Catastrophe Jones

She woke up, a memory of blood bubbling at her lips, salt in her throat. It felt like seawater in her eyes, up her nose. Everything stung. Everything was knives. Everything was tightening, tightening. “You’re not you,” she whispered, staggering to her feet.

Vertigo.

“Oh, sh–”

Pinwheeling, she shifted, skidding, boots slipping, and the loose tile goes off the roof, and so does she, all arms and legs and wild hair, plummeting into the alley, sailing past the fire escape.

She squeezed her eyes shut, reaching her hands out in front of her as though she could arrest that high of a fall with just that.

A millimeter from the ground, she stopped, breath scattering the dust, her braids and curls slapping the ground. She could feel the heat of the sun-baked asphalt radiating against.

And then, she hit, cheek smacking the pavement, bruised and split at once, blood running, eye opening only to wince in pain.

“Must be Monday,” she groaned, and closed her eyes again.

Wake up.

The young, burly blonde man shudders in his sleep, and rolls over. “Hnnh?”

Wake up, child.

“I…wha–” He sits up, rubbing his eyes, and looks around, but sees no one, and comes fully awake, half-startled, jumping out of his bed and half-tripping over a football jersey.

Shhh, that’s it.

“I’m… I–” Wild-eyed, brown gaze staring over the world, confused.

No, don’t speak. Just Listen.

He waits, heart thundering in his chest, and struggles to understand.

Good.

Close your eyes.

The boy does, feeling a buzzing, a screaming, behind them, and he whimpers, frightened.

Open your eyes.

Standing before the mirror, the young man looks himself over — gone is the muscle, gone is the blonde of his hair, gone the brown eyes, replaced by intense blue that pierce the night, peering out from behind red-tipped black locks that lay against pale cheeks.

Hollis–

“Yes, Lord?”

You will serve me well.

“Yes, Lord.”

Find her.

“Yes, Lord.”

Dreams are a potent thing, especially for one who lives in life, serving death. Dreams are away for the past to speak to us, for our experiences to live with us, all over again.

Dreams are a way for the subconscious to take flight, like some graceful blackwinged bird that cries out in a one-note song, and lifts into the air, like a shadow dissipated by sunlight.

In her dreams, she will walk with Death, who takes down those she loves, and restores them again, some of them better than before, more whole, more perfect, and some less, taking away pieces of them that are vital, but the poor folks don’t know it.

Sometimes, Death gives those pieces to her, in the dreams, and those who have lost watch her mournfully, curiously, as she is given what was taken from them.

No one is angry, however, and no one accuses, but the whole of it has the taste of the midnight market, where there are beggars and those who would clutch and need and take without thinking of how she might be frightened.

The older woman is not there to guide her, and somehow, though she had been clutching it tightly only a moment ago, the cool, smooth, round stone of Death… has gone missing from her hand.