Cian

"Watch your step," I said, offering Lucie my hand to help her clamber over a throng of boating supplies: an oil tank, an old and rusted propeller, a couple moist and mildewy life jackets. Inside the ill-lit boathouse, it smelled like gasoline and saltwater, the paint peeling on both the interior and exterior. I sighed; the first dock had no evidence of a body, so I traced my way past the flotation devices to go the second, but got the same result.

Lucie leaped from the second platform, landing roughly on the third. She began to teeter on her toes, and I inhaled, only letting myself breathe when she didn't fall. Her voice, however, did sound wary when she called to me: "Cian, you might want to see this."

I came to her side and peered down into the water, where a boat should have been. Instead, a man floated facedown on the surface, the water turned grayish black by the lack of sunlight. His skin was blanched and lifeless, hair gray and stringy. He had obviously been there a while, as the scent of rotting, moldy flesh wafted up into my face.

Next to me, Lucie coughed and covered her nose. Other than that, however, she showed no sign of severe disgust; she didn't turn and run back out, like I'd expected her to. It brought a begrudging smile to my face. "Do we touch him?" she asked me.

I shook my head. "No. Don't touch him. Diseases and stuff."

"Right. Diseases and stuff," she repeated. She turned in a slow circle, scrutinizing the boathouse. She stopped abruptly and tugged at my sleeve. "This looks familiar, doesn't it?"

Lucie faced the only boat in the structure we stood in, a vintage sailboat docked at the second platform with cracking white paint and a rusted wheel. Someone had painted The Sea Daisy in faded blue on the side, but that wasn't what had caught Lucie's eye, and it wasn't what caught mine. It was that same line I'd seen in Richard Hall's kitchen, and painted using the same substance: blood. Tis starving that makes it fat. "So you were right," I said to Lucie, glancing back at the body. "Whoever it is isn't just killing for sport. They're planning these murders."

"Murder," said a vacant voice that sent chills down my spine. I looked up, and my eyes met the dead man's, bland and cold, as if they'd been drained of color. He was stocky and broad-shouldered, still wearing the fishing shirt and cargo pants he'd died in. Damp gray hair fell across his eyebrows, stubble moving around his mouth as he spoke. "That's what happened to me. The shadow followed me, then it killed me."

I froze up a little. "The...the shadow?"

"You wouldn't mind elaborating, would you, Mr. Fisherman?" Lucie offered a sweet smile, and I just shook my head at her. There was something strangely enjoyable about having her there, standing at my side, assisting in any way she could. In fact, I realized, I felt empty without her beside me. Even if she only reached my shoulder.

Mr. Fisherman shook his head once, a curt gesture. "I don't know," he said, then his eyes lifted to me, wide and crazed. "It followed me and it killed me. It followed me and it killed me. It followed me and it killed me!"

I raised my eyebrows. I'd never came across a soul who was so lost. By now, the pungent scent death brought along with it was relentless in my nostrils, like decaying matter. I licked the scar at my lips, reaching to grab Lucie's wrist. "This guy's gone bonkers. Stand back."

"What are you going to do?"

A smile blossomed on my face, pulled up further at one side than the other. My shoulder blades had succumbed to their usual tingling, my wings humming underneath the skin. It grew louder and louder, and I let Lucie's wrist go, pointing at The Sea Daisy. "My job. Boat. Now."

Only when both of her feet were inside the vessel did I let my wings free, flapping them to power myself forward. The wind my wings created rocked the boat Lucie was on, the water lapping up against the docks with more force, slapping them with blaring thunks. Mr. Fisherman's eyes grew wider, and he shouted again, "The shadow killed me!"

Then he darted out of the way.

I drew myself to a halt.

I'd never taken care of a soul that didn't want to go the afterlife, but the way this guy was running around, you'd think he was positive he was going to hell.

"Alright, mister," I muttered, watching him skitter from platform to platform, "game time's over. Time to go."
"The shadow was like you," Mr. Fisherman said. "He was dark, all dark..."

"Shut up," I said, and sighed, reaching out to grab him as he passed me another time. He squirmed, and I slammed him against the dock, the only way I could keep him from moving. He looked up at me in terror, and I said, "Goodbye."

I brought my wings around us, a customary part of the process, and then he was gone.

There was the only the water and the sun and The Sea Daisy.

"Are you done now?" came Lucie's voice, cutting through the silence like a blade.

"Done," I said, dusting off my hands. I got back to my feet, and Lucie peered over the boat's bow, her eyes wide and studying. For a moment, I questioned why she was gawking at me like that, until I realized I had yet to retract my wings. I rubbed my shoulders sheepishly.

"You have wings," she said.

"Yeah."

"They're pretty."

The look I gave her was skeptical; in a sea of adjectives, pretty was not the one I'd expected her to land on. "Thanks?"

"They're also, um, black."

I eyed her strangely, letting them return to their hiding places in my upper back. "Does that scare you?"

I climbed into the boat, resting myself on the edge of the bow with an exhale. After a moment, Lucie joined me. "I mean, no," she answered respectfully, "but it is kind of creepy..."

"So they do scare you."

"No!" Lucie exclaimed, shaking her head. The sun was up by now, and it caught in her irises, turning their dark, ebony color a lighter caramel. Her eyelashes glittered like jewels. "Wings aren't scary. Fangs are scary. Bloodlust is scary. Wings aren't scary. I'm not scared."

"Sounds like you're just happy I'm not Edward Cullen."

"That may be true," she admitted with a grin in my direction, and I smiled back at her, before I realized something. Amidst the salty smell of the bay, another scent peculiarly remained: faint but unpleasant, like something rotting in the distance.

I realized with a start that it was death.

Yet, the soul was gone, so in all logicality, the smell of death should have went with it. It lingered, however, and with it, something else: roses.

I froze.

No. That can't be. Lucie's not—

I looked at her, but she was too busy watching the bay's waves come in and out to notice my distress. I tried to convince myself I was mistaking it for something else, but no, the scent was death, and it was coming from her direction. I bit my lip. Why? She wasn't a ghost. I could touch her, feel her. This had to be some sort of mistake—

"You touched that guy, you know," Lucie said suddenly, tearing me from my reverie. She hopped off the ship's edge and stood before it instead, resting her elbows on the railing. As she looked at me, she pushed a few awry curls behind her ear. "And he was dead, but you touched him. So why can't Vinny touch anyone?"

I pushed my thoughts away for a moment, climbing out of the boat. Maybe if I avoided thinking about it, it would go away. That had never worked before, but there's a first time for everything, right? "With Vinny," I told her, "it's different. I can touch souls because it's the only way I can send them where they need to go, but Vinny's beyond direction. That's the difference between a soul and a ghost. One can leave, the other can't."

Lucie frowned at me as she stepped onto the dock, following me as I headed for the boathouse's exit. There was no longer any reason to be there, and now that the sun was up, I had a strange craving for pancakes. "He's stuck here, you mean? How did that happen?" she paused, then sputtered and covered her mouth. "Oh," she said, shaking her head. The sudden crimson color to her cheeks was adorable to me, though I'd never say so. "Forget I asked that. I'm sorry. You don't have to tell me."

"You know what, Lucie?" I said, considering. I stopped for a moment, feeling her gaze on me as I slipped my hands into my pockets and took a long breath of fresh, seafaring air. I didn't realize how much I had missed this place, missed drifting into the Pacific on our family boat, missed the playful, childish yells bellowing from my throat: "Race you to the dock, Vinny!" I hadn't realized how much I missed normality.

This is my life now.

I turned to Lucie, ruffling her hair. She blew a raspberry at me in response, swatting at my hand. "It's story time."