Eerie Silence

They exited the house, Damian’s steps a swift march while Amy followed behind him, lingering with a smile on her lips. She felt pleasant, the way she used to after completing community service or some other good deed. That Damian didn’t share this disposition was a mild disappointment but Amy had never heard him speak highly of his job. Perhaps she could change his mind.

“Damian,” she chirped, “where are we going now?”

Dark eyes glanced back at her and his marching slowed. Lingering on her face, eyes seemed to see right through her into her mind and soul. “Home, Amy. You can’t be out in a town where people might see you.”

“I could change my appearance.” She thrived for life, to see her friends and keep an eye on her father, but Damian hung back as he had in school. They were so similar sometimes, but right now she felt they were standing on opposite sides of every position. Maybe she had misjudged how similar they were. Bookworms didn’t often find other bookworms that appreciated the same genera, and also enjoyed the same other hobbies. Like magic, Amy hadn’t believed in true love. She had believed that you had to work at relationships, but with Damian things had fallen into place and been natural. Once he revealed his powers to her she was even more confident in their relationship. She didn’t marvel at his magic or love him any more for it, but it was amazing and explained a portion of him that she had not been able to understand before. Amy thought she even loved him because he was angel of death. All along she had seen him as a good figure, even if Damian did not think highly of his work… their work.

A pinch at the corner of his lips silenced Amy. Damian wouldn’t roll his eyes at her, but the movement of his lips was an equivalent.

“Ok.” Linking her arm with his, Amy tried to remain cheerful. “We can go home and curl up together, watch a movie or something until the next assignment.”

He nodded, refusing to look down at her, and continued moving forward. As they walked, the attire fell from Amy, her clothing shifting from that of her Death persona to jeans
“It’s death Amy. You shouldn’t be happy about it.”

She studied him, the man she loved who had experienced so much, who had brought humans to the afterlife for many years. “They’re going someplace nice.”

“You don’t know that. You don’t know anything about it Amy.” He sounded tired, weary, and his dark eyes dropped with weight as his shoulders sagged. He was old and tired.

She balled her hands into fists, her face flushing red. “I don’t? I actually died. Just because you’re old doesn’t mean you know more.”

“No. It does not; however the compliment of knowledge obtained by the individual holds no significance. Death is universal and timeless. I was not gleeful to take this position of death, but I did it willingly. It is a heavy burden.”

Amy shook her head, hair flinging across her face and her feet stopped their movement. “I want to go see Marcy and Tracy. We are among the living, Damian; you might want to remember that.”
He paused a few paces ahead of her and turned slowly. When he spoke his voice was thick and wrought with emotion. “I made the mistake to be amongst the living once, Amy. We are death and do not belong with them. If I hadn’t tried to be amongst them, you might still be alive.”

With a snort, she shook her head once more. “You let the job define you. You think death is gloomy and the end. Well I don’t think that. I won’t make the mistake of hating myself because of what we do.” Her temper flared as it had never done around him and she turned on her heal and began walking away. They didn’t fight. Amy had never considered them to be one of those couples, the kind that said they loved each other and then fell apart, who had spats just because they had a difference in opinion. Yet, there they were, arguing.

Before the car had killed her and Amy had made the decision to return as a death figure, the two of them had had school to talk about, and their friends, and the world around them. Damian was never eager to discuss his job, but it hadn’t been an issue. Now it was the focus of their relationship because she had made the decision to join him, and become a part of his work life.

As her feet dragged over the asphalt, she attempted to recall any bit of a conversation pertaining to the line of work they were both currently employed in. She hadn’t asked many questions, and he didn’t bring it up. When Damian had to leave abruptly for an assignment he would simply apologize.
The night Damian had led her through the cemetery and revealed his true nature to her, Amy had been shocked, nearly horrified, and confused. Damian had managed to control the situation so that she calmed down and absorbed his words with eagerness. He had phrased it so that the word death never left his lips, but she understood. Marveling, Amy had not been afraid. Dark and often brooding, Damian was not dangerous and he had made it very clear that she was safe with him for he was not a killer.

Shaking hair out of her face, Amy rounded a corner. Her feet were carrying her towards the high school, and power rippled over her skin, shifting her appearance so that she would be able to weave throughout the halls without drawing attention.

In her lifetime, Amy had not asked questions. She reflected that it was foolish of her. Amy had not pressed Damian for answers about what he did, for details or even for his opinion on the matter of life and death because she hated to see him in pain.

When she stood before the school, her hair short and blonde, Amy was the image of a scared freshman, new to the school. A wave of fear rolled through her, and she let it show. The humans around her would dismiss it as jitters and nerves about starting at a new high school so late in the year when in reality she had become nervous about seeing her friends. In her current form, they were not her friends.

She sighed and turned around, folding her arms across her chest.

Damian had followed silently behind her and stood watching her.

“You were right, not about the idea that I shouldn’t be happy about helping people pass over to the other side, to the next chapter of their lives, but I shouldn’t have come here.”

He raised a dark eyebrow and allowed a silence to drift between them. “Be careful what you say when human ears can hear you, amore.” With a sad smile Damian beckoned her to follow him. Across from the school there was a row of apartments and to the side of that was a cluster of trees.
“We shouldn’t fight,” he spoke in a low voice as he wove between trees. A slight shade cast shadows across his creamy skin and darkened his hair. “But there is a lot to discuss, much of which is going to create tension between us…” She couldn’t imagine what they had to talk about. Amy figured their lives would go on as they had. It was clear now that she could not return to the school but Damian could remain and she could see him after school. Or, he could drop out of school and they could stay in his apartment and work. She had imagined a life together, one where they were a couple, happy, but now things were getting in the way of the happiness. Damian and she had conflicting views of death, but that shouldn’t matter. People married despite different religions, different beliefs.
Maybe they couldn’t work together.

Damian had years of doing this job, of collecting souls, and she could see how it wore on him. Who he was before this job, before being Damian the angel of death, Amy didn’t know, and she wondered if it would change her to. He seemed to think so.

She ignored him as they walked. Damian wrapped his arm around her shoulders, holding her tight to his side. This is why she had comeback, to be with him, and yet, Amy couldn’t think about how she felt tucked against him, his scent around her and his fingers rubbing her shoulder gently.

Sounds were amplified, and she jumped at the sound of honking horns. Her death did not bother her, but the sound frightened her. Amy recalled smashing into metal, the car meeting her body. Now she saw that accident with each passing car.

Keeping her disguise, Amy was free to walk down the sidewalk, staring at the living humans that passed them. A man on a bike sped by and she knew he would crash in two years, three months and twelve hours, landing himself in the hospital before passing away. The car the sped past her had a male driver that was nearly blind and would die in his bath in two months. Information swirled around her. Somewhere in her mind she had the information needed to shut it off.

The time spent in the classroom was a blur now that she was present in the world of the living. She hadn’t been gone for long, she thought, but the teachers had bombarded her with information.
She didn’t want to know when they were all going to die. Amy wanted to see them live long lives before passing, but she tried to stay positive, firmly believing she would help their souls move on.
Stealing a glance at Damian, she tried to read his thoughts. It wasn’t within their power, as far as she knew, though he had often seemed to be reading her mind.
What was bothering him so much?

Howling wind pushed against her form, clawing at her bare skin. Luminous gray clouds rumbled above as they moved down the thick gray sidewalk. She danced over cracks and weeds that pushed up through the cement. Nights before she had walked this path, dreaming of a wedding in a forest. Now her mind raced with irrational thoughts. Fear swelled in her chest: fear that Damian had loved only her humanity, that she was living. He had spent many years among the dead, and alone without company in any form. Their time together had been short, and his proposal had only come when he knew her time had passed. She had done everything in her ability to return to him, easily accepting this position as angel of death.

Pulsing power pulled pleasantly around her petite form, coiling over cool skin like a snake.

They had explained her power to her simply. It was an extension of herself that allowed her to live. As long as she had power she would live. She could take souls from one side of the vial to the other and she could make items materialized. If Amy could think it she could make it happen.

Right then she was wishing she could make Damian see the world through her eyes, but she didn’t think her powers worked that way, they were more material possession sort of powers.

In their silence, the comfort of their contact was lost, but Amy did not want to break it while they walked. Her mind raced with thoughts that she dared not speak. They had always been open and honest with each other. The only secret that had ever been between them was what he was, and once that was in the open there had been nothing. Her thoughts now were threatening to spill out in anger and annoyance. Amy wanted to make sure she was more collected when they spoke, and she thought it would be best that he spoke first because it was his problems that needed to be discussed. Before he had said anything, Amy had thought they were doing well what with her back and able to be with him.