“No! No! Kala! Kevin!” I tried to call them back to me. “Don’t leave me. Don’t go.”

She held my children’s hands and shook her head at me. “I’ll be back for you,” she said.

“Don’t take them,” I begged. “Please. They’re only children. Take me instead.”

“It isn’t your time.”

Such a matter-of-fact answer for an event that would make me wish for death a million times over.

“Take me. Let my children have a chance to grow up. Kala wants to be a veterinarian. She wants to make animals well. And Kevin—” My voice broke and I couldn’t continue. “Dennis will be a good father. They’ll be fine without me. Take me.” I held out my wrists, offering the veins to the broken windshield for a slashing.

“It isn’t your time.” Her face was pale, the eyes dark and sad.

“Make it my time. Trade me for them.” Panic had begun to build beneath my ribs. My heart squeezed, and I hoped it was the first sign that a deal had been struck.

“You can’t bargain with death,” she said. “It’s either your time or not. This isn’t your time.”

Against the pain in my chest, I struggled to free myself from the seat belt that held me. “No!” I fought, but the belt was tight. “No!”

They backed away from the car. A shaft of sunlight touched Kala’s chestnut curls. Tears hung in her lashes. “Mama.” She held out her arms to me. Kevin bit his lip.

“Please!” I ignored the man tugging at the driver’s door, his face showing horror and panic. “Please don’t take them.”

“It’s their time.”

“That’s supposed to bring me comfort?” I wanted to kill her. I wanted to tear her fleshless body with my teeth, rending her apart. Anything to protect my children.

“Their purpose is done. Let them move forward.”

The pressure in my chest became unbearable, and I knew it wasn’t a heart attack. Grief had set up lodging. My new boarder had brought his full accommodation of pain. “For God’s sake, I’d rather be dead. Please, take me!”

She shook her head. “When your time comes, I’ll be back.”

They stepped out of the sunshine and slowly dissipated in the shade cast by the oaks.

“Please!”

I was still shrieking when the man got the door open and Mrs. Darcy reached in to grasp my hands that clawed at the air. She tried to calm me until the ambulance came, but I could tell by the tears on her face that my children were gone. Just like that, gone. As quick as snuffing out a match.

There was a funeral, which I don’t remember. For a year, Dennis tried to make a go of it, but he lost not only his children but his wife. No man should have to live with a zombie, and though Dennis tried, there was nothing he could do to bring life back to the husk of my body. I ate what I was forced to eat. I sat in the sun if someone led me there. I bathed if a bath was drawn. Mostly I sat in a rocker by the front window and watched for her. I knew I’d see her again.

After Dennis left me, I cut my wrists in a bathtub of warm water. It’s a funny thing, but I’d always expected it to be painless. Bleeding to death is excruciating. The body demands to live, no matter what the mind or spirit says. My lungs burned for oxygen. My starving heart suffered anguish. I felt agony, but I knew soon it would be over.

That’s when I saw her again. She stood in the doorway of the bathroom, a vague creature of swirling air currents and energy and bath powder. For a moment I saw the terrible beauty of her face as she shook her head.

“It isn’t your time, Sandra.” She held out a scroll, and for a split second, I thought I saw names written in blood. “Your name isn’t here.”

“Fuck you.” It’s hard to be witty while bleeding to death.

“You can’t cheat death,” she whispered. “And you can’t hurry it.”

“Where are my children?”

“Their destiny is no longer your concern. They’re where they’re supposed to be.”

With those words, I knew Kala and Kevin were forever lost to me. Death would not resolve my loss. “I hate you! You won’t win! I’ll do whatever is necessary.” My voice weakened.

She slipped closer and looked into the tub that was bright with warm blood. “It isn’t your time.”

She disappeared and I heard footsteps pounding up the staircase. Dennis to the rescue. Why couldn’t he leave it be? He could’ve collected the insurance money and been done with the guilt. But no, he’d come back to check on me. I hadn’t looked good. He’d been worried, had a bad feeling. Feeling guilty over the divorce, he’d come back to make sure I was okay. But, of course, I wasn’t. I was far from okay.

Two years later, the wounds on my wrists were hard to find. My new attitude—one of self-sufficient acceptance—had won my freedom from West Briar Estates, the place where crazies can get twenty-four-hour surveillance and legal pharmaceuticals to blur reality. Never make the mistake of telling a psychiatrist that you’ve had a conversation with Death; it’s a surefire ticket to involuntary incarceration. While under the watchful eye of the medical staff, I began to formulate my revenge.

I learned to smile and pretend an interest in the news and the visits of my nieces and nephews. Actually, I was interested in the news. I’d begun to catch glimpses of her in the newscast footage of violent slums, on the dusty roads of the Middle East, and in the mud villages of Central America as a flood swept houses away. She was always there, a half-formed face in the shuddering palm fronds or in a dust devil shifting across the desert. She was there, the Pied Piper of the dying. She’d always been there, but no one looked for her. Except me. I sought her out, gathering the tidbits that would become my arsenal.

When the doors of West Briar closed behind me, I moved into a lovely old home with screened porches and an acre of yard that Dennis bought for me. He’d remarried and his wife was pregnant. They both came to visit, to include me in the growth of their baby. No two people could have worked harder. So I feigned an interest and began to garden with spectacular results. I had a green thumb. Imagine that. Someone who watched for death could grow anything.

As the years passed and I waited to see her, my plan took shape. She’d sentenced me to a half life. When she took my children, she took my joy. She wouldn’t let me die. She said it wasn’t my time, as if she could dictate the end of a person’s life by a timetable worked up like a train schedule. Good. I’ve been waiting. I’ve arranged for a little surprise.

It begins tonight, symbolically enough, on my birthday. I saw his ship in the harbor last night while I walked the midnight streets, unafraid of harm because it “isn’t my time.”

Tonight I’ll be forty-three, a mother of dead children, a divorcée, a failed suicide. A winner.

The winter days are short, and I’ve watched the sun wane and the timid appearance of the gibbous moon. Somehow, I thought it might be full—too many superstitions and legends, I suppose.

My home isn’t far from downtown, which is my destination. Thank goodness it’s a weeknight. On weekends young people crowd Dauphin Street to drink and party and listen to music. Tonight, a Tuesday, the downtown will be quiet. The hunters will be out.

By the time I park my Volvo beside a meter, which I deliberately don’t feed, dusk has fallen like the soft kiss on a child’s sleeping brow. The Mobile River is only a few blocks away, and I can smell the water. The last, lingering businessmen and-women are hurrying out of downtown. Hurrying home, as out of control of their lives as I used to be.

Neon lights a few bars, and I go to Barnacle Bill’s. I’ve watched my pirate often enough to know this is where he’ll be. Just as I step to the doorway, a rustle of wind reveals her image. She’s in Bienville Square, a vague outline among the squirrels and homeless people who sleep on the park benches. She walks beside an old man, and he never senses her. I know exactly what she’d say. It isn’t his time.