This is my entry to Weekly Wattpad Contest #39.

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Death was beautiful.

She had learned this, watching the painter day in and day out. She knew she shouldn't- she had duties to fulfil. Raking in souls, transporting them safely across to the afterlife, this was Sarah Anne Dower's job as the Grim Reaper's intern.

She worked diligently at first, proudly displaying the intern badge pinned to her chest, savouring the weight of the scythe in her palms, smoothing her fingers along the bone staff and down the curved silver blade.

Sarah studied hard, learning the laws of the reapers. She, among many others, had the opportunity of becoming the Grim Reaper's successor, his replacement.

The Grim Reaper had grown weary, his empty sockets staring ahead into nothingness as skeletal hands wrapped around his scythe. Bags of wrinkly skin clung to his face and his cold, deadly breath stopped men in their tracks.

The Grim Reaper wished for peace and Sarah was determined to be the one honoured to grant it. That was until her first mission, her first taken life.

She didn't know what she expected. An elderly person buried beneath their knitted blankets? A drunk man racing down the road with his foot rammed against the gas pedal? Certainly not at the children's ward in a sleazy hospital.

It was too challenging for a first task. The child's eyes were innocent and wide brown orbs, like melted chocolate. His chubby fists immediately tugged at her heartstrings. Sarah leant forward, cooing at the child, her skeletal wings folded behind her back.

The child's gleeful giggles erupted seeds of guilt in Sarah's chest. But she had a duty, a job. She forced herself to do it, reaching into the baby's chest and yanking out his soul, pure and white as snow.

She hid the soul in the folds of her midnight robes as nurses rushed into the room, charging through her like she was mist. She left then, not wanting to hear the child's parents mourn their loss.

Sarah had performed her duty, flawlessly and effectively, yet the kernels of guilt lodged in her throat never went away. She repeated the reaper belief like a mantra in her head.

Death is beautiful, Death is beautiful, Death is beautiful.

She repeated the phrase until it echoed in her dreams, but she struggled to understand it. How was death beautiful, if it only brought pain and loss to those left behind?

Sarah wrestled with these thoughts as she soared through the sky, tasting only clouds as the wind bit at her ashy skin. The sceneries beneath her blended together, like the swirling oils of a painting.

Merely a single house caught her attention. It was dark and old, smelling strongly of dust and chemicals and rain. The flowers were the most observable aspect.

Flowers sprouting from between the mouldy floorboards, flowers hanging from the window sills, flowers paving the overgrown gardens, flowers thriving up against the chipped walls and over the roof and flowers dominating every room inside the house.

Peering through the cracked window, Sarah saw a woman perched on top of a rickety stool. The woman, grey hair plaited into a braid, faced a half-painted canvas.

Sarah could hear the woman mumbling incoherent words and slipped into the house, secure with the knowledge that she was invisible to the human eye.

Creeping closer, Sarah let the woman's words drift through her mind. It sounded like a nursery rhyme she would chant along with as a young reaper.

"Corpses in our graves,
We are free, we escaped...
One day you'll be,
Just like me...
Death is beautiful,
soon you'll see..."

Painted on the canvas was a rotting skull, with flowers growing out of it, extending like vines. The atmosphere surrounding the skull seemed dark, crushing. In contrast, the flowers seemed lively, full of positive light.

"One birth, one death,
One ends, one starts...
Where there's pain,
Something's to gain...
In darkness there's light,
Shining so bright...
And don't you mope,
There will always be hope..."

The woman's pale blue eyes held infinite wisdom, making her seem thousands of years old. Sarah felt a chill run up her spine as the woman began to talk. It felt directed at her.

"People don't share my sentiment. To most, there is white and black, good and bad, with no shades of grey in sight."

The painter's eyes never left her canvas.

"Death brings sorrow and tragedy, yes, but it also marks the beginning of a person's eternal life, their era of peace and tranquillity."

The woman plopped her paintbrush into a cup, stirring it quickly.

"I'm sure people would think I'm mad if I said that death is beautiful. Like I was telling them there was a snowstorm in the middle of summer, or that up was down, or that time was merely an allusion."

The dirty water within the cup swirled in circles, forming a multicoloured black hole.

"Humans should be more like flowers," she said.

"Flowers start out as seeds- not much to look at, but full of potential. They grow and thrive. People admire them, nurture them and praise their beauty. And when they wilt, they return to the soil and fertilise it for the next bedding of flowers."

She dried the paintbrush and dabbed it in red paint. "It's a constant cycle, life and death. Whether you see it as a tragedy for not being preserved through time, or as a story of hope, of life for those to come- that is up to you."

The woman's wise words swam around in Sarah's head for days after. When the guilt of reaping humans' souls weighed on her conscious, she would just think of that captivating painting, of the woman's philosophy and of her pale blue eyes.

Sarah visited the woman often. She didn't believe the painter could hear her or see her, but the woman rambled on as if she thought there was someone listening.

Finally, her goal was achieved. She stood kneeling in front of the Grim Reaper, his one hand resting on the crown of her head and the other gripping his scythe.

She succeeded in being chosen as his successor, with flawless soul deliveries and no incidents resulting in creating ghosts. The Grim Reaper handed her his scythe, a sign of great respect, as she took it gratefully.

With the scythe in her hold, her great skeletal wings spread wide, she marched through her plane with her chin held high, aware of the heavy title now pinned to her back.

Wherever she went, people would bow their heads in respect, never meeting her eyes. It unnerved her.

She thought of the wise woman, the only thing that would lessen her burden. Hurling into the dreary sky, she bolted to the woman's house. There was something that was notifying her senses.

Arriving at the old, damaged house, Sarah found the woman under her crisp bed covers. The hand that often held a paintbrush was still, her body unmoving. The pale blue eyes that reminded Sarah of the sky before storms were closed, not likely to open again.

She sunk into a nearby armchair, staring out the window. The sky was covered in a blanket of dark clouds, blocking the sun everywhere except for a single spot.

Rays of light spilt out of that spot and that's when Sarah felt she truly understood.

Human spent their days hiding from the darkness of death in fear, chasing after the light. Light that glowed, that guided, that distracted with glitter and gold in the darkest of nights.

But if one faced the darkness with a set jaw and determined eyes, embraced it- was it truly that frightening?

Days later, someone would stumble into the old and mouldy house and find a curious sight. On the chest of the lifeless painter laid a beautiful bouquet of ruby roses and a scribbled note with one insightful phrase.

Death is beautiful.

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Total: 1318 words

Choices-

1. Sarah Anne Dower, the Grim Reaper's intern.

2. An unexpected visit to the hospital, a mysterious bouquet of flowers, and a snowstorm in the middle of summer.

3. Light. It glows, it fades, it guides and it distracts with glitter and gold in the deepest of nights.

4.The chaotic painter / The lover of flowers

This is quite dark and philosophical, but I like it. What did you think?