Excerpt: Death By Blackberry

What happens after you die has been a widely debated subject throughout the world for, well, ever. For Luke it was like waking up after an unexpected afternoon nap. He didn’t know where he was, what time it was, and had the sinking sensation he was late for work. Plus his mouth was wide open and he was drooling. Blinking, he looked around to discover he was in the waiting room of a large doctor’s office. It was a busy place. The plastic, butt cupping chairs were all full with likewise open-mouthed, drooling people. There were little kids, teenagers, a hot chick or too, and a lot of old people. Most were asleep and all wore the same blue paper gown. Luke looked down. Yup. He was wearing a paper gown. He shifted. Yes, it was the open-backed variety, and yes his ass was stuck to the plastic chair.

Within minutes of his awakening, a nurse opened a door on the far side of the room. She was a vision in her white, starched uniform.

“Luke Skywalker MacLaren?” she called.

“That’s me.” He croaked, peeling off the chair and launching across the room in fear she’d not wait.

The nurse turned and looked over her shoulder at him as he approached, “There you are, sugar.” She winked and Luke’s heart - the one in his soul not the one left in his empty physical vessel - lurched. She sure was something.

He followed her down a long, wide hallway lined with doors. The carpet was the faded gray you’d expect in a medical facility. The lights were buzzing fluorescents. There were manilla charts stuck next to the doors and colored, plastic flags next to them indicated who knew what. Luke had never been able to figure out what those things meant. But he wasn’t paying much attention to any of it and had yet to consider why he was there anyway. He was busy watching the nurse’s butt move as she walked down the hall. It was a perfect bubble. Her waist dipped in to create the perfect hourglass shape. Her skin was so white and silky. In a nutshell, he could think of nothing other than how it’d feel to cup that beautiful ass in his hands and press that luscious body against him.

She turned into a doorway and indicated for him to sit on an examination table.

“The Peter will be with you shortly.” She said as she left the room, giving him another wink and blowing him a sensual kiss.

Oh look there. Luke was drooling again.

This can be said for The Midwestern Center of Purgatory at Chicago, it was a state of the art facility. Despite the outdated mode of paper charts - the Peter’s refused to go electronic - they had everything and were nothing if not efficient. Luke’s wait was only two days, seven hours, and four minutes long. Of course Luke didn’t have a clue how long he waited, only that it seemed to be a unnecessarily long time. Yet he never got the urge to pee, so he reasoned it just felt long. In reality, it was a much shorter wait than he would have experienced out East at, say, the Purgatory and Peter Fellowship of New York. The wait there would have been at least three weeks. But then again Luke would also never again need to urinate. All Luke knew was that he was tired of reading People magazine’s Sexiest man Alive issue of 1989. Sean Connery was just not that interesting.

When the Peter finally breezed in all handshakes and apologies, Luke automatically assumed he was a doctor. And he was, of a sorts. Purgatory works like this: you die, you get dragged to Heaven’s waiting room, you get evaluated. Peters were the guys who did the evaluation. They were the guys who decided if you went to Heaven, went to Hell, or needed to serve time in between. This particular Peter was short and bald with age spots swirling on the top of his head.

“Good afternoon…” the Peter paused and looked at the chart, “Luke. How are you feeling?”

“Good. I feel good.”

The Peter looked him up and down, “Did you bring any Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups with you?” The Peters loved Reese’s Peanut Butter cups. If only this was preached about in church a lot more people would get to Heaven and a lot less would go to Hell.

“Um. No. Nope. Do I need them?”

The Peter sighed and jotted something in Luke’s chart.

“That’s okay. Let’s take a look at you.” The Peter then proceeded to check in Luke’s ears and up his nose and in his mouth. He didn’t need to do this, not at all, but he’d recently learned in a seminar titled How To Put the New Soul At Ease that acting like a doctor sped up the process and virtually guaranteed the new soul would accept whatever he said. That was the primary reason why he’s requested the bald head and age spots. It was much more doctor-like.

“So.” The Peter said, scooting back a few inches on his little rolling chair, “Let’s see what we have and where you need to go. Sound okay with you?”

“Yup. Sure thing Doc.”

The Peter smirked to himself. And Marilyn, the nurse, thought he was crazy for getting rid of his hair.

“You are Luke Skywalker MacLaren, date of birth May 25, year of our Lord 1986. Correct?”

“Yup.”

“You are the son of William and Rita MacLaren recently deceased on April 22, 2009. Is that correct as well?”

“Y-yes.” Luke didn’t know why the doctor needed to know these things, but what did he know about being a doctor?

“Your brother is Harrison Ford MacLaren. Wait. You’re Luke Skywalker and he’s Harrison Ford?”

Sigh. “Yes. May parents were big Star Wars fans and we were born exactly three years to the day after the release of Return of the Jedi.” Luke’s voice was a drone. When they were kids it had been cool to be named after Star Wars but the constant questions and jokes about his name got old. Besides it was way cooler to be Harrison Ford but instead he was Luke Skywalker. Who cared if he was the greatest Jedi that ever roamed the galaxy? The dude was a whine ass.

The Peter was smiling at him, “So. You don’t care for your name?”

“I didn’t say that. I like the name Luke. It’s well. You know.”

“Sure. Sure. I understand. Now. I see here you graduated without Honors from High School yet I also see that you were blessed with an exceptional IQ and logic quotient. Is this so?”

“No. Yes. I mean, what?”

“You went to University, I see. But did not graduate. Why?”

“University? You mean college? Yeah, I went to State. But -”

“But?”

“But, you know. With my Mom and Dad dying in the car accident and with Harry the way he is. Things were tough.”

The Peter crossed his arms. “Your entrance date to Michigan State University was on September FIND OUT THE DATE, 2004. Correct?”

“I guess. Yeah.”

“And at the time of your parent’s death you were not taking classes. You were, in fact, nearly fifty credits shy of graduation after five years in East Lansing. Is that correct?”

“Well. Yeah.”

The Peter scribbled again in his chart then sat for a moment, making a decision, and nodded to himself. He stood, grabbed his stethoscope and placed it on Luke’s chest, listening to the heart of his soul. Luke sat still as he knew he should, from all those years of yearly physicals when he was growing up.

When he was done, the Peter crossed his arms and looked sternly at Luke.

“You have a good soul.” He said, “But you’ve walked a cowardly and nearsighted path. You have squandered the gifts God has given you and have died before your time.”

These were big pronouncements. Luke wasn’t big on pronouncements of any kind, much less important ones. To avoid hearing what was being said, he stopped listening. Instead his mind had wandered to when he could get dressed and get out of the doctor’s office. This led to wondering where his pants were. Which led to wondering where his underwear was. Which led to wondering if his underwear had been clean when he took them off. Which led to a smack on the head from the Peter.

“Ouch.” Luke said.

“You will remain in Purgatory until you’ve learned the seven virtues you were expected to learn while you were alive. The nurse will be in to give you your clothes.”

“Woah.” Said Luke, hoping if it was the hot nurse from before that his undies were skid mark free.