He was persistent.
I’ll give him that.
But I’m not the type to give in.
I can wait.
After all,
I’ve got all the time in the world.
~
“Jordan!”

Jordan Harrison jolted upright with a start, staring through the clumps of unruly dark hair. Leering above him, there seemed to be a mountain of pink fur and blonde hair. Squinting through the light, he began to make out features somewhere in the mess.

“Sleep well, honey?”

A smile crept to his lips. Of course. Kaitlin.

“Better.”

He took in her fluffy pink bathrobe, barely concealing the frame of her body. He knew all her imperfections so well, and it was at that point in his love life that she became most beautiful to him.


She sat down on the bed beside him, and with the one tender smile she offered him, he knew she felt the same.


The large grandfather clock in the corner chimed rhythmically, as if in agreement. This point in time indeed. Nothing’s more beautiful than here and now.


Slapping him playfully on the knee, Kaitlin gave him a long look.

“You’ve been out for hours. You’ve got to get to work soon.”

“There’s no rush.” He closed his eyes and sighed, forcing himself to believe his words.

“I’m serious!” Kaitlin said, her hands going to her blonde hair, fingers weaving through the tangles. Opening one eye, Jordan grinned.

“Weren’t you the one who said time stood still when we were together?”

“I’m also the one who’s saying that bills need to be paid.” She stood up, and began walking toward the kitchen. “ And the one who wants... no... demands diamonds for her birthday this year.”


Sighing, Jordan rose and followed her obediently. There were some moments where he couldn’t tell whether Kaitlin was the sensual woman of his dreams or his surrogate mother.

.....


Finally, after he had been shooed out the door, Jordan headed to work. He was content with his job as an assistant to the wealthiest banker in town, Michael Bates. Jordan couldn’t help but wonder what Michael would be doing once he walked into the shiny white bank. Michael was the kind of person that would be smiling and laughing no matter what he was doing. Signing paychecks, smiling. Paying a bill, laughing. Jordan allowed himself a brief smile. Suddenly, he heard a chiming in the distance. Looking up, he eyed the large subway clock that adorned every alleyway. What was it about clocks that fascinated him so much? They seemed to tick continuously, as if counting down. But to what? Sighing, Jordan entered the bank.


Upon his entry, Jordan noticed a pile of uncollected mail resting in an unruly pile underneath Michael’s office mailbox. Scooping up the stack of bills and letters, he headed towards Michael’s office, to see if he could deposit them on his desk. However, just as his hand had closed around the brass door knob to the main office, he heard a voice from inside the room.


“I’m a very busy man, Mr. Hopkins.” Jordan was taken aback by the sudden coldness in Michael’s voice. He froze at the door, his curiosity getting the better of his weak conscious.
Another voice, supposedly the named Mr. Hopkins, answered, “Mr. Bates, I assure you, it would be a good investment.”

“I don’t care about good investments, I care about morality. This... this can’t possibly be..”

“Mr. Bates, it’s revolutionary! This could change humanity all together!”
Revolutionary? Jordan pressed his ear against the door and listened closely.

“Mr. Hopkins, what you’re proposing here is monstrous. This...device... if it can do what you say...that is, predict time and cause of death...there’ll be panic. What sort of benefit could this bring?”

Hardly believing his ears, Jordan allowed himself one glance through the keyhole of the doorknob. What he saw, did not dazzle him, or even vaguely astonish him. No, the sight rather disappointed him.

Michael and a well-groomed, middle aged man (most likely Mr. Hopkins) were standing in the center of the room, too preoccupied with their discussion to notice the slight shift in the door. Delicately placed on Michael’s mahogany desk was what appeared to be an ordinary wristwatch. Leather strap, metal buckle, nothing too remarkable or unusual about it. Was this the watch that was being kept in such high regard by the man? The supposedly revolutionary watch?

“Mr. Bates, I do believe...”

“I, I don’t have time for this. Please get out of my office.” Michael sighed,one of his chubby fingers vaguely gesturing towards the door.

Mr. Hopkins sighed, and regarded Michael with some contempt.

“You’re a fool, Mr. Bates. But I’ll leave the watch here. Maybe it’ll change your mind.”
Seeing Mr. Hopkins beginning to head for the door, Michael’s quick reflexes kicked in, and he sprinted down the hall, turned back around, and acted as though he had simply started walking towards the door. When Mr. Hopkins finally stepped out of the office, it looked as though Jordan had just emerged from the adjoining hallway. Confident that Jordan had not eavesdropped on his conversation, which of course, was not true, Mr. Hopkins left the bank.


As soon as Mr. Hopkins, and soon afterwards Michael, had left the office, Jordan paced up and down anxiously outside Michael’s office, silently daring himself to go in, to examine the watch. It was just sitting there, after all. Surely Michael wouldn’t notice if he picked it up. His curiosity finally winning over, Jordan crept into the office, and gingerly picked up the watch.


As he had seen before, it looked like a normal watch. Nothing extraordinary about it. Sighing, he placed the watch back down onto the desk, his disappointment staring back at him in it’s reflective surface. Just as he was about to walk back to his own office, to maybe give Kaitlin call and laugh about the so-called “extraordinary” watch, he noticed a sliver of a button, just barely poking out of the circular top. Newly intrigued, he retrieved the watch, and after another careful examination, pressed the button.


The reaction of the device was instantaneous, the circular part of the watch flipping over to reveal a more modern bottom, with digital numbers flashing across the plastic screen. As soon as Jordan strapped it on, the numbers began changing, and words began to march across the bottom of the screen. Squinting at the screen, he could barely make out a set of numbers, and the tiny print.

December 5th, 2012
Explosion, Bates Bank.
Cause of Death: Blood loss caused by the tearing apart of both legs. Medical assistance will not arrive on time to stop the flow.
Likelihood of Death: Certain


His fingers went numb. Michael. He had said, while talking to Mr. Hopkins, that this watch predicted the time of death... and the cause of death.


Fumbling in his pocked for his smartphone, his shaking finger brushed against his calendar app. Flickering to life, it presented itself smugly on his screen.


“Today is December 5th.” Jordan murmured, his voice quivering.

“The watch says I’ll die today. I’ll die... in an explosion.......”
His head snapped upright, and he scanned the office, looking for signs of this unprecedented prophecy. Suddenly, off in the distance, he heard a low hiss.

“The gas!” But surely the gas itself wouldn’t cause an explosion, he thought, clinging onto his last hopes.


Then, he heard it. The ever so subtle noise, of a cigarette being lit.
Relying on all his instincts of self-preservation, Jordan sprinted out of the building, pursued by his growing terror.


He had just flung himself out of the bank, when it burst into an inferno of smoke and flames. Screams of pain seemed to echo out of the dust, and flood his brain. Panting heavily, he clutched his ears, trying desperately to drown out the cries. Only when they had finally ceased, did he turn to examine the scene.



“It......it was right...” Breathed Jordan, staring in shock at the pile of rubble the bank had abruptly transformed into. He stood there for what felt like hours, staring into the dark pile, his eyes locked on one grubby hand, poking out of the dust.

Behind him, he heard a high pitched scream.

“Jordan!” Kaitlin ran towards him, the sound of her hysteria resounding in the destruction as she sobbed and flung her arms around his neck.

“They, they said the bank exploded! I didn’t know what to do! Oh, thank god you’re okay!” She continued, dampening his collar with her tears. “You must be the luckiest man alive!”

“Yes...” murmured Jordan, glancing down at the watch,

“It’s really quite...” He watched the gears of the watch shift as the screen produced a new cause of death, and a new date, which, he noted, was not too far in the future. “..A stroke of luck.” Gazing off into the distance. He smiled. Who knew what would come next?
~
And then half a year more would pas, clocks ticking away and time slowly slipping by.

Excuse me, dear reader, but I must interrupt this touching scene, regardless of your involvement in the tale of Jordan Harrison. For this part of the story repeats itself in a most tiresome cycle.


Jordan would avoid his death, only to find a new one reappear on the watch he had stolen. He would continue to be evasive, becoming more and more cautious, more obsessed with the control over his existence given to him by the watch.


He would refuse to confront me sixteen times in all.


I grew aggravated at first. After all, he was nothing more then a human. A pure, simple human, obsessed with prolonging his meaningless life. But I suppose it was, in some ways, his obsession that made him powerful. At least, powerful enough to cheat death. Specifically, to cheat me.


But the more I watched him, the more I became intrigued and amused by his antics. His preoccupation with eluding me seemed to give him some sort of great thrill. Every time he avoided me, he became triumphant, laughing and punching the air. For me, the only one after the explosion who knew the whole story, he was clever. But to the ignorant outside world, he was a lunatic. They would see him fleeing streets, locking himself in his home to prevent some new disaster, and chortling at unexpected moments at his marvelous planning.


Kaitlin couldn’t take it. the thought that the one man she had ever loved had become so maniacal. She left in somewhere around the fifth time he avoided death. He didn’t do so much as bat an eyelash, so filled with his own joy at cheating me again that he barely noticed her absence.


This was what finally convinced me that Jordan Harrison, formerly mortal, would be an excellent candidate for the office of Death.
?
After all, I had been in need of a replacement for several centuries. Collecting souls, after all, is a very,very tiring job with no rewards. He showed potential and I was ready for the final rest I had given others all this time.


But no one is ever willing to take the job at first.


No, when I finally confronted him, somewhere around his sixteenth time, I forced it on him. After all his time spent cheating me, despite my amusement, I did find a bit of motivation for revenge.

His reaction, was understandable.



“You’ve been playing me for a fool.”

“ Don’t be so angry. This is truly a happy ending. Well, for one of us.” I smiled as I brushed away strands of dark hair that had escaped into his eyes, forever frozen and staring into me as if I could be seen by mortal eyes.

“You bastar-`.”

“Now now, Mr. Harrison, there’s no need to get mouthy with me.”


With those words, his eyes blazed with what would initially seem like fury. But as I gazed into those pools, now brimming with tears, I noticed something more.

Admiration. After the screw-you, came the feeling that perhaps he saw the cleverness in how I defeated him, perhaps understood, even, how I could, appreciated my cunning.

The emotion wouldn’t last long.

“I must commend you, Jordan.” Turning my back on the now whimpering heap of man that lay in front of me. “You’re smarter than I believed you to be.” Theatrically sweeping my cloak behind me (I’m almost going to miss that part of the job), I faced him and smiled.

“Therefore, I am giving you a reward. Just as the Death before me gave me a reward. I will grant you a day of the life that might have been. A taste.” I cocked an eyebrow. “Just name the date, present, past or future. It’s all the same now.”

Without hesitating a second, he murmured, “June 19. Kaitlin’s birthday.”
So now came the regret for the way he’d treated the girl. But such is mankind. No one goes to their end without scores left, but in some way, I suppose I could let him settle this last one.

“How very predictable, Mr. Harrison. But I suppose, we’re all lovers or fools in the end.”
Staring up at me with wet eyes, he asked: “What did you choose?”

Sighing, I gave him my answer.

“Lets just say you and I aren’t so different.”
Beaconing towards the distance, I smiled.

“Keep walking that way, and you’ll be there.”
And as I watched his slow descent, I chuckled.

“Goodbye, Jordan.”
“Even time is irrelevant now.”


THEN END