It is our choices, Harry, that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities."

(J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets)

I let out a bunch of curses which, thinking back, probably wasn't the best thing to do if I was supposed to be judged. Oops.

Then again, dead or not, falling on your butt hurt. And it felt all the worst because Malach was lying down on Dash's bed, dirty shoes and all, and not seemingly being bothered by it.

Why he could lie down and I couldn't? It seemed unfair!

"Yes, you see. Guides are responsible for many things... One of them being, of course, researching a person's past and their motives for each one of their actions. We are a person's lawyer, so to say." He explained, his expression filled with laughter even as his eyes remained serious. Dead. It was a strange combination.

"Once they get in the Afterlife, we defend their decisions so they can be forgiven and move on..." A long pause, and then he smiled. "And before you ask, the Afterlife is where you are now. You see, we have Living, which is the place where your family and friends are. We have Heaven and we have Hell. I don't believe I need to explain those to you."

I grimaced. "No, you don't. TV did plenty of it."

"Well, you shouldn't believe everything you watch on TV, but oh, well. It's good enough for now." Tapping his foot in the bed, he took a deep breath. "Afterlife is divided into four. We have the Waiting, which is where you are, where everybody stays until after their judgment. We have Purgatory and Serenity - which are transitional places. Sort of like being in school, if you wish. And, of course, we have the In Between... Which is the place where we, as the guides, live."

I got to my feet and shook my head. "This is confusing," I complained, but Malach smiled at me.

"No, not really, not once you figure out how things go once you die. You see, once you do, you automatically go to the Waiting - it's this phase where you don't feel as if you are really dead. " I nodded emphatically at this - there was a bit of relief in knowing I wasn't insane, that people went through these things I was going through as well.

"Then, well, there's the Judgement. If you are good, you go to Heaven, if bad, to Hell. Of course, there are those people who are bad but not enough to go to Hell. If they want to have a shot at Heaven, they go into Purgatory, to learn. Then there are the ones who are mostly good, but not enough for Heaven. Those go into Serenity. Schools, you see?"

"And you?"

"People In Between... We are special, I guess. You can find all sorts of people In Between: Good ones, bad ones... In short, we are the misfits. You see, most of us have a very strong reason not to want to move on. The reasons though, vary." Shrugging, Malach sighed, opening his eyes to stare at the ceiling. "They can be good, can be bad, and every single shade in between. If you want my advice, though, don't ask someone why they are In Between. Most of us don't like to talk about it and it can be seen as a very rude question."

Oops. "Sorry." I whispered, and Malach shrugged.

"You are the one I'm supposed to guide. It's fine."

"And so...You are going to defend me?"

Malach shrugged. "Sure, if it's needed and if I'm able. You see, I can't lie in my defense. But what happens is that, sometimes, those guides want to free their charges so much, that they blind themselves to the person's faults. They find excuses for terrible acts that don't have an excuse, simply because they don't want to see reality. They don't want to see their charge's faults.." Malach stretched and then set, eyes staring at his hands for a long while. I didn't know what was going on in his head, but I did know it was something bad. Something he wasn't to blame for. With a sudden movement of his head, he turned to stare at me, freezing me in place as efficiently as a lion would a deer. "A couple of years ago, a friend of mine did the worst thing she could ever do - she fell in love with her charge. And as they say, love is blind, Maisie. Aline would have forgiven everything Izak did. Everything."

I winced. "This doesn't sound like it ends well."

"That's because it doesn't, " Malach agrees, grimacing. "Then again, no cautionary tale ever has a good ending. It's why they are named 'Cautionary' in the first place. Anyway, Izak managed to convince Aline he was innocent, that all he needed was time to prove it. In her distraction, he ran away and stole back his own body. Now he continues his life by bringing other people to despair, pain, and sadness. "

"I'm so sorry to hear this..." I whispered, shaking my head. This obsession with keeping living even after their time is gone, this just didn't make sense to me. "Is Aline ok?"

He offered me a small, kind smile. "Aline will never be ok again - she was sent to prison to pay for her crime of aiding him. The only way to free her is to bring in Izak to pay for his own crimes... Which won't happen, not until he dies."

I frowned. "Well, then follow him around, until he dies. Isn't that easy?"

"Not really - especially not when you consider that Izak died three hundred years ago. Not when you consider that Izak keeps his life and his youth by drinking the life force of different people, people such as yourself, Maisie."

"Like me?"

"Yes, people who died before their time, you see? More specifically, people who died before their time due to particular conditions. He drinks their energy until he finishes feeding on their very soul - like a vampire. Most often than not, we don't even notice their soul is gone until it's too late - it was lucky Savannah Blackwoods noticed you. I wouldn't have found you otherwise."

"You mean... you mean if I don't fix this I'll end up disappearing?" I said, and if my voice sounded a tad hysteric, well, I figured you'd forgive me.

I was a tad hysteric.

His eyes went sad.

It was funny, I thought, how his eyes could look so dead, be so empty, and yet be so expressive. Almost a contradiction.

"No, Maisie. I found you in time - I'll guide you to the afterlife and you'll be able to move on. You'll be safe. But there'll be a price to pay - Izak fed on a good part of your soul already. You'll never be able to be reborn again, not safely, so you better be lucky enough to get Heaven the first time. Also, he'll feed on another soul soon... and I might not be able to save that soul from nothingness."

I frowned. "I...You must be mistaking me for someone else. I mean, as I said, I'm nothing special – even my death was a stupid accident. I can't save anyone... not even myself. I'm not a heroine."

"Are you sure, Maisie?" his voice was suddenly so dark that it made me shiver. "Was your death really an accident?"

*

Malach left and if you asked me what I did in the next hour, I wouldn't be able to say. I do know that the next thing I knew, I was back home, curling on the ground close to my bookshelf.

My hands ached to touch my books, to turn the pages and trace the words written there. Some of them were dear to me, so dear, I knew them by heart.

My parents hadn't decided to do what them yet, so they were in my bedroom the way they always were. In fact, my whole room was just as I remembered leaving it – and I found some comfort in that.

Despite the fact that it physically hurt me when my hands passed through my books. Just straight through.

I don't know how long I stood there, but the next thing I knew, my bedroom door opened and Jace sneaked in. He had huge bags underneath his eyes and it looked like he'd been crying for hours.

I wished I could hug him so bad.

"I watched that show today." He whispered, and I knew he was talking to me... Which was really strange, if you consider that he was looking at one of my pictures in the nightstand, instead of me. But oh well. "The one you always said you liked and I said it was too nerdy for me. It wasn't quite so bad... and now I feel sorry for teasing you so much about it. Damn, May, I feel sorry for so many things now."

I found myself inching close to Jace.

"Jacey, you don't need to be sorry," I whispered, glancing at him.

"You know, I've told Mom I'm going to start reading your books. I think it made her a little bit happier, that someone else would read them. Would it make you happier, I wonder." With a sad smile, he glanced at my books and then back at my photograph. "Do you think you'll ever forgive me? Do you think Dash ever will?"

I watched as Jace laid down in my bed, my portrait held tight against his chest. I watched over him until he slowly fell asleep, tear tracks still present on his face.

If you asked me what I did in the next couple of hours, I wouldn't be able to tell.

There was a mix of feelings bubbling inside my chest - I was sad, tired, confused, angry and even... relieved.

It was hard for me to make sense of those feelings, even harder to put them in words. The knowledge that I couldn't remain in Waiting forever, that soon Malach would be here and he would be wanting me to make a decision, to make a choice... it made me feel sick.

I know what a heroine would do - any hero or heroine worth their salt would decide to help save Aline, and God knows how many other people this cruel fate, the fate of becoming nothing.

It was funny how even being dead didn't sound as bad and being nothing... I guess in part because all any of us want, as a race, is to leave a mark in the world.

We all want to do it in different ways. Some want to find a cure for an illness. Others want to score well in games. Some want to be known for acting in movies or singing and some want to be known for being the best teacher or providing the best home care.

At the core of it, I think we want our lives to matter. Even if it's just to a few people... or even just one person. We want to matter.

To think we can become...nothing. Can you imagine it? Become nothing. Nothing. Even dust is something - dust makes people sneeze, it leaves a mark. Nothing is, well, nothing.

It sounded terrible.

And yet, what he was asking of me, I didn't know if I could make it. I was fourteen - a girl who liked reading books. Sure, I learned a lot from reading Sherlock and watching Supernatural, but I'm not sure how much of it is actually useful.

Maybe nothing at all.

And the idea of facing a being that had been around for centuries, it was scary. It was even scarier to think that there was a part of me living inside him now - and did it mean I was partially responsible for what he was doing? Did this mean I could tune him in like Harry Potter?

I didn't have a scar, which was a bit of a bummer. It would be kind of neat if I had one, and then I could feel pain when he was around and so on. Sort of like a radar.

Because, let's be honest here, why did this guy pick me my soul to snack on? Or, heck, when did he do it? I'm not super social. I'm not someone who's always at parties - most often than not I avoid them like the plague.

So when would this have happened? And when it did, wasn't there anybody else better than me around? I've already said time and time again I was nothing special! You're a century old, you can have a refined palate. Why not go after super talented people?

Or, again, why not go after people nobody would miss? Because, ok, I don't have tons of people that love me, but the ones who do, do it right. Like, seriously, look how Ingreth was! Look how my brother was!

I wasn't easy pickings.

Then again, I didn't want him to pick someone like, say, my brother. Or my parents. Or Ingy. Or Dash. Or Miss Savannah. Or anyone really.

So I guess it's better that it was me.

Satisfied with that conclusion, I was starting to ponder over what to do again when a loud noise made me - and Jace - jump.

It was the door, and inside came a furious Ingreth dragging a pale Dashiel behind her.

I couldn't help it, my eyes zeroed in their hands. She was holding his hand.

Jace was looking at them with a confused, sleepy, expression. It was clear he didn't know where he was, nevermind when he was. I always loved waking him up exactly for this reason.

Jace looked like a confused puppy until someone shoved a cup of coffee under his nose. You know what I mean - when you nudge a puppy awake and he was toasty and warm and is all 'why did you do it?' And then you prepare a milk bottle to feed him and he stares at it for a little bit, not knowing what is it for, and then he latches into it.

It's adorable.

"What's going on?" he asked, his voice a little husky from sleep. I had a moment in which I wanted to pinch his cheeks, grinning at him before I turned to look at Dash.

My good mood died when I noticed Ingy was still holding his hand.

"What's going on? What's going on?! Well, you should ask your sister what's going on!" Ingreth said, lifting her hands to the sky and finally letting go of Dash's hand and finally I could smile again. Oh, Ingy was mad - and when that happened she was a force of nature – she had always scared me a little bit, to be honest. Still, this might be the one time in forever that I was actually happy to see her furious.

Well, not happy, per se. Relieved, maybe.

You see, Ingy and Joanne never got along. Never. Ingreth was the one person who seemed to absolutely loathe my sister.

"I'll never understand how come you two are related, Maisie," she often told me, which made me shrug. I know she meant it as praise, but the words always kind of bothered me.

I guess it was because I wanted it to be obvious we were related. I kept seeing those stories about sisters who were also best friends and I craved it.

Only, clearly, it had never happened.

Jace, still half asleep looked at Dash, who shrugged. Actually, Dash didn't even seem to be paying much attention to what was going on.

He was looking at me – no, he was glaring at me. As if I had done something wrong – and in fact, I'm pretty sure that the only reason he wasn't yelling at me is that there were other people around.

I found myself hiding behind my brother, hoping to escape his glare – but much to my surprise, Dash also stepped to the side.

Is he afraid I'm going to disappear?

The memory of yesterday, when he went to shower and then ran back to his room when I went quiet made me flush. Shoot, I didn't mean to scare him.

I just wanted to spend a bit of time with Jace, who clearly needed me... Also, I wanted to clear up my head a bit after Malach's visit, but I wouldn't if I had known he would be this mad.

I mean, it's not like Jace could see me, right? Dash could, so...

"What did Joanne do now?" Jace asked, running a hand through his messy hair and making it stick up at the end.

"Look at this!" Ingreth said, pushing something that looked like a piece of paper against my brother's chest. "I want to kill that girl!" Letting out a loud sound of annoyance, Ingreth started pacing around.

My brother glanced at the paper and let out a loud growl. Curious, I moved and stood on my tiptoes to look behind his shoulder.

I still couldn't see anything, so I tried a little harder. A little harder...

And then, I could see it.

It was a picture of me – I could even remember when it was taken. It had been one of the best days of my life: we had gone to watch Fantastic Beasts in the movie theater in town. In this picture I had a huge smile, a plastic Harry Potter wand clutched tightly to my fist.

I was in geek heaven that day.

As I remembered this, a slight smile started forming on my lips. It was a good memory. I couldn't understand why they had been so mad; not until I saw the strange drawings in dark red ink at the very bottom of the picture, plus a single word, written in all caps.

DIE.

The combination bothered me so much, but so much, that it was painful. So painful. I couldn't understand, but the pain grew and grew until I had to clutch my stomach. It was like I could feel the car running through my stomach again, and it hurt. I felt my body get heavy and heavier, and then I fell.

Holy crap, I could float?

I was totally floating!

Pain momentarily forgotten, I was beaming at myself for floating in the air because, seriously, who wouldn't? I was floating.

So cool.

I turned to glance at Dash to see if he had seen me float, but he looked like he had seen a ghost – Ha, which he kind of did, right?

"Maisie?" he whispered, and I frowned. Why did he look so worried? I was a ghost, it wasn't like I could die, right? I mean, not again.

It was then that I heard Jace's curse and I turned to look at him. "I'm sure Joanne didn't mean it. She better not have meant it." He sighed. "You know how her relationship with Maisie was – they argued a lot. She must have written it on a fit of anger... she didn't mean it."

"But May- May is..." a sob left her lips and she shook her head. "dead, Maisie is dead, and Joanne should not be showing off this picture to those friends of her, that boyfriend of hers, brandishing it around as if it was a bloody trophy."

I frowned, not really happy to hear this and then Jace replied – I know he did, because his lips moved, but I couldn't hear it.

I couldn't hear anything but the loud sound of my heart pounding inside my chest. I glanced at my hands and they glowed, blood dripping from my fingertips.

Blood.

<<Maisie Pereira, surrender. Your soul belongs to us.>>

The voice was so loud, I wondered whether anyone else had heard. I looked around, but couldn't see anyone else in the room with us.

Another vicious bout of pain and I cried, it hurt so much, it wasn't supposed to hurt like this. I was dead! I had never heard of anybody feeling that much pain after they were dead!

As my vision started to fade, I noticed myself falling and I was almost sure Dashiel screamed and behind him, a huge pair of blood-red eyes watched me from the impending darkness.

"I don't wanna go." I whispered, as my eyes meet Dashiel."I don't wanna..."

"MAISIE!"

╭───────╯•╰───────╮

YOU DON'T NEED TO RE-READ THIS TO UNDERSTAND THE STORY. YOU CAN GO STRAIGHT TO THE POINT WHERE YOU STOPPED READING.

Originally published: December 3rd, 2019

Revised: March 24th, 2020

╰───────╮•╭───────╯