Silver Meadow's Stories

A short story by Silver Meadow

0.

I step into the afternoon sun. Finally, my lungs are filled with fresh air and not lecture hall spores.

My English professor harassed us about this five paged analytical essay due tomorrow. I’d be lucky if I have enough energy to finish the readings. Let alone understand what made Greek gods (especially Hades) so conditional.

I just want to be an Engineer.

On the way to my job, Lament’s End Cemetery, I fill up my tank then buy a very late dinner: some subpar sushi.

“Are you sure?” The cashier ringing me out looks like she’s seen a ghost.

I can’t tell if she’s twenty or fifty years old. It’s the blue ribbon tied in her hair.

I mean, you should think twice about gas station sushi. Gas station anything really. Maybe I should get something safer like some nachos or something…or a protein bar? Nah, I need more than that. Some real food. But that costs too much, and I’m confident $15 remains in my bank account without pending charges.

I laugh to myself. “Yeah, what am I thinking? I’m trippin’ for real. Gas station sushi is…a risk.”

The woman’s jaw slacks. “I’m sorry, what?”

“I should just go to the Benihana up the street. It’s probably cheaper.”

Her mouth remains open. I thought my comedic timing was decent.

“Oh,” I say. “Just jokes. I’m broke broke. Like ‘are y’all hiring?’ broke. Couldn’t have your shift, though. I work nights at a cemetery.”

Did I curse her bloodline? You would think I did by the look she gives me: face all bunched up in disgust. Never will I attempt to banter with a stranger again. My fault for listening to people’s advice to ‘open up more’ when this is what’s on the other side.

Well, at least I ain’t gotta worry about people for the rest of the night.

1.

I should be working on my five paged essay, but how can I focus with this random harp dancing through the air? It’s two in the morning. I’m trying to read this collection of Greek myths so I could write this dumb thing before tomorrow.

I check the security cameras, maybe someone is serenading their deceased loved one? A woman with one thick braid in her hair sits before a tombstone, strumming this harp, fingers cascading delicately as a spider weaving its web. She’s breaking the city’s noise ordinance in a poetic way.

Who am I to judge?

Just because I’m ‘Lament’s End Cemetery’s watchman,’ sitting in this keep, don’t mean I’m gonna to do anything. In fact, I’m advised to contact the actual authorities if people aren’t respecting those at rest. I’d never call them if I saw something supernatural (which I really don’t believe in), and never understood why people do. What’s due process to a ghost?

Her instrument glints in the moonlight. This music floats under the night sky as gooseflesh sprouts on my arms. I feel my heart drawing near this sound, coaxing my legs to move towards it.

Her face turns to the camera, eyes dark and round, innocent. “Aaron…”

She sings my name.

Wait, it’s the lady from the gas station. Unless she got a twin sister who serenades the dead in her free time.

2,3,4.

She continues to strum under the spotlight my lantern creates. The cemetery gets pretty dark at night, with only a few lamp posts with fewer functional bulbs illuminating the graves. Yet this doesn’t scare me: failing classes and student loans do. The woman looks up from her instrument but continues to play. No sweat on her brow. This harp somehow doesn’t crush her bony shoulder as it stretches a few feet above her head.

She grins with crow’s feet wrinkling on either side of her face, but her skin has a youthful radiance and would glow brighter when the morning comes. “Aaron,” she says. “If I play a song for you, will you let him go?” The woman nudges her head in the direction of this withered tombstone she’s sweeping for. Sitting in the corner of the cemetery. The only grave without company.

I squint my eyes at her. “Am I trippin’ or did I just see you at the gas station earlier? And I don’t remember telling you my name.”

She plucks a note way out of key, halting this melody. “Can you see the name on the tombstone?”

I crouch over the headstone with my lantern.

In Loving Memory of Aaron Jones

2004-2024

“Hold up,” I say. “Is that me? Am I dead?”

“Umm,” she sings. “Do you recognize this song? I call it Orpheus’ Final Plea-“

“I’m dead…”

She lets the harp crash into the ground with a cacophonious garble of notes. “Aaron,” she says, covering her mouth. “Oh my…”

She claps her hands in the dead silence.

“Man, this ain’t nothing to celebrate,” I say. “I’m only twenty years old!”

“Was. And no, I’m not applauding your death. I’m cheering because you’ve finally gained an awareness.”

We stare at each other; only my eyes begin to water.

I don’t understand. Nothing feels different. School, work, repeat. Everyone around me acts the same and I’m pretty sure we ain’t pass away together.

I thought when you die you would know.

“Who are you? How come you know this?”

She brushes past me, shaking her head. “Oh, I see,” she says. “You’re partially aware. That’s not a good sign…”

I follow her down the cemetery’s path. She can’t stop shaking her head and exhaling sharply. This should be my reaction. This disbelief.

“You didn’t answer my question,” I scoff. “Who are you?”

“Guess.”

I look around, sniff the air, feel the cold ground beneath our feet. Everything feels earthly. “It’s not hot enough to be Hell…I don’t think you’re Satan.”

“Don’t sell me short.”

“But you’re not exuding love and light,” I continue. “I don’t feel calm around you at all, so I know you ain’t God.” I tilt my head. “You gon’ help me out or do you want me to keep speculating? I got an eternity.”

She sighs. “I’m not telling you because you ain’t let me play my song.”

I plant my feet. “I get it. This is some in-between place. Like a place where people who die young hang out, right angel? You forgot to tell me to fear not.”

There’s no semblance of joy on her face at all. “I’m Orpheus.”

Orpheus: the guy from the only Greek myth i’ve retained. The one who ventured into the Underworld in hopes of freeing his wife, Eurydice, from Hades. With his lyre and passion, he moved the God of the Underworld to a single iron tear.

So he’d let Eurydice go under one condition: no looking back. Just walk all the way out of the underworld without peering over your shoulder—since Hades lied all day atop of being conditional—to ensure your wife is actually there.

Sadly, Orpheus disobeyed these alleged ‘simple instructions’ and looked back before his final step. He watched Eurydice plummet right back to where he had almost freed her.

It made me think like ‘dang, why couldn’t Hades just let her go without all of that?’ The dude already survived the realm of the dead and played the frick out of that lyre to a God with incinerator level rage.

“Orpheus?” I say, “Specific. I don’t like Hades very much, but you probably hate him. He’s a loser with too much dominion…why you a woman?”

Orpheus grimaces, flashing those gray teeth. “Long story. The name’s Hades. Your sentiments hurt my feelings.”

That still don’t really explain the woman part.

“Oh…my bad, man.”

“Just kidding,” Hades says. “I don’t have feelings anymore.”

We end up right where we started, except this time, my grave is the only one. Under a spotlight. The dirt pile next to it is sky-high. Hades stands over the casket hole, motioning me over to do the same.

“I ain’t going over there,” I say. “That’s a thousand-foot drop.”

I try to walk away but the world around us is a curtain of darkness. The land my grave lies on is the only thing left now. I don’t have a choice.

No shiny casket lies underneath. It’s only a stairwell with an imperceptible end. They ain’t pointing upward. I chew at the inside of my cheek.”Hades, does that lead to where I think it does?”

“Despite where it’s heading directionally, probably not. Think of it as the next level.” She gestures at the stairwell. “After you.”

“Nah,” I say.”Ladies first.”

7.

That tower of dirt was deceiving. These never-ending steps only take a few minutes to descend, and the railing is pure ice. My shoulders droop at this, relieved it ain’t hot.

Instead of a secret afterlife bunker being revealed, we step foot into another environment. A forest. Dense and thicketed like the ones in fairytales. I’m not inclined to fantastical crap, especially not after my mom read me Hansel and Gretel as a kid.

The perfect story for the family with a forest as a backyard. I was certain I smelled gingerbread whenever I played outside and refused to for a year straight.

“Why are you breathing down my neck?”

I guess all this reflection distracted me from stepping on the back of Hades’ shoe. “Sorry. We in a forest, why?”

She shrugs. “Let’s just keep following the path, scaredy cat.”

“I’m not scared.”

“Oh yeah? I hear your joints rattling.”

I walk ahead through this mossy labyrinth. Is it day? Is it night? I can’t tell. Only holes of light shine through the canopy. Each step is riddled with tree roots and inconspicuous shadows.

I look back at Hades, feet dragging with her eyes closed. Some creepy dark forest isn’t enough to frighten the God of the Underworld.

She cracks an eye open.”What now? Is there a ghoul behind me or something?”

I shake my head no. “I’m just wondering why you’re a woman.”

“It’s so weird talking to you. Like actually having a conversation. You usually repeat the same fourteen lines to me…I have some memorized.”

No wonder she was making weird faces and nearly broke my toe when she dropped that harp earlier.

“Really? What’s your favorite?”

She taps her chin. “I got an essay to plagiarize. Good night, Hades.”

Dang, that does sound like something I would say. Sounds like I was stuck in a loop, and for some odd reason, Hades is my witness?

“Aaron…Aaron…” A deep voice echoes through the forest— exactly how I imagined Hades would sound.

I freeze, glancing at her once again. “Was that you?”

“Was that me what?”

“Whispering my name.”

“No.”

“Aaron..” the voice continues. “Finish your essay…” it wisps with the wind, fluttering the leaves.

“Okay, yeah I heard that,” Hades says. “I think it might be him.” She points upward.

Perched in a tree is a pair of glowing eyes. “Aaron…five pages or you fail.”

Hades catches up to me. She stands at my side. “Don’t tell me that’s your English teacher.”

The ground shakes as he lands on all fours. Too much agility for a guy who had a double knee surgery. He cracks his fingers as the forest rustles around him. Yup, my Classical Mythology 323 professor.

“Hey Professor Long,” I say. “Long time no see since I’m dead now…”

“Not punny,” Hades interjects.

“I would love to have that essay turned into you, but purgatory ate my laptop,” I continue. “I mean, I got Hades right here. You can’t get more Greek mythology than that. May not look like him standing at 5’5″ and other things, but…yeah.”

The Hades in question offers no additional evidence to support my argument. “He’s going to attack you.”

Unfortunately, Hades is right. Professor Long leaps in the air, with only one target: me.

8.

You’d think someone with bad knees couldn’t jump from tree to tree, and not while the student they precede by a few decades sprints ahead.

“Why is my professor here? He ain’t dead too, right?”

“He could be. Or he could be a manifestation,” Hades says, jogging but somehow keeping pace with me.

This manifestation hooks my ankle. Prof. Long pulls on this rope, which is snakes so rigidly it’s like my foot isn’t there anymore. My nails dig into the mossy earth. And here is someone whose circulation is not cut right now watching the entire thing.

“You just gon’ stand there? Help me!”

Hades continues to just stand there. “I’m not allowed to interfere.”

I clench my jaw in pain. “Says who?”

Her cheeks puff up until she can’t hold her laughter in. She doubles over even. “Aaron,” she gasps for air. “he’s reeling you in with a chain made up of tiny F’s—a failure chain!”

Hades is useless.

Her laughter continues as I’m forced to sit at a desk also constructed by the first letter of the word ‘failure.’ The shackles drape around my limbs and bind me to this desk ripped from medieval times. One Geoffrey Chaucer scribbled on (Prof. Long would never shut up about him or Shakespeare).

A quill in an ink jar and a stack of papers lie before me, “Write,” Professor Long commands. “You have five minutes…”

As it pertains to Earth, my English teacher wasn’t scary at all. A stringent grader, but not as edgy as my Physics professor, who got suspended for dropping a textbook on a snoring student’s head. He claimed ‘It was a simple refresher on gravity,’ like we needed that for some reason.

Even now, if it weren’t for Prof. Long’s superhuman capabilities, I couldn’t take him too seriously in the fuzzy-sweater-glasses combo he stayed in no matter what the weather did.

Hades wheezes. “Why did he give you a quill?”

Only splotches of ink drip onto the page. I ain’t a painter. I ain’t Shakespeare. I want to build things. I snap at Hades, “You seriously not finna help?”

She stands far off in the distance, cackle echoing throughout the forest. “I’m sorry,” Hades wipes tears. “I’m not allowed to interfere, Aaron. It’s not my rule.”

But the letter ‘F’ leaps from Prof. Long’s hand and tapes Hades’ mouth shut in an instant. “No distractions.”

“Maybe I can interfere a little,” Hades murmurs, peeling the shut-the-‘F’-up-‘F’ from her mouth.

“Three minutes left, Aaron…” Prof. Long taps his foot on the tree trunk. He looms over me with those glowing eyes. I was always indifferent towards the idea of an ‘in-class’, in this case, ‘in-purgatory,’ essay. Why teach us about a mystical writing process that could take years just to expect an entire essay in five minutes?

I could write about technicalities all day. Technical analysis, construction fundamentals, and catching all the structural mishaps on all kinds of developments. But I draw the line at a Greek myths I ain’t even read.

Screw this essay.

What could Prof. Long do? He can’t kill me. Plus, his whole philosophy is ethics. You know what, maybe the punishment would be Shakespeare as my writing tutor for eternity.

Hades creeps up on me. “Hand me that.” I shove the quill in her direction. She writes her name down.

“I said no distractions!” Prof. Long sends a ripple through the ground from his stomp.

“Yeah, yeah, fuzzy sweater,” Hades says, rolling her eyes.

She scribbles the word sushi.

“Why sushi?”

“No reason.”

But that little grin on her face lets me know there is, in fact, a reason.

“One minute…” Prof. Long showers us with leaves from his rattling.

“Cross my name out then write yours,” Hades says.

I follow her instructions.

“Times up Aaron.” Prof. Long climbs down from the tree and snatches my ‘essay’ off the F-desk.

I shoot Hades a look. If he chews me out then it’s all her fault, and she better use those alleged underworld powers. She mouths “keep watching” to me.

My English teacher shrills. My poor eardrums.

The essay is thrown high into the air, and Prof. Long runs away still screaming. The ‘F’ shackles loosen the further he gets then eventually fall away.

“Every English teacher’s worst fear…” Hades watches him high-tail it.

“Math?”

“Plagiarism.”

9.

Light blooms on the far end of the trail. It’s much more promising than this Hansel and Gretel shrubbed and brambled forest.

Hades sniffs around. “You smell gingerbread?”

My eyes widen. I inhale then exhale the same old muggy air. “Nah…do you?”

“Nope, I just know the Hansel and Gretel forest from anywhere. That story scare you or something?”

“I read it years ago. I don’t even remember it for real.”

“I see a witch over there.”

“Where?” Every inch of my body freezes.

“Lies, scaredy cat. Let’s keep walking. I see some light at the end of the trail.”

They ain’t lie about Hades being a trickster.

The more I glance at her, the more I begin to recall. I have vague memories of Hades and the bits of information she shared (like why she’s a woman). “You’re the last person I saw before dying. I lowkey remember you telling me that.”

“Yup, not any of your loved ones but a gas station clerk,” Hades says. “I was told two facts about her: she has functioned on three hours of sleep since childhood and has won every physical altercation encountered…”

That explains those gray circles under her eyes. Her combat skills have no physical indicator. Must be her secret superpower. “So,” I say. “Should I use your original pronouns or…”

“Ahh, I see. I’m Hades but I’m presenting as a woman. Use whatever shoe fits best, Aaron.”

I nod. “Cool, so if I say Miss Hades-“

“Don’t. I’m not old. She is, but I’m not.”

We squint at the light that brightens with every step. Strong winds howl from the distance. Man, it better not be a cliff or something. Who knows? This light might be Heaven. From what I interpreted, God likes to build faith before the reward.

This forest ordeal is the storm before the calm.

But—with that being said, what the frick is Hades doing here?

I glance at her again, biting at her pointy nails. Very lady-like.

“Wait,” I say, “I got some questions for you…”

“I’ll answer two then that’s it.”

“Aight,” I say. “How can I trust that you’re actually Hades, and if you are, why are you helping me?”

“Answering in reverse. I’m helping you because I’m unemployed. The employment I seek requires a test of some sort, with individuals like you.”

“Like me…” I echo.

“Yes, I must assist you. I won’t elaborate any further.”

“Can’t trust you’re telling the truth.”

Hades cackles. “I’ve been honest ever since I was in my father’s stomach. Wanna hear that story?”

“Nah, prove who you are.”

Hades plants her feet. She lifts an eyebrow at me—she better not start raging. Instead, she gives a low, soft, lazy whistle. The volume don’t match the effort, even birds take flight at it.

An earthquake disrupts the ground like Hades summoned a mountain. Not quite, but something about its size. A mass of existence charges at us.

She doesn’t run, so I don’t.

Three sets of claws thunder in the distance, and moments later, Cerberus bounds into view, all drool and doom, tails wagging like a dog that hasn’t seen his owner in years.

“He likes to hang out with me here. Happy now?” Hades says, while three massive heads take turns slobbering on her sleeve.

Here I was thinking she’d show off those invisibility powers or make skeletons dance or something. But Cerberus? That’s gnarly.

“Come on,” she continues. “I don’t feel like walking anymore, I’m not the God of cardio.”

I may be dead, but at least I could say Hades gave me a ride on her thirty-foot guard dog. We get a better view above this thicketed canopy.

The light isn’t just a mysterious clearing; it’s a city skyline.

10.

Cerberus sniffs the pavement as we pass through this city. Everything is abandoned but not overrun by nature like people up and left just a few hours ago. My eyes stay peeled because someone will jump out somewhere. I’ll be ready this time.

“Are you afraid of metropolitan areas?” Hades sits slouched.

“Nope,” I say.

Hades straightens his back.

“Well…” I continue, pretending I don’t notice the return of his disappointed posture. “Not anymore. But I used to hate driving through downtown as these huge buildings would tower over me. It made me feel too small, too powerless…”

“Powerless?”

“I don’t know. I just felt like they were going to sprout legs and step on me. Never been too fond of grand structures,” I say. “I know it’s strange coming from an aspiring engineer.”

“Too bad Hephaestus is too busy doing whatever he’s doing. You’d probably like him more than me.”

Is Hades nonchalant, aloof, and conditional? Yeah. But it’s amazing how she out of everyone in the afterlife is ‘helping’ me on this top secret mission she refuses to share the details of. “Now that I’ve gotten to know you, you’re not too bad.”

“Yeah, yeah, but I’m not your favorite.”

“You are.”

“Leave the lies to me, Aaron.”

“I’m not lying.”

Hades raises the back of her hand to me. Her nails are those of a walking corpse: white with dirt stacked onto her cuticles. “Stop,” she says. “It’s Apollo, isn’t it?”

“I already said it’s you.”

Hades scratches her hair. “Hermes? Poseidon? Nah, you don’t strike me as a Poseidon fan, he think he all that…” She turns around, looking me square in the eye. “Zeus?” And before I can respond, “sike, no one likes Zeus.”

Something thuds and slams into the ground. Heavy as a boulder dropping, causing the glass on the buildings to shudder. Cerberus and Hades remain indifferent. She won’t let up. “What about Athena? I saw her recently…I didn’t say ‘hi’.”

The city falls quiet again, so I shake the noise off. Probably nothing. “How you stay in touch with everyone? Family group chat?”

“Family group chat, Aaron you’re so funny.” Her monotonous tone says otherwise.

She keeps going through the list of Greek Gods Prof. Long would know of and I wouldn’t.

The ground reverbs once more. Earth cracks. Car alarms wail as the ground darkens by a shadow.

Hades finally stops. “What scares you?”

“Hansel and Gretel, failing classes, student loan debt, and grand structures.”

Hades tugs on Cerberus’ collars; he turns at her command. Behind us, one number: $30,493, floats above. Light as a balloon but heavy enough to create such a disturbance.

“That’s how much I owe…” I crane my neck.

“Aaron,” Hades says. “This is pathetic.”

Cerberus slopes his body, growling at the silent number, midnight fur prickled. Yeah, something is about to go so wrong.

“Aaron,” the number projects robotically. “Pay me.”

“Seriously, what is with you and these cartoony fears? I wouldn’t even know how to punish you if you were the bane of humanity.”

Being chased by debt armed with lasers would be good enough. They zip past us as Cerberus sprints. An explosion here a melted bike rack over there, and a steady demand from my debt. “Pay me. Pay me. Pay me.”

“Got any tricks up yo’ sleeve for this one?” We escape by only Cerberus’ reptilian tail which causes a lot of confusion on my end. This number has an advantage in the air.

“My expertise is moral debt,” Hades says. “Let’s find somewhere to hide.”

Up ahead lies a parking garage. The pathway curves into an unknown destination, round and around Cerberus runs, and the deeper we descend underground. If Hades’ three-headed dog could squeeze down here, then we’re silly to think my debt can’t.

Now, structurally speaking, this laser-shooting-hot-air-balloon of a number could inspire this entire garage to collapse on us. But it wouldn’t get any money.

However, unpaid debt is relentless.

“So,” I say. “We’ll just camp out here and hope my debt will get tired and go to sleep?”

“Give me a better idea.”

Unfortunately, I can’t. But if this is my battle, if this is my in-between, I must face whatever is after me head on. Even if that’s alone.

It’s my responsibility.

“Y’all wait here,” I say as I dismount Cerberus.

Hades laughs. “What are you going to do?”

“Pay it off,” I look over my shoulder. “With my soul.”

“Okay, don’t be ridiculous. There’s another way.”

“No, Hades.”

“No?”

“This is my fate,” I continue. “Thanks for everything.”

Like Prof. Long, my debt can’t kill me. But it could chase me for all of eternity until I pay it off, and I’m not sure how the afterlife job market works or why we’d even bring the concept of ‘working for a dying’ to the afterlife.

I digress.

I’ve seen enough action movies to know this could go two ways: One, an epic fight in which I’m triumphant, or two, I get melted by its lasers and live out the rest of forever as a puddle.

Either way, I can’t show the God of the Underworld that I’m a coward.

Right when I take a few steps, the sound of metal bending and scraping attacks our eardrums. As though something squeezes through the garage’s spiral entrance. “Pay me. Pay me. Pay me.”

11.

Halfway in and halfway out of the garage’s entrance is my student loan. Not merely the size it was above ground. But still formidable. Still nightmare fuel. Still hunting me. Well, once it finds a way in.

Hades cackles over Cerberus’ returning growls, you’d think it was that dog’s debt the way he’s foaming at the mouths. “I’m sorry but getting chased by debt in the most literal form is tragically poetic.”

My loan saws its way into the garage’s entrance, with a new number appearing through every piece of brick crumbling. “Aye man,” I say. “You laughed about Prof. Long, you still ain’t tell me what’s so funny about sushi, and now my student loan is hilarious? These are real fears, Hades. Things us mortals don’t sign up for but endure with so much uncertainty you wonder what all this is for in the first place.”

I doubt she’d understand, though. Being a God who determined the fate of many.

“Alright, alright, put the soap box away,” Hades says. “I’m sorry I don’t understand the conundrum of witches in gingerbread houses, but if you haven’t noticed, since you were ranting, that’s not the same amount of debt from earlier.”

Dang it, Hades is right. There’s only $10,493 in comparison to $30,493 shooting lasers. “Then who paid it off? ‘Cause my pockets empty.”

“Think symbolically, Aaron. It’s a must here.” Hades grips Cerberus’ collar so he doesn’t go barreling towards the number that’s almost through the garage’s entrance.

Okay, symbolically…well, most people run from or ignore debt. They hope that if eyes aren’t on what they owe, they owe nothing (not speaking from experience). Maybe my debt shrank because I stopped running from it. So, instead of sprinting away, I’ll run towards it. I’ll embrace my debt.

With my arms spread for the perfect embrace, like I’m meeting the love of my life from the other side of the flowerfields, I approach my ball and chain.

Cerberus comes running after me since Hades has, yet again, lost her composure through laughter. He leaps and gnaws at this sentient number. I, however, do not. I hug it warmly. “I accept you…”

My sentiments overpower its repeated demand of ‘pay me.’ Softer its mantra grows and smaller the number becomes. Eventually, the number is the size of a chew toy for a regular sized dog that isn’t Cerberus, turning from $1 to zero.

I exhale. “That’s all it took. A little accountability.”

Or I thought. In its dying breath, “Rise, my slumbering brothers. Rise!” Is heard.

The ground erupts.

12.

We go from the deepest depths to face-to-face with a skyscraper. Nothing else but blue sky and wind. Pieces of what used to be the garage plummet from the heights. We next. Thankfully, Cerberus uses every piece of falling debris as a stepping stone, and we land as roughly as driving fifty over a speed bump.

What’s the point? The ground beneath us crumbles, opens, and shoots rifts throughout the pavement. A Hansel and Gretel forest I could handle. An evil Prof. Long one step away from failing me is managable. But the dormant-skyscraper-titans? I’ll die twice.

“Aaron, you gotta hold on,” Hades says. “I saw our exit when we were picked up.”

I offer no reply. I don’t have one. And if I no longer have a pulse, how is my heart beating in my throat?

Animated arms grab at us as the buildings stand on feet that don’t look strong enough to support them. Dang, maybe my fears are a little cartoony.

I’m not weak. I’m not some coward. I worked at a graveyard almost every night and had nothing to worry about. Not a ghost, a zombie, or whatever. That supernatural junk meant nothing to a guy with no ends but made them meet anyway.

That’s why I bury my face in Cerberus’ fur. I thought a dog from the underworld would smell, but I think he just got back from the groomer’s. Hope he doesn’t mind me screaming into his flesh that isn’t infested with maggots and fleas, more like lathered in blueberry and black licorice shampoo my dad used on our dog.

“Aaron!” Hades slaps the crap out of my head. “Imma need your help.”

I look up from Cerberus’ fur. “What could I possibly help the God of the Underworld with?”

We duck at a titan’s arm that swings overhead in hopes of scooping us up. The buildings clash as they try to move about a city not designed for structures thousands of feet tall to walk on noodle cartoony limbs. Debris rains down because of this.

“I’m retired. The underworld is no longer its own thing. It’s with another thing,” Hades scoffs. “You see the rift dead ahead?”

“Dead? Sorry, I forgot I already was, but yeah, I see it.”

It’s about as wide as a canyon, and we’re fast approaching. It’s either turn back around and face the cocktail of skyscraper titans or make a fifty-foot jump.

“Aaron,” a skyscraper, glinting in the sun with hundreds of glass windows (the scariest kind), says. “We will crush you into eternal pain and suffering…”

On that note, a fifty-foot jump is light work. Hades nods at me like she read my mind. “This dog is stubborn,” she says. “If you don’t lift all three of his heads simultaneously at equal height, we ain’t jumping.”

“Even in a situation like this?”

“They either get all or you get nothing. So grab one collar, and I’ll get the other two.”

I hold on to his left head’s spiky collar. Is it sharp? Yeah. Is it as painful as being trampled by buildings that weigh several tons? Close second.

The cloud of debris is right on our backs; so is this huddle of steel, glass, and concrete. “On three,” Hades says. I shut my eyes, if I see the drop I’m gonna overthink everything.

“One…two…three!”

Before I died, I only went to the gym at least four times a year. Was I out of shape? No, not at all. I actually ran track then quit after the first meet in high school.

It’s just that I should’ve been deadlifting five hundred pounds every chance I got because that’s the equivalent of one of Cerberus’ heads. My arms are like the cartoony ones the buildings have.

We’re chalked.

I snap my eyes open mid-leap. “Hades! He’s too heavy!”

It’s already too late. We barrel towards the utmost edge of the canyon. The buildings digging their feet into the ground in a desperate attempt to stop doesn’t help. Chaos blooms all around us.

My stomach deflates from the sheer gravity of the abyss. So dark it appears one-dimensional, but hear me out, it’s not. I ball my hands, clenching my body for an imaginary impact.

In a free fall, a low grade cackle.”My bad,” Hades says. “I forgot you’re a mortal with real fears.” Right before Cerberus lands face first into the canyon wall, Hades hooks her foot underneath his collar and tugs. And like a bird taking flight, her dog ascends. I wonder what my physics professors would say about that? Oh well, I’m grateful.

We rise towards the heavenly sky then eat dirt. We’re ejected from Cerberus’ back and left with sand in our mouths. Better than a never-ending drop. I brush this searing sand off my tongue because it’s been cooking since the beginning of time.

The buildings are a cluster of debris as they ultimately push each other over the edge or smash on the way there. I cover my ears at the collisions. Earth’s foundation can no longer hold the other side of the rift up.

The ground collapses, swallowing every titan. An unexpected silence blossoms after the rift stitches itself back up. We’re left with nothing but a sandy desert.

I don’t recall ever having that much thrill in my life, let alone the afterlife.

Hades claps her hands and cheers. “That was insane! I’ve seen a lot, trust me, but a skyscraper stampede that ultimately ends up in the belly of an abyss? I’m writing that down!”

I would cheer along, but I’m too busy coughing my lungs out. Hades hits my back, believing she’s helping (she’s not).

My composure returns, sort of. “Where are we now? I can’t take this anymore.”

Hades shrugs. “Let’s climb over this dune and see.”

12.

The dune takes us half an hour to climb, partially because of its height and partially because of this heat that’s like someone baked a California Reaper and left the oven open.

Cerberus wimpers to himself. He deserves to drink a lake after saving us. Nonetheless, we reach the peak. We squint at the sun setting on more desert sand. All that work for nothing.

“I’m out of fears,” I say. “So what’s up with this?”

Hades opens her mouth but is cut off by Cerberus pacing and whining. Unless there’s an invisible enemy, I don’t know what could be frightening the guard dog of the ex-underworld.

“What’s wrong?” Hades pets all three heads. Still, no solace is granted to his dog as he trembles. She whistles a melody in vain: Cerberus breaks away and sprints back down this dune that took us half a century to climb.

A trail of dust smokes behind him.

“Dang,” I say. “Should I be scared, too?”

“Nah, he only gets like that when…wait a minute.”

Hades stiffens, staring into the horizon with her eyes wide. Now the God of the ex-underworld looks terrified? My heart rate shoots back up. She grabs my face and turns it towards something, an archway, blurry, sitting far out, yet close enough to make out, surrounded by a humongous stone wall. Deep blue flames span across from the other side.

“I was wrong,” Hades says. “You are going to hell.”

The End…at least, it feels that way.