Rosco stretched his long legs and stepped out of the ambulance, or through the ambulance, rather. Instead of the hospital parking lot, he saw a long blue tunnel made out of smoke, stretching on indefinitely.
"Well," said Rosco to himself, "they sure make it easy to find the afterlife."
He turned around to glance at the ambulance one more time, to check on his brother in the passenger seat, but the scene was gone, replaced by a wall of blue smoke.
"They did always tell me that you can't keep it when you're gone." Rosco turned on his heel and started down the smoke tunnel. He wasn't sure how long he had been walking, when he saw red smoke start to filter in the swirling tunnel walls. He could have sworn that he had heard the national anthem, too. And an elephant. Confused, Rosco didn't even noticed when he stepped out into a white room. Looking around, surprised, Rosco saw that he was in a reception room, almost hotel like. There was an elderly man at a desk. His bronze nametag said 'Peter.'
"Smoke gotcha?" The old man chuckled. "You came from a Democrat hell-hole, if you'll permit me. The blue and all, you know."
Rosco stared at the man, perplexed, and felt his body over again.
"I thought I was dead..." he mumbled.
"Oh, you are," the old man replied amiably. "Would you mind filing out some paperwork?"
He leaned across the desk and shoved a clip board at Rosco. It held only one page, and that one page contained only one box. It read-
POLITICAL AFFILIATION (list here)
"This is IT!?" asked Rosco.
"That's it!" said the man.
"But, but, see, I thought Heaven was.."
Peter interrupted. "Pearly Gates? White Clouds?"
"Is this hell, then?" Rosco gulped. He had been pretty good, hadn't he? Even joined the choir at church.
"No, not unless you're a hippie. Now, just list your political affliation."
Rosco shook his head. "I've never voted in my life, never even registered to. I mean, I was only twenty, I am only twenty, I hate politics."
"Then are you an anarchist?" asked the man eagerly.
"No, I just never wanted to be involved."
"Well that puts you in a pickle," said Peter. He snapped his fingers, and suddenly they were in an impossibly huge room, surrounded by hundreds and hundreds of doors. On each of these doors was symbol, or if not a symbol, then writing. They were closest to the biggest, most trumped up doors, one emlabazoned with an elephant, its neighbor boasting a donkey.
"See," said Peter, beginning to walk, "The Big Man Upstairs got tired of all the bickering, debating, and political disagreements going on in heaven. All the staunch Republicans keep seeing the Democrats cropping up, and request to be transferred to Purgatory. It was becoming very difficult. In the olden days, you were either repressed or opressive, and in Heaven, it was easy to drop all that. But now..." the old man sighed.
Rosco passed doors labeled "Whigs," "One London," "Communism (staunch)," "Communism (relaxed)," "Anarchy," "Bull-Moose," and a plethora of obscure groups he had never heard of.
"How it works," continued Peter, "is that each political group now has its own version of Heaven. If you go to the Green Party, you can frolic in eternal fields, light up some marijauna, you know. If you decided to go Communist, you'd end up in a perfectly stable Communist Earth, where the money distributing actually works, and everyone is equal and happy. Want to go Greek? You can even find a way to the old Acropolis; participate in the Athenian debates. Provided, of course, that you are a free, land-owning, male citizen. Didn't own land by any chance, did you?"
Rosco shook his head, racing to catch up with the surprisingly quick old man.
At a door labeled with "African National Congress," Peter came to a halt, almost causing Rosco to smack into him.
"Well son, you must have had some kind of polical ambitions at some point. Was your dad a Democrat? Did your mother have a secret copy of "The Little Red Book?" What about a teacher, did anyone influence you in the slightest? I've got other souls to send about, you see," Peter said, shifting uneasily. "Time still exists here."
"I've never had any political affliation. Ever. I'm sorry," replied Rosco. "I'm glad that I didn't, though. I never cared much about fraternities, either. I just wanted to make the world a better place, but I never got a chance to, now."
The older man grinned, showing gleaming white teeth. "Then there's a place for you after all." He snapped his fingers, and the room spun, the doors spinning wildly until a door marked "Progessive Party" came to a stop beside them.
"How much did you care for the 19th century?"
Rosco started. "I was born in 1992."
"Well, ever role-played? Costumes, wigs? Doesn't matter, you'll like it, I can tell. Very fun people, those Progressives. Just a little touched sometimes." Peter snapped his fingers a third time, and Rosco's clothes flew off, quickly replaced by a pressed and starched suit and top hat. His shoes were shiny leather and there was even a handkerchief in his coat pocket.
"Are you sure about this?" asked Rosco.
"Positive. But if it makes you feel better, I'll come back in one thousand years and check, okay?" Peter patted Rosco on the back, and put a wrinkled hand on the doorknob.
"One question!" said Rosco quickly. "Where did Hitler go?" he stammered.
"Oh," chuckled Peter. "You want to know if he went to Hell or not? Well, there's not really a hell anymore, but we couldn't very well send him to the Nazi party, he'd enjoy that far too much, and most of them don't want him anyway, bad for their image, you know."
He opened the door, revealing a cobble-stoned street in a much older Richmond Virginia, helping Rosco in.
"He's Republican now."
Author notes
Heehee!
If you didn't catch it, the title's a play on the quote "The road to Hell is paved with good intentions."
Ignore- "It crunches. Watching it crunch." Why the difference!? Third person to... another third oh gah English is so strange.
A contest entry
- The Afterlife Buffet by hey incendiary.
350 points, ended August 17, 2007, 6 entries
Silver trophy winner
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Please tell me what you think
Comments
1 - 14 of 14
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I thought this story was hilarious. Never pictured the after life to be that way. You're very creative and clever. The part about Hitler was random but really funny. Good work!
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This story was pretty good. It confused me a little bit, but it was good anyways.
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I wasn't expecting this :D
Wow. That's all I can really say. Wow. You did an awesome job, and I love how it turned out totally spontaeneous, as if...
nvm.
*Claps 4 you!*
Great Job!
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How funny! HA! Well... That was a knee-slapper... So yeah... I didn't understand some of the big words you used though... Ignore my slowness. But in any case...
Keep the ink flowing!
~Z -
Amusing
A nice touch of gentle, after-life, political satire. Well done.
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LOVED the title on this one, such creativity and depth, it hits this one ~
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Wow! This was so funny! I didn't expect it to be a commentary on politics and religion...it surprised me very much!!
Good idea for a story in general, humorous and light hearted, but filled with inner meaning. This is something that I could see an english class studying as a short story (I mean this in an entirely good way as this is what we are currently doing in english).
I laughed my way through this and I'm still laughing as I write this. GREAT JOB!!
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I just wanted to make the world a better place, but I never got a chance to, now.
"now" is unnecessary
This is hilarious! for the most part very well written. I' impressed, you not only got away with talking politics (which I hate), talking about religion and you made me laugh. I couldn't find anything struturally wrong either. Thank you for entering, this fit perfectly. -
haha, this was awesome! Really funny. I love the idea that god split up heaven into all the political parties so that they wouldn't fight Good writing keep it up!!
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This made me laugh out loud. Nice and shapr with like no grammar errors except the one mentioned in the above comment. Good luck in whatever contest you entered.
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what a cool idea! Seperate people according to political beliefs! I loved this one. It was so funny and readable. The flow was great, and I loved the dialogue. Great job, good luck in the contest! 
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It was an original take. It was less dark than a lot of the entries, and I'm a fan of dark, so no brownies there.
And it wasn't very descriptive, scenery-wise. All the greats say description is limiting, but I say it's setting the stage for a greater freedom of creativity.
But the dialogue was fun, and I liked the in-jokes. 7/10.
beginning: 3, language: 4, plot: 2, ending: 5, dialog: 5, characters: 4.
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"Looking around, surpisd" Little typo there... I'm not sure what I'm writing so there'll be LOTS for you to catch in my writing here. Damn spell check doesn't apply to comments. So you're able to see what I really write like with no help of editing software. Great. Though I don't think I've misspelled anything yet. Woo!
Anyway.
Rosco. Freaking kick-ass name.
This piece is hillarious... You actually do humor very well, don't you? That one about the teddy bear... that was you, right? You have a sly sense of humor, kid. Very nice.
I wasn't too impressed with all the different colored smoke. It didn't serve a lot of purpose, wasn't too interesting. Everything else, perfect! leave it in!
Favorite parts:
"Smoke gotcha?" (so... you can leave the blue smoke in, fine, but the color change was unnecesary)
"No, not unless you're a hippy."
"All the staunch Republicans keep seeing the Democrats cropping up, and request to be transferred to Purgatory."
And of course,
"He's Republican now." (this line needs a quotation mark on the end, by the way!)
You're such a... funny girl... -
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Merci!
Thank you so much! Humor is starting to get easier. The smoke bit was supposed to symbolize Democrats (which is where he came from, all the blue) then the red Republican smoke fighting. ... Lol now that I think about it, it is pretty strange. I'll throw in something about an elephant or a donkey
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