When I wasn’t collecting souls, I took to following you around. Undetected, or so I thought. The few times you sensed my energy, you’d stop and say very quietly, “Henri?”
I stayed silent. I wanted to observe you without risking exposure. To see how you’d act when you thought no one was looking. I thought perhaps this would dissuade me from haunting you, but the effect was the opposite. The more I watched you in your most mundane moments, the closer I wanted to be.
I was in your bedroom one evening. You had just showered and dressed for bed, and you were settling in for the night when you lay back against your pillows and said with a sigh, “Henri, I know you’re here.”
How could you possibly know? Your mediumship must be extremely sensitive, or perhaps it was a result of our growing bond.
“That’s kind of perverted,” you continued. “To watch me like that. What if I felt like jerking off or something?”
A wave of shame overcame me because even though part of my duty was to monitor the humans in my territory, it wasn’t supposed to be for my own personal pleasure.
“You could join me.” You lazily stroked your abdomen and reached under the waistband of your pajama pants. You were goading me into conversation, and it worked.
“No, I can’t.”
A divot appeared on your forehead as you sat up in bed, perhaps a little surprised that your scheme had paid off. “I knew you were here. Why not?”
“It’s against the rules.”
Your eyes narrowed slyly as you considered it. “Was it against the rules when you body-snatched Tyrell?”
I didn’t care for that term. I much preferred “inhabited,” but I didn’t correct you.
“Yes.”
Possession in itself wasn’t against the terms of my release, but doling out punishments to humans certainly was.
“But you didn’t get in trouble?”
“Not this time.”
“And you used to have a body,” you said, puzzling it out.
“I did.”
You turned over onto your side and propped yourself up on one elbow. You traced the crisscrossing pattern of your sheets with one finger. With a body, I’d be able to feel the warmth of your breath, to nestle behind you and mold your slender body against mine, smell your skin… But as it was, I could only sense the movement of the air and the shift of energy as you inhaled and exhaled.
“Well, what happened?” you asked.
It was so long ago. Nearly two thousand human years. You’d think the gods would have forgiven me. Or forgotten.
“I disobeyed the gods.”
“That sounds serious.”
“It was,” I said without any pride whatsoever. “I changed the course of history.”
After my punishment, which was cruel but not so unusual, the Thrones sent Azrael to offer me this choice: enlist as a foot soldier in his newly formed Imperium army, or surrender my bloodborn body and serve as a reaper, ferrying souls between realms. I’d been slaying beings for so long that I’d grown weary of bloodshed, so I’d chosen the path of quiet, humble servitude. But I couldn’t have predicted how isolating it would be, nor how long this penance would last.
You licked your lips. So soft and yielding. I didn’t want anyone else to touch them, to even gaze upon them.
“Are you going to tell me what happened? How you lost your body?”
“No.” A sweeping sadness overcame me. This could never work. I should stop tormenting myself and forget you ever existed. That would be better for the both of us. The silence stretched on.
“This is a bad idea, Orlando.”
You sat up and kicked the covers off your legs. “What’s the worst thing that could happen?”
