Anubis Comes to Visit

You know you’ve been working too hard when Anubis shows up in your kitchen with a cup of tea because you’re looking a bit peaky. I don’t know when I realized that Anubis had taken a personal interest in my life, but I wasn’t surprised when he showed up in my kitchen. It just seemed to be the next logical step—the physical manifestation of a god of death in my kitchen.

The tea was a surprise.

Why wouldn’t a god of the dead want me peaky? Wasn’t peaky a quick drive and a car wreck in a bad neighborhood on a stormy night away from death and, thus, his realm of authority? Do gods of death have monthly quotas? Do they, in fact, have any control over who comes to visit them? Permanently?

Maybe he didn’t want me as a permanent guest. Come to think of it, I wasn’t entirely sure how Egyptian death worked or even how it applied to me.

I’m not, in fact, an Egyptian.

Not that I’d mind if I were. Of all the countries and civilizations that have existed on this planet, Egypt is certainly up there when it comes to mystique, sentimental attachment, and aesthetic.

I digress. Distracted and loopy with exhaustion, I’m being rude to my guest. Anubis is still holding out a tea tray for me, a concerned look on his jackal face. How I can tell it’s concerned instead of hungry, I’ve no idea. I’d better take the tea.

“Thank you,” I say politely, taking the cup.

“Cream? Honey? Lemon?” Anubis inquires.

“Whiskey?” because if I’m peaky, a hot toddy would be just the thing. And also, because if this is a dream, I want to see how far I can manipulate it. I’ve never lucid dreamed before and this seems like a fantastic way to start.

A little jar appears on the tray. Anubis gives me a stern look.

“Only if you accompany it with honey and lemon. Otherwise the benefits will only be at a third of their potential.”

I shrug and hold out my teacup.

In go whiskey, honey, and lemon. The death god hands it back to me and I sip. Mm. Divine.

Anubis balances the tea tray carefully on a stack of books then moves a whole ream of articles, drafts, and notes from my other chair, and gracefully folds himself into it.

“So,” he says conversationally, “you’re not sleeping. That’s a dangerous habit, you know.”

I wave a hand at the piles of knowledge, wisdom, and tripe (mine) scattered around my apartment. “Dissertation. Teaching. Research. Grading. Class. It all must fit somewhere.”

“And sleep?” Anubis’s hands are clasped on the table, and he leans forward suggestively. I’d almost say he raised an eyebrow, but my impression of jackals was that they didn’t have eyebrows.

I shrug, taking refuge in my perfectly balanced tea—hot, sweet, tangy, with a slight burn down the back of my throat. Drat. Was I coming down with something? I had no time for illness or doctors or sick brain. I studied Anubis. Maybe I already had something, was hyped on meds and sick brain, hence Anubis. That made a lot of sense.

I sigh and finish my tea. I suppose a quick nap at two in the morning wouldn’t set me back too badly. Anubis watches me place my teacup on his tray. I thank him politely, knowing now that there was no point in addressing him, but deciding to cling to the principle of good manners anyway. I stand, swaddled magnificently in a large fuzzy blanket. Anubis smirks and follows me down the hall to my bedroom.

If, in the course of a medically-induced hallucination, the Egyptian god of death tucked me in and sang me a lullaby, who’d know or care, right?