The Borio Singaldi Writing Anthology

Borio Singaldi is Not the Star of This Story About Death

(A Storio written by myself, but inspired by an idea a friend of mine had, but didn't care to write it down himself.)

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This is the story of Halloween.

I mean, it's not "the original" Halloween story, but it's certainly a Halloween story.

I don't care if this is the wrong time of year for this.

It needs to be told anyway.

Halloween. All Hallow's Eve. A day historically associated with the dead, the undead, the grim, and the macabre. Yet somehow, it had become Death's least favorite day of the year. You can thank commercialism for that.

But it was almost over. Once the trick-or-treating was done and the new day came, he'd be ready for La Dia De Los Muertos. Now there was a day he could appreciate, because it was a day he was actually appreciated. Plus, it was one of the only times he could go out looking like his normal self and everyone would be fine with it. On Halloween, it was all a joke. An excuse to dress up in ways you'd never be allowed to on any other day and kindly take candy from other people. No one appreciated or even feared him on this day anymore.

Death was exhausted. He'd had to put on a big shebang for this day all day around the world, and while he'd daresay he was killing it at the part, you can be sure he was, in fact, dead tired. He was practically a walking corpse at this point. He couldn't live to see another trick-or-treater come knocking on his door again, but he was fatalistic enough to know that there was a dead zero chance of...

You know what, I'll stop. I can't keep this story alive with all these puns.

Death plopped onto his couch, fishing through the endless bowl of candies he'd bought in bulk. His sight was blurred, his hearing muffled. This day had just dragged on and on. He was sick of the toffees and there were way too many of them left over for him to finish off, but there had to be a few good bits of Milky Way inside. And so, he sifted through rocks in the river to find his gold, grinning wildly when he struck the jackpot. A gold rush of Milky Ways soon ended up inside him.

Now there was something to feel good about on a day like this. Being an unliving being to begin with, Death could devour as much candy as he wanted and it would never have any physical effects on him. Psychological effects, however... I have no idea. What do you think the knowledge of infinite candy never affecting your body would do to your sanity?

"Well," Death said to nothing (except perhaps a Narrator he suspected was listening in), "I guess it's not so bad right now if I can just munch on candy for the rest of the night until I wake up tomorrow morning with no memory of this day's events. What's the worst that could happen?"

I don't get why people just say these things out loud, it's like they're asking for trouble. Of course, the worst thing that could happen did happen, as the universal laws of jinxing are just that cruel: the doorbell rang. Now, was Death's utterance a causality, correlation, or coincidence? Some things we just don't know. What we do know is that the doorbell rang and there could only be one reason for it.

Death cursed with such extremity that if he'd been cursed with the Curse Curse, he would have been immediately killed, which is a paradox we can't afford to get into now. "Please, not another one, I can't do another one. Please just let this be the last one."

And so, Death trudged to the door and opened it, trying to suppress a growl, a yell, or an eldritch screech that would shake the world.

And someone familiar stood before him. Death blinked, realizing his eyes were still bleary from exhaustion. His mind was still in that hazy fog. He needed to focus in order to prove to his mind what his vision was telling him.