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Well. That had been easier than she’d thought it would be.
She turned the gilded gold doorknob and stepped into the lobby. The polished stone floors seemed to stretch forever in front of her, bordered by the fence on the right and the endless army of columns staggered into perpetuity on her left. She could see the faint outline of Roberta’s desk getting nearer, and beyond that, the huge cooler full of silvery souls began to reveal itself.
But the desk was empty, and so was the rest of the lobby, from what Bunny could see. She frowned as she approached, eyes dipping to read the hand-scrawled ‘Back in 15 minutes’ sign that Roberta had clearly left on her desk.
Bunny gathered all the confidence she possessed and forced it into her walk as she approached the huge cooler. The souls within were swirling in serene circles, like that fancy vodka with the glitter in it after it had been shaken up by a really good mixologist. But as Bunny got closer, it was like they could sense her presence and got excited. They began to move more quickly, darting in and out of each other like a huge litter of metaphysical puppies.
Oh boy, Bunny thought, grabbing her pendant. She maintained the air of confidence she didn’t truly feel, worried that if she put even one toe out of line they would smell her fear. The handle above the nozzle tingled when she touched it, but she didn’t hesitate, dipping it forward with painstaking carefulness so that only a few souls trickled out at a time.
And then she felt it. The tiniest, most irritating itch underneath her right nostril.
She flared her nose and wriggled her lips, hoping to dispel the weird sensation, but the more she tried not to scratch her face, the more persistent the itch became. But it wasn’t until the tickle in the back of her nose that she knew she was really in danger. Her brain felt like it momentarily disengaged, making it impossible to focus on anything other than the spasm that was about to rock her world.
Her fingers pulled the cooler handle a little too far forward. Hundreds of thousands of souls saw their chance to get one step closer to freedom. They rocketed out of the faucet, slamming into Bunny’s pendant at the exactly the same moment that she was captured in an inescapable spasm.
“Ah-choo-lerghph!”
She was thrown backwards with the force of the refill, looking for all the world like one of those action movie heroes who tried to outrun an explosion only to end up being blown dramatically into the air anyway. Breaking the worst of her fall with her backside, she still landed painfully with the heels of her hands behind her.
She grunted, pressing her hands to her chest protectively as she slowly lay back until the pain subsided. She closed her eyes to the bright while light that obscured the ceiling above, wondering if it might even heal her if she lay there long enough.
Her train of thought was cut short when a dark shadow blocked out the light.
“Gesundheit.”
Bunny didn’t need to open her eyes to know who was blocking her potentially body-healing rays. “Come to finish me off?” she snarked. She kept her eyes closed, partly because she was more than a little embarrassed to think that Death had just witnessed her epic backfire—literally.
“Not your time,” he replied urbanely, like they were merely discussing the weather and not the fact that she almost broke her damn neck not sixty seconds ago. “Though I’m sure you’re going to have some rather nasty bruises in some very inconvenient places.”
The sudden suggestiveness in his words made her open her eyes just so that she could glare up at him.
“Your wrists,” he clarified with a smirk, reaching for her. “Here, let me help.”
His movement was enough to make her scramble to her feet, potential fractures be damned. She straightened her scrubs and smoothing down her hair, tilting her head to one side as she tried unsuccessfully to hide her embarrassment. “Thanks, but I’m the kind of woman who likes to pick herself up off the floor.”
“I noticed. You get that from your mother.” Death tucked his hands into the pockets of his coat and squared his shoulders. She’d come to recognize the dual gesture as something of his ‘reset’ button, but the action still drew her eye. Bunny thought she noticed a brief flicker of movement, as though he was trying to hide some kind of agitation.
“I get my ass-kicking skills from her too,” she told him, lifting her gaze to meet his by way of a challenge. “Just in case you’re familiar with those.”
“As a matter of fact, I am.” He pulled a face, as if the mere mention of said skills was enough to send a shiver up the very spine of Death himself. “Not first-hand, of course. But I do confess, Connie was terrifying when she wanted to be.”
Bunny’s mind flashed back to an image of her mother, madder than a wet cat and twice as wild, after she and Ben had pilfered the apple pie she’d made for a church fete and taken it down to their hideaway at the old salvage yard to share the feast with their friends. She almost smiled at the memory but chose to raise a brow instead.
“This from a man who reaps souls for a living,” she quipped back, before pausing in thought. “Are you a man?” she asked, and then regretted it the next instant. “Sorry,” she added, fumbling. “That was rude. I only meant—”
“Are you a woman?” he interrupted her. His dark eyes narrowed as he honed his focus in on her, but the subtle lift of his brows hinted at amusement. Playfulness.
“Yes,” she volleyed back, straightening her shoulders to look more feminine than her scrubs would usually make allowance for. “But I’m alive. Mortal. You said that you can’t remember a time before time, right? Plus, you’re Death.” She shrugged, as though that explained pretty much everything, including her need-to-know status about whether or not he was a Ken doll or anatomically correct ‘down there’. Call it medical curiosity. “Stands to reason that you’ve never actually been alive. Only Life would need to know what it’s like to live,” she pointed out.
That was the statement that gave him pause for thought, and it was the one she actually managed to feel guilty about. His face fell as soon her words hit their mark, stinging him where she now knew he was the most vulnerable.
“I think that’s true,” he said, his voice so quiet that it poured salt in the paper cut her guilt had sliced into her conscience.
“You mean you don’t remember if you’ve ever been alive?” she asked just as softly, apologizing with tone and cadence, if not with the actual word.
“I don’t.” He cleared his throat very slightly before throwing her a wry look. “It’s part of the reason why I ask for my vacation every year. Four weeks as a human.” His lips took on a sardonic twist that smacked of bitterness. “See how the other half live.”
Well, shit.
