Read Online Beautiful Sorrows by Mercedes M. Yardley - Free Book Online Page A

freezer. Stupid freezer. I wish I’d never seen the thing.
    “Sucks to be you,” said a voice out of the darkness.
    I jumped so hard that I slammed the back of my head against the freezer. The pupils of my eyes felt like stars, and I ran my tongue over my teeth to make sure that they hadn’t been rattled out.
    “Hmm. Can’t say that wasn’t satisfying.”
    I blinked a few times, and turned my head toward the familiar voice.
    “What are you doing here?” I asked. I really didn’t want to hear the answer.
    “Why, my love, what a silly question. I’m here...for you.”
    He drifted my way, his black cloak spilling around him like fog. His hood was pulled low over his face, but I could still see the glitter of his eyes. He stretched out his arm and pointed at me with fingers of exposed bone.
    “I have come to take you home,” Death said. And smiled.
    “Knock it off, Death. Get me out of here!” I rattled my chains at him, and his smile widened.
    “I don’t wanna,” he said, and sat down next to me. He looked around the room and whistled. “Jill’s some piece of work. Bet you’re regretting kicking me out of the house now, aren’t you?” He picked up a severed arm and examined it.
    “This so isn’t the time to talk about this, Death! Release me before she comes back!” I gave him my most commanding glare, but he didn’t seem to notice.
    “Poor me, booted out of my home and forced to find new lodgings elsewhere. And you, you shack up with a psycho killer. Qu’est-ce que c’est ?” He started to hum, and patted me on the shoulder with the detached hand.
    “Please,” I said, giving up. “I don’t want to die.”
    Death lowered his head and looked at me from under the hood. “You’re going to have to, you know. Everybody does.”
    I went cold. “Now?”
    Death stared at me for a long time, and I stared back in horror. Finally he sighed. “No, not now. I guess. Man, I am such a softie.” He stood up, and tossed the arm into the corner. It landed with a wet thump. “But we have to establish some rules.”
    “Like what?”
    Death paced around the cellar room, ticking the rules off on his fingers. “Number one, I get to move back in. I hate my new roommate. He’s such a dweeb.”
    “I...okay. But you can’t leave your beetles and things around the living room. It’s so disconcerting,” I pointed out, when he turned to glare at me.
    “I don’t think you have much room to negotiate, pretty girl.”
    He was right. We’d talk about this later. “Anything else?”
    “Rule number two. You know that twenty bucks that I owe you?”
    I nodded my head. “Yeah.”
    “Debt forgiven. Got it?”
    I nodded again. My life for twenty bucks? Freakin’ steal, I say! Suddenly I heard the basement door open, and my mouth went dry.
    “Death, hurry! She’s on her way down!”
    “One more thing,” he said, and I began to panic. I scrabbled at the chains and heard a strange mewling sound. It took a second to realize that it was coming from me.
    “Calm down!” he ordered, and the authority in his voice shut me up. For the first time I saw Death as somebody to fear instead of the gangly sack of bones who ate all of my Cheetos and saved over my games on the Playstation. I stared at him with wide eyes.
    “What else do you want?” I whispered.
    Death looked at me and grinned, his skull shining in the dim light. “That’s for me to know and you to find out.”
    I scowled and he shrugged. “I haven’t decided yet. But I’ll let you know when I do. Now hush.”
    And hush I did. Jill had descended the stairs and stood staring at us.
    “So, you’re Death,” she said. She sounded strangely unfazed. That’s because she’s totally a creepy psycho weirdo, I decided. I have the worst luck in roommates.
    “I am,” Death said. His cloak was swaying around him in an extra ghostly way. Sometimes that guy knows how to work the ambiance.
    “Funny. I never saw you when I killed anybody else.” Jill looked