The little girl laid low on the grass behind a tombstone, panting from loss of breath. She had been running frantically in the graveyard (how she got there, she didn’t remember) trying to flee the hooded, bat winged reaper. The reaper’s skeletal feet floated above the ground, searching with it’s hollow eyes. Looking, searching, hunting for the little girl. She held right onto her stuffed bear toy tightly, putting its head over her mouth to muffle what seemed like her loud breathing. She didn’t want to imagine what would happen if she got captured by the skeletal reaper, looking into its hollow eyes as the last thing before it either tore her head off her little body, or sucked her soul out to feed it’s never-ending hunger. The reaper was now behind the tombstone she was hiding at. She heard it’s slow, ragged breath as it looked around. She closed her eyes tightly hoping it would go away or turn its back so she could dash away from it and escape the graveyard, but would escaping the graveyard stop the reaper from hunting her? Or would it just pass the graveyard barriers and continue to follow her until it got what it wanted: her. The ragged breathing diminished as the reaper floated away. Now was her chance to make a run for it. She could see the graveyard gates when she opened her eyes; that would be her chance of escape. What happens after she’ll figure out when she gets there. She got up and was ready to make her escape when the reaper plummeted down in front of her, blocking her escape. She was back on the ground trying to scurry away from the skeleton of death by crawling away until her back was against the tombstone she was hiding behind from the start. The reaper floated forward and then stopped, looking down on her. She looked up to it’s skeletal face but it wasn’t the scary face she imagined. Instead, it’s face had a solemn, even sad look to it. It then raised it’s hand and it pointed with its bone finger to the tombstone behind her. She looked behind her at the tombstone and read what was on it: Dearly Beloved Gone Too Soon. At first she didn’t understand. But then it began to make sense. Why she didn’t remember how she got to the graveyard, why the reaper was hunting—not hunting, helping her. It wasn’t a demon from hell. But an Angel of Death helping her back to rest. She wasn’t alive. She was dead. She was just a restless spirit in denial of being dead. She looked to the Angel of Death and apologized for the restless spirit she was being as she laid on the grass and closed her eyes and sank back down into the earth leaving behind her stuffed bear toy on the grass, resting on the tombstone.