You Are a Ghost. (Sign Here Please) Read online

  “Blast,” he said. “There’s been a mixup. We’ll have to send you back to general receiving for re-processing.” He wrinkled his nose. “The forms to send someone back are a nuisance.”

  Nathan got the distinct impression that this man didn’t much like him, but then none of the bureaucrats seemed to like him. The man straightened his single-windsor knot tie then produced a stack of about fifty pieces of paper, all of which he filled out with astonishing speed.

  At this point, Nathan would normally have asked to see Director Fulcher, but he remembered that Brian said Director Fulcher was plotting to trap him in the afterlife, so Nathan decided maybe it was best to keep his mouth shut until he figured out what to do.

  Meanwhile, the bureaucrat was muttering to himself.

  “-and must send a notice to the Mistakes and Complaints Department for them to fill out the pertinent form related to reporting this incident, CC’ed to general receiving. There we go.”

  He signed the form.

  The world dissolved around Nathan and he was back in the infinite unending blackness, which Nathan started to find very tedious. It was all the same in every direction he looked. Maybe they ought to install some TV monitors and put the news on. Nathan would have watched the news. He vaguely wondered in the back of his mind if the incumbent Mayor of Dead Donkey was maintaining his lead in the polls over the corpse and Mr. Smiley Face.

  An intercom chimed again, and the mechanical voice said:

  “Station Number Cosine (2°), please.”

  Then another station materialized around Nathan. This one was exactly like the previous station, with precisely the same model of desk and arrangement of forms piled high in neat rows, except the person behind it was different. This particular bureaucrat was a very tall, thin, middle-aged man with powerful-looking glasses. They enlarged his eyes and gave him a shrew-like appearance as he peered over at Nathan. Then he turned back to the papers in his hand, which Nathan recognized as a copy of one of the forms that the previous bureaucrat had just filled out. He was wearing a one-and-one-half windsor knot.

  “Are you in charge of general receiving?” Nathan guessed.

  “No,” the man said calmly. He pushed a form towards Nathan and began to tick off boxes with a pen. “Name, type of badger, type of stroke, type of bathtub.”

  By this point, Nathan had totally forgotten he had a badger under one arm and as he reached out to accept the form, he accidentally dropped the badger. The badger immediately began to maul his legs, and Nathan collapsed to the ground, screaming.

  “For goodness’ sake, pull yourself together,” the bureaucrat snapped at Nathan.

  “I’m trying,” Nathan gasped as he struggled to get the badger off of his chest again.

  “I was speaking to the badger,” the bureaucrat shot back with distaste. “I don’t really care what you do with yourself, but you’ve got to sign the form.”

  Despite the considerable amount of blood, Nathan managed to once again yank the badger away from him and tuck it unceremoniously under his arm. He grabbed the form with his free hand and looked it over.

  “Where’s Jeanne?” he asked.

  “Jeanne?” the man repeated. “She runs the desk for-”

  “I already know,” Nathan cut him off. “Isn’t this the badger-stroke-bathtub desk?”

  “Yes, of course it is. This is the Desk for People Who Died Of A Stroke While Simultaneously Being Mauled By A Bathtub And Crushed By A Badger.”

  Nathan blinked for a few seconds as he turned this information over in his mind. Finally he parsed it sufficiently to understand what the problem was.

  “Oh, I see,” he said, nodding enthusiastically. “There’s been another mix up. I wasn’t mauled by the bathtub and crushed by the badger, I was crushed by the bathtub and mauled by the badger.”

  “Damn,” the bureaucrat said, and pushed his shrew-like glasses up his nose. He regarded Nathan with the same look of disdain that Nathan had come to expect from the frumpy woman.

  “What do I do?” Nathan asked.

  “We’ll have to send you back to general receiving,” the man said.

  “But I don’t want-”

  But the bureaucrat had already produced a stack of forms, about fifty pages high, and started filling them out with the speed of a printing press.

  Again everything dissolved into infinite, unending blackness. Nathan clicked his tongue disapprovingly. There was nothing to do in the infinite, unending blackness. He looked at the badger under his arm, which was still trying to maul him.

  “So, how are you doing today?” Nathan asked.

  The badger hissed at him angrily. It wasn’t very happy with Nathan because Nathan had crashed an aircraft into its habitat.

  “That wasn’t my fault,” Nathan objected, sensing its displeasure. “I wasn’t flying the plane. A dog was.”

  The badger hissed at him again.

  “No, it wasn’t my dog. I don’t own a dog.”

  There was another intercom chime.

  “Here we go,” Nathan said cheerily. “I hope they get it right this time.”

  “Station Number 5-Tau, please.”

  That didn’t sound right either.

  Everything again materialized around them. There was the same type of desk with the same tidy stacks of forms piled high on it. A large executive desk toy, a newton’s cradle, was clacking merrily away on the summit of the paperwork. Behind the desk sat a badger, black with white stripes, in a fine white shirt and a coat with a one-and-a-quarter windsor knot. Nathan stared at it. It pushed a form at him with its front claws and hissed. The badger under Nathan’s arm growled back.

  Badgers do not like badger bureaucrats any more than humans like human bureaucrats, as a general rule of thumb, though due to their highly anarchic society badgers generally do not encounter quite so many bureaucrats on a day to day basis. They can, therefore, be quite recalcitrant when they die and start to have to fill out paperwork.

  The bureaucrat-badger hissed back at the pair of them, and the badger under Nathan’s arm wiggled free and mauled Nathan across the legs, then started to hiss furiously at the bureaucrat. The bureaucrat continued to tap on the form insistently with its front paws.

  Nathan picked up the form, which was written in english. At the top it said, “Form 625446 - For Badgers Who Died Of A Stroke While Simultaneously Being Crushed By A Bathtub and Mauled By A Person.”

  “No, this isn’t right either,” Nathan objected. “I had the stroke, not him. At least, I don’t think you had a stroke, did you?”

  The badger Nathan had come in with shook its head vehemently.

  Ahead of them, the badger bureaucrat gave Nathan a funny look which Nathan imagined might be loathing in the badger sense, then hissed and began to fill out a now-familiar stack of forms about fifty sheets high.

  Nathan sighed.

  As soon as the badger bureaucrat clawed its signature into the form, the world dissolved again. There was infinite, unending blackness.

  “This is why I don’t like bureaucracy,” Nathan said unhappily.

  The intercom chimed again.

  “Station Number e^15.2, please,” the intercom voice said, before cutting off.

  Another desk piled high with forms appeared in front of them. The person behind this desk was a woman in a pantsuit with short-cut dark hair and equally dark eyes. She glared up at Nathan and the badger, then repositioned the little photograph of a horse (or possibly an equiclops) that was perched on top of her pile of forms.

  “Is this the desk for people who have died of simultaneous stroke, badger attack, and falling bathtub?” Nathan asked with an increasing hint of desperation in his voice.

  The woman gave him a quizzical look that immediately told Nathan it was not.

  “No,” she explained presently. “This is the desk for people who have choked to death due to a rubber band wrapped overly tightly around their throats while being beaten by a blindfolded person who has mistaken them for a piñat
a. Why? Have you recently died of a simultaneous stroke, badger attack, and falling bathtub?”

  Nathan held up the badger by way of explanation.

  “The badger could have mistaken you for a piñata,” the bureaucrat insisted.

  “No he didn’t,” Nathan said. “I was simultaneously crushed by a falling bathtub, died of stroke, and was mauled by a badger. This badger, actually, who I think still wants to maul me. Can you send me to see Jeanne?”

  To be honest, Nathan was not entirely sure why he wanted to see Jeanne so insistently because she wasn’t a very pleasant person, and he didn’t have a plan for how to get out of his present predicament once he got in to see her.

  The dark haired woman scoffed, then picked up what appeared to be the combined load of fifty-page redirection forms that had just been signed by every other bureaucrat Nathan had seen.

  “I can’t send you back to general receiving after having been misdirected so many times,” the woman said. “Regulations dictate I have to send you to the Mistakes and Complaints Department.”

  The badger growled.

  “There’s no call for personal insults,” she said sharply. “It’s not my fault. I just enforce the rules. You have been redirected more than the statutory limit, so we have to send you to the Mistakes Department. That’s just the way it works.”

  She filled out an immensely-complicated looking form in about two seconds, then handed it to Nathan. As soon as he took it, she signed another piece of paper and the infinite, unending blackness returned.

  Deciding there was no point in moping too much about it, Nathan mentally planned to redecorate the infinite, unending blackness. Maybe a splash of paint there, a comfy couch to sit on here, and a big TV over there, and it would soon be as good as home. Meanwhile, he’d accidentally loosened his grip on the badger again, and it started slashing away at his chest, but Nathan didn’t mind it that much. He started to hum another cereal jingle that had been bouncing around in his head for a while.

  Finally, the familiar-looking complaints department materialized around Nathan, though he had appeared standing at the back of a less familiar-looking line. A woman with a squashed face and a rose-colored jacket was stalking up and down the line, handing clipboards out to people. When she reached him, she said, “take a number.”

  She held out a roll of tickets in a menacing fashion. Nathan obediently tore off a number. Then the rose-colored jacket woman pushed a clipboard with a form on it into Nathan’s hand, then turned to the badger.

  “You too,” she said irritably. The badger ripped off a ticket with its teeth. Then the woman left them alone, moving to the family of six humans that had just appeared behind them with odd and irregular-looking goat legs.

  Nathan stared at the forms he was carrying. He had both the form the last bureaucrat had given him and the one on the clipboard. The first of the two forms asked:

  “Answer the following questions as concisely as possible. 1) What kind of rubber band was placed around your neck to suffocate you? 2) Was the rubber band intentionally placed around your neck? Yes/No. If no, please explain. 3) What kind of piñata were you mistaken for?”

  On and on it went.

  The next form was labelled, “Mistakes and Complaints Department Entry Form.” The first question asked, “are you sure whatever has happened isn’t actually your fault and not ours?” The second question read, “come on now, fess up, it’s really something you did, isn’t it?”

  Nathan sighed and put the form down. A huge monitor over the top of the line read, “Estimated Wait Time: 6,000 years.” Nathan couldn’t see the front of the line, so he immediately gave up. With the badger still under one arm, he walked out of the nearest door and found himself in the usual infinite hallway. When he walked about ten feet down the hall, another door materialized and Nathan sped through it to find himself in the complaints department proper.

  To his left, a bureaucrat was enthusiastically shoveling pile after pile of forms very much like the ones Nathan had just been asked to fill out into an incinerator. Just past them, Nathan spotted Ian talking rapidly to another bureaucrat.

  “I know that they had half their children turned into dictionaries while the other half got goat legs, but that’s all very normal given the circumstances. What else do you expect when you take four children to a basketball game? Tell them that they’ll just have to wait to file an application to receive a request for a Form 352080 - Authorization to Stop Being a Dictionary. The other half of their children will just have to make do with goat legs.”

  Ian did not see Nathan. Nathan looked down at his arms, which currently contained an angry badger, several forms, and a clipboard. He got an idea - one of his better ideas, he thought. Nathan approached Ian, mustered his biggest smile, and then loudly said, “Hello!”

  Ian jumped.

  “Nathan,” he exclaimed. “You surprised me - surprise is a state of shock, I should explain - what are you doing here, here being the Complaints Department-”

  “I died again and got misdirected by general receiving and sent here,” Nathan said. “You’d better send me to Director Fulcher’s office immediately, because I’m supposed to go to Director Fulcher’s office whenever I die.”

  “Pursuant to Document 3470634: Memorandum Pertaining to Nathan Haynes,” Ian agreed. “I should explain that the Memorandum Pertaining to Nathan Haynes is a memorandum pertaining to you, Nathan Haynes. You are Nathan Haynes. Yes, I’d better send you right away.”

  Ian took out his Bureaucratic Transit Device and shook it. The bottom of the 8-ball changed to say “Director Fulcher’s Office,” and a door appeared.

  “I also wish to file a new complaint,” Nathan said.

  Ian was not smiling, but if he had been his smile would have faltered.

  “A complaint?” he asked nervously. “We don’t like getting those here in the Complaints Department. What’s your complaint about?”

  “I got misdirected several times, and then was mauled by this badger,” Nathan said. “Here, you’d better hold the badger while I get the complaint form.”

  He handed Ian the badger, which spat and hissed angrily.

  “So here’s the top of the complaint form,” Nathan told Ian.

  “Okay,” Ian said, and accepted the complaint form.

  “Now you’d better hand me the badger back so he can sign his statement.”

  “Sure.”

  The badger was handed back to Nathan and signed another paper on the clipboard with his claw.

  “And here’s the last form I was given by the second-to-last bureaucrat I saw, which has something to do with rubber bands and piñatas....”

  “Alright.”

  “Oh, I need the first form I gave you back because I need to write something on it.”

  “Fine.”

  “You hold the badger again while I write.”

  “Okay.”

  “Now here’s the clipboard and another form.”

  “Good.”

  “Give me the badger back.”

  “Of course.”

  “And here’s the last form.”

  “Yes.”

  “Oh, hold the badger again and give me that form back again, would you? I’d better double-check it.”

  “Sure.”

  “And give me the badger back.”

  “Here.”

  “And here’s this form again.”

  “Mhmm.”

  “Now take the badger one last time.”

  “Okay.”

  “And hand me your Bureaucratic Transit Device.”

  “Sure.”

  “And give me the badger again.”

  “Yes.”

  “And here’s the ticket that they gave me while I waited in line in the Complaints Department. That should be everything.”

  Nathan was now holding the badger and the Bureaucratic Transit Device while Ian was holding the assortment of forms that Nathan had collected.

  “Well, I’m very sorry to hear ab
out your mishap with the badger and we will get these complaint forms processed right away,” Ian said, peering at them. “In fact, I’ll process them myself.”

  He threw them into a nearby incinerator, where they quickly turned into black ash.

  “I don’t think you can expect any forthcoming response from our department, but rest assured that the situation will be addressed as soon as possible,” Ian said. “Now, you’d better get to Director Fulcher’s office quickly. You don’t want to keep Director Fulcher waiting.”

  “Agreed,” Nathan said cheerily, and opened the door, tucking the badger under one arm and stuffing the Bureaucratic Transit Device into his pocket.

  It was as he did this that Ian realized he had been tricked.

  “Hey, give that back!” he exclaimed.

  He grabbed at the device, but it was too late. Nathan stepped through the door to what he imagined was safety.

  Nathan was, of course, a very foolish person. Only he would have imagined that Director Fulcher’s office was safety.

  Chapter 20

  When Nathan stepped through the door into Director Fulcher’s office, he found it in greater disarray than ever before. Most of the potted plants were out of their regular order, while the forms on Fulcher’s desk were untidily stacked and wobbly, a start contrast to their usual neat piles. Fulcher himself was standing behind the desk with his hands behind his back, his top button undone and his shirt ruffled. However, he did not look tired or defeated. On the contrary, his eyes had the glint of a starving tiger in them, a starving tiger that has just spotted an unattended pork delivery van with the back left open.

  “Hello,” Nathan said with his usual good nature. He walked in and sat down in front of Fulcher’s desk. It was then that he remembered he had resolved last time to bring Director Fulcher a gift the next time he died, but then subsequently totally forgot about it. He shifted awkwardly and does what everyone does in this situation, and seized the first thing that came to mind and pretended it was planned.

  “I got you a present,” Nathan said. “It’s this - uh - angry badger.”

  He placed the badger down on Fulcher’s desk, where it scuffed up the wood and knocked over a pile of forms. Feeling that this might not be the world’s best gift, Nathan reached deep in his pockets to try to find something, but the only thing he had on him was literature from the religion fair.