Death Sucks

by Andrew Mallen

  “Mad?”

  “Yeah! Mad! Insane! Think about it from his perspective. An Angel walks up out of nowhere and tells you the world is ending, that God is being fooled, that Satan is planning to overthrow Him and that you need Him…Him to come on down here to have a chat about it.”

  “Shit,” Bobby spat, when she put it that way it was no wonder anyone with a molecule of common sense saw her as nothing more than a full-fledged nutjob.

  Gunshots echoed from between the cluster of tall, brick buildings.

  Roger!

  “Roger!” Maria cried out in terror.

  Bobby was already sprinting toward the shadowed walkway where Roger and Lenny had disappeared with the cop.

  *

  The cop was down, Roger lay on top of him while Lenny worked to pack the wound of a kid a few feet away as if immune to the danger he was putting himself in.

  “Lenny get down!” Roger pleaded.

  “Can’t dude, gotta pack the wound or he’ll bleed out.”

  Inspired by his partner, Roger shed his fear, assessed the scene and triggered the microphone on his portable two-way. “Officer down, officer down. Shots fired from the upper floors on the north side. Two victims need immediate evac. One civilian, male, early twenties, bullet wound to the abdomen. One NYPD officer, bullet wound to the upper right arm, currently unconscious. ”

  “Good job,” Lenny gave Roger a well-deserved compliment.

  Bobby and Maria beamed like proud parents. “At least we got something right,” Bobby gave them both a much-needed verbal pat on the back.

  “Yes we did,” Maria agreed.

  A bullet ricocheted off the sidewalk a few feet to the EMTs left.

  “Fuck that was close!” Roger cried out.

  “This guys packed but we gotta get him and the cop outta here, pronto!” Lenny shouted.

  “Let’s do it!” Roger wasn’t keen on playing target for whatever trigger happy crackhead was firing at them.

  Another shot bounced off the concrete, closer this time. Bobby had to do something, he wasn’t about to let Roger get killed, not after all the work he’d put into the guy. He sliced the air with his scythe after whispering the idiotic passwords and stepped from the sidewalk and into an apartment so nasty it made Roger’s pre-sober pad look like a suite at the Ritz.

  Needles, baggies, used condoms and every other variety of filth littered the cracked linoleum floor. A tall, lean, corn-rowed addict of no more than twenty fidgeted beside the sheet covered window. He was sweating profusely despite the cold and the fact that he was buck ass naked. Mumbling, pulling at his junk, sniffing his fingers and shuffling in a tight circle, the speed freak was tightly wound in the web of his favorite poison.

  The naked guy peeled the grimy, makeshift curtain back, raised his 9mm Gloch and popped off two quick shots. “Pigs! Fucking pigs! Freddie knows, he knows!” he screamed hysterically.

  Bobby had to stop him and figured logical reasoning wasn’t exactly this guy’s specialty. Dropping his hood he yelled as loud as he could, “Hey dickless?”

  The shooter spun, his reflexes and his senses were heightened by the drugs pumping through him. The gun came up level with Bobby’s chest. In the living world with his hood down, Bobby was as vulnerable as he was visible.

  Should’ve thought this one through a little better dumbass.

  Bobby whipped the butt end of his scythe up into the dangling testicles of the shooter. Something popped.

  “My nuts!” the naked guy screamed as he crumbled in agony and forgot everything else.

  The gun slid across the floor and into a pile of what appeared to be dirty diapers.

  Smells about right. I hope those are his because if there’s a kid in this shithole then this guy needs a lot more than a ruptured nut.

  “Just say no!” Bobby screamed at the writhing maniac, raised his hood and blew the druggie’s already fragile mind.

  *

  “What did you do?” Maria asked, arms folded as she waited for an answer she knew she wasn’t going to like.

  “Saved our boy,” Bobby replied coolly.

  “You interfered, you broke the Laws didn’t you?”

  “Yes I did, I broke your Laws,” Bobby admitted with pride.

  “Well…well…” Maria wanted to be angry, she wanted to be the voice of reason but she knew the Reaper did what needed to be done to save them all. “You…you…okay.”

  Bobby stared at the Angel as if she’d grown another head. “You mean you approve?” he asked.

  “No!” she cried. “But it was necessary.”

  “So doing bad things is okay if it’s for a good reason?” Bobby pushed.

  “No!”

  “So please, explain it to me then.”

  “No!” she growled and shot him a look of heated exasperation. “Stop! It’s not the right time for this! Can’t you ever just leave it?”

  Mayday, mayday! You went too far! Should’ve just taken the pass dumbass! Ha, that rhymes.

  “You’re right. Sorry. Really, I’m a jerk,” he said and hoped it wasn’t too late.

  Maria examined him with her burning emerald eyes to see if he was done being a jerk. Satisfied, she nodded and forced a weak smile.

  “Thanks.”

  “For what?” Maria asked.

  “For always letting me slide when I do something stupid.” It was hard to admit it but Bobby knew he was no easy guy to hang with.

  Maria smiled again, this time she didn’t have to force it.

  13.

  “You have to kill me,” Maria said it so casually that Bobby was sure he’d misheard her.

  “What?”

  They had just returned from Roger’s two-year anniversary meeting. Lenny had given him his coin. The two men had become inseparable, their friendship was the best and brightest part of both their lives. After deciding the world was ready for the ultimate bachelor slash gamer pad, they decided to move in together a few months earlier. Roger added the last of his ill-gotten, freezer-burned cash to Lenny’s hard-earned savings, and together they managed put down nearly fifty percent of the hefty asking price on a newly-built townhouse in New Rochelle.

  The place was a lot nicer than either of them had ever lived in before. Two bedrooms and two bathrooms split the second floor atop an open staircase rooted in a wide open living room. The kitchen was white and clean and modern and the two roomies vowed to keep it that way. A formal dining room had no place in either of their lives and was quickly converted into a gamer’s paradise. Two 60 inch OLED hung on opposite walls with a PS4 Pro and an Xbox One S hooked up to each one. Matching desks stood side by side. An Alienware laptop, customized for optimum graphics and performance, sat on each one. An official movie poster from each of the Lord of the Rings movies covered one wall. A massive bearded Viking axe crossed a broad sword over a shield depicting two battling dragons decorated another. A colorful, glossy poster of a universe where no man had ever gone before and an original cartoon rendition of Yoda sitting on the toilet reading his species version of Playboy adorned the last. At the door a life-sized Darth Vader complete with a motion activated light saber (Lenny had sold his entire collection of comics to buy it) guarded the entrance. The room was their pride and joy, their escape, their little slice of heaven on earth.

  Maria sat on one of the four comfy kitchen chairs staring into the thick border of woods that surrounded the development but her mind was a lot farther away. Bobby sat on the opposite side of the round wood table, studying her for any signs of insanity.

  “It’s the only way,” she said without turning to look at him.

  “No it’s not. We have a way, we have a plan. It’s taking a little longer than we imagined, sure, but it’ll work,” he didn’t even sound convincing to himself.

  “The ones that listen think I’m crazy or corrupted. The others won’t listen to a word I say, it’s like I have the plague or something,” she accurately summed up their progress over the past eighteen months.

&
nbsp; Bobby couldn’t deny they were failing but there was no way he was giving up. “You mean the ones that run like you’re a zombie and they’re the last fresh meal on two legs?” he asked with a grin.

  Maria frowned. “Listen Bobby we tried, we really did but it didn’t work and we could run out of time at any second. Roger thinks he’s Superman down there risking his life five nights a week. He could die at any time! I’m scared Bobby, I’m really scared.”

  “He’s fine,” Bobby dismissed the idea.

  “No, he’s not! We’re not!” She spun to face him, her frustration was getting the better of her, “This isn’t just about Roger, it’s about us!”

  “Us?” Bobby had never heard her use the word that way, if he had a heart that beat it would have skipped more than a few.

  “Not us…us, like a couple us,” she squashed his short lived excitement. “I mean this, our plan, our mission.”

  “I know,” he lied. “But that’s the plan, that’s what we agreed. Roger takes us to the dying and we try to convince your people to listen.”

  “He’s happy now. He’s living a good life, we can’t mess with him anymore. It’s not right and it’s too dangerous.”

  “That’s part of the deal ya’know?”

  “Ya’know?” she mimicked him, they both began overusing the phrase since living so closely with the man who coined the verbal crutch.

  “Really?” Bobby smiled.

  She returned it. “Sorry, bad habit, ya’know?”

  They laughed together in the empty kitchen. The break in the tension was a much needed distraction.

  “Think about it at least,” Maria pleaded once they settled.

  “I can’t. I don’t want to,” Bobby said and cringed at his own childishness.

  “We might not have a choice,” Maria pushed gently.

  “There’s too many ‘what ifs’,” Bobby brought up the long list he’d begun compiling a few weeks earlier when she first began dropping not-so-subtle hints as to her new line of thinking.

  “This is a ‘what if’. Our whole existence is a ‘what if’. We started this and we have to finish it Bobby. Roger is not immortal and once he dies then everything we’ve done, everything we know will die with him. Sitting around here, riding around with them in that ambulance, trying to convince Angels they’re all doomed, it’s not working Bobby. We have to take the next step, we have to.”

  Damn she’s good. All common sense and logic and stuff. All batty eyelashes and the whole desperate and beautiful thing. How am I supposed to stand up to all that?

  “I know,” Bobby relented.

  “You do?” Maria couldn’t believe it.

  Bobby looked at her with sad, tired eyes, eyes that had seen too much, eyes dulled by unspeakable horrors and the fear that went with them. And still those same eyes peered out into the world hoping to find something to make it all worth it, something to hold on to, something and someone to love.

  Maria studied him closely. She could’ve loved him, she knew she probably already did but there was nothing she could do about it. He was a Reaper and she was an Angel. Worlds separated them, universes, entire plains of existence neither of them could even begin to understand. And if that wasn’t enough there was the Laws she swore to abide by when she took her sword. She wasn’t allowed to talk to him or to touch him, never mind hold him close or need him. She wasn’t supposed to but she felt herself ache with the thought of not being near him, of not hearing his laugh or seeing his smile. But she needed to be strong, she needed to resist. Love was an added complication that only made an already impossible situation even worse, but it was a lot more than that.

  “We’re supposed to change the world, right?” she asked.

  “Yeah girl, all of them right? Me and you, Pinky and the Brain 2.0,” Bobby tried to sound his usual undaunted self and failed miserably.

  “I don’t know who Pinky is but that’s the plan, it’s been the plan all along. We have to keep moving forward, right? We’re stuck, you know it as much as I do. It’s not what I want but I think it’s the only way.”

  It was Bobby’s turn to study the trees.

  This is crazy! Like, crazy fucking crazy! Even if I wanted to…I don’t know if I can. I hate this! I hate this shit so much! She’s right. That’s the worst part, she’s right. How am I supposed to do it? How do I kill her? I love her!

  “So… when do you want to die?” Bobby asked without turning.

  “Tomorrow works for me if it works for you,” she replied calmly but she could barely keep herself from running to him and hugging him with all the pride she felt welling up inside her. “I want to finish up with Mr. Robot before…”

  Bobby didn’t let her finish, he didn’t want to hear her say it again, “TV junkie.”

  “You did this to me Robert Grant,” she squealed with relief and delight, happy the hardest thing she’d ever done was behind her.

  “Point a finger at me and there’s three pointing at you,” Bobby countered and shook his head with insincere disgust.

  The dead walked together into the living room toward the lure of the big, clean, comfy microfiber sectional and the 70 inch 4K Samsung that hung across from it. Maria threw herself into her spot against the left arm and Bobby plopped into his on the opposite side. The space between them was as intimidating as Death Valley and as tempting as the Garden of Eden. Bobby used Lenny’s jail broken iPad to download the latest episode and cast it up onto the big screen. Inside, in his mind, he was terrified beyond anything he had ever felt before but refused to let it show for Maria’s sake.

  I’d let this whole thing go if I could spend a lifetime or two with her. Selfish? Yep. Horrible? Yep. True? One hundred fucking percent with sugar on top.

  *

  Swirling winds and the freezing rain lashed the Bronx mercilessly. People scurried to wherever it was life required them with their collars high and their heads low. Whether to hide from the cold or from the truth of why they were out so late mattered to nobody but them. Parked on the Bruckner Expressway service road, Bobby and Lenny were enjoying a Star Trek trivia game of their own creation within the cozy confines of the ambulance’s cabin. In the back a far more serious discussion was under way.

  “I don’t think I can do it,” Bobby whispered.

  “You can,” Maria replied, wanting desperately to reach out and take his hand. “You’re strong and you’re brave Bobby, I’ve seen it.”

  Bobby’s eyes yearned for tears. They burned and they itched but they were as dry as desert sand.

  I can’t do this. I can’t hurt her. I can’t let her go. I won’t! I won’t!

  “Bobby?” Maria whispered tenderly.

  He cringed at the sound. It was so beautiful, so soothing, so soft and so sweet, and he hated it. He hated what it asked and he didn’t want to listen. Not anymore, not about this, not when all it wanted was for him to kill the only person he’d ever loved.

  “Bobby?” Maria asked more urgently.

  “What?” he asked without raising his head.

  “You said you knew…that you knew it was our only chance,” she reminded him of their conversation the night before.

  Bobby nodded slowly while making sure his hood kept his face hidden in shadow.

  “We can’t risk waiting any longer,” she pushed, she didn’t want to but she knew he’d never do it if she didn’t. “We have to do it now.”

  “The ‘what ifs’,” he grumbled knowing she was right but stalling anyway.

  “Bobby,” even frustrated she still maintained a gentle, comforting tone. “We’ve been through this. I know it’s hard. I know you’re scared, I’m scared too. Really, really scared.”

  Bobby heard the pain hiding in her words. He raised his head to look at her. Through all the crazy, mind-warping nuttiness she was his rock, his anchor and his best friend. “Maria,” he wanted to tell her, to admit how he felt but he couldn’t, it would only make things harder. “I’m…I’m nervous.”

  The Reaper
had something he wanted to say but didn’t, something he always seemed on the verge of sharing but never did. Maria thought she knew what it was. She thought it might very well be the same secret she kept so diligently guarded but didn’t dare push him to reveal it fearing he might do the same.

  “I am too Bobby,” she whispered. “It’ll be fine. I’ll go to Him, I’ll explain everything and I’ll be back before you know it.”

  “And if Roger dies while you’re gone?” Bobby voiced his biggest fear.

  Roger dying would mean Bobby would be hell bound and, without an Angel, Roger would be as well.

  “I will find you,” Maria said it with so much confidence and with such conviction that Bobby believed she would, that she’d do everything in her power to do just that.

  He nodded and closed his eyes to hide the misery they held.

  “Don’t let Roger do anything foolish while I’m gone ya’know?” Maria said.

  “Ya’know?” Bobby couldn’t resist.

  Maria smirked, “Keep him in check, right, that’s how you say it?”

  Bobby smiled despite himself, she could always make him smile, “Yep, you got it.”

  “Ok then,” Maria rose from the bench and melted through the securely locked rear doors of the ambulance and into the storm.

  “What? Now?” Bobby cried as he scrambled after her.

  Maria turned to face her executioner, her ginger curls dancing hypnotically in the wind. Her smile beckoning Bobby anxiously.

  *

  “Here?” Bobby looked around, taking in the scene.

  The NYCHA buildings bordering both sides of the eight lane expressway loomed like sentinels and smelled of desperation. Traffic roared past in both directions, garbage swirled its invisible wake. The aerial ballet reminded Bobby of his own futile existence since his death as he bounced along aimlessly at the whim of an unseen force and with no end in sight.

  “Come on Bobby, just do it before I chicken out,” Maria begged, her face drawn and her lips quivering.

  Seeing her bravery and her determination, her strength, it only made him love her more. “I…I can’t!” he roared.

  “You have to!” the Angel cried. “You have to or I’ll let the next Reaper I see do it if you don’t.”