The Bone Phone

I would have thought spreadsheets and purchase orders to be too trivial for eternal damnation, but by the time I walked Josh through the process for the third time, I just walked right up to the torture line and stood there. 

I could still hear them even after I hung up the phone. Their voices lingered in the dark red clouds of hell like distant echoes. Please cut off my ears, I thought, still waiting in line for torture, but things were moving slow today.

I could see a demon walking with intent towards the line. I could see the stark white of the bone in his hand. I could see he was coming for me. 

“Phone call,” he wheezed, handing me the bone phone with one grotesque claw-like hand. 

Reluctantly, with no choice, I took the phone and pressed it to my ear. “Hello?” I asked, knowing exactly who it was, because no one else living would ever care to call down. 

“Oh heyy, it’s us again. Just a quick question, do you happen to know if there is a backup paper copy of the 2020 manufacturing statements?” Josh’s voice came casually through the static. 

I sighed, “check the filing cabinet in the basement, the one that’s kind of behind the door, so you have to go into the basement and close the door behind you, or you won’t see the cabinet.” 

“Oh my God, you're so right. We did not even see that cabinet. Literally what would we do without you?” 

The sound of trivial laughter made my ears feel like they were on fire, more so than normal. I could hear them, all of them in the office. In my office. Rifling through papers, moving things around, changing things. 

“Neeeexxxt,” the demon torturer called. 

I hadn’t noticed I was up in the front of the line. Ears, please take the ears, I thought. Instead, he took off my other arm, the last one went a few weeks ago. Great, now I’ll have to listen to those idiots on speaker phone.

 I didn’t expect to get rich starting O-source, it just happened. It was a simple business. We manufactured little rubber O-rings that went on garden hoses. As if explaining that at a dinner party was not torture enough, right? 

Business picked up when we met with the hose manufacturers and they told us to make the o-rings thinner so they broke faster. Turns out, most people would rather buy a new hose than figure out how to make the ten cent repair. We still sold the repair kits, but hose sales went through the roof.

By year five, I had more money than I would have dreamed of. I suppose that’s part of how I ended up here, the money that is. 

When the phone rang again, I had to answer it with my nose. “Hello?” I subserviently answered. 

“Oh hey again, sorry to bother you, I was just looking for the…” the voice trailed off and the sound of static filled the thick smoky air. “Never mind, I found it. Haha.” 

Who actually says haha? I could still hear Josh mumbling to himself about how silly he thought he was for things like that. 

“You forgot to hang up the phone Josh,” I called out. He couldn’t hear me. Then I heard him shouting around the office taking down the coffee order. 

 I could see a sad sap walking towards me with the God forsaken bone in his hand. He was doing some lazy demon’s dirty work. Who has it worse, this guy or me? I thought. Probably me. 

“It’s for you, again,” he whined, walking off as sulky as he had approached. 

“Hello?” I answered. 

“Oh, hi, again, so sorry. I looped in Carol from finance. You remember Carol right?” Josh’s voice crooned into the phone. 

Unfortunately, he was actually waiting for me to respond. “No,” was all I could summon. 

“Oh no? Carol is great. Anyways, she must have been hired after you died. So sorry again about that. Anyways, Carol is here and we were just looking back to that pesky 2022 lawsuit. I mean, I’m not blaming you for the mess, but we are still trying to clean it up. Anyways, do you know why the red dot sheets don’t correspond to the faulty O-ring accident docs?” 

I paused trying to remember. What the hell is a red dot sheet? Apparently I was taking too long because a demon decided to shoot a flaming tar arrow through my solar plexus. As I reeled over in pain, I thought hard about the red dots. The sound of static was so loud I couldn’t concentrate. 

“I’m not sure about the red dots Josh,” I finally screeched out. 

“Ohhhh right, red dots started after you died. Carol’s idea, bloody helpful too!” Josh said.

Carol’s stupid voice bubbled up from the static, “yeah, thanks Josh, just a little something I picked up in my corporate career,” she said. 

“Either way, do you happen to know where those documents are, the ones that correspond properly?” Josh asked. 

Just then the static grew so loud neither of us could hear anything. The buzzing sound filled the fiery pits of hell and the phone cut out. 

Thank God, I thought. I can’t blame them though, really. When bone phones became popular, I used them too. Maybe a little too much. Now I realize why exactly everyone I called seemed so annoyed. Back then you could find some great numbers on the black market, for the right price. It was useful to say the least. But now, it's a direct connection between hell and O-source. 

A sleazy demon dragged his feet towards me with a phone cord trailing behind him that looked like an umbilical cord. Great, the landline. He pushed the thing towards me. 

“Who is it?” I asked the demon, out of reflex like he was my assistant. 

“It’s your son, he forgives you,” the thing croaked.

I was stunned for a moment. “What?” I asked.  

The demon keeled over with a roaring laughter that sounded like a dying cat. “It’s just Josh,” he finally spit out through his laughter. “It’s just Josh,” the thing repeated.