Earl Menzies had never been to heaven or hell, but he figured both would have an intake process.

 

He was forty-seven, a CTA bus driver who’d spent his whole adult life in a brick apartment overlooking the Brown Line. On an unusually warm March evening, he was microwaving leftover lasagna when his heart decided to go on strike. One moment he was blowing on a too-hot noodle, the next — darkness.

 

When he opened his eyes, Earl was standing in an elevator. Wood paneling, brass trim, faint scent of lemon cleaner. There were no buttons, just a small lens set into the wall, glowing faintly.

 

A man in a charcoal suit appeared beside him, flickering slightly. Not flesh-and-blood, more like a projection from an old office training video. He held a clipboard.

 

“Earl Menzies?”

 

“That’s me.”

 

The hologram nodded. “Right. This elevator runs on quantum superposition routing. Until your moral classification is finalized, you’re technically in both heaven’s lobby and hell’s waiting room at the same time.”

 

Earl blinked. “That… sounds uncomfortable.”

 

“Any aversion to cats?” the hologram asked casually, making a note.

 

“What?”

 

“Never mind.” He made a second checkmark.

 

“Based on your record, you qualify for Entry-Level Paradise. But there are complications.”

 

“What kind of complications?”

 

The hologram glanced at his clipboard. “You once told a kid on your bus that Santa Claus died in Vietnam. That’s three demerits.”

 

Earl grimaced. “That’s it?”

 

“It’s cumulative,” the hologram said, in the tone of a man explaining why your coupon doesn’t apply to alcohol. “There’s also the library incident.”

 

“What library incident?”

 

“You returned Moby-Dick with a slice of bologna in it.”

 

“That was a bookmark.”

 

“It was meat.”

 

“That’s debatable.”

 

The elevator gave a polite chime and slowed. The doors opened to a small beige hallway lined with numbered doors.

 

“This is your provisional placement,” the hologram said. “You’ll receive two live feeds: one from Paradise, one from the Infernal District. Switch back and forth until you decide where you belong.”

 

Earl stepped into his assigned room: looked exactly like a Marriott circa 1994—floral bedspread, muted lighting, faux-walnut furniture. Beige everywhere, and beige, Earl discovered, was surprisingly comfortable.

 

He toggled between the two channels.

 

Heaven’s feed: Everybody Loves Raymond reruns on low volume.

Hell’s feed: the Bears-Packers game from December 2006, on loop, with commentary ten seconds behind the play.

 

After three hours of switching back and forth, Earl lay on the bed and sighed.

 

“This ain’t so bad.”

 

The hologram’s voice echoed faintly from the hallway, “Decision protocol paused indefinitely.”

 

Far away, in the systems where digital deities managed eternity, an order was placed: lasagna-flavored nutrient paste, on repeat — a nudge intended to keep Earl from staying too comfortable.

 

Unfortunately, none of them had any idea how much Earl loved lasagna, even in liquid form.