Page 46 of Grim

I stand behind the chair facing the couch to wait for her to wake up. Deciding I need a distraction, I focus on my mobile and make notes. The cold, clinical task of filling out the case report grounds me in what I laughingly refer to as my reality. I log the details:Peaceful departure, minimal resistance. No haunting probability. Standard grief levels in the next of kin. It’s a textbook case, and I should be satisfied. But I’m not. Something rankles.

I’m about to send off a status report to Big D when a drowsy, purring sound from the couch pulls myattention. It’s not the dreaded cat, but rather a creature I’m finding may be far more dangerous.

Rue Chamberlain.

Her blue-grey eyes flutter open, tired, confused—yet somehow still radiating a light that’s so damn impossible to ignore. She rises, slowly pulling herself up, hair mussed, lips parted, breathing deep. I’ve witnessed thousands of humans wake. But none have affected me quite like this.

There’s a grace and fluidity to her movements that weren’t there before, or perhaps I didn’t notice them. Either way, I cannot deny the growing pull this frustrating human has on my thoughts. I loathe it.I think.

“Welcome back,” I droll, attempting to sound aloof.

“Is it over?” Her voice is hoarse, raspy, like gravel over silk.

“For Olivia in this life? Yes.”

“Her name was Olivia,” Rue repeats, her gaze softening as she voices the name—that reverence in her voice makes my chest ache in ways I don’t care to admit.

“Yes, well …” I clip, brushing past the raw emotion that is starting to linger like smoke in the air. “You should go get yourself some water. You sound hoarse.”

I avert my gaze, but the truth is, I don’t care about the damn water. I care about the way she looks, sitting there, the way her eyes flicker with something almost hopeful despite it all.

“How do you do it?” she blurts, uncharacteristically raw, her words slipping out like the breath she’s been holding since we stepped into this strange, uncharted territory together.

“Do what?”

“All of it. Any of it. It’s so …” She pauses—searching for the right word, I imagine. “Sad,” she eventually finishes.

The word sits heavy between us.

Sad.

Such a small, woefully inadequate word for what it really is.

I stare daggers back at Rue as my jaw tightens. Hundreds of years of practice, of repression, of keeping my spine straight, heart closed, and duties cleanlyexecuted—and this little flame of a woman dares to see through the cracks.

I sigh, unable to wholly ignore her empathetic energy. “I wish I could say it gets easier, but it doesn’t,” I admit. My voice is lower. “It’s just different.”

“But they don’t really die, do they? Not forever? There’s something else. It’s not the end,” she presses, the hope of something more, something bigger still clinging to her.

“No, it’s not the end,” I reply solemnly, my voice dragging, careful not to break the illusion she’s clinging to. “But it’s not the same. You lose control. You go where Fate decides. You’re part of a system that forces you to give up any autonomy, any free will you might have had—and probably took for granted for too long.”

My mind flashes briefly back to my mortal days—simple memories of the ocean air tickling my cheeks or a warm blanket enveloping me and—

“But surely, there are moments of joy in the OtherWorld?” Rue breaks my reverie. “Experiences worth living for, for lack of a better phrase?” Her voice is hopeful yet tinged with something, as if she can sense the quiet, buried sorrow in me that I try so desperately to ignore.

I hesitate. I should shut this down, but instead, I find myself responding. “Indeed, but don’t underestimate the power of feeling,” I say in a rare, unguarded moment. The look in Rue’s hopeful eyes pulls more words from me. “And I don’t just mean emotionally because that does stay—oh, believe me, that does stay. But physically too. Feeling. The power of touch is everything. It’s singular and the heartbeat of mortal living. And it is strong.”

“She tried to kiss him.”

“What?” I ask, missing Rue’s transition.

“Before we left. The reap. Before she moved on to Processing or whatever you call it.”

“AfterLife Processing. ALP. Yes. Go on.”

“Yeah. She tried to wipe a tear and kiss his forehead. But the tear didn’t move, and he didn’t respond.”

“That’s right, and that’s because she couldn’t. Not anymore. But her first impulse—many souls’ firstimpulse as they begin to pass over—is to stay connected to this world through physical touch.”