs. He supposed he ought to be obedient, and crawled up the pool ladder to look Death in the eye. Well, eyesocket.
If Death had had them, it would have cocked an annoyed eyebrow at Tommy. “About time you showed up,” it rasped.
“Me???” Tommy said. He was feeling quite miffed, and rather enjoyed the sensation. It was the first strong emotion he’d had since, well, the first time he’d fallen into the pool.
“Tommy Johnson, age 4 years, 2 months,” Death said, absently. “Says so right here. I really love this, can’t imagine how I got on without it. Nice color, too.”
“D……DAMN your stupid electronic day planner!”
“It’s much more than that, really. Look, I can send email,” Death tapped the plastic casing affectionately.
“Arrrrrrrrrrggggghhhhhh!” replied Tommy, knocking the infernal device out of Death’s hands. It landed in the water with a satisfying splash.
Death kicked its way to the pool edge, its eye sockets sprouting cold flame. “GRAVE CONSEQUENCES await you!”
“Like bloody what?” Tommy was truly savoring his anger. “I’ve been dead for over a year now, with no one for company but a brat and his yuppie parents! What about me, eh? And it’s not like life before that was a picnic either. You want to send me to hell? Fine! At least it might be interesting.”
“Get a hold of yourself, boy. And stop whimpering. I can’t look it up now,” it said with a significant glance at the bottom of the pool, “but I seem to recall you were no worse off than any other four year old. Come along now, lots of lollys for you in heaven.” Calmer now, Death patted Tommy’s head with what passed for its hand.
“Stop treating me like a child, damn it!”
“Hmmm? You’re only four. And don’t feel bad about it. At least you managed to escape the whole puberty and dating business.”
“I’m sixty four!”
“No, you’re not. I looked it up. Useful things, these computers. You died drowning in your parent’s pool while you mum did her bit for the mail service.”
“You mean almost drowned.”
“I don’t show up for almosts.” Death clacked its teeth together. “Dear me, no! I’m busy enough as it is. Backlog’s been tremendous. Speaking of which, we need to get going. Heaven can’t wait.”
Tommy felt something click in his mind. “Listen you bag of bones, I didn’t drown that day. I went on to live for sixty more years.”
Death stopped wringing the pool water out of its cloak. It reached into a pocket and pulled out a stone sundial.
“Er,” it said.
Tommy tapped his foot.
“It’s a bit late, isn’t it?” Death grinned apologetically, which didn’t do anything to improve Tommy’s mood.
“Damn right it’s late!”
Death shrugged. “So you got to go on living a bit, so what? Have any kids I should know about?”
“I NEVER EVEN HAD A DATE!!!!!!!”
“Oh. Well, sorry. But that makes sense. In general, you could expect to be ignored. I mean, who wants to date a dead man? Trust me, I spend my Friday evenings playing Cribbage with Thoth. Of course, every century or so, Kali drops by. The things she can do with those hands…..” Death chuckled.
“I don’t want to hear about your love life. God, I was probably drowning while you were off playing hide the dagger with an Indian goddess. Well, that just figures.”
Death said nothing.
Tommy stood up. “That’s it, isn’t it?”
Death whistled through its teeth and shouldered its scythe. “Well, little Tommy, time to get going.”
“I’ll tell St. Peter.”
Death stopped. “You wouldn’t.”
“And why the hell not? You ruined my life!”
“Sorry, that’s part of my job description.”
“So is picking up souls, right? How’s a little missing in action report going to look on your year end evaluation?”
Death stopped whistling and put a convivial arm over Tommy’s shoulder. Fortunately, Tommy’s sense of smell had gone downhill ever since he’d died.
“Tommy, my dear little boy.”
“Man. And angry man.” Tommy shifted uncomfortably in Death’s grasp. The emotion was fading again, to be replaced by uneasy suspicion.
“Look Tommy, I think we can make a deal. I’ll just drop you off in the land of the living. Don’t worry, I’ll come round again later. You get a bit more lifetime, and we’ll never talk about this again.”
“What?” Tommy said bitterly. “Another decade or so of loveless and friendless existence? No thanks. I’m going straight to the papers with this. Or whatever they have in heaven.”
Death put a slip of paper in Tommy’s palm. It was covered with illegible gold writing and had a large red heart on the backside.
Tommy narrowed his eyes. “What on earth is this?”
“A voucher for True Love. Don’t give them out much anymore. Modern folk aren’t that willing to face me to get one. So, this one’s an extra. Have fun!”
Before Tommy could say anything, the icy hand of Death waved goodbye, and he felt himself in the grip of sleep, perchance to dream really, really good dreams.
#
He woke up in his cubical, a slice of pizza stuck to his cheek. The sign on the entrance said “T. Johnson, Auxiliary Help Desk Assistant”. Taped to his computer was a handwritten sign that said, “Lack of preparation on YOUR part does not constitute an emergency on MY part.” Nothing had changed. Well, he was alive. And his clothes seemed a bit looser than they usually were. Obviously, a trip beyond the grave was useful for shedding those unwanted pounds.
He turned to his monitor to deal with the blue screen. He might be alive, but his computer was dead as a dead doorknob.
“Tom?”
He spun his chair about and started to topple over. A strong, tanned arm caught him. He looked up.
Two deep brown eyes stared into his. They were affixed to a woman’s face, which the classical minded would call “Hellenic” and the less classical minded “a looker”. No more than two inches shorter than Tommy, she had the build of a professional athlete cursed with a slightly too voluptuous figure. Focusing his eyes, Tommy read her tightly stretched t-shirt.
“Annapurna ‘05” he whispered, trying hard to concentrate on the picture of a jagged mountain below the words.
The woman helped him back into his seat. “Oh, that!” Unsurprisingly, it was a musical laugh. “Sorry, couldn’t find anything else for casual Friday. I’m really more of a suit and short skirt kind of girl.”
“You like out….outdoorsy stuff?” Tommy managed. “Like, you know, outdoors? Um.” In his pocket, a slip of paper grew warm. He shifted uncomfortably.
She laughed and tapped her shirt interestingly. “Yeah, but don’t imagine for one instant I know what I’m doing. I nearly died up there. Lost two toes for my trouble.” She laughed self-depreciatingly. “Almost ashamed to waddle about on the beach now. At least I managed to summit, though.”
Tommy’s eyes widened. “You climbed THAT mountain.” He started to point to the shirt, but thought better of it.
“With oxygen, yeah.” She shrugged. “Rheinhold Messner, I’m not.”
“Oh, no! No, not at all. I mean, in a good way.” Tommy resisted the temptation to bang his head against the desk.
She stuck her hand out. “Susan. Susan McCormick. Pleased to meet you, Tom.”
“Tommy,” he said. After a few seconds he took her hand. It was very calloused, but warm.
“How cute! I have a little cousin we call Tommy. But already he wants us to call him Tom.” She rolled her eyes. “Trying to act all grown up, you know.”
“Being grown up isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.”
Susan looked very serious. “I think you have a point.”
She suddenly laughed again, and Tommy resisted the temptation to hug her. He knew that this was all because of the voucher, but heck, he still wanted to take things at a normal pace. It would help preserve certain illusions.
“Er,” he started. “What brings you here?”
“I’m told you’re absolute wizard at fixing computers that want a good fixing. So I navigated my way over here. I am at the right place, am I not?”
Tommy almost told her that Lawrence was really the fixit man, but a rare burst of inspiration hit him. “Hey, love to, but I’m about ready to knock off.”
Susan frowned. “At two thirty?”
He shrugged. “I’m rather flex time, these days. But anyway, if you want to discuss computers, you’ll have to do it over a bite to eat.”
She leaned over and pulled the pizza slice off his face. “Not pizza.”
“Er, no.”
“Fine. But I feel an obligation to buy. After all, I’m the one who sought you out.”
The paper slip was almost too hot to touch now.
#
Things went about as well as could be expected from there. No, they went far, far better than expected. They found things in common, shared TV shows, a fetishistic tidiness, and a love for rich food (that Susan could always burn off). A few weeks passed, a few kisses were exchanged (but not much more, as Tommy was a gentleman), and Susan invited him up to her cabin in the woods for some hiking. The wink she added to that invitation was almost enough to make Tommy pass out. Gathering the moisture in his mouth as best as he could, he agreed.
“Tommy?” Susan asked, as they reclined on a rocky shore by a clear blue pond.
“Susan?” he replied, contemplating toying with her hair, but fussing with some grass instead.
“This is very important to me, Tommy,” she said, sitting up and putting her hands on his shoulders.
Tommy tried to slow his breathing without much success. “Oh, ah?” he said with concern.
“I not getting any younger, Tommy.”
“Beats dying.” In his mind, he hit himself on the forehead. Hard.
“Tommy, before we go any further, I need to know how you feel about raising….” Her voice trailed off, and she looked away with wet eyes.
Tommy bit his lip, thinking of the yuppie brat. He smiled helpfully at her.
“TOMMY I’M TWENTY NINE AND I WANT A DOG!”
Tommy’s jaw dropped and his heart leapt. “Oh, hey. I like dogs.”
Their clothes were off in a heartbeat, as they tumbled over moss covered boulders into the waiting waters of the pond.
“Bravo, bravo,” said Death, clapping its hands. “Well done, both of you.”
They leapt to their respective feet.
“Not now!” yelled Tommy.
“Not now!” yelled Susan.
Death shrugged. “You know, you aren’t the first to say that to me. But look, I granted you both an extension. Tommy didn’t drown and Susie didn’t die in that avalanche.” It fiddled with its Blackberry. “See, I have you down as drowning here in the midst of passionate embrace. Do you know how many people would kill to go out like that?”
Tommy and Susan expressed their displeasure.
“Hey!” Death protested from underneath the pile of rocks. “You can’t do this, I’m DEATH!”
Susan shrugged as Tommy smashed Death’s blackberry with a particularly sharp stone. “So, I suppose we’re dead, then. We’ll just have to make the most of it.”
Tommy stood up. “You know, I could really go for an ice cream right now. Do you think spirits can eat ice cream?”
From under the rocks, Death whimpered.
Susan smiled. “Only if it’s chocolate. This IS heaven, I think.” She pointed across the pond. “Nearest malt shop is that way. Shall we go haunt it?”
Talking about dogs, the two strolled arm and arm into the water.
