Death Stopped By

Everest Nelson has got a story, and it was one for years he'd been planning on taking with him to the grave. But time and age had remained with him all through the years. He was thirty years old when the incident of the story occurred to him, and now he was in his early eighties, sitting beside a table in his hostel-like room located in a nursing home that was situated five miles from the city, surrounded by miles upon miles of rolling hills and verdant outdoors.

It was raining outside and it splattered repeatedly on his closed windows. He observed the pouring rain with sombre interest. It too had rained on the fateful day the incident of the story happened to him. the rain was soothing to watch, and it was partly why he was seated here by the table with an exercise book open before him, holding a pen in his hand while he gradually dredged up the memory of what had happened to him on that day ... of the person he'd met. He doubt if anyone reading this story when he was done telling it would ever believe a word of it; he too probably wouldn't were it not the fact that it happened to him and not anyone else. Hopefully by the time he was done telling it, he would have discovered why he even chose now to write it. Why not simply take it to the grave, as he'd always promised himself that he would? It wasn't like anyone he'd ever been with knew of it, not even his late Angie or any of their five kids or grand kids ... no one knew but him.

Everest brought the pen to the book's open page and began to scribble ...

EVEREST'S STORY

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My name is Everest Nelson. Right now I'm seated in my room inside of a nursing home watching the rain fall outside. I am a month shy of turning 82, and the contents of what I'm about to tell are real and true, even though you, Dear Reader, may never believe it to be so. I am an old man, but I don't feel like one. I've witnessed a man die, and I as well witnessed who killed him. It happened forty years ago, and it's the story that I'm about to tell. Please believe me when I say I'm not losing my marbles or going senile on you—whether you choose to believe what I'm about to say is left to you. But it was real alright ... and it happened.

It was the month of October when it happened. I remember this because just like today that I'm writing this, I was as well a month shy of becoming forty-two back then. My wife and I (God rest her soul), lived in a small town called Kuta. We lived in the outskirts and during that time we owned a large farm plantation as well as a supermarket. It wasn't something big, and sometimes weeks tend to go by with us making little or no sales. The town dwellers often prefer hopping into a bus and travelling the 10 miles trip to the city to get all what they required at the large markets. But usually when we got folks trooping into the town, usually Youth Corpers coming from far across the country coming over to teach in the local schools, then we'd get busy stocking the aisles with the usual stuff they preferred instead of risking the journey of heading to the city.

It's usually hot around October. The rain showers came very few or usually unexpectedly. The earth becomes hot and parched—the season gets tedious for farming. That day was a Thursday and I was seated behind the counter flipping through a newspaper that was three days old and thinking these same thoughts when there came a loud rolling grumble in the distance. I got up from my chair and glanced out the back window at the sky and saw how steadily the dark clouds were approaching the town. Strong gust of wind blew through the louvers at me, cooling off the patches of sweat I spotted on my shirt's armpits.

At that moment I heard the bell chime as the door was pushed open, announcing the presence of someone stepping into the shop. I turned around at the sound of someone stumping his boots on the withered welcome carpet at the door's entrance and right away knew who my first customer of the day was—Magnus Jethro, the one and only.

At the time prior to him dying suddenly before my eyes, Magnus Jethro was pushing sixty-three and was everything a miserable old man should be. Dour, cantankerous and just plain annoying as anyone I knew back then in the town. He had a wife whom he'd practically driven to madness because of his constant nagging attitude, and three sons whom after leaving the town had not once ventured to come and see how the old fart was doing—not even when the town opted to foot the bill in burying him. Now here he was in my shop, and I couldn't help but wonder whatever might have brought him here. Alicia, my wife, had gone to the city to pick some items at the market and wouldn't be back till another two hours; I was stuck to with Magnus till he left my sight.

Done with his feet stumping, he looked up at me and gave me a haughty look before turning around and shuffling between the aisles in search of whatever. I turned to look out the window and by now the dark clouds had built into a covering blanket and had covered just about every inch of the sky. There came another groaning rumble of thunder and then flashes of lightning spewed in bright succession out of the sky's underbelly. I cringed from inside my clothes. Always I've been frightened by the sight of lightning, and that day was no exception. Minutes later the sky opened up and sent down showers of rain; the electricity went off soon after that.

"Damn lights!" I heard Magnus curse out loud from within the middle of the store. "You'd think every time it rains that the idiots have got to turn off the switch. Stupid ingrates they are!"

Who was I to argue with him; the mere sight of him was enough to spoil my day, much less a bit of heavy downpour. I reached for the newspaper I'd been perusing a while earlier and flipped it open to read up some headline I'd undoubtedly read five, six times already. There was little light for me to make out the words, so I opened a side drawer and took out a candle. I lit the wick with a match and placed it on a stand and found it easy to read then while Magnus, the old buzzard, shuffled about the store.

The door bell chimed once more and I looked to see who it was. At first I couldn't make out the dark shadow that stood there by the entrance, not till I picked up the candle stand and held it before my face. Behind me, the shower of rain was turning into a torrential downpour with thunder crackling every now and then.

It was a hooded figure and the first thought that came to my head was that whoever it was standing there in a black hood was someone's idea of a crazy joke. Then I looked closely and noticed the stranger—whoever he was—held some kind of staff in his hand.

"Hey!" I called out at him. "Hello there ... can I help you?"

The hooded figure turned its face towards me and all I saw was a hole of blackness where its face ought to have been. Then I looked closely at its hand, and got my first shock of surprise ... and fear. Its hands ... there were skeletal. I felt my heart leap into my throat and I just about gagged on it when I realised who'd just stepped into my shop.

Writing all this down, I know you, Dear Reader, are going to find it hard swallowing any of this. These words are probably nothing more than an old man chalking up some crazy dream he had or some type of hallucination. This isn't exactly something I expect anyone would want to believe, not even those charlatan psychics or Apostolic preachers, always talking drivel about the world going to Hell ... like any of them have been there before and lived to tell the tale. No, I don't even expect myself to sit here and believe any of what had happened that day ... but happened, it had. And I wasn't drunk or stoned, or delusional in anyway to think I didn't recognise who'd just stepped into my shop.

Death, it was. Galloping Jesus, it was Death in the flesh!

There came the sound of something clattering to the floor and then smashing to bits. I practically jumped from the sound as then I remembered Death and I weren't exactly alone in the shop. There came loud curses coming from the far end of the shop. Magnus had probably broken something as he almost always did whenever he came shopping here. I was about to yell out at him, ask him what the problem was, when I turned to look at Death and noticed it disappearing behind the standing aisles close to the door. I should have come round my counter to see whatever was happening, but instead I remained rooted where I was, too scared, too frightened to cry out for help ... as if any measure of help was going to come around to lend a hand. Outside the rain and thunderstorm was still striking the earth, cutting us from the rest of the world.

There was a two-by-four plank hanging under my counter table in case of extreme emergencies that since we opened the store neither I nor Alicia have ever really encountered. This was one of such instances where the wood ought to have come in handy ... except my hands, my body, was so stiff with fright to think about taking it out from its hiding place.

There was Magnus, calling out in triumph was he shuffled over towards me, cradling something in his hand and waving it in the air as if it were a gold nugget he'd found. He dropped it on the counter in front of me; it was a medium-sized jar of Vaseline. He was grinning at me and heaping with happiness. It was the last happy look I saw on his face.

"Well, well, wouldn't you know," he said to me, crackling in delight. "Wouldn't you know how long I've busted my butt trying to get me one of them Vaseline jars. I ran out of my last one the night before. Woke up this morning feeling empty and cold inside my bones."

I was reaching into a side drawer where he kept nylon bags in which to bag his Vaseline jar while he reached into his back pocket and unearthed a wallet. At that moment I looked over his shoulder and there was Death coming at him from behind like the wraith that it was. It stretched out a skeleton's hand towards Magnus. I was about yelling out to Magnus to look out when Death's hand touched his shoulder.

There was enough light from my burning candle for me to see what happened next. Magnus uttered a throaty gag and his body became stiff as if he'd just been struck by lightning. His complexion turned pale almost at once. His body broke into a shudder and his lips made a blubbering sound the kind a child would make if it were choking, and in a way, Magnus did look as if he were choking on something. At that moment the shock seemed to come off me and I saw Magnus was about slipping to the floor. I grabbed his jacket collars and tried holding him up, asking him what the matter was, even though already I knew. Magnus grabbed at his chest, still making that gagging sound in his throat. I stood there holding onto him while at the same time watching the life drain out of him. He became too heavy for me to hold on to and eventually I allowed him to fall from my hands to the floor. I came from around the counter and kneeled beside him, trying to feel for a pulse by the side of his neck. There was none—he was dead and gone from this world.

A dark shadow came before my face. I looked up and there was the wraith-like creature standing before me; its empty hooded face staring down at me, and me as well staring into its face, into the void that was infinity. I remained like that, staring up at Death while it too stared down at me with its staff in its hand while I cradled Magnus's dead self in my hands. My heart was beating so fast, I thought I was dead already.

Then it raised its other hand towards me. Still I remained where I was, not daring myself to move, yet frightened out of my wits and breathing heavy at the same time. Afterwards when I get up I would realise I'd peed on my jeans. I watched as Death brought a finger towards my forehead and did what looked like a sign of a cross a few inches from my face. Then it turned around and walked towards the door. The door bell chimed and flung itself open for the wraith as it then disappeared inside the rainstorm outside. I got up to my feet, letting Magnus's head hit the linoleum floor, and went to the door. I looked out into the steady downpour, but could hardly make out anything. The road passing in front of our shop leading further into town was completely washed up by the rain. Brilliant flashes of lightning lit the sky sporadically, followed by loud clashes of thunder that made me disappear back into the shop.

I went to the back room and searched out an old blanket that had been in there for God knows how long. I returned with it and draped it over Magnus's corpse. I said a muted prayer for him. He'd been a most irritating bastard in town, yet no one had wished any harm towards him. Now he was gone, and it felt so much like I'd missed an old friend.

I remained in the shop with him for another hour plus while the rain continued its downpour outside. I kept vigil over him before three young men from town arrived at the scene; they too were just as surprised to see Magnus lying on my floor, dead.

"What happened?" the three of them asked me.

"Heart attack," I said without even thinking about it. "The old buzzard had himself a heart attack."

That was the same thing the doctors found when they performed an autopsy on him in the city memorial hospital where his body got moved to the following day, long after the rain had stopped and a hot sun had returned once again with a vengeance. Alicia did ask me about it, and I told her the same thing I told anyone who bothered to ask me about how he'd died. Never once did I mention about what had really killed him—no one would have believed me anyhow.

My wife and I, and practically half of the town, had attended his funeral; his wife had been comatose, too weak to even accept the news that her erstwhile tormentor was now six feet under. There had been a mild celebration afterwards, and the next day and the day after that, the town's business had gone on like it usually does in such places. Years later people had forgotten about Magnus. But not me; never did I forget.

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The question you're probably asking right now, Dear Reader, is what happened to me when the wraith nearly touched my skin, making that cross-like sign above my forehead. I won't say that I really know, but I could venture a reasonable enough explanation. It's the same explanation I've come to accept all these years in my old age. That unlike all the other miserable-looking old farts living in this nursing home out in the middle of nowhere, I've been blessed with life. I know that even when I'm done writing this piece of story, that I'll still be alive and well. That my heart will still be beating with the same strength as when I was twenty. That I will live to see myself become a hundred years old, and that no ailment or sign of illness is going to come and change that.

I believe this as much as I believe all what I saw that day. I hope that by writing this and leaving it all for you, that someday you too will find it in your heart to believe me.

Somehow I doubt you will.