When Frederick Carmichael died, he discovered the charm of death.

Death, his beloved Lady Death, showed him compassion by giving him a second chance. From that moment he realized that death was an underestimated charm and wrongly feared; a beauty that was hidden under a black cloak and inside a bony figure.

But Lady Death's generosity came at a price and, in Carmichael's case, a penance. Sin leads to penance, and that affirmation was very true.

"Mr. Carmichael, do you believe that an entity is tormenting me?"

Carmichael looked at the woman sitting across from him. Her name was Evelyn Gautier, she was a refined and wealthy old lady who lived alone in a huge mansion located in the French Quarter of New Orleans. The vulnerable woman had tried to contact dozens of people who claimed to be ghost hunters, mediums, and even an exorcist, but she never received any response, until he, of course.

"I think, madame Gautier," he leaned towards her and took her wrinkled hands in his, "that it has been lucky that our paths have crossed."

Mrs. Gautier, pleased, smiled softly, showing the wrinkles at the corners of her mouth.

"Oh, Mr. Carmichael, I share the same feeling." She placed a hand on her chest with a stricken expression. "You are the first person to listen to me. My grandchildren ignore me and I don't even want to think about what my companions would say regarding my delusions."

"It is not a delusion, madame, and as regards your grandchildren, I fear that their only interest in their riotous youth is the fortune they possess and the pleasures it brings."

"Those are exactly my thoughts!" She exclaimed. "Although correct me if I'm wrong, you're pretty young too, don't you think the same way as them?"

Carmichael was indeed young. He died in the year of 1998 at the fruitful age of twenty-eight. The cause of death? Too pathetic to bother telling.

"I'm young, however, I think that you don't suffer from any sort of delusion and my only objective at this moment is to help you solve your dilemma."

The old woman, pleased, nodded.

"Do you need anything else to proceed?"

"Don't worry about anything." He rose to his feet, smoothing his trench coat and pulling on a pair of black gloves. "Death and I have a special relationship."

He winked at her and the woman released a discreet laugh that hid behind her hand. Carmichael left the room and began to walk through the mansion without any haste.

It was huge, made up of long hallways, high ceilings, and custom-made furniture specifically for this house. According to his partner's investigation, the Gautiers were a family of French descent, owners of the luxurious Gautier clothing brand, a brand that began as a small shoe factory in a French town. Mrs. Gautier moved with her husband to New Orleans over sixty years ago, where she bore and raised her children, leading a relatively quiet life until her husband died of lung cancer.

Carmichael didn't doubt it when he saw the number of ashtrays scattered around the house, but what caught his attention the most, was a striking painting hanging on one of the walls. He had an eye for art and knew immediately that it was an Altamirano, specifically one of the 10 paintings in the last series titled Dama sin rostro (Faceless lady). It was a beautiful image of a woman in a field of sunflowers, turning her back to the viewer and covering her face with a black robe. An exquisite work by Dana Altamirano, and like all the paintings in her last series, it repeated the pattern of the mysterious lady. The woman's identity was never known since the artist died after finishing her last and unknown painting entitled El rostro de la dama (The lady's face).

A very realistic imitation. Expensive given the level of detail.

He put his hands in the pockets of his pants, admiring the painting with a detailed eye until his peace was interrupted by the ringtone of his archaic flip phone He exhaled through his nose, took out the forsaken device, and, with a graceful movement of his hand, opened the lid and answered.

"My dear Cornelius, you have terrible timing."

"Don't call me that," he chided. "Did you finish the job?"

"Do you see me there with you?"

He listened as Andrew harshly typed the computer keyboard on the other end of the line. He was in a terrible mood.

"Hurry up, we have a situation."

"You being hungry doesn't count as a situation."

"Besides that."

Carmichael looked at the painting again. Even the signature was almost identical to the original.

"Can't you tell me over the phone?" He inquired.

"No."

"Ah," he chuckled and leaned against one of the columns of the house, "you want to see my beautiful face that badly, huh?"

The only response he received, was the incessant ringing of the hung-up call. Carmichael laughed again. Cornelius Andrew, Andrew as he preferred to be called, was his analytical and apathetic partner who solved all his problems. He was almost a hermit, so asocial that he was completely immune to Carmichael's charms and flirtations.

"Okay, enough detours, let's finish this." He closed the flip phone and returned to the room where Mrs. Gautier was waiting impatiently.

"It's done?" She asked hastily.

"Almost," he replied, offering his hand to the old woman. "Could you join me for a second?"

The old woman frowned slightly, but she ended up accepting his hand and standing up. Carmichael linked his arm through hers and led her through the house at a leisurely pace.

"What is it that you want to show me, Mr. Carmichael?" She questioned.

Carmichael stopped in front of a door and turned to Mrs. Gautier before opening it.

"Madame Gautier, do you think our meeting was a mere coincidence?" He asked.

The woman, though confused, kept her composure.

"A lucky coincidence, I would say, but what does this have to do with anything?"

It was on these occasions that Frederick Carmichael felt more like a con man than he already was. It was a constant reminder of his record as the man who ended up in limbo, and instead of transcending like everyone else, his stubbornness made him see an opportunity. He interfered with what he shouldn't have and opened a door that allowed all the souls in line to escape. He cynically approached Lady Death and, based on deception, managed to offer her help to fix the situation. That was how he became the first soul hunter, the first Death Deceiver.

This situation was not so different.

"Madame Gautier, allow me to tell you three truths." He cleared his throat and held up a finger. "Number one, the Altamirano in the hallway is an incredibly well-done replica."

The old woman frowned, and he held up another finger.

"Number two, your grandchildren don't ignore you and there is no entity tormenting you," he continued, confusing the poor lady. Frederick took her hand, cold and thin, and brushed his fingertips over her palm. "And number three... You died two days ago of a heart attack."

Mrs. Gautier froze and, after Carmichael's words, immediately snatched her hand from his.

"But what insolence are you saying?!" the old woman exclaimed, offended.

Frederick already knew this routine, so instead of answering, he simply opened the bedroom door and pointed inside.

"See for yourself."

Mrs. Gautier took a cautious step inside, and as soon as she crossed the threshold, she saw it, saw her motionless body lying on the bed in the center of the room. Pale, stiff... dead. Wandering souls refused to die, so much so that they were unable to see the truth until another soul showed it to them.

Mrs. Gautier froze, but after digesting Carmichael's words, her pale blue eyes, previously clouded with denial, were washed over by clarity, and with it, a tragic acceptance. This was the worst part of his job, having to witness firsthand the surrender of a lost soul to death.

"You're right," the old woman finally agreed, and she squeezed his hand as she smiled tearfully. "Thank you very much, Mr. Carmichael."

After her last words, Evelyn Gautier transcended. One would expect that witnessing such an act would be something spectacular, seeing the release of a soul, but in reality, the process was unremarkable. It was just a simple blackout, like seeing something, blinking, and opening your eyes again to find that something had disappeared.

Carmichael took one last look at the empty spot next to him that the old woman had previously occupied, and exhaled. He walked out of the room and left the door open so that when her grandchildren came to visit her, they would find her body and give her a proper burial.

He returned to where the Altamirano replica was, took it down, covered it with a white sheet, and left the house without the slightest concern. The worst habits took the longest to perish.

He crossed the huge front yard of the mansion and went out the gate, saying goodbye with a charming smile to the guard who was patrolling the empty house.

He took out his flip phone, writing a short text message to Andrew:

Job done. What do you want for dinner?

He hit send and held up his hand just as a cab came around the block. The car pulled up next to him and he stowed the replica painting in the trunk before climbing into the back seat.

"Where to, sir?" Asked the driver.

Carmichael gave him his charismatic smile through the rearview mirror.

"Ritz Carlton Hotel," he replied.

"Vacation?"

"Business, but a vacation wouldn't hurt."

The driver sighed.

"It wouldn't," he replied and drove calmly. He turned up the volume of the radio and a woman's voice came out of it:

"It's like a sensitivity pandemic," she explained. "Thousands of people affirm that they can feel that their loved ones have not died entirely, that they're still there, hanging around in their lives."

"And couldn't this just be an attempt to lure the attention?" asked a man with a mocking tone.

"There's more than a hundred thousand reported cases of this phenomenon to say such thing."

Carmichael listened, intrigued. What started as ignored news soon became the front page of the most important newspapers in the world and the most talked about topic of conversation on radio and news programs.

Death stalks us.

The impossibility of transcendence.

Trapped souls.

All those were the biggest headlines, all discussing the same issue. Carmichael could not help but smile twistedly, he could walk freely through the world, next to people who had lost loved ones and suffered this phenomenon, because no one would ever know that he was the cause of it.

"It's scary, isn't it?" The driver asked as he stopped at the traffic light, watching Carmichael through the rearview mirror.

"Death is not scary," he replied with a confident smile. "It's charming."

The light changed and the driver was about to speed up when he was stopped by a high-pitched scream.

"Wait!"

Carmichael turned in the direction of the voice, finding a dark-skinned teenage girl with wavy hair painted a deep bubblegum pink standing outside the door on the opposite side of the cab. She hopped in without asking for permission and caught her breath after running.

"Couldn't you take another five minutes? Jeez," the girl complained. She couldn't get past fourteen.

Carmichael frowned slightly, trying to keep his charm despite his perplexity.

"I beg your pardon?"

"Was it so hard for you to wait, Freddy?" She inquired.

Freddy?

"Who...?"

"We can go now," she interrupted, addressing the driver.

The driver nodded cordially and sped up the car without question. Carmichael had been young once and he guessed this girl was just looking for a free ride. She was harmless.

"If you wanted a free ride, all you had to do was ask," he spoke.

"I don't want your charity, I want you," she answered in a low voice and pointed a finger at him. "I know who you are, Frederick Carmichael."

There was no way a girl like her would know him. He didn't remember her from any of the social events that he enjoyed attending so much, she definitely couldn't be a resentful ex-partner and neither was she a relative of some soul he hunted.

"How do you know my name?" He inquired, severely.

The girl smiled mockingly.

"Who hasn't heard of the great Death Deceiver?" She sneered. "I know who you are and I know what you did."

"What are you...?"

"I don't think you want Lady Death to find out about your big lie, do you?" She interrupted.

Who the hell was this girl and how did she know so much about him?

He watched the driver through the rearview mirror, making sure he wasn't suspicious about anything. It didn't matter because no human would fully understand the meaning behind their conversation, but he preferred to keep it as discreet as possible.

"I don't know what you're talking about, kid," he hissed then.

She rolled her eyes.

"Don't play the fool with me. We both know the truth."

Carmichael, sapping all the charm from his face, scrutinized the girl anxiously. She had to be a Death Deceiver or maybe a lost soul. That was the only way to explain how she knew so much.

"Okay, let's stop beating around the bush." He crossed his arms. "What do you want? Money?"

She frowned.

"How do you know I want something?" She was just a frivolous child.

"Your tone is threatening, threats are usually accompanied by a request."

The girl snorted.

"You speak like an old man."

Carmichael gritted his teeth.

"Speak up, brat."

She took out a piece of bubblegum from her pocket and, as she unwrapped it, she gave a mischievous smile and said:

"My name is Nina, and if you don't want me to reveal your dirty secret to Lady Death, you will teach me how to cheat death."

Author's note:

Hi! This in my novel for the ONC, the prompt that I choose is number 40.

To be honest, this is my first time writing for the ONC and I think it's very clear that english is not my first language, nevertheless, I wanted to challenge myself and participate in the english edition to practice my writing and, of course, have some fun developing a story from the selected prompt.

Thank you so much for reading! 🖤