Another day was done as the sun poked out from the east. Another nightshift, another day until next payday.
Owen Penner was well used to it. He had had the drive-though window job for three years, and it had bracketed his existence for all that time. His school performance had been middling, as there always seemed something more important to do. When he had finally finished, he was glad to have been done. Finding a good job had proved to be somewhat of a challenge; he hadn’t the staying power because he lived by the rule that a man had to work. The night job, he had found two weeks into his job search. It wasn’t a great job, but it was a full-time job – as close to a permanent job these days as a person could hope to find. Even if his dad disagreed a little, Owen counted it as a real job. It just wasn’t that good a one.
Getting the orders right, the coffee and victuals out, had been a challenge at first; he had to talk himself through it, and he had made his share of mistakes. The second year in, though, he had gotten it down to a routine. It had become relaxing.
Lately, he had noticed a new addition to his routine. People started pulling up, ordering, and then asking for a job application. He’d been caught short the first time, but his manager had later slipped a pad to the window. Owen was sobered: some of them had looked pretty desperate, almost as if their patronage would earn them brownie points.
He didn’t bring up the possibility of promotion to his dad; lately, he’d been pointing out that he had three years’ experience and a good work record. Even if he was let go, his experience put him at the front of the line. He had (somewhat nosily, he had to admit) asked the manager what kind of candidates would be signed up. “None,” replied the older man, “and not what we’ve got even if there’s an opening. All that matter these days is experience.
“I’m seeing applications – even résumés - with good degrees from good schools. I can’t help ‘em, and that’s the way it goes.”
Owen found that his dad, an electrician, lapped it up. “’Bout time; they had it coming to them.” He smiled as he stuck his left had casually in his pocket: job habit. “They were the ones who thought that we working men were a little rough on their scenery. They didn’t mind in the least when everyone’s protections were dismantled; not a bit. Now, they have to live with what they’ve done.”
His dad was his height, but Owen still found that equality a little surprising. They looked a lot alike, except his dad’s hair was darker and somewhat gone at the top. Had he been pressed, Owen would have admitted that his résumé tales had been a little self-serving; ever since he had taken the night shift, his dad would sometimes make kidding remarks about “children of a lesser job.” They were good-spirited, but there was a little bit of a hint embedded.
There wasn’t any such jabs in Owen’s place, just a hominess that sometimes was lonely. He rated a bachelor apartment: small bedroom, mini-bathroom and a somewhat larger everything-else room with kitchenette. He soon put it to work fixing his dinner.
After done, he flopped down in the easy chair and hit the remote. The local morning news show stood in for his dad’s evening news, and the morning talk shows served in the stead of prime time. Some of them served pretty well as comedy. There were other shows too, mostly reruns, but what’s the excitement in watching old stuff? He couldn’t be bothered TiVoing the prime time stuff, as there wasn’t much point pretending he had a day job. Almost all of his paycheque went though his fingers, and he was too settled to think about taking a trade in college. As of yet.
He hadn’t eaten that much, but he was feeling groggy. A little too groggy…
Owen’s head leapt up when he sensed that he was no longer alone. “Who – Jeezus!”
He had leapt up with the second word. The figure in front of him was clearly sheathed in black: a full robe with a matching black hoodie. The only body part that showed was a bulbous nose. Owen’s eyelids jerked back when it hit him that the thing (whatever it was) outmatched him in the height department.
He didn’t say anything after. His eyelids had returned to normal position…or so he thought. Whatever this thing was, it was going to have the first word.
And it did: “I require your assistance with a death.”
What am I – a nurse!? After that thought passed, though, Owen finally realized who it was in his place.
“You’re – you’re – “
“I am Death.” With a voice deeper than my dad’s... “Should you choose to assist me in this task, I will give you the year of your own death.”
That jolted him back, somewhat. “Year? Why not the whole deal? The day and time? Too?”
“You may request them if you wish, but I must inform you that the information you may earn will in likelihood be useless. You will almost certainly take action to avoid your death, and doing so will leave you as ignorant as you were before. There are no second chances, not ever.”
Owen’s hands rose up at that, and he began feeling wary. What he was hearing sounded like that economics crap. This shift here, that shifts there, and we all wind up where we were. Not unlike the opposite of life.
“I think I’ll take my chances. Gimme the day, hour – as exact as you can make it. Once I’m done the job.
“Now, what is it?”
He didn’t mean for his voice to crack like that, but this thing was pretty imposing.
Now, Owen felt whatever it had in place of eyes spotlighting him. His stomach curdled.
“Turn around; there is something that you must see behind you.”
“Why don’t you tell me,” his voice said in starts. “I don’t have to – “
“Do it.”
He felt sweat on his forehead as he complied, silently this time. Whoever this Death was, he was pretty damn mean. Before Owen had finished turning around, he saw…himself. Slumped over, on his easy chair.
“I’m…” Without meaning to, a spit-bubble popped over his lips. “I’m…”
“No, you are not dead; you are asleep,” the creature said behind him. Behind and upwards. “When you are ready, we will depart to the death place of the soul you will be transferring to my keeping. I will go, and you will prepare that soul for me to take. He must be ready to accompany me, and willing to do so expeditiously. Only then will you learn the moment of your death.”
Moment? That word jerked him back into some kind of awareness. So it was a deal.
Owen was now in front of a huge bed in an even huger bedroom; Death was gone. The sheets looked glazed, as did the pajama on the old stork in front of him. One look at the guy’s face said all that needed to be said about the dried-up bird.
He was clearly in the class that Owen’s dad had told him about. So rich, the interest he raked in could pay food, rent and board for everyone in Owen’s apartment building – more than, likely. One of the fellows that rigged the rules: this day it was ‘merit’, just like it was ‘character’ in days gone by. Either way, you don’t come even close to him unless you bought into his world hook, line and sinker. Even then, you didn’t mean a damn unless you were rapacious.
Death’s introduction to this cave-chest had made his father sound like a clubmate. “This man had devoted his very life, soul and fibre to one goal and one goal alone: making money. He cares for nothing else, much as he professed otherwise. ‘Competitive’ was his excuse. He took pride in his talent for bending both rules and norms, in personal terms as well as in business practice.”
A figure in the bathroom gave evidence of it. Owen drifted over and saw the kind of woman that he’d only gazed at in magazines. Blond hair, down to a little below her shoulders. Taller than normal, lithe and thin. Blue eyes: he could see them in the mirror. The kind of jaw that made her look like a tooth grinder. She looked not more than ten years older than Owen himself. What was in her eyes induced a headache: ostensibly open and bright, there was a certain vacantness in them. She was, of course, beautiful, which made Owen’s headache worse. It took several seconds before he realized that she was the old geezer’s wife.
Instead of lingering, he turned away. Part of it was the job he had to do, but part of it was the need to get away from her. She didn’t know he was there, nor would she.
Time for the wake-up call. “Hey? Guy! I’m here to tell you something.” Owen didn’t mean to sound officious, but he wanted to get it over with.
The lingering headache blunted Owen’s surprise at seeing the fellow – the spirit of the fellow – rise up from his corpse. “Boy, you are not very polite,” he said. The purse-mouthedness of the old boy’s kind of authority was now evident. “What brings you here?”
“To bring you some news, old timer. Your time’s up.”
“So what are you. A kidnapper? A robber? My security system is nothing to be laughed at, and my wife is – Amanda? Amanda? Could you come here?”
Owen began to smile as the old crow’s bark turned into confusion. “No, she ain’t available to take your call right now.”
“Then who – I mean, why are you?”
Might as well have some fun with this. “I’m an executive assistant of a personage you’ve probably become acquainted with recently. His name is Death, and he’ll be by real soon. I’m just here to do the prep job.
“Turn around, please.”
Not unlike Owen himself earlier, the old guy craned his neck around and saw his own corpse. His face was expressionless when he eyes once again met Owen’s.
His voice might as well have been too. “So I am. My widow must be delighted.”
Owen just blinked, so the guy helped himself to some more talk. “I mean it; there is no need for me to be dicey as I’m the dead one. I’m quite sure that her boyfriend – oh yes, they all have them – will be jumping with glee and counting the money that used to be mine….”
He continued in that vein, with the only interruption for his breathing. Over the next ten minutes, Owen learned about: the geezer’s déclassé first wife; his arrogant second wife; some unflattering things about the current one that jibed with what Owen himself had seen in her eyes; the geezer’s kids; his grandkids; what they cared about; what they didn’t care about; etc.
The funny this was, Owen found himself growing kind-of sympathetic. Since the geezer wanted to hear himself talk, Owen had an opportunity to sift through his memory. This fellow reminded him of – wait.
One of his friends had a mother that got divorced. Her husband had run out on her. She sometimes wanted him to lend an ear, which Owen did because she’d had a tough break. And her son was his friend. The thing is, what was coming out of that old stork’s mouth was a lot like her woes. Only…
…only this fellow was at the top of the world! And her he was, complaining like a jilted wife!
It became easy to listen to the drone now; Owen had no need to fake a smile. This pillar of po-lite society, this titan of the executive suite, this maven of the business magazine covers, was a whiner!
The rest was easy. The old boy must have felt some residual guilt, because he tried to ask about Owen. “Seeing as how we are both dead, we might as well get to know one another.”
“It’s all right; just say what you got to say. Let it out, because you won’t have any chance once Death gets here.”
And sure enough, the geezer did. He made an effort to talk about something other than money grabbing, but it was forced; all he could really do was talk his business. Death had been exactly right about this clown. By the time his droning recounting was over, Owen felt good enough to be solicitous.
“You’d better make yourself ready. You’re going to be taken away soon.”
“Oh, that’s right.” The he smiled, or tried to. “You’re not a bad boy; you’re a nice boy. Others would have walked off, but you didn’t. You lent me your ear and showed more consideration than any of my grandchildren. I’ve said my piece, so Death I await.”
Owen took the cue, and called in his mind to the Reaper. He soon felt the same presence that had jarred him back in his home. The old fellow looked over and opened his mouth.
“Before we go, I would like to say a word or two about this fine boy you’ve –“
“Please,” Owen interrupted. “You’ll say it just by going with him.”
The old man looked quizzical, but then shrugged and looked back at Death. “All right. I’m ready to go.”
Owen had been banished back to his old room while Death saw to his charge. Looking at his slumped-over body, he had time to think things through.
That old guy is someone that any of his friends would trade places with in an instant. That kind of money? It might have been as high as a billion bucks. A hundred million, maybe. And not only his friends would…
There was a kind of customer for which Owen had to go through the routine mechanically. The usual arrival vehicle was a Mercedes, Cadillac, BMW, Saab or Jaguar. Even the sight of those brands pulling in was leadening. All of them had men and women who hoped, schemed, pushed, drove to get up to where that old guy was. Some of them, he was sure, wondered what they lacked, or were getting over the fact that they’d never reach the heights – their heights. And here he’d been, looking at and listening to the real thing, and what he had found was a…
…tool. The guy was a tool of his money, of his business. And that’s what all those assholes aspired to be. Someone like that old fella. Owen wondered why, despite all that his dad had explained, he was kind-of pitying the old guy in a warmish kind of way. Maybe the old boy really had something to whine about.
His dad had told him about the plutocrats, and Owen was glad of it, but –
“Your task is complete.” Owen turned around, and saw Death out-heighting him again.
“It didn’t take that long,” he ventured, waiting.
Death paused, and delivered his judgment in that reverb baritone of his. “No, it did not. He was talkative, but the pacification of him was straightforward and consumed little time. You have fulfilled your end of the bargain.”
You mean there was doubt? But that thought came nowhere near to being voiced; Owen just waited.
“You asked for as much precision as can be supplied,” the baritone continued. “Your death will be on December 26th, 2012, at 11:38 AM.”
That close? Again, Owen couldn’t voice it.
“Well… thanks, Mr. Death.
“But I just wanted to ask you: could you kind-of tell me the cause – Whoa!”
The figure was gone from his vision as he was floated over his slumped body. He was the top of his head approach, then a jolt of darkness, then the floor and his shoes. After straightening up, a quick glance around revealed that he was now alone. Alone for the rest of his day, which would end at about noon or one.
Boxing day, 2012, 11 – sometime around 11 AM. He’d better be careful…
