Starting Sparks: Zoe + Death + Rapunzel

Hello, my lovely jabberwockies. Today I'm linking up with Starting Sparks which is hosted by Emily @ Ink Inc. and Ashley @ [insert title here] (which is simultaneously weird and cool because I've never done this before so we'll see how it goes).

This month's prompt is to rewrite a fairytale using the characters in your novel. So. I'm using my previous WIP, "Zoe + Death, BFFs" (which I've talked about here and here and here) and Rapunzel (mostly because I adore "Tangled").  

***

Zoe glared at the opposite corner. Everything in this stupid tower was the same. The same whitewashed bricks, the same worn floorboards, the same stupid pictures on the stupid wall. Generally, everything was stupid, including her mother. 

"No, dear," Mom would always say. "The world is too dangerous for you. You must stay in here, where it's safe." Please. It was fine for her to go out all the time but Zoe had to stay here. Where it was stupid. Did she mention it was stupid here?

She flung herself across the floor. The only thing to do was to play her guitar, and even that got old after a few years of being locked in here. Still, she was good at entertaining herself. In recent years, she had read all the books in her too-small library, perfected a handstand and became the world's best Teenage Guitarist Who was Locked in a Tower. 

Zoe started as a familiar voice called from below. "Zoe, let down your hair!" She scrambled to her feet, raced towards the window and flung the ladder down. Her mother had suggested that she grew her hair out so she could use it instead of the ladder, but Zoe thought that idea was utterly ridiculous so she kept it short just to spite her. Death liked to remind her what a rebellious child she was. 

She grabbed her stopwatch and peered out to see Death struggling to climb the fraying rope ladder. It was especially hard for him when it was windy, and he had fallen off more than once. His neck would have broken a dozen times if he wasn't already dead. 

When Death reached the top, she held out her hand and helped him in. "Thank you," he said, panting. "I think I'm getting faster." 

Zoe checked her stopwatch. "Yeah, you totally are." He wasn't. He took ten seconds longer than last time. Being Death and everything, he could have just teleported into the tower but he claimed that he needed some exercise, hence the ladder climbing. 

They'd met a year ago. Death was passing by, having mistakenly teleported two miles too far to the left, and when he heard her playing guitar he decided to check it out. Thank goodness he did. She was dying of boredom, and once she decided that she didn't need to kill him to protect herself Zoe was pretty good with having a friend. Of course, it was weird being friends with the Grim Reaper, but whatevs, she guessed. 

Death propped his scythe up against the coat hanger and rummaged around in his bag before pulling a book out. "Here," he said. Zoe grabbed it. It was a music book. She grinned and gave him a big hug. He brought her paint once, but she threw it at his face and he never brought liquids again. 

"Alright, tell me everything," she said. Zoe settled into her bean bag and waited for his stories. He searched through his side bag and found a bundle of photographs. 

"This," he said, showing her a picture of a flat road through an endless desert, "is the Australian Outback. It's a desert that just goes for miles and miles!" 

Zoe snatched the picture and stared at it, then slid it into her box of Death's photos. She'd hidden it from her Mom and took it out whenever she was feeling particularly murderous. 

Death went through each of his pictures, telling her of the far-away places he'd visited. She sighed, tucked each of them into her box for safe keeping. 

"Zoe, ladder!" called someone. It was Mom. Zoe glanced at Death, then at the picture in her fingers. It showed the depths of the Amazon rainforest, with its high canopy and crowded plant life. It was a place she'd never get to see. 

She'd been locked in this tower for seventeen years for her own protection. She'd never felt the grass underneath her feet for fear of Mom finding out. Maybe, just maybe, she was done with lowering that ladder every day. 

Death noticed her change in mood. "You know," he said, twirling his scythe. "I can teleport." 

Zoe dragged herself to the window and bundled the ladder up in her arms, preparing to throw it out the window to let Mom up. "Your point being?"

"I can get you out of here," he said, rolling his eyes. "I seem to remember you saying something about wanting to go to Paris."

Zoe stared at him, her mom momentarily forgotten. "We... we can do that?" 

"Zoe!" Mom called. "What are you doing?" Her voice sounded distant, like a forgotten echo, from the top of her prison/tower. 

Death held out his hand. 

She stared at it. 

She took it. 

And they were gone. 

***

Well, that was fun but I suppose it'd make more sense if you've read the book and maybe if I'd expanded it by about 500 words or so, but anyways. I hope you enjoyed!