Heaven, Hell & Room Service

Chapter 1: The New Arrival

Neil was having a particularly shitty day, which was saying something seeing as he was already dead. However, it is worth mentioning that the fact that he had been dead and living in Hell for two years, had nothing to do with the shittyness of his day. In fact, he had quite accepted that part of his existence. The day was a bad one, if he was being honest with himself, because of the porridge.

Neil had always enjoyed porridge in the land of the living, he had even gone so far to brand it as his favourite breakfast food on more than one occasion. And so when Hell's ever so charming Maitre D' had asked him to pick one breakfast food for the rest of his existence in the Afterlife, he had blurted out the word before ever fully appreciating what that would mean. And now, over eight hundred bowls of cream of wheat later and he had realized one unavoidable truth: there is definitely such a thing as too much porridge.

As a result, he lay sprawled out on his bed, having just got back from the ground floor dining hall, feeling extremely crappy thanks to an overload of porridge. Neil eventually mustered up the fortitude to pull his body into a sitting position, leaving him staring at the New Kids on the Block poster that was plastered above his dresser. Don't get the wrong idea though, Neil most certainly did not put that decoration up, and he had begged for it to be taken down, but to no avail.

Suddenly, there was a knock on the wall behind Neil's head. The knock was accompanied by a muffled voice, which said the following. "Hey Neil man! You home?"

Neil sighed. "If I say no will you still come over?" Some of you may think that this is a stupid question, and that if Neil didn't want the mystery guest to come over, he should have just stayed silent. But what fun would that be? That's just an aside, now back to the dialogue through the wall.

"Yuppers."

"Can't we just hang out later Adam?" Neil knew the answer to this too, but he had to try.

"But I have news, and it's huge."

Another sigh. "Alright then, it's unlocked."

Six seconds was all it took for Adam to get from his own room and into Neil's, which was impressive for a man who wasn't exactly thin. Adam Pollitt was, in a word, a geek, and a heavyset geek at that. I'll leave the physical description at that, and allow your own imagination to paint a more detailed picture of him.

He entered the room, holding a green can in each hand. "Hey man! Didn't see you at the floor meeting today."

Neil's reply was unenthusiastic. "Oh yeah, I forgot." Floor meetings were a concept instituted about six months previous in order to 'better facilitate communication between residents'. Neil did not find them fun or useful, and thus had not gone to one after the first.

Adam plopped himself in a sitting position on the end of his friend's bed. "Figured, I brought over some Mountain Dews. Want one?"

"Nope."

Adam cracked a can open with a quick fizz. "Suit yourself. So you wanna hear the news?"

"Sure."

"You know old Mr. Fenton?"

"Crotchety bastard, lives down the hall, face like a pug, smells like a New York deli all the time. No, I apparently have no idea who you're referring to."

Adam often did not grasp sarcasm. "Huh?"

Neil managed a semi-interested smile. "What about him?"