The sound of a droplet…  Echoing through the caverns of my consciousness. The stillness of my thoughts encompassing surges of emotions. The deafening silence engulfs me, as if oblivion itself became manifest. My skin shivers, “its probably the cold air, yeah… maybe…” My senses go into overdrive, one memory after another overloading my mind. Eternity seemed to pass me by. I try to compose myself, arrange my thoughts, and make sense of what’s going on. Then, a flash of blinding light, then… Darkness.

A violin was playing across the hall, my heart swayed with each note; each tone reaching the far reaches of my soul. I went outside and asked “who’s playing?’ “Oh my, I apologize, for disturbing you, I forgot to close the door.” A young lady in her early 20s demurely said. “Not at all, you were playing magnificently.” She seemed taken aback by those words, she looked down on the floor and replied with a tinge of disbelief “Surely you’re joking, I… I.. I’m not good enough yet” She was suddenly teary-eyed.  There was something about her eyes… I tried to ask what was wrong, but words escaped my lips. As I stared into her emerald eyes, I felt… lost, I felt despair, sorrow filling me to more than I can bear. Her eyes sparkled with beauty, and yet it seemed like a façade to hide her loneliness within. “Anyway… I have to go, I have things I need to attend to.” She replied, breaking the silence, with a smile. I wondered how she managed such a beautiful smile, and have those sorrowful eyes at the same time. I could only manage to nod and smile back, we parted ways. As I lay on my bed, I kept wondering why I’ve never seen her before, why I never noticed her. I’ve been living in this apartment complex for 6 months now, who would’ve thought I’d have a neighbor like that. “Shoot, I forgot to ask her name…” , I thought to myself as I drifted off to sleep.

A week passed, as I came home one night, I heard it again. My heart pounded, beating faster and faster…  The melody understood me, it echoed my emotions. I felt a strange familiarity to it. It was sheer bliss, and yet… I felt emptiness. I searched for the sound until finally I found her again. She was standing on a hill gracefully playing her violin. I stood frozen, mesmerized by the sight of her,  “beautiful” I thought to myself.  She played with such elegance… she… played with such sorrow, I caught a glimpse of her face, she was weeping while her eyes were closed as she played. I went to her, and grasped her hands. They were trembling vigorously, she was a little startled, then she looked at me. She smiled “ah! So we meet again” she said, as she tried to hide her trembling hands. She smiled as if, she wasn’t crying awhile ago. It pained me to see her like this, “Stop this” I told her. She was probably about to say, “Stop what?” but as she looked into my eyes, she knew what I meant.  She was wearing this smiling façade for such a long time, it seemed like it was a normal part of her life now. We sat on the hill, staring at the night sky. It was unusually starry, and a light drizzle of rain somehow managed to sneak under the stars.  I held her hand, fearing she might crumble if I let go. After a while, she gave a sigh, she told me about the violin, she told me about the melody, she told me about her story. 

She was weeping again, but somehow it felt different, a huge load seemed to have been removed from her shoulders, she wept out of relief, out of the gush of emotions rushing out of her. She played her violin once more, then smiled with sincerity, the façade was shattered. “I think… I can let go now”  she told me.  I held her hand as we went back home. Our eyes met once more, I gave a sigh of relief, and left for my own room.

“The violin was a gift from mother” she told me, as if she was digging out her very soul to unearth these memories. “I always did love violins, the memories they invoke, and the emotions they made to surface were things i found great beauty in.” She said with a tinge of sadness in her tone. “We were always close to each other, we only had each other as family, we had no one else to help us out.  She was everything to me.” Her eyes were welling up as she spoke. “I think you’ve already guessed by now, she passed away already. She was frail, after working long hours so we could survive.” She spoke in an ever softer tone. “She earned enough to buy me a violin, and told me to play for her one day.” “I never did get enough time to learn a melody; she passed away too suddenly after that. I never got to play her a song.”

She played her melodies, hoping it’ll reach her.  She played to remember precious memories. And then afterwards I told her….

I knocked on her door the next morning, I was still racking my brains “what did I tell her last night that made her feel better?” I thought to myself, “never mind, anyway more importantly I’m not going to forget to ask her name this time” The door was apparently open after all, I went inside, and there was nothing, no furniture, no bed, nothing that would indicate that someone was living here. I spoke to the landlord, and he told me that this room was never occupied at all. I went back to my room, shaken by the turn of events, I washed my face and looked at myself in the mirror, I saw her… She was me. And then.... I woke up….

Beads of sweat were dripping down my face,

“a dream…”

“more memories of the dead…”

“this job will really kill me one day…”

My name is Death.

Explanations:
The humanization of Death as a person who experiences the emotions of those who's souls he is tasked to take away. The suffering Death has as he relives the life of the soul.
Given with minimal periods, and an extreme amount of compound sentences to quicken the pace of the story.