As I stood at the counter waiting for the coffee
pot to fill, spreading margarine on my toast, I realized that I could never
imagine myself leaving the apartment again. I sat the toast down on a napkin.
Walked back to my bed. Flung back the covers. And slid back under the heavy
down comforter, back into the warmth. And I was happy. Those first few seconds
under the covers were the one feeling we truly desire. There was nothing more I
could ever ask for. This is what I wanted, I thought, this was it. Why was the
world so cold? So ghastly, so decrepit, so terminally doomed, so dogmatic, so
feral, so warm under my covers? I slept.
I rubbed my eyes a few times to clear my view.
Punched the button on my phone. Not as much time had passed as I felt it had.
What a wonderful feeling! I shoved the phone under the pillow.
The next time I awoke it finally came with the
restlessness that gets me flopping from one side to the other. The way a
butterfly feels when it knows it’s time to crack open the cocoon. So I got up
feeling like a Beedrill. Plus the coffee was already made so that always makes
it a little easier to arise.
Caffeined Beedrill finished the half eaten piece
of cold buttered toast, chewing with his mouth open because his nose was
stuffy.
Knock knock knock
I opened the door and a young man stood there.
He was chipper. I was Beedrill.
Hello sir do you have just a couple of minutes
to spare? he asked.
Of course I do, I said.
Ok good because I’m God and if you would have
said ‘no I don’t have a couple minutes to spare today’ you would have really
missed out on your salvation.
Alright, well that’s good, come in and have a
seat, I told him.
Here is all the paper work we’ll just get ya all
set up here. Just a few X’s here, and….here, and here. Sign there, yep, yeah,
eh, yes that’s it. Great! Well, it’s been a pleasure meeting with you today Mr.
Beedrill. I’m glad we could get everything squared away on your afterlife
policy. If you ever have any problems just let me know and I’ll get it taken
care of right away for ya there.
Yeah, no problem, thanks for coming, bye, I
said.
I walked him to the door and fiddled with the
lock for a second before getting the door open, I didn’t even remember locking
it last time I shut it but finally got it open as we both awkwardly faked
smiles and laughs. I told him to have a nice day, he bid me the same and I
closed the door behind him.
I sat back on the couch, opened up my laptop,
laughed at a few meme pictures on reddit.com/r/atheism, then I refilled my
coffee mug. This time I added a little cream and sugar to it since I was wide
awake now.
I fired up the Gameboy Color emulator on my
laptop and resumed my game of Pokemon Red. Damn, Beedrill was only at level 37.
How the hell was I supposed to beat Blaine on Cinnabar Island? I need to train
him up a few levels before even considering taking him on. But Beedrill is in
no mood for that I don’t think. So I closed my laptop.
***
Alex England, is 24 years old and has been bouncing back and forth between living in South Korea as an English teacher and living back home in the US writing. He enjoys writing short, bizarre, and slightly creepy stories that leave you not really able to pinpoint what was actually creepy about them.
