There are two days in everyone’s life with less than twenty-four hours, the day you are born and the day you die. He is dying and I am summoned. His screams have echoed through the village for days. They burrow under the houses, flow along drains, poison the well and pull everyone who hears them into his room. The screams reach the sea caves, then they echo and bounce back to that house. And his family decides.

No more.

They can take. No more.

* * * 

When they send for me, I wait until dusk. I drape my black shawl about my head and keep to the shadows. The family permits me entry. I hear him gasping for breath. His lungs strain to pull the air in. And this is why I come. His heart is too strong, it holds him fast in this life. This is what we all do. Try to live. But it is time, the leaf must fall.

His mother is on her knees, stripped bone knuckles fingering the beads of her rosario, praying for his death, as no mother should have to. This is the way of women. Life is in our gift as is death. But only some can grant it and I am one. Lullabies and funeral laments sound the same to me. One sings the baby to sleep, the other sings the soul to rest.

I lead the mother to the door. I must speak with him alone. His sunken frame is yellowed from pain and illness. His hollow eyes watch me and in them I see fear and relief. The room is filled with the sickly sweet smell of his spoiled flesh. I take his hand in mine, caress the birdlike bones, lean down and whisper.

‘It is nearly time.’

The hand twitches.

‘I will return after three days and three nights.’

The lungs rasp.

‘Then you can let go.’

The hand slackens.

I place a wooden yoke under his pillow, symbol of the bond between life and death that must be broken.

My calling card. A promise of my return.

* * *

When three days have passed, I wait for complete darkness. I push against the door and when it opens for me, I know the family has not changed their mind. I go to his side and brush my fingers across his brow. He sighs, like a baby sunken in a dream. I put my arms around his shoulders and raise him up so I can sit behind. Then I cradle him, as his mother no doubt once did. And I tell him stories.

I murmur to him of the sunlit days of childhood when eternity was ours. Remember? I say.

When our bodies did as commanded and we were bursting with life, like the peaches that hang heavy, yearning to be picked. I speak of the angular days of young adulthood when our hearts beat faster and our blood quickened with the delirium of all that could be. I stroke his cheek as I remind him of the hours passed in simple contentment. A glass of viscous red wine shared in the piazza. The warm belly of a good laugh. The soft weight of a sleeping kitten. The sinking heaven of a clean bed. The tingling spark of a stolen kiss. The promise of a new day, every day. But not tomorrow.

My voice slows and lowers and I mourn for him. For the tomorrows he cannot have.

I stand and settle him back onto his pillow, rearranging his sheets, smoothing the wrinkles and placing his hands across his chest. I kiss his cheek and take a moment to see a smile trying to surface on his lips.

Then I take my wooden hammer and strike, just once. I know where to act with effect, the exact point to hit. I am good at what I do. The result is instant. I slip away.

Someone in the family will hear my soft tread on the stairs and the latch of the door. Someone in the family will go to check on him. And someone in the family will announce that, Glory be, his pain is ended. No one will mention me.