UM(1) Creative Writing Club (Activity)

Rasp

Day 312 as a scheduler. I've been assigned to a place in between the mortal realm and realms unbeknownst to mortals. Time for a soul in my place is very specific; 9 minutes and 49 seconds.

"Don't you ever take us petty for keeping some seconds! More than 6,000 people die each hour which means we have to host about 1,500 souls every 15 minutes to make ends meet and yet, for the sake of god, this place won't hold 1,500 schedulers!" a senior once bellowed at the newbie, me. I was too dumb to follow his maths but, here I am! Appreciating very mini bits of those 11 seconds.

Our domain is known; "Memory Lane" which sounds quite fancy for some haunting flashbacks. Each of the thousand of us guards the brightly lit lane of his charge. All kinds of spirits have to trespass the lane and it's also their last chance to see the highlights of the most recent life of theirs. However, the mischievous ones and disturbing souls tend to escape. They can't stand to see the horrific memories they created. Sometimes, these kinds even give us headaches like pulling pranks and verbally abusing. Everyday, we make sure none of the deads stays more than 10 mins in our place since there could be system errors at the lanes.

My slot's No. 612. Colourful and mesmerizingly shaped stones fill the lane. A thousand lanes exist but the noises from the neighbor lanes never overlap mine. I explain how the five houses work in the very first 49 seconds... AND repeat it EVERY ten minutes or so! On a DAILY basis!! MY superiors can do maths but can't come up with a better idea which is as simple as pre-recording the introduction?? Is it because they're too old? What a waste of their divine energy!

At the moment, I'm taking care of a woman's soul. The name's Ming. The first candy house showed there weren't any giggling moments in her babyhood. I just knew it because her memory capsule didn't look delicious. I bet she didn't like the taste of old memories,too.

The second house is a cybercafe but we do not serve caffeine here. I did my usual job. I let her choose between playing a game of her taste and seeing her awkward youth on the memory display. I learned that she was shy and clumsy as a girl, and that she had her first love at fourteen. The memory screen is so overrated. Till this day, I can't understand why many souls love to see embarrassing things their youth versions did.
"Aren't games way more amusing??" I would ask the kids who had to come here early.
"Of course,Mr.Guardian!" they would say.
At least, the little guys know what they really need.

Apparently, our soul was a brilliant caretaker. She was a great mom, a patient wife and a fantastic boss lady She had been an icon for young women. I could tell because three out of five doors in the third house opened! The third house doesn't open its main gate for just anyone. It keeps out the failures of the earth. The other two doors didn't open for she didn't have a chance to express gratitude to her parents and for not being a pure saint. A wild guess, but I'm pretty sure the last door didn't open for me, too. Her soul seemed very pleased devouring the memories.

6 minutes left.

The memories the souls see in the remaining houses, according to them, are more realistic. I can't see them but they said it felt like they were teleported to that exact time and place where the memories took place. I expected that since the days I was a trainee. After all, they are the rooms that decide whether a soul deserves heaven or hell.

The 4th house holds the best memory of life and the last, the memories of wrongdoings. The fourth house is the most addicting one for the lingering souls. One time, when the system broke, a soul escaped and he lived in this house for two weeks meaning that we had to work overtime that long. I remember convincing him to be transferred by offering the figurine he had adored so much on earth. He was quite a man!

She has been standing in front of the slot machine of the fourth for almost three minutes. I saw tears of joy fell down her face. The time's up!

"Hey, Ming!"
She turns to me calmly.
"So, what was that?" As I ask, we're already at the last house. Here, time works very accurately and we don't have to walk along the lane to switch houses if the time's up in the previous houses. I really want to take some seconds away from her last 3 minutes. Her soul doesn't deserve this amount of time.
"My k--"before she can answer, the tube above her sucks her away.

Then, I hear voices.
"I'm sorry, dear. I need him for my baby."
"Taking away my family! What else did you hide behind such calmness??" the voice is cracking with both  agony and anger.
"Please..., do not...take him away," the same voice softens and continues but, this time, her words are for another person, "Please, Joe. I'll try hard to bear our child even if it takes my life. So, please, do not leave me for another woman's baby. It will...seriously.. break me, Joe."

Soon, sobs echoing in two different frequencies come to overwhelm the whole house. Maybe, it wasn't just one woman who suffered...