Remembering Hell Page 2

  But have you ever noticed that a lot of questions that we as humans think about are actually things we’ve been aware of on some level for a very long time? I heard once that slot machines in casinos are constantly putting together combinations. The second you put in a coin and pull the lever, it lands on whatever combination the machine had already decided on at that very second. Our inner voice speaks to us all the time too, and it is only when we land on a particular thought that it is able to enter our minds, where we can process it. Gabby can tell you that your soul is going to come up with three cherries or two lemons and an orange, so to speak. At any rate, she’s totally brilliant. I vacillate between being completely in love with her and being outrageously envious of her at the same time.

  However, as I walk into the agency and see the way Gabby is looking at me, I realize I am also quite frightened of her. Her face is filled with something not quite angry, but there is a fire within her eyes that alludes to angelic fury. Now before you start thinking that angelic fury is on par with angry puppies or spitting mad adorable babies, let me remind you that angelic fury was once responsible for things like killing the first born of entire countries and shit like that. When Gabby gets mad, or to better describe it, righteously infuriated, particularly on Deedy’s behalf, then she gets scary. And not like when you were a kid and your mom said “Wait until your father gets home!” kind of scary. I’m talking Chuck Norris would shit his pants kind of scary. So a ticked off angel is not on the top ten “must see” list in the hereafter. And while I’ve never actually seen Gabby’s wrath, I have heard enough stories to know I don’t want to. Ever.

  “Okay, I know you’re pissed off at me right now. But no smiting me or anything,” I say with a false bravado and accompany it with a nervous giggle. I walk past her to the coffee pot. “May I have a cup of your wonderful coffee?” I’m trying to sound way more nonchalant than I actually feel.

  “I’m not angry, Lou. And of course, but please let me get it. Whenever you get near my coffee you always make a huge mess,” she says with genuine laughter. Thankfully, she’s in a good mood.

  I laugh along with her. “When I was living, Bobby used to call my sugar packets and dirty spoons Weasel Scat.” When I was in Hell, I couldn’t even remember Bobby. It took years and a little of Deedy’s magic before I remembered I had shared my life with a wonderful man. A wonderful man who called me Weasel, but still a great guy. Now, of course he is here, in Heaven. Along with his wife, a wonderful woman named Sue Ann who he married a few years after I died. The two of them raised my daughter, Dinny. Dinny was a nickname too. Bobby loved nicknames. Her actual name was Linda, after my best friend in the whole world.

  Thinking about Linda snaps me back into the present, and I decide I am willing to push the edge of the envelope with Gabby. “You know why I’m here, Gabby. I need to talk to the boss.” I decide that perhaps being a bit more respectful might be required here, so I quickly add, “If that’s okay?”

  “That is always okay, Louise,” Gabby answers with a small smile. “But you aren’t just asking to talk to him, you are quite frankly demanding that he comes and talks to you.” She hands me my coffee. “You don’t think that might be just a bit presumptuous?”

  “Why?” I say with total sincerity. I breathe in the aroma of the coffee before taking the first sip.

  Gabby gives me the kind of smile you give to a child who just asked why the sky is blue. “Because you are basically asking for a command performance from the Boss for something you already know how is going to end, sweetie.”

  My eyes start to fill, and I clear my throat before I begin to speak. “I’m sorry, I really am,” I say, and I mean it. “I know I’m acting like a spoiled brat, but this is a hill I’m willing to die on,” I continue. “You know, if I could…die again.” I half-heartedly laugh at my own joke.

  Gabby opens her arms and brings me in to her for a warm embrace. While I am enjoying the contact, as well as the natural healing power of her touch, she looks down at me with an expression that is so sweet there are no words to describe it in a way that anyone living would ever understand. There are some breathtakingly beautiful moments you will just have to wait until the afterlife to comprehend.

  Then the air changes, and I can feel the excitement. I look up at Gabby and see the sparkle in her eyes that I know is reflected in mine too. “The Boss is here,” she says.

  Suddenly his booming voice fills the corridor. “Gabby, if you don’t mind, could you ask Ms. Patterson to come in here before her poor head explodes?” His humor is evident.

  The sound of Deedy’s voice, rolling in with that heavy Welsh accent is always soothing to me, no matter how jangled my nerves may be. Intellectually, I know that he’s not always Welsh, not always dressed to the nines in the finest suits, not always called Mr. Deedy, not even always a “he” for that matter. But to me, he is now, and will eternally be Mr. Deedy, because for whatever reason, that is what I need him to be. For others he may be older, or younger, or black, or blue, or female. He can create himself to look like anything, because after all, he created everything and everyone.

  Yes. It’s true. I get to see God as a six feet five inches skinny dude with a funny accent and a great wardrobe.

  I practically sprint down the hall to Deedy’s office. I pause at the door as usual to reflect the first time I ever came here and stood in front of this door. The first time I ever walked through it, I was a resident of Hell. Convinced that I deserved an eternity of suffering, I came here to work for a strange, enigmatic man who, as far as I knew, owned a temp agency. But this office was the birthplace of my redemption. This place was where I realized I was forgiven, and it was here where I discovered I had actually been doing temp jobs for God.

  I walk in like a woman with purpose and start talking even before I take my usual seat across from his huge desk. “Okay, so I know you already know why I’m here, and I have been thinking about this ever since it happened,” I say, my speech already prepared in my head so I could just lay out my argument with at least a bit of eloquence. “I know she did something horrific, and I heard her last words, which basically was her giving herself her own trial and judgment. But her life as a whole—” I cannot finish because Deedy interrupts me.

  “Hello, Louise!” Deedy says casually, as though I haven’t said a word yet. He addresses me like two old friends running into each other on the street. “How long has it been? A few years since we have been face to face? Although, I must admit, I really do love our evening chats,” he says with a sly smile.

  I look at him with exasperation. I did not pray until after I was dead. Is that weird? But since I’d never done it before, except to kind of fake it when I was a kid in church, I reverted back to my only research which were movies and television from my childhood. I started praying every night before bed, on my knees with my fingers interlocked and my elbows on the mattress. At first I felt silly, like I was talking to myself, but since I knew for a fact that there was a God, I just talked to Deedy, exactly the way I would talk to him if I was sitting directly across from him. I feel something very much like gratitude to know he is actually listening when I pray. However, I am also starting to feel pissed off that now that I’m right in front of him he has decided to deliberately not listen.

  “So, should I go home and get on my knees to get your attention? We have to talk about what happened.” I feel my face get flushed with embarrassment at my own cheekiness.

  “No, actually we do not,” he replies with an authority that supersedes any emotion or inflection. Deedy has always been able to shut me up, even when I didn’t know who or what he actually was. He has this posture, this way of being, that makes me want to instantly become a better person. And I don’t want to disappoint him. Again.

  He continues, “We have nothing to talk about, because what happened did not happen to you, my darling girl. It happened to her. Well, more specifically, to them. And while I am overwhelmingly interested in hearing how you may feel a
bout that, I can’t help but think that besides your burning desire to vent whatever emotion you may be feeling, what you really want…” he leans across the desk and looks into my eyes with a fire behind his eyes, “is to start meddling around someone else’s journey. And that, darling girl, is not your job.” He points at me with a long elegant finger, and then he wags it back and forth as though he is telling a puppy not to jump on the furniture. “Do I have to explain the importance of what you do one more time?” he asks.

  All right, so no matter how much time goes by, this is where Deedy and I always end up. I have been part of the welcoming committee in Heaven for the past half century or so. That means my job is to gather together families and loved ones and be a kind of event planner for new arrivals. Remember when I said that getting to Heaven was a great party? Well, that is partially because of me. I am quite good at my job, if I do say so myself. Not that I do not want to do more, or to be more. Specifically, to have wings and super powers like Gabby. And I have made that very clear to Deedy, both face to face and in our “evening chats,” as he likes to put it. So this is the part where Deedy tells me to learn temperance and to not allow my personal ambition to get in my own way. He has a plan for me, just as he does for each of us, blah, blah, blah.

  “No!” I say with desperation. “Because I’m not talking in abstracts here. I am not here to discuss your management concepts or the glass ceiling! I am talking about something much more important!” I am on my feet now, my emotions taking over in my voice and my argument. I realize that my hands are on his desk and now I am staring into his eyes. “I cannot…absolutely cannot allow my best friend to go to Hell!”

  Linda and I had been like sisters at one time. My first true friend, who stood by me no matter how big of a shitbird I could be—and you have no idea how big that is. I had a knack in my youth of turning bad behavior into fucking performance art if I really put my mind to it. And even when it backfired in Linda’s face, like my drunken toast as her maid of honor at her wedding rehearsal dinner, there was always forgiveness in her heart for me.

  In the remote viewing room at the company, I have seen so many lives wasted and even more senseless deaths brought on by a hopelessness that can only be felt by beings trapped in their own cruelness. Linda was never cruel, never even unkind. It was painful to watch her grow old and see the bitterness form and then become her armor and shield against a world that she could no longer understand or participate in, and eventually watch it seep into her very heart. Linda’s heart was always a wonder to me, so full of love. As I watched her final days tick by like minutes to someone already eternal, and the understanding that in the end she was going to let the bitterness win, first over Hank and then herself. It was a final testament, but it was the wrong testament to her life. Linda was good. Linda was the best. Why should she be punished when so many others who lived terribly—and yes, I am thinking of myself for a brief moment here—get to be here? My breath is now ragged as my thoughts overwhelm me. I sob now as I sit and put my head on Deedy’s desk.

  He looks at me, and his expression is one of True Love. It brings me a sort of peace, but it also makes me even sadder. How long will it take for Linda to see that expression? Or to feel his comfort?

  “I know it is difficult, Louise,” he says softly. “To see someone you care about, especially the way you love Linda, make a decision that could cause herself so much pain. But you also know how this works. You know what is ahead for her, and you know that she will eventually find her way home.”

  “And in the meantime?” I say through a new set of sobs. Damn Deedy, he always knows how to make me cry.

  “In the meantime, you are going to have to let her go,” he replies gently.

  I take a deep breath and realize that an idea is forming as I begin to speak. It just flows so quickly out of my head I wonder for a moment if it is really mine. “Okay,” I begin. “Let’s talk about my job classification.”

  “My darling girl!” he says with surprise. “Are you playing the sympathy card? My best friend just committed a heinous act and is on her way to damnation so I should get a promotion?” He sounds incredulous.

  “No. Not a promotion. A demotion,” I say with excitement. “Send me back,” I say that with a little less excitement. To be totally honest, Hell is not a place anyone actually wants to go. In fact, I am pretty sure I just heard Gabby gasp out in the lobby. That almost makes me burst out laughing, but I don’t. I just look steadily at Deedy, who is returning my gaze with complete amazement.

  “You can’t be serious,” he says.

  “Yup. Don’t send me back with no memory and having to wear terrible clothes and stuff. Send me back like the people I worked for and with when I was there the first time. Or like Will! Send me back as a guardian! That would be perfect!” I exclaim.

  “How would that be perfect? You realize you cannot be Linda’s guardian,” he says, barely hiding his own shock at my unexpected request. I take a moment to absorb this, and find a teensy bit of pleasure from the fact that the creation can occasionally still surprise the Creator. Free will extends to the afterlife, and I apparently used mine in vast proportions just now. I don’t dwell on it for long, though, because I am now on task like a pit bull with a brand new bone.

  “Obviously,” I say matter-of-factly.

  “She won’t even be able to see you most likely,” he says thoughtfully. I can see he is now considering all the possibilities. Just as a side note, you never want to play chess with God. He can see all the moves—past, present, and future. I’m pretty sure that is what he is doing now. He is playing about one thousand different chess games simultaneously, with me as the self-administered pawn in all of them.

  “I spent thirty-two years in Hell, remember? I think I know how the place works,” I say with a twinge of reticence in my voice.

  Deedy looks at me very closely, in that way that he does. A way that makes me feel like he is seeing through the imaginary body that I, as do all of us, continue to pretend that we have, and is looking at the bare soul I actually am. He studies me for a long moment and then a look of sadness comes over his face. Uh-oh, I think to myself. Did he just see checkmate? Then I see a quick look of surprise again, followed by sadness once more. Like the ships passing in the night metaphor, his expressions are so fleeting that I wonder if I imagined them. Then for a split second I am afraid that he is about to just announce that he is going to send me back, not as an employee but as a resident where I can wallow for the next ten thousand years in my own ego and insubordination. But finally there is the look of affection and amusement. Where some would take that with relief and comfort, I of course take it as an invitation to go further.

  “And you have to admit,” I begin. “I would be so much better at the whole guardian thing than some people. I mean, I already know the neighborhood, and I am way better at sneaking around than Will on my worst day!” I look at him and nod my head knowingly.

  “And she’s back!” he says grandly. “My over-confidant Darling Girl.” He looks at me and laughs. “Okay. I will have your assignment tomorrow at eight am.” Then he pauses and says more seriously, “Are you sure this is what you want?”

  “Fuck yeah!” I say.

  He raises his eyebrows at me.

  “What? Just preparing to return to the old hood. Gotta talk like that natives, ya know.” I try to ignore the fact that he is reaching into his desk drawer for the infamous curse jar. That little bit of masterful smartassery will cost me a quarter. I happily make my donation.

  “Ofalus yr hyn yr ydych yn dymuno i fy annwyl” Deedy says to me.

  “Speaking of old and language. You know, since I have been in Heaven I’ve met thousands of people from Wales. Even they don’t speak Welsh. Why do you?” I say.

  “It doesn’t look like it sounds, and it doesn’t sound like anything else,” he says. “I have always had a soft spot for the more puzzling things in life.” Then he looks at me and winks mischievously. “People too.”
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  I bow with a flourish of my hand as if I was on a stage. “Thank you. Thank you very much,” I say with my own wink. Then I add with all seriousness, “Really, Deedy. Thank you for this.”

  “Good luck, Louise. I’ll see you tomorrow,” he says, and I know I am now officially dismissed.

  Smiling, I walk back down the hall. Gabby is waiting for me like a panther waiting to pounce.

  “Do you have the slightest idea of what you are doing, Louise?” she asks. There is no anger in her voice. I think she is really concerned for me.

  “Apparently not,” I say. “I never even considered I would once again have to use an alarm clock.” I laugh. Everyone in the entire kingdom knows that the one thing I hated more than the coffee or the wardrobe choices in Hell was the fact that I had to be at work at eight in the morning on the dot every fucking morning.

  Gabby puts her hand on my shoulder. Her touch gives me a warming sense of goodwill. “You’ll be careful down there, right? It has been so long since you’ve had to have your guard up.”

  “Gabby, how many of the people who work in Hell had to go there first?” I ask.

  “A few,” she answers. “But yes, Louise. You are a unique individual,” she says with relief.

  “And it should be interesting,” I continue. “To see the old neighborhood as a tourist instead of a resident. Might even be fun,” I say with as much bravado as I can muster. “At the very least, this time I get to come back here every night.” I look at Gabby with now sparkling eyes as tears begin to fill them once again. This time, I know the way home, I think to myself, knowing there is no such thing if Gabby is around.

  “Exactly,” Gabby says with a winning grin.

  This time I say what I’m thinking out loud, because I still find it a bit creepy when Gabby is speaking while I am just thinking. “And I’m guessing by Deedy’s reaction that there isn’t a line of folks outside of his office demanding a demotion?”