The Ever After

Chapter Thirteen: The Undertaker

"WE HAVE AN APPOINTMENT."

Though May was still piled under the clothes, she could tell they'd come into a dark hallway. A few moments ago she'd heard a door creak open and slam shut. And then she felt the cool air blowing on her sweaty face.

Now she could just make out the legs of a desk. And then a pair of feet hovering before her.

"Right this waaaaay . . ."

May was jostled along, and then they came to another stop. "You will be called in shoooooortly."

Another creaking door sound, and then the clothes over her head were pulled out of the way, and Pumpkin smiled down at her. "How are you?"

"Okay, I guess."

"You can come out, my dear," Arista said.

May climbed out of the basket and looked around. They were in a pitch-black room. She couldn't see anything but Pumpkin and Arista sitting next to each other, and a glowing sign that read 2,007,998 SOULS SERVED.

"Arista," May whispered, "back at the bookstore-"

Ding, ding, ding.

A list unrolled before them in the dark:

RULES OF THE UNDERTAKER

Please extinguish any burning body parts before entering. Please, no cameras. The Undertaker, while extremely good-looking, will not show up in photographs. Under the psychic privacy act, views of your past, present, and future are protected. No talking in the waiting room!

ANYONE NOT FOLLOWING THESE RULES WILL BE SUBJECT TO POSSIBLE MUTILATION AND A FINE.

Looking back and forth between Arista, who sat calmly and gravely, and Pumpkin, who no longer seemed afraid but curious-swinging his legs and looking around the room, as if they were at a picnic-May said, "But that book-"

"Silence!" The voice that came out was so loud it made the walls shake. Pumpkin shook with them. He sat on his hands.

They all stared at one another, May bursting with the news of what she'd seen.

Just then, ahead of them, the darkness began to open up, one section at a time, like puzzle pieces of light being put together. The pieces formed a childlike shape, with skinny legs and a bob haircut. It was the shape of May, glowing blue before them. The sign above it announcing the number of served souls dinged to 2,007,999.

May looked from Pumpkin to Arista, who nodded to her, then back to the cutout May in the darkness.

She walked up to the opening and squeezed through. It was a perfect fit.

May was in sunlight. All around her were white, fluffy clouds.

Her feet appeared to be standing on nothing.

A red velvet couch sat a few feet away, and on it, a figure in a long black robe, a black hood obscuring its face in an oval of darkness, its hands gently stroking a sharp, gleaming scythe.

May shrunk back just as the figure sat up and reached for its hood. She took a few more steps backward, but her feet began to sink into the clouds beneath her, and she moved forward again. The hood fell back, revealing a beautiful woman with long glossy black hair, alabaster skin, and ruby red lips. She smiled at May as she splayed her feet out in front of her and filed her nails against her scythe. There were wings on her ankles.