Remembering Hell (2 page)

CHAPTER TWO

“Fuck, fuck, fuckity, fuck!!”

The words just fly out of my mouth.
It’s like only yesterday I was a cabbie in Hell and filling the boss’s “curse
jar” took up the majority of my disposable income. However, that is not the
case. I have called Heaven my address for a great many years.

My name is Louise Patterson, and I
died and went to Hell. Whether or not I deserved it, or if I did indeed earned
the redemption that I finally found are purely subjective. However, I did end
up here, in Paradise where everything is cool and folks are happy and the
general population tends to frown upon the gratuitous use of the F bomb.

“Lou! Haven’t heard you talk like a
truck driver since…well, since you were a truck driver!” Will says, laughing at
his own joke. Will is one of my dearest friends up here. At one time, he was my
guardian angel. I was once damned to eternal temp jobs, and Will had to stalk
me. He was so bad at it I almost always saw him hiding or following me. Good
times. Well, not really, but I’ve learned to remember the good and let go of
the bad.

I get up from the wall of screens
I’ve been parked in front of for the past few hours. We are in the central
office at WF&PI. The “company,” as we call it, is a remote viewing center
for family members and curious angels to look in on what is happening on Earth.
This is a wondrous place, and if people watching is a hobby of yours in life?
You’ll want to spend a great deal of time here once you are dead. Joyous
occasions are celebrated tenfold up here, with generations of families
reuniting for weddings or births or even deaths. When someone shuffles off the
mortal coil, they are brought here where they can be welcomed back into the
bosom of love from everyone who knew them in life. That is, as long as they
make it here. If they end up in the opposite place, they are usually alone and
confused for a while. But it doesn’t take long to figure it out. For me, I knew
I was in Hell the second I realized that I had no choice in what I could wear
every day, and the supernatural closet that was providing my outfits had been
programmed by someone for which torment and disgrace came as naturally as
mother’s milk to a newborn. At the time I thought it was some kind of Devil. In
reality, the one person who knows how to punish someone more acutely than
anyone else is one’s self.

When I got to Heaven and could
choose my occupation I considered working here. In the end my ambition got the
better of me, and I chose a different path. But I like to spend my extra time
here. I get to see my parents or grandparents occasionally when they come in to
hang out and watch my daughter or grandchildren or great-grandchildren.

It’s bizarre to think of myself as
a great-grandmother since my appearance hasn’t changed since my demise. I died
of breast cancer when I was forty-five years old. That means I get to be
middle-aged for eternity. Lucky me! I watch from on high as my family and
friends go on with life. Many of them aged and eventually passed and came here.
I try not to take it personally when a few of them look at me with surprise, as
though I was the last person they’d expect to see in Heaven. But most of the
ones I was closest to were very happy to see me. Almost as happy as I was to
see them. There is a great sense of peace when someone I love shows up here. I
get to be part of the welcoming, with smiles and tears and eternal agape. Agape
is my favorite word. It means unconditional love. And I’ve been fortunate, that
all of my loved ones who died ended up here immediately. No one had to take the
detour I did through Hell before finding their place in eternal bliss.

Well, at least not yet.

Will is now studying me with
sincere concern. “Maybe I should call ahead to the agency and warn them that
you’re coming,” he says, tapping his Bluetooth earpiece.

“Not necessary,” I say quickly as I
walk to the elevator and punch the down button. “Gabby is at the front desk.
She’s already briefing Deedy.”

“How do you know?” Will asks with
wonder.

“No, I haven’t sprouted any remote
viewing power or anything,” I say, half joking and half resentfully. “I just
know Gabby. And I feel it in my bones.” “You know your bones aren’t real,
right?” Will says with a smile.

“Yeah? But I bet if I hit you in
your imaginary nose bone it’ll hurt!” I tease.

The doors open, and I’m on the
elevator. “And don’t bother trying to follow me. I doubt you’ve gotten any
better at it in the last quarter-century or so…” I say as the doors close. Will
is wagging his finger at me, like a father to a toddler who’s just sassed at
him. I just give him my most alluring smile as the doors shut.

As I start down the long trip back
to the street and down the few blocks to the agency, I think about Gabby. Gabby
is short for Gabrielle, and she is an archangel. Yeah, the one you’re thinking
of. Don’t worry, I thought it was a man too. Anyway, Gabby as part of the “top
dogs” of the Angelic hierarchy comes complete with glorious wings and a set of
superpowers that would make Stan Lee jealous enough to cry. One of those
superpowers is that she can read minds. Well, kind of. What I’ve learned over
the years is that she can’t exactly read minds. It is more like she can hear
what is in your heart or soul or whatever. Of course, a lot of times, it seems
that she is answering a question that you have just formulated in your mind,
hence the mind reader rap.

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 about 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.