Grim Tales From Up Above

Chapter 6

She sliced her throat with the blade, but instead of blood spraying from her neck there was a bright light that emerged from her.  She lost all strength and hit the ground hard, as her body began to dissolve into tiny gold specks being blown in the wind.

Suddenly, the towering red monster, Him, started screaming in pain.  His neck was gushing with blood in the same spot where Her had cut her throat.  Junior got up and ran as quickly as he could from his once powerful adversary to the dying girl he adored so dearly.  He lifted her head with his skeleton hand, unable to say a word.  They were both in their original bodies now, simply staring at each other while she was dissolving.  

“Why?”  He finally managed to ask.  She smiled and looked in the direction of Him who was turning black and breaking up into little pieces of ash being scattered in the breeze.  Grim and Mandy were scratching their heads as they watched Junior walk towards them.  He approached his mother and without a word wrapped his arms around her, squeezing her tightly.  

It wasn’t until several weeks later was Junior finally able to talk to his mother and explain everything that had transpired.  She didn’t scold him or tell him how stupid he had been, she just asked if he really loved her.  He gave a nod and she retuned to him an expression of sympathy and understanding.

Minnie stood in the doorway of his room while he sat on his bed locked in a daze.  She couldn’t have understood what he went through, but she still wanted to know.  She sat there next to him trying to figure out what to say when he finally broke the silence, “I didn’t know her for very long, but I know I loved her.  And now that she’s gone I don’t want to do anything except cry.”

“Brother, it is okay to be sad.  Remember that you have an eternity to find love again, so don’t become lost in despair.  If you dwell on the past then you will never have a future.”  

The next few days gradually became better for Junior.  He found himself able to get up and enjoy himself a little bit.  Minnie even took him to a secret cave she had discovered in his absence.  He was awestruck by the ghosts that lived there.  There was even a headless horseman who Minnie had befriended.  (How she did it was a mystery, seeing it was impossible to talk to him.)  He gave them a ride to an interesting circus full of trapeze swinging zombies.  Junior let himself get lost in the sights and sounds of the circus.  

Junior was finally getting back to his old self.  The events that had transpired up above seemed like nothing more than a bad dream.  Despite everything returning to normal, he still missed Her and he missed living up above.  Well, he was the prince of the Underworld and had better just get used to it he told himself.  The siblings returned home at half-past midnight and crashed on the couch.  

Junior woke the next morning to find that he was in the backseat of his dad’s car with Minnie staring into a book.  He inquired to what was going on and was answered by his mother turning around from the front passenger seat.  “We’re moving.”  She said it as though he wasn’t supposed to be surprised.  So, of course, he asked where they were moving to.   “Your Uncle Nergal’s neighbors moved out.  We’re moving up to Endsville.”  Junior merely looked up at his mother stunned, as if waiting for her to say, “NOT!  Gotcha!” but it wasn’t a joke.  That’s when he looked out the window of the mid-size car to view a glimpse of his school as they passed by.  He couldn’t believe it.  

His dad offered to turn him human for school the next day, but Junior politely refused.  He was perfectly happy being the one eyed skeleton he was.  The Grim Reaper shrugged and went out to trim the hedges with scythe in hand.  Junior led Minnie to school, telling her all about his classmates and how shocked they would be to see him like he was.  Minnie carried her books close to her chest and stared at the sidewalk, she was excited to see all the kids and jumped with joy at the idea when Junior told her there was a school play coming up.  

Junior wasn’t paying attention to where he was walking because his head was turned to Minnie while he was talking to her.  So when she stopped suddenly, he didn’t know why until he turned his head to see a girl with red eyes and long dark hair standing only a few feet in front of them.  It was Her, standing there as alive as ever, as a human girl wearing a red dress and a backpack, fully prepared for school.

Back in the distance was the shadow of the Underworld’s queen, watching the three children go off to school.  A deep Jamaican voice asked, “You know dat ya shouldn’t of done dat.  Just cuz ya have the power doesn’t always give you da right.”  She wasn’t listening to him scold her.  Instead, Mandy just smiled at her kids going off to school.