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Authors: S. G. Browne

Tags: #Humorous, #Romance, #General, #Contemporary, #Fiction

Fated (3 page)

BOOK: Fated
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Not surprisingly, my attention is quickly restored to its prior condition.
“That’s better,” she says, looking down at me, her green eyes filled with mirth.
Seconds later, her face is gone from view and I feel her warm breath caressing the most stimulated part of my anatomy.
While technically not human, we move around in fleshy shells that mimic their appearance. Man and woman suits. Makes it easier for us to exist on Earth. Humans tend to overreact when they see bright blinding lights or celestial beings with wings or supernatural entities that have more than four appendages, so it just saves a lot of work for Confusion and Panic and Hysteria if we look like the so-called intelligent life-forms on the planet. It’s not as bad as you might think. Kind of like wearing an elaborate latex costume. After a couple hundred thousand years, you get used to the fit.
I can still hear the woman who is on the Path of Destiny talking to the super, telling him she’ll take the apartment, but my focus is on my own particular destiny at the moment.
Destiny and I have had an on-again, off-again thing for most of the past quarter million years, though it’s never been anything serious. Kind of like long-term friends with benefits.
In spite of the facts that she often sickens me with her upbeat attitude and that I can’t stand how humans willfully submit to her and hate me, I have to admit Destiny is more talented at noncontact sex than Glamour, Temptation, and even Lust. Though I have to give Lust the nod when it comes to full-contact bed surfing. After all, she is Lust.
Destiny continues to arouse me, creating a pressure in the air between us that’s almost palpable. That’s the key to noncontact sex: to build up the arousal by simulating sex but without penetration or any form of touching. The idea is to heighten the tension to the point where release occurs without physical stimulation.
Just as I’m approaching the threshold of release, Destiny suddenly stops.
When I open my eyes, she’s already halfway dressed.
“Gotta go,” she says, slipping her tank top over her head.
“Now?” I ask, my hands gesturing toward my lower extremities for emphasis.
“I’ve got a client I have to deal with in Portugal,” she says, putting on her go-go boots. “See you later.”
And like that,
poof
, she’s gone.
Before I can even get my boxers out of the hydrangeas, Destiny is most likely already in Portugal reassigning some would-be hero’s future. One second, you’re having noncontact sex on a roof in Manhattan, and the next, you’re halfway around the world.
Another perk of being immortal is not having to take public transportation.
Two thousand years ago, with most of the world’s two hundred million inhabitants concentrated in Europe, Asia, and Africa, we didn’t have to travel much. And really, two hundred million people are pretty easy to manage, considering most of them didn’t live much longer than thirty-five years, give or take. But once colonization of the Americas and Australia began in the middle of the sixteenth century, things really started to get out of hand, with the world population doubling from Columbus’s screwup to the beginning of the Industrial Revolution. And it’s really become unmanageable in the past two hundred years, with the global population jumping from one billion to nearly seven billion. On top of that, people live nearly twice as long as they did a hundred years ago.
I knew when humans discovered the concept of sewers that things were going to get complicated. But if I’d known human beings were going to procreate like rabbits on Viagra, I would have asked to be transferred to a different department. Like Abstinence or Chastity or SELF-CONTROL.
Or Death.
If you can’t prevent humans from reproducing at the source, then you can at least control the floodgates by draining the reservoir. Though personally, I think Dennis should do his job a little better. Thin out the herd. Return a sense of normalcy to the planet so we can all take a little breather. Maybe get a chance to go to Bali or Tahiti or Disney World for a change. I’ve always wanted to ride Space Mountain.
Maybe I can put in a request for reassignment. Except with my luck, I’d end up getting something like Humility or Diligence. Besides, I’ve been Fate for so long, I probably wouldn’t know what to do as anything else. Guess it’s just my fate to be Fate.
By the time I put my clothes back on, the super and the new tenant are gone and I’m alone on the garden rooftop. After getting worked up by Destiny, I’m not in much of a mood to be alone, so I figure I’ll see what Flattery is up to. Or maybe give Prurience a call. But before I can punch in her number on my cell phone, I get called away for a meeting with Jerry.
CHAPTER 3
Jerry’s reception area
is always packed, what with all the souls making the transition from earthly to ethereal, not to mention those who aren’t going to be making the journey but want an audience one last time to state their case. Most of them don’t get a second chance, but every now and then, Jerry shows a soft side and lets them in.
Today is no exception, though
today
is just an arbitrary term. Time and date have no real meaning here. I sat in Jerry’s waiting room for what seemed like an hour one time, and when I finally got back to Earth, I’d missed the entire Third Punic War.
Of course, that was back in the late Classical Age, when the population was still manageable, so it wasn’t like there was any big hurry to get back to Earth. But now, with my schedule booked, I should be in and out of here in a matter of minutes.
Problem is, while I’m waiting for the appointment ahead of me to finish up, I have to sit around with all of these human souls, most of whom were fated to end up here. And once they’re free of the encumbrance of human flesh, the mysteries of the universe are revealed to them. That includes the concept of life after death, the creation of human existence, the governing of the cosmos, and recognizing me.
“So you’re Fate,” says the soul of what was once a forty-six-year-old woman who died of pancreatic cancer.
I ignore her and try to avoid eye contact.
“I just wanted to thank you for all of the nausea and vomiting, the loss of weight, the yellowing of my skin, the chemotherapy, and the slow, anguished, painful death I had to endure.”
This is what I have to deal with whenever I come here. Angry souls taking out their frustration on me. Like most of them didn’t have anything to do with it.
Chain-smoking cigarettes.
Diets rich in animal fat and low in fruits and vegetables.
A lifestyle of sitting around on their asses watching ESPN and reality television instead of adhering to a regimen of regular cardiovascular exercise.
I really hate coming here.
“Hey,” she says, poking me in the arm. “I’m talking to you.”
By this time, several of the other souls sitting around us have taken notice.
“What’s going on?” asks a fourteen-year-old boy who got killed by a drunk driver.
The woman who died of pancreatic cancer hikes her thumb at me and says, “This guy’s the reason most of us are here.”
“Holy shit,” says a twenty-five-year-old man who overdosed on heroin. “It’s Fate.”
Before I have a chance to slink away to the bathroom, the entire room notices me.
Think awkward.
Think unpleasant.
Think torch-carrying mob.
Seconds later, dozens of human souls who were condemned to their fates are in my face, telling me how much they enjoyed their agony, their deaths, their failed existences. Fingers are pointed. Spittle flies from snarled lips, hitting me in the face. Men and women and children berate me, damn me, and curse me in more languages than even I know.
My job is so rewarding.
“Fate,” says the receptionist from behind her desk. “Jerry will see you now.”
I get up from my chair and squeeze past the mob of angry souls as they continue to scream obscenities at me. Even for all of the anguish and misery and discomfort they had to go through during their lives, all of this venom seems a little excessive. Then I look over and see Hostility in the corner, laughing so hard he’s turning red.
“Asshole,” I say as I walk into Jerry’s office.
“You know,” says Jerry from behind his enormous oak desk, “I’ve ended civilizations for less than that.”
“I was talking to Hostility,” I say, closing the door behind me.
“Is he still out there?” says Jerry. “I thought I told him to go find some poor, oppressed people to rile up.”
“Yeah, well, he’s riling up everyone in your waiting room.”
“Just so long as he stays out of the Middle East.”
The thing about Jerry is that he’s omnipotent.
Though he’s pretty nondescript for an all-knowing, all-powerful deity. Average height. Average weight. Average features. No distinguishing characteristics. It kind of helps him to blend in when he makes a terrestrial trip to have a look-see.
But since he doesn’t get out as much as he used to, he still likes to keep an eye on things from his office, which is made entirely of glass—including the floor and ceiling. Not exactly the most sensible way to set up shop, but it affords Jerry the chance to keep an eye on things while he’s working. And it pretty much freaks everyone out. Who wouldn’t feel a little awed, standing in front of the Big J with the universe expanding in a 360-degree view all around you, wondering if the floor is going to crack?
I’ve been here countless times before, and Jerry assures me his office is OSHA-certified, but I still take off my shoes and walk tippy-toe across the floor to his desk.
“So what did you want to see me about?” I ask, sitting down.
Jerry’s known name, the one given to him in the Old Testament is, of course, Jehovah. No one around here ever calls him God or Yahweh or any of the other names ascribed to him by humans. As long as I’ve known him, he’s always been Jerry.
“I’ve noticed a bit of sloppiness in your work lately,” says Jerry. “Ever since the start of the Industrial Revolution.”
That was more than two centuries ago. He must have a back-logged stack of paperwork in his in-box.
Back when societies were still agriculture based, humans weren’t as easily distracted from their paths. Even as recently as the middle of the eighteenth century, the success rate for humans on the Path of Fate was just under sixty-two percent, which meant that six out of every ten of my humans achieved their optimal fates. Today, with the constant barrage of commercials and celebrities and pitchmen telling people whom they should aspire to be and what they need to make them happy, that number has dropped to less than three in ten.
“What’s going on?” asks Jerry. “And don’t give me any more of that European-colonialism crap. It was bound to happen sooner or later, so just deal with it.”
It won’t do any good for me to complain about my workload or the grief I have to deal with on a daily basis, considering whom I’m talking to. But lately, I’ve reached the point where it just doesn’t seem like what I’m doing matters. Regardless of the paths I set them on when they’re born, the majority of my humans end up disappointing me. So I’ve started assigning them random fates, missing my quotas, and overburdening various geographic regions with taxi drivers and street performers.
Quotas are very important to Jerry.
Rule #9: Meet your quotas.
So many lawyers. So many paparazzi. So many strippers. It’s not as easy as it sounds. You get too many baristas, and the next thing you know, the whole cosmic wheel can get thrown out of balance.
“I don’t know,” I say. “I guess I’m just bored.”
“Bored?” he says. “You’re bored?”
I can tell from the tone of his voice that he doesn’t really have time for this. But I might as well give it a shot.
“Yeah,” I say. “I was kind of hoping I might get reassigned.”
He lets out a laugh. And when Jerry laughs, it’s not very funny. Especially when he’s Earthside. Mount Vesuvius. Krakatoa. Mount Saint Helens. Good thing he doesn’t have much of a sense of humor.
I glance down and wonder, not for the first time, about the integrity of the plate-glass floor.
It’s not as if there’s no precedent for one of us switching jobs or getting reassigned. Faith has been replaced more than once over the millennia, Fidelity was transferred to a desk job in the wake of the free-love debacle, Reason got canned after the Salem Witch Trials, and Ego lost his job after the Beatles broke up.
Just to name a few.
So it’s not like I’m asking for something out of the question.
“We don’t have any openings at the moment,” says Jerry, once he’s stopped laughing.
“What about Peace?” I say. “That opening hasn’t been filled yet.”
“You don’t want Peace,” says Jerry. “Trust me. Besides, you’ve been doing your job for so long that I don’t have anyone on staff who could replace you.”
BOOK: Fated
7.47Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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