Five inmates are waiting on death
row. Inmates are typically visited by the Undertaker of Sorrows while they serve
their sentence. He doesn’t visit everyone, but death row inmates see him more often.
While waiting one night, each of the five inmates receives the Undertaker’s
letter warning them to let go of their sorrows with the worst of them not
paying attention to it. After reading the letter, the four think about what
they should do. The fifth one does what he always does as he silently keeps to
himself in the corner of his room.
During the next day, they receive
their items to remember what they did. The first one receives a knife with skin
and hair still in it. Even when he touches it, he can still hear the screams of
the people whose lives he took, the anger he felt, and the feelings of sadness
as the reason for him taking their lives resurfaced. He didn’t want to kill
them, but if he didn’t, he felt as if others would suffer. Content with his choices,
the first inmate spends his days cutting his room with the knife as if stabbing
and slicing those he hated again and again.
The second inmate receives a wallet
with some meager change inside it along with the picture of a small family in
front of a house. This inmate thinks of the different things she can do with
the change she has. Maybe she can kill herself with what she has. It might be
slow, but to her, it’s better than waiting for her turn to die. This is all
that’s on her mind. The thought of getting over her guilt and what is causing
her sorrow is a fleeting thought that appears on and off in her mind. The
wallet delivered to her is from an old woman she robbed. With the picture in
the wallet, she found the old woman’s family and stole from them as well. Even
with all the money she had, she couldn’t escape justice. Now she just thinks of
an easy way out.
With pictures of women in
flirtatious women, the third inmate remembers what causes him feelings of guilt,
however, he tries to get rid of those feelings by pleasing himself. These
teenage girls weren’t raised by the best of parents and found themselves
molested by this man. Only one of the girls has been found who put the man in
jail. The rest are nowhere to be found. This inmate refuses to admit his guilt
even as the echoes of the girls’ screams and cries torture him.
Old toys are sent to the fourth
inmate, but she does nothing as always. Back in her younger years, she would
run away from whatever troubled her whether I’d be financial, murderous, or
familial. Even when she gave birth to children, she left them without anyone to
care for them. She couldn’t run from everything in the end, so with nowhere
left to run she does her other favorite hobby which is sitting down and doing
nothing while remembering her “good” days.
Since the things that remind him of
his sorrows and guilt can’t fit in the room nor does he have to be reminded,
the fifth inmate receives nothing and keeps to himself like always. If he needed
a reminder of his life, all he will need to do is look at the scars and tattoos
on his body. Even then, he might feel like he’d want to rip at his skin until
all the reminders went away. Instead, he waits for his special visitor who will
help him take away his pain. While he is still unaware of the letter, he still
feels as if should be worried about something happening tomorrow.
The next day arrives faster than
the inmates think with all of them feeling anxious. When checking the rooms,
the guards are surprised at what they find. The first inmate’s outsides and
insides cover every surface of the floor, walls, and ceiling similar to his
victims. For the second inmate, she’s lost all of her insides including her
skeleton and all that’s left is her oily skin. Inside the third inmate’s cell
is an even more horrifying sight with the man’s crotch pulled out. It appears
that he bled out in agony until he died. The way that the fourth inmate died
is similar but might be even more disgusting. Various kinds of insects and
vermin crawl out of her skin and body. From the looks of it, she was eaten from
the inside while she was frozen in place.
Knowing how cruel and sinful the last
inmate was, the guards brace themselves for what they might see. To their surprise,
they find the fifth inmate how he always is with his hands folded in prayer. On
closer inspection, the man they once feared appears to have a new face as he
appears to be more like a gentle giant instead of a monster. Nothing changed
about his appearance physically, but the eyes of the guards are picking up on
something their minds aren’t. A Catholic priest enters the room in time for the
man’s confession and last Eucharist.
While the man confesses his sins,
the officers find the letter from the Undertaker of Sorrows in each of the five
cells. Confused about the outcome, the officers go over the fifth inmate's
record. They go over his long list of crimes and wonder if the man is admitting
to committing every sin imaginable. The only thing that indicates a change in
him is him turning himself in. Again, something happened that they didn’t see.
On the day of his execution, spectators
who thought they’d be happy were instead sad for some reason with some even
crying. No one could put words to what they were feeling. Before and after he
died, the inmate appears to be at peace with a soft smile on his face that no
one imagined they would see. The smile almost looks as if belonged to someone
else because of who it was on. And thus, another soul is saved from their sorrows
as the Undertaker continues his quest to relieve people of their sorrows or of
their lives.
The End
“Remember that it is not feeling of guilt that constitutes sin but the consent to sin. Only the free will is capable of good or evil. But when the will sighs under the trial of the tempter and does not will what is presented to it, there is not only no fault but there is virtue.” – St. Padre Pio
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