"UNDEADLY MISTAKE"

by Iztayul Tepes

A/N, Warnings: If this fic looks familiar, it's because I had it posted under an alias...um, another one. Yes, this is the author formerly known as IPoR.

As far as warnings go, this is a slash fic, and it's also gorey.

1

When I awoke Friday morning, I didn't know that I was to die that very day. If I had, I probably would have just stayed in bed until Saturday. If I had done that, this nightmare would never have begun, but now it may never end. And although I don't appreciate much what I've become, I can't help but want to live...or whatever you call this...existence.

Back to the beginning. I don't mean to confuse you by rushing ahead.

Friday morning my alarm went off as usual, and I was ready to face the day. Or maybe not. Come on, it was Friday. The day when all you had to do was make it through to the end, and then you had the whole weekend in front of you. Funny, weekends always seemed as though they'd last forever, but when Sunday rolled around it felt like life was coming to an end--Sunday being the unfortunate day that fell before Monday.

Fridays were also, I came to discover, the most unlucky days of the week, next to Monday. Fridays were seemingly reserved for some misfortune or other.

This Friday, that misfortune was my death. And talk about your freak accidents.

Backing up again...

I rolled over with a groan and smacked my alarm off. Naturally, I fell right back to sleep. That's when the alarm sitting on my dresser across the room went off, ten minutes after the first. The three of us had come up with this ingenius system to actually wake me up in the morning. Brilliant, but I can only claim a third of the credit.

I hit the shower after I finally roused and turned off clock number two, then dressed in my suit of the day. I liked black ties for Fridays for some reason. Ironic, isn't it? I'd be wearing that same tie to my own funeral.

I arrived at the office building where I worked, five minutes fashionably late, as usual. Only something was different. The lights were off and no one was around. Was it Saturday, after all? I wondered. But, no, the doors were unlocked.

I wandered in the direction of my office--I'm an executive's assistant so I have my own little space in the corner--but didn't quite make it there. The lights all suddenly came back on, and a loud, "SURPRISE!!!" shrieked from about fifty voices.

I turned back around to see my co-workers crawling out from behind their desks with party hats on their heads and whistles in their mouths.

"Congratulations!" I heard about a thousand times over. My hands were shaken by everyone at least twice, and even my boss had a huge grin on his face.

I feigned confusion. "Who's birthday?" I asked in bewilderment.

Everyone cracked up.

"Don't play that way, Jason," my boss, Stan, said with a grin. "It's been all over the news."

"Ha, ha," I muttered wryly.

That was kind of a pun. I knew a few of the guys down at news channel seven, and I'd asked them to play a live clip for me--my proposal to my girlfriend, Sharon. I'd waited in the studio while she called in and gave me her reply on-air.

Obviously, it had a been a definite "yes."

And now everybody knew about it.

We had cake and ice cream. It seemed like an official holiday there at the office that morning. We all laughed and talked, and I tolerated quite a few jokes about the "ball and chain." It was all in good humor, though, so I didn't take offense. I was glad to give up being a bachelor, almost at twenty-six, and Sharon was the only woman I'd ever loved.

"Congratulations, Jason," a timid voice murmured once the crowd had dispersed for lunch break.

I looked across my desk past my two other visitors-for-the-moment at Marcia, a middle-aged woman that everyone kidded had a crush on me. The two guys standing in my office winked and smirked, quickly exiting the premises, and had the audacity to close the door behind them.

Marcia blushed. "I didn't mean to interrupt--"

"Not at all," I smiled, leaning back in my chair and gazing at her. She looked back at me until her face was bright red, and I knew that the rumors had to be true. "Why don't you have a seat? I'm just finishing up this piece of cake."

"Oh--! No, I....I couldn't," she protested quickly. "I just wanted to say....God bless you in your union, and....I pray you'll find all the happiness you deserve."

She's kind of a religious fanatic, if I didn't mention. Not that I minded the well-wishes, but when she started reciting verses from Psalms, I was grateful that the telephone's obnoxious ringing interrupted our little communion.

Things finally calmed down at about eleven, and we all got down to business. Most of us worked straight through lunch, having stuffed ourselves on junk food all morning in light of my recent engagement, and things went on normally. I punched out at five as usual, didn't get out of the building until almost six thanks to my well-wishers and congratulators, then went home to change. The day seemed so incredibly normal and happy that if anyone--even Nostradamus himself--had dared to tell me how it would end, I wouldn't have believed it.

I was supposed to meet Sharon at eleven that night--kind of late, but she was working night shift hours at the diner. Before that I had a date--the friendly kind. I was to meet my friend Seth at O'Malley's, a little bar down on 5th Avenue where we went for drinks together pretty often. I wondered if he'd heard the news yet. He hadn't been at my little surprise party--he works the graveyard shift at our office building, and was probably sleeping at the time.

Funny, that. He was a smart guy, and very friendly. Everybody liked him. I often wondered why he hadn't been promoted yet. We started out working together when I'd moved to San Francisco from New York City for a change of scenery--both of us during the dead of night. Now, though.... I was a big-shot at our level, and he was still the caretaker, so to speak.

I put on a pair of black slacks and a white dress shirt, adding a black jacket to complement my outfit. I combed my red hair until I had that wavy-bangs thing going and gave it a spritz, then stuffed my wallet into my back pocket and locked the apartment door on my way out.

Typical. Normal. Who'd have guessed, that just in a few short hours, I'd be dead?

Seth was already there when I arrived at O'Malley's, seven-thirty on the dot. He was always a little early. He liked to be on time. Another reason why I couldn't understand his lack of promotions.

"Hey, man!" I called, walking over to him where he was already seated, in a dimly-lit corner booth with two beers waiting. His was already three-quarters emptied.

He smiled, closed-lipped, and I saw at once that something was bothering him. I just didn't know what. It's hard to get him to open up sometimes; he always seemed like he was hiding his feelings for some reason.

"How's it goin'?" he slurred. He wasn't drunk; just characteristically lazy and slow with his speech. He almost had an accent, not quite.... Texas, maybe. Seth never talked about his past.

I plopped down across from him and grinned widely. Maybe my news would cheer him up. "Did you hear already, or do I get to tell you?"

"Tell me what?" he asked, looking away almost nervously.

"Man, don't you watch the news?" I laughed.

He swallowed. "....Not usually," he muttered.

"Well, then you missed it. I finally proposed to Sharon--live on TV!" I laughed excitedly and picked up my beer bottle, expecting him to give me a wide-eyed, happily surprised look.

He was dead silent.

"Well?" I said, after a swallow. "Aren't you going to congratulate me?"

"....Uh, yeah--sure. That's great." He cleared his throat and looked down at the table.

I stared at him. He was being really....weird, even for Seth. "Hey, man. Are you okay?" I reached across the table and patted his hand. It was icy cold.

I was surprised when his other hand reached to cover and hold mine. He gazed intently into my eyes for a moment, as though trying to peer right into my thoughts, but it was uncomfortable to me at the time--holding a man's hand and gazing soulfully into his eyes--in a place like this, especially. I pulled back. And laughed. Nervously. "You look sick," I said casually.

"....Do I?"

"Jesus, man, your hands are like ice!"

"I'm not feelin' so well...."

"Maybe you should call off tonight."

He looked down at his drink, grasped the bottle and stirred it up a bit with a sigh. "Maybe."

We were silent for a long while. I didn't know what else to say to him. I thought he'd have been happy for me, wanting to know all the details--how I'd gotten the news station to broadcast a thing like that, how she'd sounded on the phone line when she'd tearfully said the word... But nothing like that--almost the opposite. He didn't sound happy about it at all.

`He must have something going on,' I thought in dismay. Family sickness or something. Seth was a good friend--almost like a brother. We hung out a lot on our weekend nights off, and on weekdays we almost always met at O'Malley's before he started his shift. He was always laughing, smiling. He never did a lot of talking, but he loved to listen. Except, I realized, when I talked about Sharon, or relationships in general, for that matter.

I had to wonder about that, too. Maybe he was jealous. Yeah; that seemed to fit, what with the way he was behaving now. I'd never seen him with a woman--or anyone else, for that matter. I never could figure that out. He was such a likeable guy, if a little private, but it seemed to me sometimes as though I was the only friend he had. If he had a girlfriend, I'd never met her...and he'd never mentioned her.

Or maybe he really was sick. I never remembered him having so much as a cold, and he had a body that I admit made me envious. No matter how much working out and dieting I did--don't get me wrong, I'm not a hobgoblin or anything myself--but I could never be as thin-yet-so-strong-looking as Seth.

Seth is taller than I am, and our hair is a pretty sharp contrast. Mine's red and I keep it fairly short--his is black and VERY long, usually kept back in a ponytail. (I'd only really seen it down once, at the bowling alley when he'd lost his hair tie.

Sharon had been with us that night. She said she loved his hair--with an obviously-implied "you should grow YOURS out, Jas"--but she didn't really care much for Seth himself. She thought he was "creepy." I didn't understand that at all. He's really a nice guy. And he was very polite to Sharon--no, I wouldn't say especially friendly, but....polite.) His eyes are just as black as his hair, while mine are a bluish-green hue, and his skin is porcelain-pale but mine is kind of tanned, now that I was living in California.

Seth was staring across the room, frowning. "I gotta go," he said suddenly, standing.

I stood up, too--fast--and accidentally knocked over my beer. I was already thinking, `Oh, shit. Now I'm going to be a mess when I meet Sharon later,' but Seth reached out and, miraculously, he caught the bottle faster than I could yell, "Oh, shit!" and righted it on the table.

"Careful," he murmured. Then he walked away.

I didn't want him leaving that way, like he was pissed at me or something. I followed him almost back to the door and reached out and caught his arm as he turned. He looked down at my hand for a moment, and bit his trembling lip as he looked into my eyes again.

"Hey, Seth.... If you need somebody to talk to...."

He reached for the hand I had on his sleeve, but stopped and clenched his fist before his fingers touched mine. "....I know." Then I let him go.

I didn't know I'd be seeing him again so very soon.

I watched through the doorway until he'd disappeared down the street, then sighed and turned back to our table. I decided there was no reason to let the drinks go to waste, and they were playing my favorite song. I sat down again and finished my beer. Maybe it was cheap of me, but I was still thirsty, so instead of ordering another, I finished the one Seth had left behind. Then I left the bar.

I didn't get far before I began to feel dizzy. Not exactly like I thought I might faint, but kind of drunk--more so than I should have been after just one beer. I suddenly forgot why in the world I was wandering the streets of San Francisco in the middle of the night, and stumbled off in the direction of home. At least, I thought that was where I was going. But I ended up in an unfamiliar neighborhood, and then I got worried. I was feeling so terribly sleepy suddenly, and my head ached. All I wanted was to get home and take an aspirin and call it a night. But where the hell was I?

There was a gas station on the corner with a beady-eyed kid standing nervously behind the register. I wondered if it was because I was in a shady part of town, or if I really looked that bad. I asked for some change for a five so I could call a cab from the pay phone outside, then had to hang up and go back into the store to find out where I was and dialed again. My speech was slurred--again, not because I was drunk, but my tongue seemed to be numb and swollen. Thank goodness the guy actually understood something I said, because five minutes later a cab pulled into the parking lot of the BP. I had a hard time getting my fingers to cooperate, but I finally got the car door open and climbed inside, nearly fainting from the stuffiness of the enclosed area.

"Where to?" my friendly driver wanted to know.

Good question.

Address! What's my address?!

"Um...."

"Hey! Mr. Reese!" he cried suddenly. "What the heck are ya doin' all the way on this end o' town?" The driver laughed.

"....Harry!" I shouted suddenly like I'd discovered a new curse word. It was the same guy who used to drive me to work during my night shifts back at the company, before I'd been able to afford my car.

"Hey, hey--that's right, buddy! I used to take you and your pal to work. What's his name.... How's he doin'?"

"Theth," I mumbled with my thick tongue. "He'th fine."

"Right.... Seth! Hey, You look pretty sloshed. You goin' home?"

"Yeth, Harry. Home....pweathe."

"You got it!"

"....Hurly."

"You got a date or somethin'?" he asked cackling, pulling out onto the street.

"....I'm....going to thwow up I think," I murmured groggily. I was feeling so sick suddenly....

Harry chattered on, paying no never-mind that I wasn't even making an attempt to listen to, much less participate in, the conversation. He knew my address by heart, luckily, and dropped me off not too much later. I couldn't see what I was pulling out of my wallet, and as I stumbled towards the entrance to my building, leaving the car door open, I heard Harry shouting something to me like "change for a fifty".

And then I was home sweet home, in my bed, shoes on, still dressed for a date I would never make. I wouldn't be seeing Sharon again in this life, because when next I awoke, I was already dead.