Thanatos Hangs Out

Three men in their late twenties were drinking beers and playing video games one night in a high rise apartment, somewhere in San Diego’s Gaslamp District. Death appeared and said, “Hey there, dudes. Don’t get up, finish your beer. Enjoy it, it might be your last.”

Alan jumped anyway. “Holy crap! You… I… are we going to…”

“Die? Of course. You all are. What you mean is, ‘Soon?’ Well, far as I know, I’ve only got one slip here for this visit.” Death turned His hourglass upside down and set it on the coffee table, next to the salsa bowl. An eerie calm descended. All three men blinked a few times, as Death’s spell of Acceptance of the Inevitable took hold. Although Death knew that on young men such as these, its effect would only be temporary, it was nevertheless the only way He could have a conversation with His client, and the effect did not need to last very long.

Brian was the first to ask the Grim Reaper, “So, who is it? Who are you here for?”

“Dunno. I don’t get told until the last moment. No, no — please don’t bargain, it’s tedious. By the time it gets to Me, the decision’s been made. I’ve got no discretion when the time comes. If you have a complaint, that gets routed to Fate. That goes for after My visit, too.”

Calvin said, “So what do you want?”

Death leaned His sickle against the wall. “I don’t often have a lot of spare time between My appointments. But I’ve got about ten minutes here, so I thought I’d take a short break before My schedule catches up to Me and I get slammed again. That’s about the time you two were planning on leaving Brian’s apartment here, right?”

“Yeah, pretty much, I guess,” Calvin said, “We hadn’t really talked about it.”

“Fair enough. Just do what you were going to do. Talk to me. See, I don’t get to find out what most of My clients are thinking. I mean, I’m sure they’re not happy about Me coming, but beyond that. What if it’s you I’m here for? For lack of a better phrase, could you live with that?”

“But I just got engaged!” Alan cried. “I want to have a family with her and enjoy a lifetime of love!”

“Yeah, and I just started my own business!” Brian protested. “I want to succeed and grow wealthy!”

“What about my friends, my family? My dog!” Calvin seemed distraught, despite Death’s calming magic. “I don’t want them to feel bad, to have grief for me! Grief is awful, it’s painful.”

“Of course you have some regrets, some things aren’t complete. There are always regrets and mistakes, there are always things left undone. Almost no one has completed all their missions by the time I show up. And yes, those left behind will grieve, some of them mightily and with great pain. They’ll mourn you. Then, almost all of them will eventually move on. The holes in their hearts won’t go away, but the pain will dull with time, become part of their emotional backgrounds. Trust Me, I’ve seen it billions of times. And it’s not a bad thing. Don’t you want them to be happy even after you’re gone?”

“It would be nice to be missed, but of course I want them to move on, too,” said Brian. “That’s part of what loving someone is, wanting them to be happy. Even when I’m gone, I want them to be happy.”

“So,” Death said, “this isn’t about them, it’s about you. Are you reasonably satisfied with what you’ve been doing so far in life? Was it worth the candle?”

“Wait,” Alan said. “What do You mean, ‘worth the candle’?”

“Sixty seconds ago, none of you were thinking about Me at all. Now, you know one of you has…” Death checked his Movado watch, an onyx face with obsidian sweeps and tarnished platinum Roman numerals. “Let’s call it eight and a half minutes left. And maybe another has about eight and a half years left. And the third makes it all the way to 85. No one gets to know how much time they have. Are you happy with how you’ve used your time so far?”

“I guess,” said Calvin, “That depends on what’s next, after You take us.”

“Ooooh, that.” Death waved His bony hands over one another, back and forth, waving off the query. “No help for you there. ‘Next’ is not My department and Judging is not part of My job description. Maybe Fate has some ideas for you. Unless She doesn’t.”

Alan said, “I don’t think I’ve had enough love. My parents and my sister, a couple of girlfriends. Never knew any grandparents, they all died when I was a baby.”

“Sorry about the grandparents, man. Like I say, I don’t control My own work schedule,” Death said. “But what about your friends here? If this is your last night, haven’t you spent it in the company of friends who love you?”

“Guys don’t talk about that a whole lot, but yeah, there’s the love of friends too. I suppose you’re right, I’ve had my share of love even from these dudes.” Alan nodded his head, but then stopped, considering that it might all be about to end. “I suppose there’s worse things than laughing and being with your friends right up until the very end.”

Brian said, “I’ve had my share of love, too, I guess, but can you ever have too much?”

“No. Or money, or sex.” Calvin jumped in.

“That’s interesting,” Death observed, “Sex, I get sometimes. But I don’t ever really talk about money all that much with My clients. Luck complains in the cosmic break room that it’s all you mortals ever talk about. But She’s wrong; I almost never hear about money. If it turns out I’m here for you, Calvin, do you think you had enough money? Do you care?”

Calvin sulked, chastised. “No, I don’t care about the money. But pleasure? Sex – who ever dies thinking they’ve had enough sex? Isn’t that what makes life worth living?”

“Is it?” asked Alan. “Gotta be more to it than that. Besides, sex is good, but it’s not the only pleasure there is. Neither is money.”

“Dude, he’s right, Calvin,” said Brian. “I’ve deferred pleasure, hoping to have more later or to achieve something. I could have played video games instead of studying but I didn’t. I don’t regret that.”

“So what about you, Brian?” Death turned his dark gaze to the host. “You’ve had some success in your career already. Is that what you’ve wanted to do with your time? If you’d known I was coming for you tonight, at your age, would you have still put in all that work?”

“Yes, I think so,” Brian said. “You’ve gotta do something with yourself. But I suppose I’d have taken more chances with women.”

“I shouldn’t tell you this,” Death said. “But you could have hooked up with Erica across the hallway before she met the guy she’s dating now. Might have worked out.”

“No way, Death, she wasn’t in to me.”

“Trust me, I have this on good authority, Brian. Love and I exchange information all the time.”

Calvin protested, “How was he supposed to have known that?”

“Couldn’t have. Only experience under your belt, looking back and seeing your mistakes, lets you learn from them. That’s why I tell my clients not to regret their mistakes too much, that’s how Life works. She’s a bitch sometimes but then again, I’m the only alternative to Her there is.”

Brian said, “What good does knowing I blew a chance at romance do me now? I suppose I learned from it, especially knowing what You’ve just said, but if You’re here for me, that bit of insight is just a huge waste, isn’t it?”

Death’s watch beeped.  “That’s the five minute warning. Anyway, of course it’s a huge waste, Brian. When is it not? If I take someone young, the potential is wasted; if I take someone old, the experience is.”

Alan jumped in, “So why do You take anyone?”

“Gotta. It’s the job. Look, what I’m saying is, I might take you in five minutes, five weeks, five months, five years, who knows? No one, not even Me. So you’ve gotta think short term, but you’ve also gotta think long term, and even mid-term at the same time, too. Can’t be easy, but I’m asking if you’ve pulled off that balancing act.”

Brian had never thought of it that way. “I guess that’s right. I’ve mainly planned for the long term. Haven’t really thought about it this way much but maybe the best strategy is to plan as though I’ll live a long time, and if it all ends suddenly, well, that’s not my problem. After all, I’ll be dead.”

Alan objected, “That can’t be right. You leave people behind and you shouldn’t forget about that. And some stuff we do for the long term sucks. If I’d have known He’d be here for me tonight, I’d have never gone to law school. Law school sucked. Paying off the loans has sucked more; if it’s me going tonight I still haven’t done it and I die in debt, which I guess I won’t care about but it still seems bad to say. If I’d known tonight was going to be my night, I’d have gone into debt bumming around Europe more than I did, and getting drunk more, and I’d have banged all easy girls I could have, and smoked more weed, and all that.”

“But Alan, if you’d done that, you wouldn’t have your cool car, you wouldn’t have met Zoe at law school. She’s been great for you, and you guys just got engaged last week,” Calvin said. “I’ve never seen you happier than after she said ‘Yes.’ Sure, all that goofing off would have been fun, but aren’t you better off now? You did something serious, had at least the start of a real career, taken a shot at a marriage and a family?”

Death sat back, interested in Alan’s reaction, but Alan just sort of nodded his head. “Yeah, and it might not be me tonight. I guess I’m better off for not just pursuing short-term pleasures, but seeing Death standing there next to the CD rack sort of screws up my perspective.”

Calvin posed a question. “Death, I know time is running short, but answer me this. The three of us, we’ve actually all been pretty lucky. Having You here makes me realize that. The three of us are all good friends, we’ve had good educations, comfortable lives, you know? We’re better off financially than most people, even if we don’t feel like it most of the time – does that mean it’s better or worse when You take us as opposed to someone whose life kind of, well, sucks?”

“But that’s what I’m asking you,” Death answered. “Eventually, I take everyone. Isn’t your good fortune really that you haven’t had to think about Me all that much in your lives so far?”

“Definitely,” said Alan. “I bet lots of Your clients have had to think about You every day.”

“Sure. So look, some things in your lives have sucked. Some have been pretty good. You’ve made some decisions. Two of you are going to have more decisions to make after I’m done tonight, and you’ll have to realize that one day I’ll be back.”

“Death, how can we tell if we have made the right decisions?” Brian asked.

“I guess I have a rather unique perspective on that. The way I see it—” Death’s onyx watch was set to vibrate, but they all heard it rattling, metal on bone, beneath His heavy black robe. “Sorry, pal. Gotta get back to work.” Death picked His hourglass up again, turning it to make the sands flow once more.

Immediately, all three young men seemed oblivious to Death’s continued presence even as He reclaimed His sickle from the wall and made ready His task. Calvin turned to Brian and said, “Dude, it’s getting late, I think I’ll head home,” just as the earthquake struck.