It's a Wonderful Death Read online

  Copyright © 2015 by Sarah J. Schmitt

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without the express written consent of the publisher, except in the case of brief excerpts in critical reviews or articles. All inquiries should be addressed to Sky Pony Press, 307 West 36th Street, 11th Floor, New York, NY 10018.

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  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously.

  Sky Pony® is a registered trademark of Skyhorse Publishing, Inc.®, a Delaware corporation.

  Visit our website at www.skyponypress.com.

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  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available on file.

  Print ISBN: 978-1-63450-173-6

  Ebook ISBN: 978-1-63450-921-3

  Cover design by Georgia Morrissey

  Cover photograph credit Thinkstock

  To Grams and Becca, who got it right the first time.

  Chapter 1

  The gypsy fortune-teller at the Halloween carnival predicts I’ll have a long life full of possibilities. Of course, that’s right before she uses me as a human shield to avoid the outstretched hand of a black-cloak-clad, sickle-wielding Grim Reaper and then flees hysterically from the tent. Really, if you think about it, that makes her a liar and a murderer. I better get a refund.

  And no matter what the Grim Reaper says about not meaning to collect my soul, it doesn’t change the fact that I’m looking down at my lifeless body while my friends stare at each other. Hello? Call 911. Or maybe someone could start doing CPR. Idiots.

  “Come with me,” the Reaper insists, tugging on my arm. “There isn’t much time.”

  I shake him off and shoot my best withering glare in his direction. “I don’t think so. You saw what she did. You were coming for her, not me. She’s the one you should be hauling out of here.”

  And then he shrugs his shoulders. Is he kidding? He rips my soul from my body and the next minute acts like I’m asking to change the station on the car radio.

  He smiles a saccharin sweet smile. Yeah, like I’m going to fall for that.

  “My job is to transport the souls. Nothing more. Nothing less.” He’s talking to me like I’m a four-year-old.

  I don’t know if it’s the smile or the tone of his voice, but I’ve gone from being confused to really ticked off. My hands curl into fists. “Well, it’s my senior year and my job is to win homecoming queen next week. And to do that, I need to be alive. You have to send me back.”

  “I can’t do it.”

  “And why not?”

  He whips around to face me, his hood falling down around his neck. He’s actually kind of cute with his chiseled face and coal black eyes. Of course he’s unnaturally pale, which is a total turn-off. And let’s not forget he’s a big part of the reason my body and soul no longer appear to be connected.

  “I don’t have that kind of clearance,” he says. “Even if it was an accidental collection, it’s out of my hands.”

  I find his words ironic. After all, it was his hand that got me into this mess in the first place.

  “Like you said, it was an accident,” I fume, refusing to admit my argument might be pointless. “If you can’t, can someone else?”

  He continues watching me with a blank gaze. When I can’t take his silent treatment for one more second, I look back toward my body.

  “Wait a minute!” I shriek. “Is that blood coming out of my ear?” I look closer and notice my blue eyes are staring at the ceiling with a vacant expression. Other than the eyes and blood, I look normal. Okay, sure, maybe my skin is a little on the gray side, but the lighting in the tent is horrible. Why do fortune-tellers always use so many flickering candles? When I get back into my body, I am definitely calling the fire marshal. There has to be a violation here somewhere. She may not die, but that gypsy woman is still going to pay for what she did.

  I scan the rest of my body and notice the way my neck is tilting at a weird angle. Of course that could be because my jet black hair is pulled up in a messy bun. No one can lay comfortably with a bun. It’s physically impossible.

  Other than all that, I look like I always do: perfect. Well, except for the bruise on my cheek. I must have slammed it into the cash register when I fell. It’s going to take some serious cover-up to camouflage that bad boy.

  A flash of movement captures my attention. Finally someone starts doing chest compressions. Fat lot of good it’ll do me if the Reaper doesn’t figure something out and fast.

  With nothing left to lose, I try a different approach. “Hey, you never told me your name.”

  “What?” he asks in genuine surprise.

  “What am I supposed to call you?”

  “Gideon.” He’s looking at me like he thinks I’m up to something but can’t quite figure it out. I get that a lot.

  “Well, Gideon,” I say as nicely as I can, “there has to be something you can do. Maybe snap a finger, wish on a star, or whatever. No one ever has to know about this silly misunderstanding. Then, once I’m back among the living, you can track down that stupid gypsy, have a piano fall on her head, and everything works out the way it was supposed to.” I glance at the group of girls who have been at my beck and call for the last three years. They’re all sobbing and looking around in disbelief. Except for Felicity, who’s taking a picture with her phone. Why couldn’t the gypsy have picked her?

  “No,” the Grim Reaper says.

  “Okay, fine. Maybe a piano is a bit of a cliché. How about a meteorite?”

  “No,” he says again.

  “You’re right. It should be a small one that drills into her brain without damaging the planet. I don’t want you to be responsible for destroying the entire Earth.”

  Instead of answering, the Grim Reaper turns around, the edge of his cloak hanging unnaturally in the air before finally settling around his ankles.

  “Wait,” I call after him, running to catch up. “What about sending me back?”

  “We’re leaving,” he says, shifting his scythe to his other hand. “And I already told you. I can’t send you back.”

  “But somebody can, right?” He keeps walking, and I have no choice but to follow. The air around us grows misty and I squint to see what’s up ahead. “Where are you taking me, anyway?”

  “Do you always talk this much? Most people are at least a little shocked when they die.”

  I scoff at him. Obviously the nice-girl act isn’t working. “You screwed up. Maybe if you’d been a little better at your job, I wouldn’t be dead in the first place.”

  “But you are dead.”

  “Not really.”

  This time he laughs and the sound startles me. I was beginning to think the guy was a black hole of emotion. “Did you not see your body back there? You know, the one on the ground?” he asks. “You are really dead.”

  I look down and fight to keep from losing my balance. Below me is a vast nothingness. “Can’t you at least tell me where we’re going?” I ask, sucking in my breath, which is pointless since I don’t actually need to breathe anymore. Still, there’s something comforting in doing it.

  “To the Soul Movers.”

  “The what?” I ask, but my words are swallowed by a whirling gust of wind that precedes a train of railcars pulling up in front of us.

  “Get in,” the Reaper
says, pushing me forward. It’s more of a shove, actually.

  As I stagger over the threshold, I see another Reaper ushering a crowd of people into the next car.

  “What’s going on over there?” I ask.

  The Reaper looks over, his eyebrow rising slightly. “Fifteen-car pile-up on the 405.” He looks envious. What a sick jerk. The doors slam shut and I’m surrounded by Reapers and the newly departed. Everyone looks so sad. Not sad, exactly. Empty. Like shells of actual people.

  My Reaper leans in and says, “Told you most of the dead are shocked when they die.” He’s got a cocky tone to his voice that makes me want to slap him. I manage to stop myself. He’s lucky. I’ve got a well-deserved reputation for not taking crap from people.

  Glancing around, I see elderly people and young kids and everyone in between on the train. Most of them have that deer-in-headlights look on their face. Except for one old woman who is smiling at me with pity in her eyes. “So young and beautiful,” she says, like I’m not standing right in front of her. “Such a waste.”

  I look behind me, and then back at her. “Are you talking to me?”

  “No, dear, I’m talking about you.”

  Who knew old people could speak fluent sarcasm?

  “What happened?” she asks, her voice ringing with grandmotherly compassion.

  “What do you mean, what happened?” Her kindness is starting to get on my nerves.

  “How did you die?” she asks.

  “I didn’t,” I try to explain, pointing to the Reaper. “He made a mistake.”

  “Denial,” she says and pats my hand. “It’s the first step. Don’t worry, dearie. It will pass.”

  I yank my arm away. “I am not in denial. He screwed up and got the wrong person.”

  “I’m sure he did, child.” It’s pretty clear by the look of amusement on her face that she doesn’t believe me.

  Wanting to take the attention off me, I ask, “So, what happened to you? What’s your story?”

  She places her hands gently in her lap and smiles serenely. “It was a dreadful case of old age. I’m afraid I’ll never see one hundred and one.”

  What do you say to someone who just tells you they lived a whole century? “That’s, uh, too bad?” I mutter before turning back to the Reaper.

  “You have to fix this,” I say, no longer able to hide my desperation and clutching onto his arm. “I’ve gotta go back. There is no way I am going to let Felicity steal my crown. That backstabber is probably on her way to get her fat head measured.”

  “Would you just relax?” he hisses before yanking his cloak out of my grasp and turning away from me.

  I sink into a seat. Relax? Is he insane? How can I relax when I’m … when I’m dead? And then it hits me like a ton of bricks. I’m really freaking dead. My head drops to my waiting hands and I feel my last breath leave my body as cold overtakes me. I struggle to keep my brain from accepting what’s happening. If I deny it, it’s not real. And this can’t be real. My life was, no, is just starting. This isn’t right. It isn’t fair. I just can’t be … dead.

  Chapter 2

  The doors open again and the Reapers hustle everyone into an empty terminal. Everyone but me, that is. I refuse to move. What if I get off this train and can never go back? Nope. I’ll stay here until the train makes the return trip, get off, and stay.

  “Get up,” Gideon commands.

  I ignore him. Why should I make this easy?

  “I’m not kidding,” he says. “I have a schedule to keep.”

  This gets me to look at him. “Yeah? Well, so did I. How does it feel to have things not work out the way you plan?”

  He leans on his scythe. “Listen, kid, I don’t know how many different ways I can tell you that there’s nothing I can do to fix your situation.”

  “That’s fine,” I answer. “I’ll just take the return trip and you can get back to me once you’ve figured things out.”

  “It doesn’t work that way. There is no return passage. One way. This can only be sorted out if you stand up, shuffle through the doors, and head to processing like everyone else. That’s the way it works.”

  I love how he’s still acting like he’s completely innocent in my predicament. But if he’s telling the truth, sitting on the train isn’t going to change anything. I might be passive aggressive, but I’m not stupid. “So is there someone in processing who can help me?”

  “They’ll know what to do better than I would. I’m sure this has happened before.”

  “Just not to you,” I say with a smirk.

  He nods. “Right.”

  I stand up, reluctantly, and follow him out of the car and down the short terminal that connects to a long hallway. From the ceiling to the floor, the passage is white marble. It’s like walking into a really bright mausoleum. Which is creepy enough, but adding to the shiver-up-my-spine factor is that I can’t hear anything. Not the echo of my footsteps, not even the sound of the train as it hurries off to its next destination. It is complete and utter silence. I can’t even hear the sound of my heartbeat. Like my lungs, it probably doesn’t work anymore.

  I clear my throat just to make sure my ears still work. The Reaper’s head snaps toward me.

  “Sorry,” I say. Wait a minute. Did I just apologize to him? What is wrong with me? RJ Jones does not apologize to anyone. Not ever. And why do I owe Grim Boy anything? This is his fault. On the plus side, I can still talk. “What happens in processing?” I ask.

  He looks at me with contempt. “You get processed,” he answers, very slowly, like he’s convinced I don’t understand the words I’m saying.

  I glare at him with as much hatred as I can muster, which, given the circumstance, is pretty substantial. “That much I figured out on my own, thank you. I mean, what does processing entail?”

  He sighs. “It’s where they check you in and give you the recording of your life.”

  “You mean like a DVD?”

  “Actually, they use laser discs up here.”

  “Laser what?”

  The Reaper gives me a look of exasperation. “You never stop asking questions, do you? Think of it like this: if an album and DVD had a baby, it would look like a laser disc. It’s a failed technology experiment from the nineteen eighties and nineties.”

  “Album?” I ask.

  “You don’t know what an album is?”

  In spite of everything, I’m having a good time watching him get flustered by my random questions. It’s one of many weapons in my verbal arsenal. “Relax, I know what it is. I saw one in a museum once.”

  “Yeah, well, when the laser disc turned out to be a major bust, we had some local scientists fix the flaws and started using them for the new arrivals.”

  “Good to know Heaven upcycles.”

  He shakes his head. “This isn’t Heaven.”

  “It’s not? Then where are we?”

  “Can’t you just wait and see?”

  “No,” I answer, stealing his line. What do you know? It irritates him, too.

  “RJ,” he says shortly. “I promise, all of your questions will be answered in time. Where we are, what happens, which way you’re going—”

  I stop dead in my tracks. “Which way?”

  He keeps moving. “Well, yeah. No one has a guarantee. Except for Gandhi and Mother Teresa. They were pretty much shoo-ins.”

  “Wait a minute. By ‘way,’ you mean like Heaven or …” I can’t say the word.

  Unfortunately, Gideon has no such qualms. “Hell.”

  “Thanks.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  Apparently Reapers are not fluent in sarcasm.

  We catch up with the crowd from the train and amble along in silence. I want to ask more questions, but can’t think of any. It’s as if my brain is switching off. I shake my head slightly, trying to rattle something into place.

  “You’ll get used to it,” the Reaper says, looking at me sideways.

  I try to play it off like I don’t know wh
at he’s talking about. “What do you mean?”

  “The head thing. Your brain is finally accepting that your body is dead.”

  “How do I make it stop?” I snap. “This is not happening to me. Remember, I’m going to find someone in processing to help me and then I’m going to get my life back.”

  “If you say so.”

  “You don’t believe me?” I don’t know why, but his lack of faith stings a little. Maybe because he’s the one who gave me hope in the first place.

  He leans closer to me. “Look,” he whispers, “in the thousand years I’ve been doing this, no one has ever gotten a do-over. It just doesn’t happen. If we make an exception for you, how long do you think it will take before everyone is trying to appeal their death?”

  “But you said—”

  “I said processing would figure it out,” he says, cutting me off. “And they will. I just wouldn’t get too excited if I were you.”

  Much to my surprise, tears begin to fall down my cheek. How is it that, with all the parts of me that are now useless, the tear ducts still work? Whatever the reason, the salty drops have a transformable effect on the Reaper.

  “Hey,” he says softly. “Tell you what. If it will help, I’ll vouch for you and what happened this afternoon.”

  “You will?” I say, brightening slightly.

  “Why not?” he says with a shrug. “Miracles happen all the time, don’t they?”

  Chapter 3

  Because of every movie made about what happens when you die, I prepare to shield my eyes from the blinding glare of white clouds. What I see is nothing like that. In fact, the movies have it all wrong. The Afterlife doesn’t have white clouds or angels with harps, at least not when you first arrive. It looks like a hotel lobby. A really big hotel lobby. For the most part, people are milling around with blank stares and there are small clusters of families huddling together in silence. It’s like being on the set of a zombie movie.

  The liveliest crowd is made up of the old people. Like the woman on the train, they actually seem happy to be here. There’s no shock or confusion. In fact, they greet each other like long-lost friends. Who knows, maybe they did know each other before they got here. From time to time a voice booms over an invisible intercom, startling everyone as it lists off a series of names and directs the chosen few to line up by the front desk at the far end of the room. I find an empty seat and watch people stumble toward the waiting line.