JEFFREY’S DEATH

JEFFREY’S DEATH

JEFFREY Cooper heard the knock – a real three-bang rasper – and opened his front door to look upon a figure hooded in a black shroud, the gaping hole at the front being so dark he could make out no facial features at all.

“Good evening,” said a voice from within the hood, a rasping voice that matched the way its owner knocked on doors, though Jeffrey could not see any movement where his mouth ought to be. “I am the Grim Reaper. Death to you, if you see what I mean.”

“Oh, hell,” said Jeff and his face fell. “I’ve been half-expecting you.”

“Oh, dear,” said the Grim Reaper, “have you not been well?”

He sounded as sympathetic as a vampire when a young maiden complains of neck ache.

“No,” admitted Jeffrey, “not really.” He was a bit whiny, was Jeffrey, but then like he said, he had not been well.

“Can I come in?” said the Grim Reaper. If a bag of rusty nails could speak then it would have the Grim Reaper’s voice.

“I suppose you’d better,” said Jeffrey and he quickly glanced up and down the street to see if his neighbours were watching. They weren’t. There were a few people out and about, busy, as people tend to be on Christmas Eve, and no-one was paying Jeffrey or his visitor any attention. Perhaps their umbrellas were obscuring the view. Cars passed by, their drivers’ focus in the constant drizzle directly on the car in front, their minds set on getting home or doing their last minute shopping. No-one glanced in their direction. Jeffrey stood aside to let the Grim Reaper pass. “Where’s your scythe?” he asked.

“Don’t ask,” said the Reaper, grimly.

“Would you like a cup of tea?” asked Jeffrey, when they reached the front room. He was unsure how to address his guest.  Grim Reaper? Death? It was the same thing really but people can be so funny about names and Jeffrey figured this was one visitor he shouldn’t upset. It wasn’t every day Death came knocking at your door. In fact, there was usually only one day Death came knocking at your door and Jeffrey had already decided his best bet now – his only bet now – was to play for time. Be polite and play for time. This was not just the eleventh hour, it was the fifty-ninth minute of the eleventh hour.

“I’m dying for a cuppa,” said Death and he chuckled mirthlessly at his own joke, as a robot might.  He sank into the leather settee, which he stroked with a skeletal hand. “I remember this cow,” he said, and then: “I remember them all. I’m not wistful, I’m just saying, that’s all. I’ll remember you, too.”

“Thanks,” said Jeffrey and went to make the tea.

He could have course have run away, bolted out of the back door and left the Grim Reaper sat in the front room twiddling his thumbs, but he had a feeling it would be useless. That wherever he ran to Death would already be there waiting.

He took in the tea on a tray. The living room was bright and cheerful with decorations and the Christmas tree in the corner twinkled with lights.

“Sugar?” he asked.

“Six,” said Death. “What the hell, make it ten or twelve. It’s not as if you’ll be needing it, or that it’ll do me any harm, is it?”

Jeffrey emptied the sugar bowl into the cup.

“It’s Christmas Day tomorrow,” said Jeffrey, thinking a change of subject might be just the thing to perk up the conversation. There was protest in his voice, too. Jeffrey loved Christmas and he did not want to be deprived of it. His wife Becky loved Christmas also. It was all planned. Their families were coming round. Wine would be drunk, food eaten, games played. It would be jolly, like Christmas was meant to be. But not if he wasn’t there. All a bit of a dampener really.

“I know, I know, death can be such a nuisance,” said the Grim Reaper. “I don’t do Christmas. Every day is the same to me. I don’t actually do time. It doesn’t exist as far as I’m concerned, though I know it is important to you. Three score years and ten and all that. How old are you Jeff?”

“Fifty five,” gulped Jeffrey and this time he could not keep the feeling he was being hard done by out of his voice. He had a present for his wife. She’d  have a present for him. They had presents for everyone. It was all organised.  Jeffrey was getting better too, everyone thought so. He fought the sudden urge to say it wasn’t fair. Instead, he took a deep breath. “So where’s your scythe, then?”

“You won’t believe it,” said the Reaper. “They’ve taken it off me. After 200,000 years, give or take. Just like that. Guess why?”

Jeffrey shrugged that he’d no idea.

“Go on Jeff,” urged the Grim Reaper. “Guess.”

Jeffrey mumbled he couldn’t imagine why.

“Health and ruddy safety.”

Death was right, Jeffrey couldn’t believe it.

“I said you wouldn’t believe it. 200,000 of your years and not a single accident. Then someone thinks I’ll start cutting people in half, like a demented magician. As if it mattered if I did and I was daft enough to say that, so then they got the idea I might actually start lopping heads off willy-nilly – and you can imagine the fuss that would cause. People getting to wherever their going years earlier than they ought: they whinge enough when a plane’s overbooked.

“I pointed out, people expect to see a scythe. Like Moses and his staff or Ken Dodd and his tickling stick. It’s a symbol.  I’m known for it. And to be honest it gives me a bit of status. I’d be a liar if I said it didn’t. A bit of respect. I’m not adverse to a bit of respect. But they insisted.

“Changes, always changes, nowadays.

“You know what they had me doing the other day, Jeff? I’ll tell you what they had me doing the other day…”  Jeffrey had the feeling Death was now just getting into his stride “…only a bloody customer relations course.

“What’s it matter? I said, all my customers are as good as dead when I meet them.”

Jeffrey  swallowed heavily. He’d drunk his tea, but his throat was dry. As good as dead…

“Do you know what they call it?,” went on the Reaper. “I’ll tell you what they call it, they call it D-Q-I. Stands for Death Quality Initiative.

“First thing they said to me: If you see someone you know, say hello, smile and call them by their name. That’s the first and the daftest. I mean, how can I know anyone? It’s not as if we could have gone out for a drink, is it Jeff? Not that I wouldn’t want to if we met under different circumstances. I’m sure you’re a nice bloke. But the thing is with me there are no different circumstances.

“Take every chance to develop your personality, they said. They missed the point, I haven’t got a personality. People like jokes, so do not be afraid to joke. Smile and show a sense of humour. I’m smiling now, I’m like a demented Cheshire cat under here. Can you tell?”

Jeffrey looked hard but he could still not make out any features. He felt a little dizzy. He sat down on the sofa, literally a few inches from Death. He began to feel tired. He really must play for time, he told himself.

“But they are very big on a sense of humour. It’s all about improving the death experience, they said, as if  it’s a ruddy theme park. People don’t want an  experience, they want to get it over with, I said. But they took no notice, said I didn’t have a choicer, so I’m giving it a go. How am I doing?”

Jeffrey said: “You’re not so grim, but you are very cynical.”

Or at least he meant to say it, and wasn’t sure if he had. The words had formed in his mind slowly, like having a great thought  just before you go to sleep, in time to see the wisdom of the thing but then it is lost forever as you fall asleep. Jeffrey was extremely tired, he was soaking up weariness like a sponge. But Death hadn’t finished yet.

“…reassure people they said. People want to know it’s all right to die, they said, and I said, all right to die? All right to die? People hate it! And do you know who I’ve got to go and see next week? I’ll tell you who I’ve got to go and see, only an empowerment and lifestyle coach, whatever that is. I nearly exploded, lifestyle, I said, lifestyle? Me? And now they are saying I’m being difficult and…”

Jeffrey’s eyes had closed without any effort on his part.

“Paperwork! They’re saying I have to provide, an evidence based structure…”

But  Jeffrey had already felt himself moving upwards, not floating, not rising, just moving and not towards the ceiling but towards a brilliant white light and he was engulfed by a feeling of love and an overwhelming sense of well being. He realised, with a little jolt of surprise, he was now dead and that it didn’t matter. Effortlessly he entered a long tunnel and the light was growing ever nearer and brighter but it didn’t hurt his eyes and in front him a world began to take shape. As he came into the light and out of it again he entered a beautiful garden of flowers and butterflies and birds, a stream burbled in the distance. There were wisps of clouds but he knew instantly they weren’t ever going to turn to rain. The sun was strong bit not overpowering and somewhere there was laughter and music and it was all so, so welcoming and then he heard a familiar voice. He recognised it instantly. It was like a bag of rusty nails.

“Paperwork! I haven’t done the paperwork!” Jeffrey looked up and a figure in a black-brown shroud loomed in front of him, blocking his view of the garden and countryside.

“Your time isn’t yet Jeff, you must return.”

“But…” said Jeffrey.

“Sorry. Well, actually I can’t feel regret, but you know what I mean. Off you go.”

“But this place, it’s so…”

“Doesn’t matter. It’s not for you. Go, same way as you came. Mind your head in   the tunnel.”

Jeffrey, dead, felt more aggrieved the Jeffrey who had just been alive. “So what was all that about?” he demanded.

“Well, they did tell me to work on my sense of humour,” said Death and chuckled as if he reached the punchline.

“A joke! A bloody joke?” exploded Jeffrey. In heaven or not, whether all was love and light or not, whether he had a sense of eternal belonging or not and that all his troubles were worldly and irrelevant, he was bloody furious. He knew he was on the verge of a rant and that it would contain all his earthly expletives, some of them twice. But instead he felt himself being gently tugged backwards towards the tunnel which he somehow knew would be there and as he looked at Death in the face he could swear he saw a shadow of a grin under the hood, as if someone had drawn a smile in black chalk on a blackboard.

“I thought I’d lost you,” said Becky, kissing Jeff again and rubbing a tear from a happy eye. She kissed him once more.

“If I hadn’t come home when I did, if the ambulance hadn’t been quick…” she squeezed his hand. “Well, it doesn’t bear thinking about.”

“I know,” said Jeffrey as he wondered at the power of the mind to hallucinate in moments of great stress, but he could not deny he felt a great comfort now that wasn’t there before and that was not just down to being alive and being with the woman he loved.

Christmas Day in hospital was still Christmas Day and Jeffrey’s room was filled with friends and relations and it was obvious some wine had been drunk, but there joy as well as jollity around the bed. He lived and they loved him.

Soon everyone had to go and let him rest and Becky, too, kissing him once more – twice, three times – said bye. “I don’t want to go,” she said. Five times she said it before, at last, closing the door and Jeffrey was able to shut his eyes.

They flicked open as Becky’s face suddenly re-appeared around the edge of the door again. “By the way,” she asked, “who had the last of the sugar?”