Work Text:
Undertaker hates his eyes. The lime green phosphorescent eyes staring back at him is a constant reminder of the sin he committed centuries ago. But he does not only hate his eyes because of that. No. He hated his eyes even back before he became a reaper. They were odd. He was called so many names because of them. He was a freak back when he was human. Ironically, even now, things didn’t change much. ‘Quite the opposite,’ the Undertaker muses with a wide cynical smile which always sent people running away from him, ‘ I now embrace that freakiness.’ He now loves being the freak that society will always shun away. No matter the era, no matter the ruler, no matter how much people claim to have changed, taking pride into being more open-minded, people like him will always be shunned for behaving oddly.
His past is not something the Undertaker likes to discuss. He stays away from the subject all the time. But in moments when people would ask, he would always divert the subject and make them so uncomfortable that they regret ever asking. That was the norm for him. People thought that he was a fugitive because of his scars. In a way, they were partly right. He ran away from the shinigami world. ‘And you ran from reality,’ a voice in his head reminds him bitterly. There were not many times that the normally cheerful Undertaker would frown and close upon himself. He appeared even more frightening to people that way. People who knew enough about him knew that he was in direct competition with the Cheshire Cat and the Mad Hatter. They were certain he was trying to out-grin them.
But in moments like these, when he would take an impromptu trip down the memory lane, he would be so quiet and still that you would wonder if he didn’t die on the spot. His mind torments him. His mind reminds him of what could never be any more. Of what he ruined when he decided to kill himself. He wonders if he would ever meet the only soul who truly and genuinely cared for him again. ‘That’s highly unlikely. Remember what they said. You disrupted your reincarnation. It’s forever goodbye to (y/n).’
Ah, (y/n). Sweet, innocent ( ‘Perhaps naive’ he muses snickering to himself fondly), (y/n). With eyes shining so brightly with life that they could rival with the stars above. He could spend hours staring at the back when he was a human. For her, he was a sappy romantic fool ( ‘Like Romeo. Oh how fitting that character is for him. Thanks Shakespeare’). But he didn’t mind being sappy. What could a few more snickering from his peers do to his already bruised self? Nothing. But she, oh so precious (y/n) was an angel to him. She defended him when he couldn’t care less what they said about him. All that mattered was her and her angelic smile. He needed nothing more.
But life isn’t that sweet, ( ‘It could use some sugar cubes,’ Undertaker bitterly thinks). She was taken too early. She didn’t deserve to die. Each time the Undertaker thinks back to their sweet moments spent together, they always without fault, get tainted by their last time together. Oh how he hated how sickly pale she was, ( ‘Like a corpse,’ he notes, casting an empty glance at the corpse laying on his wooden table, waiting to be put in one of his caskets.) Her hand was frail and trembling. The town’s doctor couldn’t figure out what she had. It looked like a simple cold with a fever. They did everything they could to save her. Undertaker turned to God. Pleaded desperately day and night, her sickly burning figure tucked to his side while he was kissing her forehead, trying to reassure her as much as him that she would be alright. He pleaded and promised to dedicate his life to Him if it meant she would live to see another day. But nothing. She died on a cold night. She left and took him with her. He was certain he died with her that day. Her funeral was small. He didn’t have much money left to make it into one that she deserved. She deserved more than to be buried at the top of that hill under that willow tree. She deserved more than anything he could give her.
That night, his life left with her. He went to work on the next day. He took care of everything at work as usual but his eyes were sparingly empty. He did everything automatically, the motions repeated from memory.
It was when he came back home that it hit him like the cold of the harsh December. There was no sweet smell of the broth she mastered during their early years of marriage. There was no ‘Welcome Back’ which would always warm him upon entering the threshold. There was only silence. A deathly silence. He finally cracked. He went to her fresh tomb, some snow already covering the ground. He remembers feeling cold. He remembers kneeling in front of the stone, head on the tombstone, apologizing to her amidst crying. He was weak, ( ‘I’m still weak,’ the Undertaker remarks to himself.) And then he sealed his fate. His heart already left with her anyway. He had no children, his parents were already dead. He had nothing that tied him to this world anymore. And so, his soul was reincarnated and punished. His eyes became inhuman. If (y/n) miraculously found him again, she would not recognize him. He looks nothing like the man she used to love and hold to her heart. And that hurts him more than the days he got each scar which marred his skin forever. So, he prays that she never stumbles onto him should her soul be reincarnated in London. If she did reincarnate here, she would inadvertently come to him one day or another. She would either be purchasing a coffin from him (he hopes it’s this one), or worse, a nightmare he would have to relive again, (his poor old soul won’t be able to withstand this one) her death. This time again, he would have to prepare her for her final moments. His arms will hold her one last time before putting her in one of his coffins. He would have to bury her and hide his tears. He would not be able to grieve openly as he once did since he wouldn’t know her in this lifetime. He would have to pretend, put on a face, a smile which he would come to hate this time.
No. He prays that he would never encounter her again each night. Should he come across her, he would be delighted to see her alive and smiling with that dashing smile of her. He would be delighted to see her eyes shine again even if they were not directed towards him.
But fate works in strange ways. He was certain he would never meet her again. His superiors at the Shinigami Dispatch drilled into his head that he spoiled every chance he had to meet her again after committing suicide that dreary night.
He was humming to himself, ignoring the creeping cold of December. Oh, how he hates that season, ( She loved it. She loved the snow, the cold.) The day was unusually quiet. No Earl and that dreadful stinking butler visiting him for information. Nothing to stop his mind from wandering again like last month. After reminiscing, he promised not to that again. It is time to let go. He only hopes to not encounter her as a corpse if they were to meet again. His soul can withstand seeing her happy with someone else. As long as he does not have to see her dead, or hurt, anything was better. But his plans were thrown out of the window as soon as that familiar feeling which he always got with her creep into his soul. The doorbell followed right after. Oh, Lord. He turns around, breath hitching as soon as they meet sparkling (y/e/c) staring back at him. She grins, extends her hand, and with a soft cheerful voice which could only belong to her, says, ‘I’m Back!’. The shock quickly left, and with tears streaming down his face, his trembling hand extended to touch her. The contact pleasantly burned him. ‘She is real. She is not a mere figment of my messed up mind.’ She holds his hand to her chest, on her heart, and brushes away his tears with her free hand. ‘I’m sorry I’m late. Let’s make up the most time we have together, yes?’ He could only nod with an ear-splitting smile. His doll is back, and that was the only thing which mattered.