text: Satan caved before God, which probably doesn’t come as much of a surprise. “I...look. I don’t really wanna take her. I will if I have to, but...she’s not reeaaallllly bad enough, don’t you think? I mean, I’m collecting murderers and CEOs over here. It’s not that I take issue with making someone look bad to put ‘em in Hell. But, she’s just pretty fucking annoying.” God, having already made up His mind that He wasn’t taking her, either, remained silent for a few moments. “We’re not doing limbo or purgatory or whatever, anymore, right?” “No.” Satan shook his head. “Too confusing. Way too many complaints.” “I have to say, she’s technically good enough for heaven, if I overlook a few things. But, I find myself agreeing with you, believe it or not.” In truth, they agreed often. “She’s just...well, she’s just so off-putting.” “So. What do we do? The two were sitting at their mutually favorite restaurant, sharing a bottle of wine and some bread. The irony was lost on them. It had come time for the two to discuss the terms of the earthly rapture. Nothing had been prophecized, or anything like that. To put it simply, they were growing bored of it all. “As my father always said, ‘On to the next, and the next after,’” said God. It was their 301,643 day speaking about the matter. Presumably, hopefully, it would be their last. As you may or may not have noticed, things seldom go, and things seldom went, as they are written in the Bible (or any other religious text, for that matter.) This is not something God planned. But, He also never planned anything at all, so when He let a few too many folks on Earth in on His existence, the whole “religion” thing got a little out of hand. While almost exclusively a tremendous annoyance to God, and, frankly, a baffling disservice to Satan, the two friends decided to humor the people, and go along with it, occasionally. Some time ago, God created a heaven, where pretty much most folks who want to go there end up once they’ve died. And shortly thereafter, Satan created a Hell. It became clear in the first few months of the heaven/Hell experiment that Hell needed a lot of reworking. As the two had based their initial criterion for entry into heaven on whether or not the person wanted to end up there, Hell was, as expected, quite empty. So, some guidelines of “pure evil” were established, and things began to balance out a bit. Then, in the early 21st century, people on Earth started to say things like, “If THOSE are really the kinds of people who get into heaven, then I’d rather go to Hell.” So, Satan created a second Hell, Hell 2, where generally good people are sent, and it’s exactly the same as heaven, only there are flames. That way, everyone except for the real icky people in Hell 1 are pretty satisfied. It should be noted that Satan doesn’t actually enjoy torturing people. He pretty much just leaves all the creeps in Hell 1 to their own devices, and their own devices happen to be almost comically miserable. The rapture, or end of the world, was a vaguely interesting idea to both God and Satan, but they recognized it would be hard work. Eventually, though, even God and Satan get a little sick of hearing, “The rapture is coming,” and so, they agreed that the rapture would come. Now, the theatrics of it all were one thing. God actually thought the idea of everyone floating up to heaven to be a little tacky, but He’d always thought of Himself as a people pleaser. Both of them, however, agreed that no previously dead bodies would be floating up to join them, as that is very weird. They contracted out a really good trumpet player to get the whole thing started. They had tried to figure out what it was exactly the guy should play, but eventually they told him to go with whatever felt right at the time. When it came to the folks meeting their ends in Hells 1 and 2, Satan thought it could be kind of a fun idea if the drop into the Hells was on some sort of freaky waterslide. Go out with a bang, as they say. As for the chaos that was supposed to transpire during the tribulations, the two decided it best just to forget it. Not for any reason, really, aside from the fact that pretty much no one on Earth would notice. All of this initial planning took about 5 days. It would have taken only a few hours, but the trumpet player had to make sure he wasn’t double-booked. The next 448 days were spent whittling away at the enormous list of people left on Earth into 3 categories. Hell 1, Hell 2, and heaven. The heaven people were always pretty easy to categorize, believe it or not. In fact, a lot of really shitty people get into heaven. Hell 2 is typically filled with more of your millenial anti-establishment types, and is also fairly shitty and easy to categorize. Hell 1 is always a little trickier, as the guidelines for pure evil were never very clear. Satan mostly just felt it out. But soon enough, they had placed every last person on the correct list. All, but one. On the 453rd day of their planning, they reached her name. God suggested the two take a vacation for a while, clear their heads before they dealt with her. 300,500 days later, they met again. And there they sat in the restaurant. Neither wanted her. “What about Hell 2?” asked God. “Hey, that’s like the one thing I get to be proud of,” said Satan. He was lying. Satan was proud of many things. “You’re right, it wouldn’t be fair to the folks there anyways. You could make a Hell 3?” “Oh my God. Do you know how much work it is to create one of those things? Come on. I’d consider it, I would, but she’d be the only one. And then, we’re done. No one else is going in after her because there’d be no one left. Way too much of my time for one person that, frankly, has no quality attractive or unattractive enough for me to justify making a spot for her in Hell 1 or Hell 2. And to be honest, you haven’t made a great case for keeping her out of heaven, either.” God looked over His notes. “You’re right. You know, sometimes I get these complexes where I actually feel like I am supposed to be this all powerful gatekeeper, this final judge of good and bad. They’ve talked about me that way for so long. It’s just a lot sometimes. I’m supposed to love everyone. And it’s shitty because you’re allowed to hate whoever you want. I don’t wanna be making these decisions anymore. I’m tired. And is it so bad for me to just admit that I don’t like her? I said it. I don’t fucking like her. She’s irritating. She’s kinda creepy. She’s not bad looking enough for me to feel sorry for her and she’s not good looking enough for me to feel sorry for her, either.” Satan sipped his wine and thought. “We really do a lot for all of them,” he said. “And most of them suck. A lot.” “Yeah,” said God. “After we take all the people, what’s gonna happen to Earth?” “Well,” God smiled. “It’ll be much quieter, and much prettier. I imagine animals will have a much better time of it all.” “What if we...just left her there?” said Satan. “Can we...do that?” “God, we can do anything.” God flipped to a new page of His notebook. He headed the page “Remainders.” He wrote down her name. * * * * * One half of a human lifetime later, Satan and God had long abandoned the earth. It was peaceful and beautiful, as God knew it would be. She had adjusted quite well to her solitary life. It appeared the decision to make her the sole remainder was a good one. She rarely spoke, but read frequently, and was generally happy. She knew why she wasn’t taken, and she had accepted it. Now, almost 80, she was dying. A plot had been purchased long ago, next to where her mother, father, and sister would have been buried, had they stayed on Earth long enough to die. She thought it was a sensible place to go for her death. When she found her headstone, she carved out an approximate final date. She set to work digging, climbed inside her shallow resting place, and laid down. A few minutes, or a few hours later, she was dead. She did not go to Hell 1 or Hell 2 or heaven. She did not go anywhere. Had anyone been around, they might have noticed an unfilled grave. They might have walked over and peered inside the hole. They might have seen an old woman, dressed in Dior from 2018 and they might have read her tombstone.