nanowrenlet | (no subject)

Everyone knew.

Some folks used to say, back in the days when conventional wisdom held that the world was flat and was carried around on the backs of elephants, that when the earth shook beneath your feet it was because the very pillars that supported it were trembling. This was a little like that, in that something had disrupted the order of the reapers' strange little world, and every reaper in the area -- possibly every reaper in Pittsburgh -- had felt it when it happened.

They were waiting outside the restaurant for him, all three of the other reapers, standing on the sidewalk like they had been debating with each other whether they should go in or not and Rube could tell they were each shocked and saddened by turns. Monique had Justin's messenger bag, and was holding it tightly to her chest with her arms folded across it. Brandon spoke up first.

"I knew he'd do it."

Rube didn't want to get into that just yet, whether he could or should have kept Justin away from Brian's appointment, whether Justin might have stayed if he had seen something different when Brian's time came... or whether the whole day had just been inevitable from start to finish. So instead he shrugged noncommittally and asked, "You guys hungry, or do you think you could maybe do me a favor?"

Brandon stepped forward immediately. "Are we going to his place?"

"Yep. Just need to do a bit of cleaning up."

Monique hugged the bag in her arms and nodded, and after a quick glance back at the restaurant Pete did as well. Rube cocked his head back towards his car. "I'll drive. We can pick up sandwiches on the way or something."

When they got there, Rube did the honors. The lock gave way with a satisfying click, and Rube tucked the pick back into its slim case and swung the door open, stepping aside to the let the others pass. Brandon was first into the apartment, and he let out a low whistle.

"Holy shit. Did he ever do anything -but- draw?"

Rube snorted, amused. "Yeah, he did plenty besides that. You act like you didn't help him carry half of this up the stairs."

Brandon just shrugged. "It's different. Seeing it all in boxes and seeing them out and... all over the place, like this." Rube knew what he meant. He'd seen it for himself once or twice when he'd dropped in on Justin for whatever reason, but he could still admit that it was pretty impressive.

The three reapers stood in the middle of the front room turning in slow circles, and Rube saw that they all realized what he had already known, that they couldn't leave all of this here for just anyone to find. Pete spotted a portfolio lying open on the bar counter, and started to slowly turn the pages of it. Monique stopped in front of a sketch hanging on the wall, one of Justin's many drawings of Brian, and touched it with her fingertips. "How did he look, Rube? Before he left."

She didn't have to say that she was asking about Justin, and not Brian. Rube knew. "Good. He looked... happy."

Monique nodded at that and sniffled a little, and Pete called out, "Hey, there's one of me in here."

"Probably more than one, kid drew everything he laid eyes on."

"And we're gonna pack it all up, huh?" Rube met Brandon's eyes and nodded solemnly.

It took them the rest of the afternoon and a good part of the night, and they ate through all of the sandwiches Rube had bought and had to call for takeout as well. It was slow work, slower than it might have otherwise been because they all tended to linger over it, and Rube let them. Pete found every sketch Justin had made of his fellow reapers and pulled them aside into a little pile. Monique was most fascinated by the drawings of his family, particularly the little sister. Molly, Rube remembered that that was her name, and he told Monique so. There didn't seem to be any pattern to what caught Brandon's eye -- souls Justin had taken, waiters he had worked with, scenes of that club he went to, Babylon -- but every now and then one page would be carefully set to the side as he worked.

Rube would let them take whatever they wanted. It wasn't as if Justin was going to miss the drawings, wherever he had gone, and reapers tended to mourn their losses in their own, peculiar fashions.

Brandon leaned over and looked at the paper menu Rube was holding, with its sketch of Justin's funeral on the back. "Damn, that's good."

"Yep. He had real talent." Rube hadn't seen the drawing since Justin had finished it, adding in Brian and his tree. He looked at it for a while longer, then carefully folded it along its creases, tucked it into his jacket, and stood and announced he was making a pop run.

Rube came back thirty minutes later with two six-packs, three rolls of postal service approved carton tape and a packet of shipping labels.

Brandon's eyebrows rose. "You're gonna mail them somewhere?"

Rube nodded. "Thought I'd have 'em shipped west."

"So you're leaving now, huh." It was Pete who said it, but Monique was looking up as well, expectantly.

Rube nodded again. "Sal's on his way back, they tell me, he should be here day after tomorrow." He looked around the little apartment for a minute, noting to himself what they were taking and what they were leaving behind, and added. "It's time I went home."

THE END
Final word count: 50061