“Right, now, sit down on the chair there.” The man points to an old desk chair.

I can feel the tears fighting against me to be free. I fight them, but there’s no point. I drop my head and wipe away the tears as quick as I can. The man notices.

“What are those tears for, child?” He asks softly.

I shake my head, I can feel it; if I say anything, I’ll just break down.

He shoves some tissues into my hands.

“There now, it’s not easy, is it? Cry for as long as you need, child.”

The man pulls up a chair right in front of me and sits in it. I wipe my runny nose with the tissues.

I feel the sobs building up within my chest, I can’t hold it in anymore, I just let go. The sobs tear through me until I’m coughing. My tears, finally happy to be free, pour down my face. The man pats my leg.

“What’s wrong?” He asks.

“I miss my sister.” I cough through sobs. “I never got to say goodbye.”

“How old is your sister?”

“…Five.”

“Aw, precious, taken away from a loved one so soon, she probably doesn’t even understand.” He pats my leg. “but, there’s still a chance.”

I look up, “What?”

“There’s a chance she may see you, children seem more able to see ghosts, not like most adults. Because, you see, children are not long taken away from the spirit realm, they recognise things most adults either grow out of, or forget.” He smiles, “Maybe, if she can see you, maybe, you can say goodbye then.”

“Can, can I really do it?” I sniff.

“Child, you can do whatever you want up here, there’s no rules. You live by rules in life, would you really want to live by rules in death?” The man looks into my eyes.

“I guess not.”

“You can do what you want, child.” I look into The Fixer’s piercing blue eyes. “You can find your sister. You can try to say goodbye. After we fix your hand, of course.”

I’d completely forgotten about my hand.

“How do you fix it?” I ask.

“A bit of magic.” The Fixer grins.

He stands up and walks over to a bench, where he reaches for a cloth. I watch as he grabs a bottle of green liquid out of a cupboard and pours it generously into the cloth.

“Now, child, this wont hurt a bit.” He smiles as he walks back over to me. “Your hand.” He motions towards me.

I outstretch my bad hand to The Fixer, he grabs it firmly, and wipes the cloth over it quickly, and gently, so I don’t feel a thing.

“All done.” He flashes a smile and walks back to his desk.

I look at my hand, all the blood, the cuts, the scars, gone. “How…?”

“Magic, my dear.” He grins wider, “Now, you should run along. I have another patient.” He strides across the room and opens the door wide. “Goodbye, Emily, I hope you cheer up soon.”

I get up out of my chair, “Thank you, Mister…?”

“Gerald, call me Gerald.”

“Thank you, Gerald. You’re a lovely man.” I smile a bit as I walk out the room.

“Robert Phillips, please come in.” Gerald calls, “I can help you now.”

I glance at a man sitting up in his seat, he stands up and walks across the waiting room. As I walk past him I notice he’s holding a bloodied, severed arm, I wonder what happened to him.

“How’d you go, love?” Francis calls out to me.

“Oh, good, thanks. Where’s Ethan?” I look around the Waiting Room.

“He’s gone on a little tour, hon, of where he’ll be stayin’.” She replies.

“Where’s he staying?”

“Not far from you, so don’t panic. Prince will show you where you will be staying. Wont you, Prince?” Francis calls.

“Ah, finally I’m of some use. I don’t like to just sit around all day, you know. Let’s go, Emily. I’ll show you to where you will be staying from now on.” Prince jumps off of a chair and runs up to me.

“Thank you, Francis, I’ll see you later.” I smile and walk behind Prince.

We walk up a short hallway and towards an elevator.

“What floor?” I ask.

“Ground floor.” Prince replies.

“So is that up or down?”

“Oh, yes, sorry.” Prince chuckles, “Down. All the way down.”

I press the arrow pointing down and we step in when the doors open. This elevator is nothing like I’ve ever seen, there are buttons for different numbers’ of levels on every wall, from the ground to the roof.

“How many floors are there?” I ask, jaw dropping.

“4.367 floors to be precise.”

“And what floor are we on?”

“Floor number 3,249. So it’s going to take a while to get to ground level.” Prince walks over to a corner and presses a button that is right above the floor of the elevator. “Ground floor. Right, we’ll have plenty of time. So I can answer any of your questions.” Prince sits down, I sit next to him.

“Okay. Let me think for a minute.” I think fast, “Why so many rooms?”

“They’re all for different reasons, really. One for each country, then one for each state, then different rooms for animals, say like mammals in one, sea life in another. Judging rooms, lots of different reasons.” Prince replies.

“That’s interesting, that there would be so many rooms.” I look around the elevator at each button, and think of my next question. “Prince, what is a natural way to die? So you don’t have to wait thirty-odd years just to move on, how do you move into your next life straight away.”

“Interesting question, not uncommon. The way they define ‘natural death’ here, is basically when your heart stops of no accord. So, when someone has a heart attack, that’s their time, but unfortunately, they don’t always die, doctors help them out, so they usually push a lucky person or animal through to the next life. They can’t leave a gap, people die at a certain time for a reason. We need to keep the earth full, but we can’t under-populate it, for fear of more breeding, and we can’t overpopulate, for fear of more wars and death. Other natural ways to die are, if you’re born with something. Say, cancer, or a tumour, or what have you. If you are born with it, it is natural. However, if you get cancer due to smoking or whatnot, that’s unnatural.”

“What about animals killing other animals for food, that animal would be a natural death, wouldn’t it?” I ask.

“No, not at all. You see, we’re all designed to live as long as possible, even the deer and caribou know that. Those stupid enough to get caught by a wolf, or bear, haven’t died when they were supposed to. When you die a natural death, your heart has to stop of its own accord. That is why you weren’t supposed to live very long, you don’t know this, but you were born with an extremely rare tumour, in the centre of your brain. It is an extremely small, a not-very-known to science type of tumour. It grows so very slow, that you would have been 48 before it killed you. You were never meant for a long life, unfortunately.”

“Wow. But 48 is better then 15.” I sigh.

“Yes, but getting hit by a car is less painful then a malignant tumour inside your brain.”

“Maybe so, but I would have gotten to experience more.” I shrug. “Dying at my age is ridiculous, I’m still a kid who will never get to experience anything. Ever.”

“Ah, Emily, you think that you have been so terribly wronged. You’re luckier than most.”

“Like who?”

“Me.” Prince looks down at the ground.

“You?”

“Me. This life I just ended, was my last. Like I said to you in the hallway, I could easily be in Heaven right now. I’ve had my chances.” Prince looks up to the ceiling and sighs. “Nothing ever went my way.”

“What happened?” I scooch closer to him. “If you don’t mind telling me?”

“Oh I don’t mind, I’d like to put some perspective in your life, to show you that your death wasn’t the worst thing that’s ever happened.” Prince sits down next to me and begins.

“Well, my first life, I was born a cat. To a stray mother, not too far from where you lived. It was tough, but I had two sisters and a brother, we looked after each other. My mother wasn’t around very long. She wandered out of our alleyway one day and we watched as the car hit her. We knew she was gone instantly. And, not being very fond of living in an alleyway where our mother’s carcass was rotting at the end of it, we moved on. I would say we were about four months old when our mother died. So, we were cute little kittens to humans, they were always trying to grab us, but we were smaller, quicker, and smarter. We travelled for a couple of weeks until we came into a small country town. Not many people, abundant with mice, sunshine, tall grass fields where we could hide. It was like paradise. The humans didn’t seem too keen on having four new additions to the towns’ population, but they soon came around as they realised we were helping them with the rat and mouse problem. The first few weeks we lived there were bliss. We had full bellies all the time, warm places to sleep, and the humans’ let us be.”

“That sounds great.” I smile.

“Oh it was. Everything was great, until one god awful day. I woke up one evening and wandered down to where we usually sat for drinks, and I found my little sister, face down in a barrel full of water.”

I gasp.

“Her legs had been tied together. Someone had murdered my sister. But, of course, it didn’t matter. We were just cats, no one cared. Sad, really. My brother was next, found his body in a field, I could smell the poison wafting off him and in the vomit all around him. At that point my sister and I became very wary of our surroundings. We made a choice to leave the town the very next day, but that night as we slept together in an old car, we were grabbed by a man, both of us were thrown into a bag. We struggled to get out, oh, how we struggled. I remember seeing the terror in my sisters eyes, we both knew we wouldn’t make it out of that town. Eventually our bag was dropped onto the ground and the bottom end was lifted up so we both fell out of it, scrambling over each other to hide. But there was no where to hide, so we just huddled in a corner. This huge man walked over to us and just kicked her, so hard. I heard her bones break, and he picked her up, her head in his left hand, body in the right, and just broke her neck. Killed her, as if she was nothing. He threw her body to the ground and walked over to me, I knew I wouldn’t escape, I didn’t want to escape. How could I continue to live, seeing what I just saw. He grabbed my by the scruff of my neck, and I don’t think I’ve ever been that terrified, to know that I was stuck in this immobile pose whilst he walked across the room. He dunked me into a barrel, and I thought he was just going to drown me, but no, he couldn’t just let me off lightly. He pulled me out of the barrel and threw me to the ground. Wiped his hands on a rag, then he lit a match and threw it at me. Engulfed in flames, I died. Screaming, howling, feeling my skin melt away, my organs burn. Smelling my own flesh cooking, while he just sat there and laughed.”

“Oh my God, Prince, I don’t even know what to say.”

“Nothing to say. I then spent 11 years here wallowing in my own self pity. It was a shame I was only on my first life, an experience like that is almost certain to grant you into Heaven, but I wanted to come back, my hatred for that man made me insane over those eleven years, I watched him all those years, and I knew I needed something to happen to him, I needed him to hurt, but nothing ever happened, and it made me so angry. So I decided to put matters into my own hands, I swore to myself I would remember my first life, that I would never forget that man, so I chose to come back as a human boy. I was eager to start my new life so I could do to that man what had been done to me.

So I was a boy, I grew up in a rich, high class neighbourhood, had a nice family. I was an average student, with two or three friends at any one time in my life. It changed when I was 19. I was walking down my street one day, and I watched another man kick a cat. It was that one, tiny action, and my memory of my previous life came back to me. I remembered everything.”

“What was having memories from your first life like?”

“It was enough to drive me insane. It feels like you have two souls, two minds, and often the line between my first life’s memory and my current lifes’ reality would become a blur. I would often find myself forgetting where I was, who I was, what date it was. It drove me crazy, the memories of my death, of my siblings’ death, so I had to do something. I packed up a bag, bought a gun from someone I knew through a friend, left my home, and went back to where it all began.” Prince sighs and looks down at his feet.

“Are you okay?”

“It was a dark time for me, something I will always regret.” He looks over to me, his face scary and emotionless. “I got to the old country town where I spent my last moments, and I took shelter in an old barn that was abandoned before my first life. I spent a few days figuring out what to do. On about the fourth day I went for a walk through the town, and I could remember everything. It was like I was watching a movie, I could see myself and my siblings run across the street playing, like we used to. That was hard, those memories could have killed me, But I was already on my way to full blown insanity, and…”

The elevator stops, it rattles a bit as the doors open up, Prince and I stand up quickly, we walk out the door.

“And?” I ask.

“Hang on, I’ll tell you when we get to your new home.” Prince runs ahead.

I look all around and absorb my surroundings; we’re in a large foyer, with a small waiting room, a TV hanging up in the corner. There are stairs, with gold rails leading either side of it, I look up and see a huge chandelier hanging like diamonds from a high ceiling.

“Now this place is where you come when you’re ready to leave here. To your next life.” Prince stops just ahead of me.

“What if I want to see my funeral? Or my family? Can I do that?” I ask.

“Of course you can, but you have to go back up to that waiting room, Francis has your files. This hall is usually used when a large amount of people die at the same time, like an earthquake strike, a tsunami, a suicide bomber. This hall is reserved for when there’s over 40 instantaneous deaths in one go. Then each person takes a number and waits until they’re called to the desk, then told where to go.”

“I see.” I nod. “So where am I staying?”

“A few street’s away, a small bus trip.” Prince starts walking again.

“Bus trip?” I ask, slightly confused.

“Or taxi, whichever you prefer.”

“No, no. Bus is fine.”

We walk out of the hall through big gold plated double doors. We walk past two doormen, one turns to us as we walk past.

“Enjoy your time here, young lady. Back again, Alex?” He smiles and tips his hat.

“Yes, Benjamin, thank you!” Prince grins as he continues walking.

“Thank you!” I smile to Benjamin. “Alex?”

“That was my name in my last life, Ben and I really hit it off whilst I was staying here.” Prince explains.

“Oh. But how does he know it’s you?” I ask, still not really understanding.

“He was there when I chose to go back as a cat. And he saw me this morning when I went to find out where you’ll be living.”

“Oh, I see.”

“This way to the bus stop.” Prince runs ahead a little bit.

I look around and everything is exactly like my old city before I died, the buildings and benches, the roads and shops.

“Why is everything like my city?”

“Because, people who are from your area, or state of your country, need familiar surroundings so they don’t go crazy when they realise they’re dead, they need a sense of normality. That’s another reason for those rooms in the elevator, whichever state you die in, is the state you’ll, well, live in, whilst you’re here.”

“That makes sense.” It does make me comfortable to know I’m living in familiar conditions.

“Ah, bus stop. Here it is.” Prince sits on a chair under a bus shelter.

I sit down next to him.

“Should be here any minute.”

“So, can you tell me the rest of your story now?” I ask, eagerly.

“Emily, don’t be so eager to hear someone’s horrible past. And no, I’d rather it not be announced to the world.”

“Oh, sorry.” I look down at my feet.

“No harm done.” Prince looks out across the busy street. “Do you know what my father and I used to do when I was a boy? We used to sit out on a curb, and watch the cars go past, we would count how many blue cars would go past us as we sat, and whoever counted the most, won.”

“Sounds like good quality time with your dad.” I smile, looking up at the sky.

“It was. As I got older I started to take that time for granted, always saying ‘not today, dad. Next time, dad. Next time.’ eventually it just became a ‘no’, so my dad stopped asking. ” He looks down at the ground. “Did you and your father ever do anything?”

“No, not really. He was always working, I was always busy with my stuff. We used to have the occasional family day, before Kate came along. But she was too young to take to the cinemas, we couldn’t really go to restaurants, because who’d want to eat next to a crying baby? And by the time she got old enough to start doing those sorts of things, I grew out of it all. I had my own things to do.” I feel a pang of guilt hit me as I realise, I don’t even think that I told either of my parents what they meant to me.

They’ll never know, they’ll always wonder.

I did love them, but, as a teenager, it’s too ’embarrassing’ to show affection to your parents. I don’t even remember the last time I told them I loved them.

Daughter of the year, right here.

“It’s usually the small things we take for granted in life that we’re left regretting once we die.” Prince sighs.

I nod in agreement, as I feel the tears well up inside me again. I fight hard to not show Prince, I suspect he’s noticed, but is pretending not to.

“Oh look, the bus is here!” He stands up and flicks his tail.

I look up to see a big black and silver double decker bus pulls up alongside the curb. The words “DOWNTOWN” painted on the front. The door swings open wide, I go to step onto the bus, but not before I remember something.

“Prince, I don’t have any change.”

“No matter, it’s free here. It’s free everywhere, money doesn’t exist here.” He pounces onto the bus and runs down the length of the bus. “Come upstairs, you can see everything from there.”

I get on the bus and smile at the bus driver, a balding, middle aged man with a gut bigger than the steering wheel. He nods at me and presses a button, the door closes behind me. I stumble a bit as the bus jolts forward as it drives off. I follow Prince up the stairs and emerge through the roof to be greeted by an open sky, the top level of the bus is completely open, with the exception of a small rail around it to stop people from falling off. As I walk down the aisle my jaw drops at what I see; sitting in a priority seat is a full grown, black horse, reading a newspaper. I don’t want to be rude but I can’t look away, I’m not sure how, but the horse folds the newspaper and searches through a knapsack, he pulls out a cigar and puts it in his mouth, next he pulls out a matchbox, pulls a match out and strikes it on the side of the box, causing it to ignite. He lifts the match to the cigar in his mouth and inhales, then he shakes the match and throws it over the side of the bus. He notices me, pulling the cigar out of his mouth, he shouts at me,

“Hey lady! Stare a bit longer! I might do a trick, want me to jump over a fence for you!? Shit!” He yells in an accent, American possibly.

I’m gobsmacked, I don’t know what to say, “I….I…”

“Hey! Hey, Maurice, leave her alone, she’s new here, only just discovered animals could talk today.” Prince jumps over to the horse.

“How do you know my name, cat?” The horse’s temper grows shorter.

“It’s me, Alex. I died again.” Prince rolled his eyes.

“Alex!? Holy cow! When?” The horse’s jaw drops.

“About six months ago.”

“Then why haven’t I seen you around? Huh?”

“I’ve been upstairs.” Prince grins.

“With the big man?” The horse’s eyes grow wide. “Why’re you back, then?”

“I’m helping out this girl, she died trying to save my life, although I died straight away, she was in a coma for those six months.” Prince turns around to face me again.

“Aw, little lady, you got a noble heart, saving this creep. Look, I’m sorry, people always stare at me, so I snap.” He smiles, his accent strong, definitely from New York.

“Ah…. No problem.” I say.

“Come here, I’d like to shake your hand.” He puts his cigar back in his mouth.

I walk over to the horse and extend my hand.

“Maurice.” He pushes his hoof into my hand. I realise his hoofs have double sided tape on them.

“Emily.” I smile. “Can I ask you something?”

“Sure, little lady.”

“Are you from New York?”

He laughs, “Yes I am, is the accent still strong. Alex? Do I still sound American? Yesiree, I am from Brooklyn, New York, one of the finest racing horses. Sent out to Australia when I was six. Broke my leg when I was 7. Shot in the head when I was 7 and a half.”

“That’s terrible.” I say, shocked.

“Eh, shit happens.” Maurice shrugs. “My next life though, ooh, it’s going to be a good one.” He grins.

“Oh, what will you be?” I ask, curious.

“I, ah, I don’t know yet.”

Prince shakes his head, “Look, I have to show Emily to her new home, we have to get off at the next stop. Emily, do you mind pressing the bell?”

I look around, my eyes find a button on the arm of a chair and I press it. A loud bell chimes.

“Right, let’s go down to the doors.” Prince looks at me. “It was nice seeing you again, Maurice, we’ll catch up properly another time.”

“Alright, no problem, man.” Maurice grabs a pinstripe hat from the seat beside him and puts it on his head. “You enjoy your time here, hero.” He looks at me.

I blush at the word, “Goodbye, Maurice, nice to meet you.”

Prince jumps off the seat and walks down the aisle to the stairs, I follow him down the stairs. I grip the edge of the back of a chair as the bus comes to a stop. The driver tips his head at me as we walk off the bus,

“Enjoy your stay.”