The waves crashed on the shore, sinking saline teeth in and raking back the sand, leaving bubbles behind. The sun was cresting on the horizon, a disc of blood beginning its ascent.

  “Why did you take me out here today, Mentor?” Ever said out loud. There wasn’t anyone else at the beach this early in the morning, except for a few surfers paddling further out, sitting on their boards, waiting for the good wave to come.

  A guy takes you for a long walk on the beach, that’s called a date.

  As always, Death’s quips were met with silence from his protege.

  What have your learnings been for this week?

  Ever closed his eyes, letting the sounds of the beach permeate his human mind.

  “Smiling is hard.”

  Death laughed out loud. You scared that kid pretty badly.

  “I didn’t mean to. Taylor does it so easily.”

  She… has had to practice quite a bit.

  Ever turned away from the sun, looking to the south as if Death stood beside him. “What do you mean?”

  Talk to her a bit more. Get in her good books and she might tell you more. What else did you learn?

  This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  “There is a… non-earth being that also likes ice cream.”

  Mmm.

  “You asked me to ‘be wary’. Are they dangerous?”

  Did you feel like you were in danger?

  Ever closed his eyes again and remembered: the endless eyes, the falling and the feeling that he was being stripped bare.

  “Not really, but…” Ever looked back at the horizon. The full sun had come completely up. He’d have to head off to work soon. “I felt helpless.”

  I’m still not entirely sure who - or what - it was. I have some hunches, but I need to… make some inquiries. Just know this: there’s not much I can’t protect you from. I could see you when that being was there because it perceived the Underworld and earth as being one realm. That tells me it’s a being more powerful than I, which is saying something. Anywho, back to the main lesson, Celeste. What did you learn from this reaping?

  Ever was silent for several minutes. “You told me about pain and how humans sometimes want to feel pain.” He took Death’s silence as attention. “Celeste felt the pain of not having her family all together. Her mother pretended Celeste didn’t exist to dull her pain, her father felt the pain of turning off Celeste’s life support and her grandmother felt the pain of losing Celeste.”

  Ever was silent again. “Their experience of pain was different. In the end, pain is what brought them all together.” He swallowed, remembering the feeling in his stomach in the hospital ward. “But it wasn’t in the way Celeste would have liked.”

  I’m sure Celeste would have liked to have eaten Nonna's spaghetti in real life, but then we wouldn’t be talking about her now, would we?

  “No.”

  OK then! Death clapped his bony digits today and they clacked in Ever’s mind. Off to your day job.

  Ever walked off the beach, hands in his pockets. He couldn’t quite shake the feeling that there was a deeper lesson there, but it was one that he didn’t understand - or that his mentor didn’t want to teach him.