I Was a Twenty-Something Demon Girl

Chapter 1

"Emmy? Are you alright?"

I have never been more relieved to hear Ruby's voice. I was certain we were dead. The last thing that went through my mind before I passed out was a shard of the windshield. I suppose giving her the keys was a bad idea in retrospect, but in my defense I hadn't seen that she had another Spanish Coffee before we left. I can't really blame her, either. That was a fantastic drink.

When I opened my eyes, I expected to see a hospital room, maybe some heart monitors, the faces of my friends and family who all love me dearly, or if I'm less lucky maybe the horrific scene we must have left behind when we crashed. Sadly, none of these were the case. When I woke, all I saw was my sister standing above me, still wearing the party dress she had on in the car. Red always was her color.

She had a strange look in her eyes. Not one of worry, but of confusion, like she was looking at a stranger. Nonetheless, it was comforting to see. I knew it was her right away from her eyes. Deep red, just like rubies. Her namesake, of course, mine being Emerald thanks to my very bright green eyes.

I took a few seconds to take it all in. Ruby's face, the bright light above her, the reception desk next to her, the strange looking secretary... It was at that point that I started to question our environment. Finally, after a few business days for processing, I was able to speak. "Yeah, I think so. But what's going on? I thought we crashed?"

"You sure you're not hurt?" She replied.

I had to think about it. I remembered some pain, but at that time I felt nothing. In fact, I felt too fine. It had to have been long enough for the alcohol to wear off, but I wasn't hung over, and I was certain we had crashed. Unless I imagined it?, I thought. Maybe it was just a hallucination? Can alcohol even do that?

"Yeah...We did. I'll let her explain it." She gestured over to the rather large desk nearby. Behind it sat a well-dressed woman with thin chained glasses and a beehive haircut. She looked about as stereotypical as a secretary could get, to be honest. She held her head parallel to the desk, intensely eyeing some sort of paperwork she was vigorously filling out. Every five seconds, she would push her glasses back onto her face, only for them to slip down the bridge of her nose once again. Without looking up or slowing down, she spoke quickly in a sweet but firm Boston accent: "You died, sweetie. You and your sister didn't make it outta the car. You're in the afterlife now."

I figured something was off. It was a little hard to believe, but it'd be harder to believe either of us survived the wreck. It wasn't the most pleasant way for me to learn, but I suppose there's really no easy way to take bad news like that. At the time, I was mainly pleased to learn that there WAS an afterlife at all, and even better, I wasn't facing eternal punishment, so there's a win for me! (Take that, grandma!)

Before I could fully understand what that really meant, though, she kept going. "I just need to confirm a few things with ya before we send you both on, 'kay?" She looked up from her paperwork long enough to flash me a warm, friendly smile. It was, quite possibly, the most disarming smile I've ever seen. In fact, it was so disarming that it put me on edge, in a roundabout sort of way. I was so dumbfounded, when she spoke again it made me jump.

"I just need you to confirm your name and your birthday before we get you girls moving, 'kay?"

I took a moment to collect myself, and responded: "My name is Emerald Laurel, and my birthday is March 14th, 2002."

"Well, then...Happy birthday, honey."

Yeah...It was my 21st birthday...God, it really did happen then, didn't it? Wow. It stung like a bullet ant to hear that. I think I felt myself wince with my whole body, the wind was completely knocked out of me when she said that.

"Thanks," I said through bated breath. Before I could fully recover from that gut punch, she handed Ruby and me a pamphlet.

"Take a look through these options and let me know where you wanna go. I'll get ya one free ride, after that you gotta figure it out yerselves." She flashed another smile, this time a bit less sincere than the last. The pamphlet was absolutely loaded with all kinds of different afterlives, it was truly a sight. Valhalla, Heaven, Olympus, even some sort of spaghetti world. I was utterly flabbergasted at what I was facing.

I simply had to ask: "So, everyone was right?"

Her answer was about as vague as I expected: "They're right if you think they were." I still don't really know what she was talking about, but I wasn't interested in getting philosophical while determining where to spend eternity. We looked it over for what must have been hours. After careful consideration, believe it or not, we thought Hell was our best bet. I know it sounds far-fetched, but it actually didn't seem half bad. Yeah, they torture evil people down there, but if we were to go by choice, as stated on the pamphlet, we could get jobs working for the Devil himself! I was absolutely not going to pass up the chance at being an agent of chaos. Once we had made our choice, she pointed us toward an elevator at the back of the room and snapped her fingers. As soon as she did, the doors opened and the display above read "HELL" in orange colored letters. Once we stepped inside, she gave us a polite wave and an "Enjoy your afterlife, girls," and sent us off.

As soon as the doors closed, I think whatever was compelling me to keep it together must have stayed outside, because I broke down completely. I threw myself onto Ruby, sobbing, screaming, hyperventilating, and just generally losing my mind. It wasn't very pretty, I'll be honest, but how else was I supposed to react? I had a life, a plan, I hadn't even gotten a girlfriend yet! Fuck, I never even came out to my parents!! All of it, gone in an instant...

She did her best to calm me down, eventually comforting me enough to get me to stop wailing, at least. When she finally spoke, I could tell she was choking tears back herself. "It's gonna be okay, Emmy...This is just a new beginning for us!" Somehow, she managed to crack a smile. I was always impressed with her ability to keep it together no matter how hard things got. After we both managed to collect ourselves, the elevator finally came to a stop, and we stepped outside to our new lives.