People never know how to react when meeting necromancers. Personally that's okay with me; I never know how to react when meeting people either. Half the people I meet are trying to exorcise me (read as kill violently in attempt to make the world a so called better place.)In addition, the other half of the population is scared out of their wits of me.

Yet there is a girl, without a sword or mace standing outside my door waiting expectantly, smoothing out her skirt, and checking her short mahogany hair in a mirror. I cleared my throat and opened the door. "Good evening, Lyle Inferis at your service"

She smiled offering me her hand "Paige Script, journalist and researcher."

I shake her hand; it's soft but callused in some areas from long hours of writing. I realize I'm blocking the door and hastily scoot out of the way.

"Try to get comfortable; I'll get some coffee "I slip the pickled skull from a low bookshelf and elbow a skeletal hand off the window sill. I rush off to the kitchen to hide.

'Okay, okay, you have a visitor, one that isn't trying to kill you, do not panic.' I look at myself in the window as I mix coffee into a cup that already has a teabag in it. I try to arrange my face to the semblance of friendliness but the dark red eyes ruin the image. The ones that are trying to kill me are easier to to deal with, summon zombies, smite with shadow magic, rinse and repeat. Breathe, okay Lyle? Breathe and act like a nice, normal, sociable, necromancer.

I walk back to the seating area and set the mugs on the table, my hands shaking slightly. She smiles and thanks me "What kind of magic do you do Mr Lyle?"

"Necr-"Wait- she doesn't know? She wandered in here thinking that I'd be a fire sorcerer or an ice wizard? I catch the expectant look in those light blue eyes of hers; my tongue slips "Ice magic." It's not technically a lie, since I did study Ice magic for a short time before I found other interests.

My first actual guest! I should take a picture of this, frame it, make multiple copies and turn it into a poster. I laugh, that's something I haven't been able to do properly in a while, "Ask away."

"Of all the branches of magic, why pick Ice?"

My mind starts working overtime.

"Because….It's what I'm good at. In truth I never gave it much thought, I had a talent for it, water manipulation being one of my only talents, it would be a waste to let it go."

Everything came tumbling out after that; no one had asked about my life before; surely, half-truths couldn't be so bad, could they?

What came as even more of a surprise is she listened to me. We chatted for a little longer and she proved interesting to talk to, we moved on to her own work, she'd studied for three years as a fire mage and then took up journalism as a second job. I'd never talked to a person for any length of time without them running away. I found she had distracted my mind, her face wasn't exactly perfect, it had freckles sprinkled across them, and her hair was somewhat messy. I didn't care much about that though. She looked cute somehow. We could do this more; get together for little chat more often, maybe even go out on a date.

What if I told her the truth? How bad could it possibly be? No, don't do that, no one likes necromancers. Why do they hate us so much? What I do is just a job that pays the bills, and gets food on the table. Maybe we should have given ourselves a less threatening name, like life givers or something along those lines.

Was it because we profited off the dead? There are always people who will pay good money to see their dead loved ones again. Is it so bad that we give them a chance to do that in exchange for money? If that were true, then why aren't professional mourners and undertakers under the same category as us?

I looked at Paige; she seemed different maybe she wouldn't mind."Paige?"

I took a deep breath, "I'm not really an Ice mage. I'm a necromancer." Those words had an astounding effect, her eyes went wide, and she glanced at the door.

"No, wait please."I grabbed her by the wrists, but she tore out of my grip and backed away.

That wasn't meant to happen, please stay. You can stay and drink coffee and talk like I never said that Maybe we could hug and go our own separate ways, end on good terms. But it was a bit late for that; she'd already made it out the door. No words of kindness or concern, not even a goodbye.

I watched her leave with the urge to run after her and apologize or something, but I knew deep down that wasn't going to happen. It came with the job description, we represented death, everyone wants to embrace life with open arms; sadly no one wants to hug death.