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“I don’t understand,” I say breathlessly to Raven as we drive off.

“You just saved the life of a man named Andre Philips,” Raven replies. “The passenger inside that black cab. And because you saved his life, he’ll be able to make it to where he’s going.”

I frown. “But—I thought you said I needed to claim a soul today.”

He nods once. “You do.”

We travel in silence through the pouring rain for a while, until we finally pull up to the entrance of a hospital.

Raven gets out with me. As if in a dream, I follow him into the lobby and up the stairs. None of the receptionists stop us, nor do any of the doctors and nurses glance our way.

At last, Raven stops at a room on the third floor, at the end of a long hall. The door is open.

Here, Raven pauses, then nods for me to enter. I swallow hard, my heart still pounding. Then I step in.

A small cluster of people are standing beside a hospital bed. As I stare at their faces, I recognize the man from the black cab, the one Raven had said was Andre Philips, his clothes damp from the rain. Beside him, a woman puts a hand on his shoulder.

“Is he awake?” Andre asks in a soft voice.

“He’s in and out,” the woman answers. “But you made it.”

My attention goes to the person lying in the hospital bed. There, restless under layers of blankets, is a young boy. His red hair is dull and stringy, unwashed for days. Beads of sweat dot his forehead. The breaths emerging from his cracked lips are shallow. His skin is pale and paper-thin, so that I can see webs of blue blood vessels threading across his closed eyelids.

He is, in every way, the image of the man standing beside him.

“Hey, buddy,” Andre whispers, taking the boy’s hand. “Hey, I’m here.”

The child’s sunken eyes flutter open to reveal a set of dark, dilated pupils. He smiles weakly in greeting and squeezes the man’s hand, and I realize this is the man’s son.

A soul linked to those at the intersection today. This small boy is whom I’m meant to claim.

I tear my eyes away long enough to look at Raven, but he remains by the door, waiting patiently. If he pities this child, he doesn’t show it. And why would he? How many thousands, hundreds of thousands, millions of lives has he claimed? It makes me feel alone and naive, foolish for having the heart of a human.

Slowly, I step next to the bed, a ghost witnessing a human’s final moments.

No one else in the room notices me, but the boy’s eyes meet mine.

“Hello,” I say to him. “Do you know who I am?”

The boy studies me carefully. “I think so,” he answers.

A lump lodges painfully in my throat. “It’s going to be okay,” I whisper.

The boy shifts, still clammy and shivering, until he pulls himself up into a sitting position. He looks over to where his mother hovers over his pillow and his father is holding his hand, seemingly unaware that their son is awake and alert. Or maybe they just don’t see what I see. Maybe, to them, their son is still asleep on the bed, eyes closed.

The boy says nothing for a moment as he struggles for breath. And even though I know this is inevitable, even though I know this is the way of things, I still find myself quietly begging Raven to offer him a chance at becoming a Harbinger. I beg for this boy to ask for more life.

Please. Tell me that you’ll do anything to keep living.

But he is so tired. He has fought for a long time. And I know what his answer will be. I know, and I understand.

I extend a hand to him. “Would you like company?” I ask.

He lets go of his father and calmly takes my hand.

As always, I feel that overwhelming push in my soul to revive him instead, and sense his soul respond in kind, as if instead of the power of death, I also have the ability to give him back his life.

But I don’t. The boy shifts a little, but otherwise, he barely seems to notice at all. It is a strange and intimate moment, and I think I’m dreaming all of this, that it will be one of those times when I wake and wonder why I’m crying over something I can’t remember, for someone I’ve never met.