The Choice is Yours

  “This place isn’t at all the way I imagined it would be.”

   “No, so many of you morsels get it wrong.”

   “Morsels?”

   “Mortals. Did I say morsels? Well, that’s on me.”

   “I shouldn’t be here.”

   “Oh, let’s be honest with ourselves, Francis. Well, you be honest. I’ll be true to my nature. This is exactly where you should be.”

   “This is a dream.”

   “Sure. Believe what you will. Whatever sinks your boat.”

   “What’s going to happen?”

   “Oh, you mustn’t worry about the future. Take no thought for tomorrow. Be in the moment. You’re going to be in a lot of them.”

   “I shouldn’t be here.”

   “Would you like the tour? Or do you want to do the review first?”

   “Review?”

   “It’s a review of your sins. Here you are at three hitting your baby sister with her rattle.”

   “I was three.”

   “I know, I know. Hardly fair, is it?”

   “What about the age of wisdom? Accountability?”

   “What about it? You may not have realized this, but we’re not actually here to support any of your past beliefs, or give special favour to them. We’re rather an autonomous state. Alright, Francis, how about when you were seven you held the family cat by its tail? Look at that, you still have the scars on your cheek. Oh, I don’t know if it’s been pointed out to you but there’s no healing of the body here.”

   “May I say something?”

   “Please, talk your head off.”

   “I know I did some things wrong, but I don’t deserve this.”

   “Whoa, whoa, whoa, this argument comes up a lot. Okay, here’s the deal. You tell me your sins, or sin, and then I tell you mine, and then you decide which one of us gets to be in charge, and which one of us gets to leave.”

   “Well, I’m going to lose being in charge because I’m sure you’ve done worse things than me. Does that mean I’ll get to leave?”

   “Not so fast. Its not a who’s worse competition. It’s for sympathy. Which one of us is more sympathetic?”

   “So, whoever’s more sympathetic gets to leave?”

   “That’s the way it works.”

   “So, I decide? I just have to feel sorrier for me, than you?”

   “Sure. Yea. Now, if you feel sorrier for me, you stay and you get my job.”

    “What happens to you? Do you go up?”

   “Not exactly, I go to more of a waiting room. Still, it’s a change. So, what’s your argument for sympathy? What’s your sin?”

   “I ran over my wife’s Siamese cats. But they were evil.”

   “Oh, Francis. Siamese cats are not evil. Though, they have been known to do our bidding. Ew. Pet murder. That’s a bad one to try to get sympathy for, whatever your childhood trauma regarding cats was. There’s a bit more to that, isn’t there?”

   “My wife was leaving me.”

   “For?”

   “A veterinarian.”

   “And your line of employment?”

   “Mutual Fund Advisor. What does that matter?”

   “It doesn’t, I’m trying to help you find mitigating factors. Things that might help arouse sympathy for your argument. That doesn’t help.”

   “That I was a Mutual Fund Advisor? How’s that count against me?”

   “I never said it does. I’m not here to judge you. I’ve left that entirely in your hands. Now, let’s skip to the end. Your wife is still alive?”

   “Yes.”

   “And her lover?”

   “Yes.”

    “Okay, so, let’s skim through prior sins to that. You did a bit of cheating on your accounting degree, you bullied that small kid in grade ten, you gave Theresa in Clerical that bad performance review because she always cringed when you came near her, and that made you feel like a creep... there’re thousands more examples but they’re really half points against you. You know, if you add up all the half point arguments in eternity they’ll never equal one whole point? Okay, I’m getting carried away. Summing up, can we say your real sin was willfully backing up your car over two cats, albeit Siamese, to punish your wife for having an affair? Is that a fair appraisal?”

   “Yes. And I’m sorry. Deeply sorry. I think my being here is really disportionate to my sin.”

   “Disproportionate. Disproportionate. Stick with shorter words, Francis, it’ll make your argument stronger. I’m not being critical. You get my job and you watch how people correct the things you say. Everyone’s a tormentor here. Okay, my turn?”

   “Please.”

   “I was a merchant a long time ago. I worked on one of the pyramids.”

   “Egyptian, or Aztec?”

   “Don’t be funny. Egyptian. I’m not an alien.”

   “Giza?”

   “No, not the Great One. A pyramid. You know, not everyone got to work on the big one. How many people in history get to say they worked on a pyramid? You can’t. I’m a Mutual Fund Advisor.”

   “Sorry.”

   “No, it’s not you. It’s just that a lot of people ask those things and it gets on my nerves.”

   “Everyone’s a tormentor?”

   “I’m only going to warn you once, don’t try to be clever with me.”

   “Sorry.”

   “Okay, so I’m working on this pyramid, and it’s a mix of slaves and volunteers. People trying to win favour with the local powers that be. I know I was. There was a lot of worry about famine in those days. Food poverty was a concern across the whole world then, but more so at this building site. And you can imagine that the travel, and shipping and receiving, were not up to the standards of today.”

   “What was your sin?”

   “Well, it wasn’t entirely my fault. You see, they hadn’t worked out feeding everybody logistically, and after everyone had gone about five days without food I snuck away from the camp and left them all to die of starvation. I don’t know if I could have made any difference. But it was a sin of not trying. Of being selfish.”

   “How did you have the energy to leave without food?”

   “I had mallow sap. Mallow sap with nuts and honey in it. I sold a lot of it at the time, but when I first got to the work site I could see they were already having issues, so I hoarded all that candy for myself. Well, that’s how I had the energy to get out of there.”

   “Your sin is hoarding marshmallows?”

   “Listen you little flea, I could have you roasted and your flesh torn for eternity. Show some respect.”

   “No, no, I didn’t mean anything. I didn’t know they had mallow bars… the marshmallow things… the mallow honey stuff. I didn’t know they had it back then. I didn’t mean anything.”

   “Fine. Where was I? Well, I was going to tell you about how it’s haunted me since. How I remember all their faces. Maybe I could have saved some of them. Even one of them. But I didn’t. What are you going to do? Well, it’s up to you now. Who stays and who goes? What do you think? Do you have any questions? Any mitigating factors for your sin? Anything you think I left out?”

   “How did you get this job? I’m not being disrespectful. I’m not. You don’t seem that bad. As a person. Is calling you a person an insult?”

   “Yes, but I wave certain things for new arrivals. Many people have this impression to do this job they must have picked the worst candidate. The evillest, the most ambitious, the most controlling creature. A narcissist. Not at all. Those people go to the bottom of the pecking order here. That’s their punishment for trying to reach so high, for being so full of themselves. No, this job always goes to a borderline. A not-so-bad. That’s why it’s a torment. You worry about everyone everyday.”

   “There’re days here?”

   “Figure of speech. You’ll find a lot of expressions that don’t apply here that we still use. No, it’s a job meant for someone on the cusp of wickedness. You know, like the most qualified politician is someone who doesn’t want the job. That sort of thing. Anyway, I’m just a figurehead, really, the place runs itself. Now, I have one more thing before you decide.”

   “It’s still my decision?”

    “Yes. How many times do I have to say? Okay, here’s the last part of the pitch. If you side with me on the sympathy thing. I get to leave here. You take over until you can find someone, but, and here’s the bonus, because you’ll be letting me go you’ll have done a good thing, and that good thing will help you down the line when you’re in the waiting room. It will make your time in the waiting room shorter.”

   “Yea, but if I pick me I’ll go straight to the waiting room and I won’t have to spend anytime here?”

   “That is right, technically.”

   “Okay, I pick me.”

   “Really?”

   “Yea, sorry.”

   “Oh, you’re going be.”

   “I’m going to the waiting room?”

   “No, Francis, I can’t believe how stupid you morsels are.”

   “You promised.”

   “I lied. Oh, for the love of other places. You didn’t see this coming?”

   “Alright, I pick you.”

   “Too late. Screwed us both.”

   “So, the whole thing’s a lie?”

   “No, but if you had picked me, I could have moved on and you would have been in charge. It was a half truth. That’s how you make a lie really stand up and work.”

   “What’s going to happen to me now?”

   “I don’t know yet. But it involves cats. Every time a cat is looking for something to play with it’s going to be you. I see lots of cats in your eternity, and not a lot of sympathy.”