Purgatory

Donn sat drearily in his cubicle filling out some unfinished paperwork (there was always unfinished paperwork) when he heard an alert come from his boxy old computer. He clicked on the message. It took a few moments to load.

“Piece of crap” he mumbled under his breath. He read it once it finally opened. Wonderful, he thought. These ones were always the worst. At least with the sick ones they knew what was coming. With these guys you had to explain everything. Always so confused… He clicked on the intercom. Might as well get it over with before lunch.

“Smith, Randy, please report to cubicle four,” he announced.

A few moments later a balding frumpy man in greasy shirt sleeves and brown khakis cautiously entered the cramped cubicle.

“Sit down Mr. Smith,” said Donn without looking up from his paperwork.

Randy took a seat while inspecting his surroundings suspiciously.

“Why am I here? I’ve been in that goddamn waiting room for god knows how long and no one will say anything but ‘please wait your turn.’ ”

Donn finally looked up at Mr. Smith with a bored and unimpressed gaze as he shuffled his papers into messy stack.

“You had a heart attack Mr. Smith.”

“Well I’m fine now. Did my insurance cover it? Let me sign what I need to sign so I can get the hell out of here.”

Donn let out an exasperated sigh and rubbed his forehead.

“You didn’t survive, Mr. Smith”

“What do you mean I didn’t survive? I’m here now!”

“Yes. You’re here.” Donn was already getting annoyed. “You’re here because you’re dead.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

He sighed again as he reached into a filing cabinet crammed into the corner of his cubicle and took out some forms.

“You’re dead. Just take my word for it Mr. Smith.”

He looked at Donn confused, “Is this some kind of joke?”

“No, Mr. Smith,” Donn said, irritation plain in his voice. “You’ve been eating fast food for three thousand eight hundred ninety-two consecutive days. You thought there’d be no side-effects?”

“But… but my wife can’t cook…” Randy trailed off, his eyes wandering to the floor.

“Well there are side effects: heart attacks,” Donn said, “and possible side-effects of heart attacks are death.”

He slapped down the forms and turned to his computer. “Let’s take a look here. You led a pretty boring life… you jerked off too much and smacked your wife once, but other than that you were relatively sin free… looks like we have a spot in the third circle for you.”

This was usually when they freaked out, but Mr. Smith was surprisingly calm.

“I can’t be dead… I have to go to work… I was on my way there.” He looked at Donn with concern.

“Mr. Smith,” Donn checked his drawers for another pen, “you’re not going to work. Not on Earth anyway.”

“But-- but my taxes are due! I was supposed to file them on the way home today! How am I supposed to file them? Can I mail them from here?”

“Your taxes don’t matter anymore, Mr. Smith, one less thing to worry about… along with everything else.”

“Look. Just let me go back for one day.”

“You’ll have to talk with my supervisor for that kind of deal. And good luck. The waiting list for that guy is few hundred years long.”

Donn continued shuffling through his desk, no way was he gonna let this guy get his favorite pen all greasy.

“Well, you do have eternity, but by the time you get back to Earth everyone you know will already be here.”

“Just for a few minutes…,” Randy kept stammering. “look—  I left my porn collection out. I left it out this morning because I get home before my wife and could hide it again. She can’t find it!”

“She already found it.” And maybe if you’re lucky she’ll bury you with it, Donn thought.

“Oh.” Randy looked at the floor.

“Mr. Smith.” Donn finally pulled out a pen from beneath a pile of papers. “Please just fill out this paperwork so we can both move on with our afterlives.”

Randy grabbed the pen and looked at it for a moment. Cheap blue ballpoint. 

“…Okay.”

That was a lot less painful than I thought it would be, Donn said to himself. He glanced at the time. Almost lunch.