Chapter 3Escaping My Mother's Afterlife

"Are you okay?"

Coming out of the dreamscape, Harper, the Reaper at the Department of Dream Visitation, caught my arm.

My soul was practically disintegrating. It felt like all the energy had been drained from me, and I couldn't even stand steady.

Harper looked at me, hesitating.

After a long pause, she sighed and gently patted my shoulder.

"Getting stuck with a mom like that... you've had it rough."

I forced a tight, ugly smile. "You saw all that?"

"Dream Visitations are monitored. Standard procedure."

She paused, asking tentatively, "So... are you really going to 'check in' with her every night?"

I shook my head, my voice lighter than a wisp of smoke.

"I jumped off a roof because I couldn't stand her 'checking in' anymore. Now that I'm dead, no matter how much my soul hurts... it's better than being controlled by her again."

Harper stayed silent for a moment, then suddenly lowered her voice.

"Actually... your mom refusing to burn you money might be a blessing in disguise."

I looked up.

"If no one burns paper money for you for three consecutive months, and your personal assets fall below ten thousand Spirit Dollars, you can apply for 'Netherworld Welfare.'"

"Netherworld Welfare?" I sat up straight, a light kindling in my eyes.

"Yeah. It's 1,500 Spirit Dollars a month."

1,500 dollars! That was huge!

Even if my mom burned money every day, that was only 600 a month.

The Afterlife's welfare was more than double!

Suddenly, my existence felt like it had a future.

As long as my mom didn't burn money for three months straight, I could get welfare!

Looking at it this way, being dead was pretty great.

Even if it was destitute, it wasn't a dead end.

Probably out of pity for what she saw in my dream, Harper sighed and pulled a dozen "Soul Painkiller" vials from her pocket, shoving them into my hands.

"Take these. They're Department perks. I don't use them, and I was going to sell them on the side, but seeing how hard you have it... just take 'em."

Overwhelmed by her kindness, I took them, thanking her profusely.

Harper thought for a moment, then added, "The workload here is getting intense. If you're willing to help me out, I'll give you all my monthly painkiller allocations from now on. But you can't breathe a word of this outside. You're a high-risk suicide soul. If the higher-ups find out I'm using you for labor... we're both screwed!"

I was ecstatic and quickly agreed.

"Don't worry, I won't say a word!"

With this job, even if my mother stopped burning me money, I could survive the three months.

After three months, I'd get my welfare, and life would only get better!

I bowed deeply to Harper.

A Reaper I had never met before was willing to extend a helping hand when she saw my suffering.

And my own mother, who claimed to love me, refused to let me go even in death.

She probably... never loved me to begin with.

Accepting that truth brought me a strange sense of peace.

In the days that followed, I worked diligently at the Department of Dream Visitation, helping Harper with the grunt work.

Filing life-and-death ledgers, calibrating visitation timelines, and floating between filing cabinets that smelled faintly of phantom lilies.

Harper found a corner in the archives for me to stay in temporarily.

Though the painkillers she gave me weren't many, drinking half a vial a day was enough to ease the crushing agony in my soul.

Day by day passed.

Two months.

Just one more month, and I could claim my welfare! I'd be financially free!

But then, on that exact day.

I was head-down, organizing dream files.

Suddenly, a brutal, overwhelming force gripped my soul!

Like an iron hook piercing my collarbone, I didn't even have time to scream before I was violently yanked upward!

When I opened my eyes, the blinding sunlight scorched my phantom body.

—I had been pulled back to the living world.

No, more accurately, my soul had been stuffed into a stuffed animal.

My favorite childhood teddy bear.

"It worked!" An old man with a greying beard stroked his chin, looking immensely smug. He was an Occult Medium.

My mother stood to the side, wearing a triumphant, long-lost victor's smile.

She leaned down, her fingernail poking hard into the teddy bear's head. Her voice was so cold it made my skin crawl:

"Caught you, Serenity."