A knock at the door around 4 PM marked the end of a rather awkward conversational silence that had accompanied the end of a TV show which neither Albert nor his mother were invested in. They could only pretend to be interested in rich people pitching ideas to other rich people for money for so long, and genuine conversation had dried up long before that stage of TV watching had started. The edge that accompanied the inevitable departure of Albert’s mother from the apartment also bothered both of them, though for different reasons. Albert desperately wanted to be left alone to think about the situation he now found himself in, but couldn’t tell his mother about; and so he was hopeful that she would end up having to go into work. Albert’s mother, sincerely worried about her son and his potential concussion, was still texting all of her co-workers and hoping one of them could pick up her shift.

And so, when the knock came, there was a small alleviation of tension. There was something else to think about, something new to distract them.

Albert’s mother sat up to answer the door, giving Albert a silent finger gesture to stay put. Albert couldn’t hear the first little bit of the exchange or see who it was standing just outside the door when it was answered, but the surprise in his mother’s voice was enough to draw his curiosity.

“I’m not saying I know all of Albert’s classmates, but I’ve never seen you at the school.”

“I just moved here the other week…” There was more to the statement but it was said more quietly.

The responding voice was new. Completely new, Albert had never heard this girls voice before. Not that he knew the voice of every girl at his high school, but he knew the voice of every girl from his high school that would find their way to his apartment. That is to say, there was no girl at his school who would be there for any reason, or even know where he lived, and whoever this was was immediately suspect.

“All right, I was worried he’d miss some assignments with it being the middle of the week. Come in.” Albert’s mom stepped aside and a girl with a long blonde braid of hair and what looked like worn out army surplus clothes stepped into the apartment.

If it weren’t for the ragged clothes and faint blotches of red on her face, Albert would say she looked like most of the preppy pretty girls he saw at school. But he had never seen this girl at school before. He would have remembered her. It wasn’t her appearance, but the way she carried herself that would have made it hard to forget her. Her posture was perfect, despite the incredibly heavy looking backpack slung over her shoulder, and her eyes were steady and meticulous as they took in the room she now found herself in.

“Hey.”

Her voice was softer than she looked, and almost unnaturally… girly? Albert couldn’t think of a better way to describe it. It was like the exact opposite of the girl he saw before him was talking.

“It’s me, Amy. Remember me? I just transferred schools and you showed me around the other day?”

There was something about the penetrating glare she was giving Albert while his mother’s back was turned that convinced him he should agree with her very convincing lie.

“Yeah… yeah.” Albert was still struggling to find the words to respond, causing Amy to roll her eyes in frustration.

“I heard that you had an accident or something and I thought I’d bring you some notes and homework from class so you don’t fall behind.”

Albert’s mom had closed the door and was returning to her place on the armchair at that point. As she passed in front of Amy there was a dramatic change of expression on the girl’s face, and she immediately started to look more pleasant and cheerful—like the way she sounded. Amy pulled a chair from the dining room table around the couch and took a seat near Albert’s feet.

“I’m sorry you can’t stay for too long, I have to get to work in little bit…” Albert’s mom looked to the digital clock on the microwave in the kitchen before adding on, “I should probably make a quick dinner too, before I leave.”

“You know, Amy could probably stay and keep an eye on me while you’re gone,” Albert cut in before Amy could say whatever it was she had opened her mouth to say. “Since you’re afraid I might have a concussion…”

Amy’s eyes darted to Albert for a second, long enough to say that Albert had either done something very right or incredibly stupid, but not long enough to say which. Albert’s mother shot Albert a completely different glare that was entirely motherly, and suspicious of something else entirely.

"That actually would be nice, if you don’t mind, Ms. Carol. It’s hard to study at home; my dad’s kind of loud. And if you need someone to keep an eye on Albert I wouldn’t mind. I’ve had a concussion before and it was… awful.”

“Are you sure?” Albert’s mother’s nervous eyes were now going back and forth between her son and this girl that she hardly knew.

“I don’t think I’m in any condition to do anything inappropriate mom.” Albert pushed as hard as he could for the sarcasm he knew would hide whatever the truth of the situation really was. Amy’s face going beat red was probably what sold the lie though. Even Albert couldn’t tell if that was a genuine reaction. It was already embarrassing to be around a girl his own age while his mom was there taking care of him, so he didn’t need to act all that convincing as long as he channeled that feeling.

Albert’s mom sent a warning look his way, but tilted her head to the side is acceptance.

“That would actually help a lot. I can’t find anyone to cover my shift, and you seem like a nice enough girl. I’ll leave some cash so you can order pizza or something.” Her eyes darted back to the microwave clock once again. “I should probably get cleaned up.”

“That’s fine, I need to catch Albert up on something that happened during prob and stat.”

“I’ll just step out then.” Albert’s mom stood up abruptly and made her way back to her room.

Amy’s expression changed immediately as soon as she was alone with Albert, once again taking on that militaristic alertness. Before she could open her mouth though, Albert shook his head and held up a finger.

“She’s going to listen in, you need to tell your story.” Albert mouthed the words.

Amy’s shoulders slumped in disbelief and her eyes rolled again, as though this were the most obnoxious thing she had ever done.

“So, that weird kid that sits in the corner?” Amy’s voice once again clashed with her appearance, but she was doing a very good job finding that perfect range of voice. She wasn’t being obviously loud, but she wasn’t being quiet either. Albert’s mom would be able to hear this story and she’d likely believe it was genuine.

“Mike? With the long hair? The guy that keeps drawing anime girls during class?” Albert was feeding Amy plausible material that he knew wouldn’t raise suspicion.

“Yeah, he was doing that during a group project. And that other girl. The obnoxious one, what’s her name.”

“Gwen or Celia?”

“Is Celia the one with the… you know…” Amy made a noise indicative of a hand gesture which Albert guess meant ‘well endowed’ but couldn’t tell. Amy wasn’t emoting at all, it was almost creepy.

“Yeah, that’s Celia.”

“Well, Mike was drawing a very accurate caricature of her…” Amy’s expression changed on a dime again as the door to Albert’s mom’s room opened and she crossed the small space in the back hallway to the bathroom. “And it was on the handout for the project. But we all had to check our group members work, and Mike swapped papers with Celia.”

Albert was almost invested in this story that was no doubt fake, but as soon as the water for the shower went on and they could both hear the shower curtain, Amy stopped to give Albert an inquisitive look. Albert nodded and gestured that she could drop the act.

“Your mother is paranoid.” Amy’s voice dropped all pretense and now matched her appearance and attitude perfectly. It was almost gruff, not masculine, but definitely not girly.

“Who the hell are you?” Albert wasn’t going to mince words. His mother took notoriously short showers and he wasn’t going to waste this small safety net of a potential witness in the next room.

“Relax. I’m the contractually provided assistance.”

That sentence alone spurred both a sigh of relief and a new subtler tension in Albert’s body.

“Well, that’s a relief. I have no idea what I’m doing.”

“Clearly.” Amy rolled her eyes again, this time less dramatically. It seemed to be her preferred method of emoting. “You look like you got hit by a car.”

“That happened before the whole soul deal stuff. I got pummeled to the ground and killed.”

“Rough.” There was only a formal sympathy to her voice, but the sentiment was reassuring to Albert.

“What am I supposed to be doing?” Albert was hinging on desperation as he brought up the root of his worries, but before Amy could answer the water in the bathroom stopped running.

“Don’t freak out about it, you have plenty of time. We should really go over these easier problems first.” Amy’s voice had returned to it’s fake and gentle tone as she pulled a binder out of her backpack and handed Albert a spiral notebook as well. “I took very thorough notes.”

-------------

It hadn’t taken too long for Albert’s mother to leave, though there was a clear reluctance as she did. Albert could tell that she didn’t want to leave a teenage boy and girl alone in an apartment for hours, but she didn’t have many options and he was clearly in no position to do anything she was afraid of. Going off the short conversation where Amy had shared her real attitude, he would wager she would punch him in the throat if he tried anything. Not that he would. It was only on his mind because it was the easiest lie they could give to avert his mother's suspicion.

As soon as the door was closed behind her, Amy’s demeanor shifted once again to the harsher and more business-like one she had revealed privately.

“I saw a copy of your contract and you’re in it deep, kid.”

“Is it really that bad?”

“How good are you at intimidating people?”

Albert bit his lip absently, hardly feeling any sensation from the act. It was more a nervous habit than anything else, but provided less relief with the limited sensation.

“I’ll take that as a ‘pretty bad,’ and tell you now that you are probably screwed.”

“Could you, like, at least run me through this. I’ve gotta have a chance at least, right?”

“Okay, numb nuts, here’s what’s going to happen.” Amy said with a sigh as she pinched the bridge of her nose. “You’re going to need to find another half dead schmuck who’s going to bite it before you do, convince them that the pain and suffering of actually dying is too much, and get them to hand over their soul. And normally, that only works because Death has a way with intimidation and giving off that sense that the end is inevitable. And he looks the part for his role too. But you’re a kid, you look like a trauma ward patient, and you have no communications skills.”

“What do you mean by ‘bite it before I do’?” Albert had heard the rest, but that was the part that worried him the most.

“Albert, you got lucky— insanely lucky—that there’s no deadline on your contract. You must have really ruffled some feathers or something, because normally you’d have some dramatic three or seven day time limit on this. But you’ve got halfway measures. You’re not dead, but barely. I can tell from the smell of your injuries under those bandages that they are going to fester. You aren’t going to heal naturally. And when your mom figures out what’s happening, she’s going to take you to a doctor, and from there you’re screwed the whole other way.”

“Why? What happens if I go to a doctor?”

“They’re going to cut you into pieces and try to figure out why your body isn’t doing anything and you aren’t dying because of it.”

“That’s not good.” Albert was fighting back a wave of nausea now. He couldn't tell if it was nerves or the vivid image swirling around his brain that he was going to be vivisected. Both were getting pretty bad.

“So your time limit is probably something like three days for the first soul. After that…” Amy shrugged her shoulders and gave a light shake of her head. “After that who knows what could happen, soul dealing is weird. That’s assuming you even get the first soul in time.”

“Okay, so I need to get a soul. We have until 2 AM tonight. What can we do?”

“That’s a long shift.” Amy raised her eyebrows in surprise, genuinely taken aback. Her reaction at something so inconsequential to the current situation bothered Albert. It told him she wasn’t actually invested in helping him.

“Yeah, she works late. That means we have some time right now. What should I be doing?”

“I’ll find you a target. But beyond getting the two of you in a room with the proper paperwork, there isn’t much else I can do.”