Mist and Shadow

Damien wakes up to learn that he has been tasked with killing a young barmaid in London. There's just one hitch; he's dead.

Damien woke up with a start. The light blinded his eyes, forcing him to flinch and shut them again. He eased them open, trying to blink away the tears that clouded his vision.

He was sitting in a large room in front of an empty desk. A large roller chair sat across from him tilted to the side as if its occupant had just left the room. Everything in the room seemed to have been dipped in white paint; the walls, ceiling, floor, desk, even the little potted plant in the corner. The window was blocked by a screen, allowing only a sliver of pale light to filter in. Everything was impeccable, accounted for, and sterilized.

Damien looked around dazedly. Where am I? The past few hours had faded from his mind, making it impossible to remember. Something was nagging in the back of his mind, demanding his attention. He needed to remember... what? The thought swam away before he could understand it. He shook his head. What was it?

Before he could figure it out, the door opened and a man stepped through. He reminded Damien of a businessman; closely cropped blond hair, well groomed appearance, and deep blue eyes that matched the color of his suit. The man sat down across the table from Damien, and folded his hands on the desk. He considered him for a moment in a brisk, no-nonsense way.

"I suppose you'd like to know what you're doing here, yes?"

"Yes." Damien had to work to raise his voice above a whisper. He swallowed and avoided the cold stare of the man in front of him. It felt like he was being interrogated.

"You’re dead."

The words didn't seem to register in Damien's head.

"I'm sorry?"

"You died, and now you've come here to the Afterlife."

"You can’t be serious," Damien risked a confused smile. Is this guy insane?

"I'm perfectly sane, thank you very much. It's you that's the issue."

Damien swallowed, his mouth suddenly dry. "I-I don't-"

The man's face softened a bit. "Would you like me to show you?"

The man pulled out a tablet from underneath the desk and placed it on the table. The screen flickered on and Damien saw firefighters sprinting towards a crashed car. The car was crumpled, the hood crushed as if it had been a tin can. The firefighters reached into the car and pulled out a younger man. He couldn’t have been more than twenty-one, his dark hair falling in a mop over his eyes. He still had the long lanky limbs of an awkward teenager. Blood trickled down his strong jawline, running like tears down his cheeks. There was a gash in his neck as well, staining his shirt beyond recognition. His arm was bent at a strange angle, partially obscuring his face, butthere was no mistaking who it was.

It was Damien.

Damien pushed away from the tablet and held his head in his hands. His stomach pitched, yanking all the warmth from his body.

"Oh God.” Memories came flooding back. The wheel jerking, his car yanking itself out of control. Damien was falling, falling, and then...

He realized what he was missing. His heartbeat. Damien had never noticed it before, but the steady beating of his heart had always been there. Hovering on the edge of his perception, just common enough that he had never thought about it. Now, it had vanished. He shivered, wishing to be somewhere - anywhere - but here.

"I'm sorry, Damien. I really am. I know death can be hard on someone, but there's something else."

Damien raised his head, unable to believe how this could get any worse. The man's face was furrowed with concern and sympathy.

"Damien, you're not supposed to be dead.”

“What?”

“It’s hard to explain but-”

“What do you mean ‘Not supposed to be dead’?” Damien struggled to keep his anger and confusion under control. “Why should I even believe you? For all I know, you could be conning me or something!”

"You know I'm not a charlatan, Damien." The man said gently.

"Then who are you?"

"My name is Isaac. I guess you could say I'm an angel, but that sounds a bit cliché. Soulkeeper would probably be a better word."

"An angel?"

Isaac made a face. "Yes, I know 'Isaac the Angel'. Doesn't get more Biblical than that."

“How is that possible? How is any of this possible?” Damien fought to keep the rising hysteria from snapping his voice.

"Well, the thing is, Damien, the old proverb 'there's someone for everyone' wasn't exactly made to consolidate desperate middle-aged single women. It has a more literal meaning then that. You see, back on Earth, there is a woman named Cynthia Leford."

"What has she got to do with me?" Damien asked.

"She's your soulmate," Isaac said delicately.

Damien laughed. "You can't be serious. There's no such thing as 'one true love'."

"Well, actually that's besides the point. Yes, usually soul mates fall in love with each other when they meet, but that doesn't mean that they have to meet you or you them. You and that person age about the same time, maybe a year or so apart, but no more than that. There is a connection, a bond between these two souls. When the time comes, and your soulmate dies..."

"You die too," Damien finished. Isaac nodded.

"That is what makes you so extraordinary, Damien. Because you died before your soul mate was destined to, you won't be able to fully enter the Afterlife until she too dies. That could take days or decades."

"But if I can't fully enter the Afterlife, what happens to me?"

"You remain in limbo. A ghost in the mortal world, and a shade in this one."

“If I don’t belong in either world, how come you are here?”

“As I told you, I am a Soulkeeper. It’s my job to make sure that souls get from one place to another. That therefore makes you my responsibility.”

“Can’t you just bring me into the Afterlife? Or send me back?”

Isaac sighed. “Not without your soul mate.”

Damien looked down at his hands. The entire weight of the room settled on his chest as fatigue tugged at his limbs. He wished this could just be a dream. He wished he could wake up back home, safe and alive.  

“What must I do?”

"You must kill Cynthia."

Cynthia took a drag on the cigarette, trying to steady her nerves. She leaned against the back of the bar, silently but furiously cursing her luck. Each day, she was beginning to feel more and more like Fantine  in Les Miserables. Not exactly an ideal role model.

"Oi! Cassidy or whateva the 'ell your name is!" Bruce's rough voice rang out from the kitchen. "Get your sorry arse back in ‘ere and clean up!"

Cynthia closed her eyes and slowly counted to ten. Fetch this, sweep up, clean the dishes, chop these vegetables, dust the shelves, serve drinks. The neverending list of her chores threatened her already fraying patience. How the hell did she manage to not go insane?

Max poked his head out the door. Spying Cynthia, he gave her a kind toothsome smile. "Best do as he says, luv. The General is pretty pickled today."

Cynthia tossed her cigarette to the ground with a sigh and gave Max a rueful look. "When isn't he?"

She followed Max back inside, already resigned to an inevitable fate.

Damien watched the blonde haired woman walk back inside the bar, intrigued. "That's Cynthia, yeah?"

"Uh-huh." Isaac confirmed. "Cynthia Leford. Ex-journalist turned barmaid. She lives in a small flat in the Powell Estate. Not exactly wealthy, but she manages to get the bills paid."

The two were sitting across the street, Isaac lounging across a few garbage bags and Damien sitting on a empty crate, hands folded across his legs.

"How?" Damien asked incredulously. "From the look of this place, she's lucky to get minimum wage."

"There are more ways than bartending to make a quick dollar."

Damien recoiled slightly. "You mean she's a-?"

"Yup." Isaac's face shadowed. "Really, the only people she serves is Bruce and his little 'gang'. It's disgusting, but desperate times call for desperate measures."  

"And you really want me to kill her?"

"'Want' is such a strong word, Damien. 'Recommend' is probably better."

"And what if I can't do that? Even if a life is hell like this, it's not right for me to just end it."

"If you can't kill her, you'll be stuck in between worlds until she dies. You won't be able to eat, sleep, or touch anything that was once alive or still is. I'm only here to explain to you your options."

“When is she destined to die?”

Isaac laughed and tapped the side of his nose. “That’s not for me to say, Damien. The ways of Fate are more complicated than just living and dying together.”

“So there’s someone out there who wanted me to die early.”

“Or Cynthia to die late.”

"Great." Damien rested his chin on his hands. "Sounds thrilling. Isaac-" Damien turned to ask the Soulkeeper a question, but he’d vanished.

Damien was on his own.

Isaac’s boss was waiting for him when he returned to his office.

“Nice work with the boy,” the man said. He was leaning back in the office chair, his feet kicked up on the desk. “Although you didn’t really put the Fear of God in him, did you?”

“Feet off the desk please,” Isaac said, dropping the tablet on the desk.

The man obliged and stood up, scratching his neatly trimmed beard. “How long you giving this one?”

“Five years.”

The man laughed. “Oh come on, Isaac, you’re getting soft. The last one didn’t even make it half that. I wouldn’t have agreed to Damien if I didn’t expect to win.”

“He is different.”

“Seriously?” The man shook his head and clapped Isaac on the shoulder. “You sure are one crazy son of a b***h. I’m saying two years.”

Isaac raised his hand. “The usual?”

The other man took his hand and shook it. “Of course.”

Thunder boomed in the distance. Both men turned to look out the window. The man made a face. “You know I hate it when Dad gets fussy.”

It was Isaac’s turn to laugh. “Sometimes I think he’d be happier if all Hell broke loose.”

At the end of the work day, Cynthia Leford was ready to scream. Bruce had been more antagonistic than ever, shooting leering looks at her while she worked, making Cynthia redo the dishes again after one of them broke on the floor, and nearly shouting himself hoarse when she accidentally served a patron a single instead of a double shot.

"It's not as if I poisoned him, Bruce! God forbid your customers cut back on trying to drown themselves on dry land!" That had earned Cynthia a vicious slap on the cheek. Bruce grabbed her thick hair and pulled her close into his moist red face. "If you ever talk to me like that again," he growled, "I will beat you into an inch of your pathetic life.”

Fuming, with her cheek stinging, Cynthia had stormed out.

Now, a mile into her walk home, the edge of her anger had dulled. Her head throbbed with an oncoming headache. She had smoked her last cigarette earlier. Maybe a drink would help.

Cynthia suddenly stopped and looked around. She had a weird sense of being watched, but the flickering orange streetlight was the only sign of life on the empty road. Maybe one of Bruce’s friends was following her home again. She shuddered at the thought and quickened her step.

Please God not tonight.

When she’d first accepted Bruce’s offer for extra cash, she didn’t have a good night’s sleep for almost a month. As time passed, the visits had become less frequent. It meant she didn’t always have enough money to make ends meet, but it was worth it.

She kept looking back for the rest of the way home, but there was nobody in sight. She fisted her hands to keep the tremor from starting again

Cynthia lived in a decaying red stone building that reached three stories high. It seemed to sag compared to the other buildings, who stood proud and tall in the London night. Cynthia let herself in and took the old wooden staircase two steps at a time. She barely had time to close the door to her flat before she lost control. Tears streamed down her face as Cynthia slid down the door.

She was so bitter. Furious at Bruce for being so brutal, distraught over what had led her over the years to such a horrible life, disgusted with herself for not being strong enough to bear it. It was as if someone was cutting into her heart, slowly sapping her of her will to live.

She didn’t think she could keep going on like this much longer.

Being undead was a lot like being alive. Damien could walk around like anyone else, and still had all four limbs attached. No strange tail instead of legs, no pale complexion. Just a sense of being out of place, as if the world rejected his presence.

The London night was thick with the threat of rain. Damien had never been to England and it seemed strange to think that he never would. At least not in his lifetime. He supposed it was nice enough. A bit dirty and gloomy, although he wasn’t exactly getting the King’s tour of the city of London.

Cynthia walked ahead of him hurriedly, keeping her face lowered away from the people she walked past on the street. She had marched out of the bar, the very air seeming to crackle with the pent up rage she’d suffered through.

Damien had followed Cynthia home, more out of curiosity than anything else. The more he watched Cynthia, however, the more unsure he was that he could kill her. It wasn't because she was a pretty damsel in distress; with her lank blond hair, dull blue eyes, and colorless skin, she looked more like a ghost than Damien. No, it was just something about her fiery personality and how lonely she seemed when no one was around. She was a tragic mystery and Damien had always been a hopeless romantic. Small wonder they were soulmates.

Damien slipped into Cynthia's flat just before she closed the door. Seeing Cynthia's hard shell crumple, Damien almost left the room out of shame. He definitely felt lost now. What had he been thinking? He didn't even know who this woman was. But Damien could never turn a blind eye on someone's pain, even if it was a stranger.

Damien knelt down beside Cynthia. "Hey, it's okay. It's okay. There's nothing to worry about. Everything's going to be alright." He reached out to rub her arm, but his fingers passed through Cynthia. Damien felt a twinge of fear, then regret. His words probably were falling on deaf ears, his attempt at a gentle reassurance useless. It suddenly struck Damien that he would never mean anything to anyone. And it broke his heart.

Cynthia dragged her hands down her face and looked around. Despite knowing that no one could have seen her breakdown, she felt a slight crawling on the back of her neck as if someone was looking at her. The strange thing was, Cynthia felt comforted by the unknown presence. It was as if someone had come up to her and said "It's okay. I'm here, and I care."

But she was only being sentimental.

With a shuddering sigh, Cynthia pushed herself up from the hard ground and walked over to the sink. The tap water felt tepid and probably wasn't clean, but it still felt good to splash her face. She dried herself off on a threadbare towel and hung it over the edge of the shower. Pressing her hands on either side of the sink, Cynthia faced her reflection.

A starved, pale woman gazed back at Cynthia. Her gaunt face seemed to naturally pull downwards. Her eyes had sunken into her skull after weeks of poor sleep and dulled to the color of mold. Her faded t-shirt had Bruce's Bar in peeling red letters and looked baggy on her small shoulders. Once, Cynthia had been a Beauty. Now she looked and felt like a Beast.

Disgusted, Cynthia turned away and went over to her bed. Fatigue pulled at her limbs, begging her for a chance to rest. Cynthia should work; she needed to finish her taxes by next Friday, but the idea of sleep was too pervasive. Cynthia didn't even bother to change into pajamas before collapsing onto the bed and letting sleep wash over her.

Damien watched as Cynthia stared at her own reflection forlornly. He surprised himself by realizing there was a quiet beauty to Cynthia. Not in what she looked like or what she said. Just in what she was. But she was also killing herself. Her lack of sleep and proper nourishment was causing her to slowly fade away, as if she were a picture that was slowly losing all of its color. If left alone, Cynthia would end up dying in less than a year.

But if I stood by and let it happen, how would that be any better than actually killing her?

It wouldn't.

The question was, did Damien have the strength to actually kill someone?

No, Damien thought. The question is, do I have the right?

Cynthia was a victim of abuse and hardship. It looked like she had little reason to live at all. But Damien believed that everyone deserved - if nothing else - the chance to make life better. He, at least, would have liked a second chance.

The water hit her skin in a spray of pebbles. Cynthia scrubbed at her face, ignoring the pink tinge spreading across her skin. She scrounged up the last of the soap from the bottle and rinsed off her body, trying to ignore the raw tenderness left from her bruises and cuts. She turned off the water and stepped out of the shower, already reaching for the towel hanging on the back of the door. As she wiped off, she noticed that something was smudged in the glass of the mirror. She looked closer at it, hugging the towel to her chest. Someone has traced into the foggy mirror-

LEAVE

Cynthia shivered and ran her hand over the glass, vanishing the message. She pulled on her uniform and checked the time.

S**t.

Her stalker would get their wish. If she wasn’t at work soon, she’d be driving home in a hearse. Cynthia grabbed her keys and hurried out , making sure to grab the mace that was on the kitchen counter.

Hot soapy water spilled onto the linoleum, carrying swirls of grime and dirt with it. Cynthia mopped the kitchen floor as best she could, pushing around the heavy broom. She knew it was futile. Bruce made a point of dirtying the kitchen as fast as possible, ensuring that Cynthia had a mountain of tasks to do.

Mercifully, Cynthia's boss was currently snoring off a hangover that would sicken the dead, so she had the bar to herself for a few hours. Already she had finished cleaning most of the bar; vacuuming the worn carpeting, wiping down the heavily scarred wooden counters, dusting the liquor cabinets, and loading the antiquated dishwasher as full as possible. The pale winter sun had barely inched itself over the treetops, bringing little warmth to the drafty kitchens. She had long gotten used to the chilly bar, however, and preferred the chill to having her paycheck getting cut back. Along with being the biggest slob in England, Bruce was in line to be one of the cheapest. Cynthia risked turning on the radio to Acoustic Classics, a channel dedicated to soothing melodies and sorrowful harmonies.

The message in her flat had left her on edge. The chores helped distract her from the confusing sprawl of thoughts it had conjured. If ghosts were real - ha - maybe… maybe it had to do with the constant feeling of being watched. Cynthia snorted out loud. She was being ridiculous. Who did she think it was her guardian angel? She must be more sleep deprived than she had originally guessed.

"Next up is 'Skinny Love', a cover by up-and-coming artist, Bon Iver."

Cynthia froze. Her breath caught in her throat, leaving her as fragile as a leaf in a hurricane. It was stupid how something as simple as a song could leave her like this. But even as she moved to turn off the radio, her fingers stilled. Her mind flashed to that time not so long ago when Benny had asked her to marry him. When he promised it would last. She shuddered and bit her lip. It wasn’t fair. Once upon a time, she had been so happy. The last time she had heard this song she had been young, naive, and in love. Now she was older, wary, and heartbroken.

She sighed and rubbed her eyes. Who was she kidding? It had been eighteen months. Benny had long since found someone else to tease and rob. He wasn’t going to come back. But maybe she could move forward.

And then Cynthia did something that she used to think was impossible. She took all the rage, and the sorrow, and the pain; she took all the late nights, the broken promises, and the wasted time, and  let it go. It still hurt. It would be a wound that would never fully heal. But it was time to move on.

Classic Damien, he thought to himself. I finally find the right girl and now I'm supposed to kill her.

It had been four days since he had died, and Damien had occupied most of his time by watching Cynthia. He wasn’t trying to be a stalker; he was just genuinely curious about what made her tick. After all, if they were soul mates, they must have something in common. Most of her time had been spent worrying about money and working at the bar, at least during the day.

And yet, he found himself falling in love with her little world. Her habit of drinking tea first thing in the morning and right before bed. Of staying up an extra hour to finish her book even when she needed to get up early the next day. That little flash in her eyes when Bruce spoke to her or her light laugh when Max joked around. It was kind of like watching a movie, only it was being played around him instead of a screen.

At nights, however, Damien left her alone. Even though he knew she couldn’t see him, he still felt it was somehow intrusive to watch her sleep. He supposed it was because he felt like a perv. But it was also something else.

Maybe it was because that there something special about dreams, that idea that when we are asleep and dreaming, the thoughts we have are entirely our own. Like our own sanctuary from life itself.

And maybe it was because he needed the break too. He had wandered most of London, getting accustomed to the winding streets and bitter weather. It turned out that Cynthia was only a few minutes from 10 Downing. Damien had been tempted to stop in, but changed his mind at the last minute. Dead or not, he didn’t want to risk getting into unwanted trouble.

Being dead gave him plenty of time to think. At first he’d wondered if he’d finally gone crazy. Maybe this was a coma and he was just dreaming. His mind always wandered back to Cynthia. What she was thinking, if she noticed him, why she always looked so sad. If he could really kill her.

Damien supposed that if he did kill Cynthia, he might stand a chance at winning over her over. Then again...

Hi, I'm Damien. I suppose you wouldn't remember me, but I'm the person who killed you. Would you like me to buy you a drink?

Somehow Damien didn't think that would be much of a turn on.

He sighed and leaned back against the plaster wall. In his heart, Damien knew he could never kill somebody. Especially not someone he was rapidly falling in love with. Which meant he had a long wait ahead of him.

The back door to the bar suddenly burst open, and a bull-faced man stepped through. His stout torso was barely covered by a stained white t-shirt, and his teeth looked like they had been implanted from a hippopotamus. Seeing Cynthia, Bruce sneered and walked over to where she was. "'Ello, 'ello, 'ello," he said. "Someone been cleaning in my kitchen?" He laughed and slapped his bartender on the backside. "Looking good, sweetheart. You and me should get a drink sometime."

Fury ignited in Damien's blood. The disgusting pig. Damien longed to punch his teeth in, but he couldn’t touch Bruce. He was forced to watch and hope that Cynthia could take care of herself.

"Done sobering up then?" Cynthia asked bitterly.

“Ah, c’mon, love. Don’t be like that.” Bruce moved closer, his eyes looking at her hungrily.  “I only came in to check on you. From the looks of it, you could use a little cheering up."

Bruce grabbed at her, but she managed to move the broom handle fast enough that it rapped him hard across the knuckles. Snarling with pain, Bruce backhanded Cynthia.

She fell backwards against the sink and he kicked her to the floor.

“You miserable little brat. I should have fired you after day one. Cast you out with all the rest of the garbage.”

“It'd be better than working with a sniveling pig like you!”

Cynthia hit a nerve. She backed away quickly on her hands and knees, narrowly missing another kick aimed at her head. Bruce's kick connected with the side of the stove with a dull crack. He broke out into loud howling and swearing, his bloated face contorted with pain.

“You goddamn b***h!”

Cynthia scrambled to her feet and cowered against the side of the freezer. Bruce was standing behind her and the only exit. Her eyes darted to the cracked door, but it was too far away. The mace was sitting uselessly on a shelf above the oven. She couldn't even call for help. No one would hear her. Bruce saw her glance to the door and sneered.

“Oh no little miss. You ain't gettin away that easy.”

He pinned her in place with one hand, and started unbuckling his belt. She struggled to break his grip, twisting and thrashing.

There was a sudden crash behind them. Pots and pans spilled out of the overturned cart. The roar of metal on concrete made Bruce flinch, giving Cynthia an opening. She shot her knee up into his groin and shoved him to the side. He tottered over and fell into the freezer, landing on his a*s. Before either of them could move, the door banged shut. Cynthia watched the door lock itself even as Bruce started swearing.

Again she felt her skin crawl with the familiar sense of somebody whispering in her ear.

Go.

She didn’t need telling twice. She stumbled out of the kitchen and into the cold London morning. The brisk air helped her clear her head. She took a shaky breath and hugged herself. That was it. She was getting out.

Epilouge

"Hello?"

Damien jumped and turned around.

A young woman was standing behind him. She was roughly his age, her long blonde hair plaited down her back. Her soft blue eyes searched his brown ones and Damien felt a thrill of excitement.

"Hello."

“Have we met before?”

Damien hesitated. “In a manner of speaking, yes.”

“Oh.” The woman looked a little embarrassed. “I’m sorry, I don’t remember you.”

Damien swallowed. There was so much he wanted to tell her. Over fifty years of protecting her. Waiting just so she could have the life he never had. And now he didn’t even know what to say.  It had been hard to watch her die, but now she was here. She still looked so beautiful.

"Who are you?" she asked, not unkindly.

"My name is Damien. And, I suppose, I'm your guardian angel.”

Reviews

[Sara Lufrano]

Hi Hi!

Thank you for the read! Very cool premise and good characters. I really like your writing style and imagery. Good dialogue too.

I'd like a better reason for why this all happens. What are Issac's motivations? Does Issac get in trouble if he doesn't correct this?

Cynthia changes too quickly. If she's going to change that quickly and for the reason of seeing Bruce get hit in the head, she should have come to a stronger realization earlier. Maybe she's sure something like Damien is there and takes it as a sign that she needs to get out.

It starts pretty gritty, which I really liked, and then got slightly comical. I'd like the grittiness carried through.

Overall, really good. I really like the idea! Thank you!

[acousticwriting]

Thank you so much! I am so grateful for your comment - it really helped me improve my writing. Best wishes and luck,
Hannah