"Miss Reilly." Tom had materialized at her desk just as she was reaching for her thousandth file (or was it her millionth? Time was meaningless, after all). "The work day is complete."

"The what now?" Piper blinked at him. "We have work days here? Since when?"

"Since always." His mustache twitched. "You may return home."

"So wait, what? A 'work day' is a thousand weeks or what?" She gestured at the massive stack of processed files. "Because I've been here for... I mean, it has to have been months. Maybe years? I've processed more souls than there are people in Cincinnati!"

"Time is—"

"Yeah, yeah, meaningless in the afterlife." She slumped in her chair. "But what am I supposed to do at home? There's nothing there."

Tom just vanished, leaving her alone with her unanswered questions.

And now here she was, pacing her afterlife apartment, which was somehow both exactly like and nothing like her real home. She flopped onto the couch, then sat up straight.

"What the hell?" She bounced slightly. The cushions had exactly the right amount of give. Not too soft, not too firm. Perfect.

Experimentally, she put her feet up on the coffee table – something she'd always avoided in life because it was just slightly too high, making her ankles ache after a few minutes.

"Oh come ON." The table was the exact right height. Her legs rested at a perfectly comfortable angle.

Everything was slightly off - not in a bad way, but in an uncanny, too-perfect way. Even the temperature was exactly comfortable. It was infuriating.

"I miss being uncomfortable," she announced to the empty room. "I miss having a crick in my neck from falling asleep watching TV. I miss burning my tongue on too-hot coffee."

She flopped onto the too-perfect couch. "I even miss doomscrolling Reddit."

Grim appeared on the coffee table, knocking over a stack of magazines that definitely hadn't been there a moment ago.

"Oh, now what?" Piper sat up. "You're bringing me reading material? What's next, a Kindle? Netflix? Maybe a—"

She stopped. Among the scattered magazines was a cream-colored envelope she recognized. The wedding invitation.

"How did you..." She reached for it, then pulled her hand back. "No. You can't just bring things from life into... wherever this is. That's not how this works."

Grim began meticulously cleaning his paw.

"Is it?" she asked, less certain.

The cat ignored her.

Piper picked up the invitation. It felt real. The paper was thick, expensive. She ran her finger over the embossed letters: "Sarah Elizabeth Reilly and David Chen request the honor of your presence..."

She'd barely looked at it the first time. Had shoved it away along with her bills and her discomfort and her...

Her breath caught. There was a photo.

Sarah stood radiant in a simple sundress, her hair falling in soft waves. When had she grown it out? And those breasts - had to be implants, right? Parker had been flat as a board last time she'd seen... her. The word came reluctantly, but it came. And somehow her sister looked more feminine than Piper ever had, which was... that was...

And David. He was handsome in an understated way, with kind eyes and a gentle smile. But what caught Piper's attention was how they were looking at each other. Like they were sharing a secret. Like they were the only two people in the world.

Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original.

"Well, shit," Piper muttered.

She thought about her own marriage, brief and forgettable as it had been. Eight months of trying to be the perfect wife to a man who'd wanted her to be... someone else. Anyone else. They'd both been relieved when it ended.

"At least I didn't have kids," she told Grim. "Can you imagine? Me, a mother? I couldn't even keep a marriage together for a year."

The cat gave her a look that seemed unnecessarily judgmental.

"Don't start," she warned him. "I know what you're thinking. 'Oh, Piper rejected her sister's happiness while being miserable herself, how ironic.'" She affected a posh British accent for the last part.

Grim continued staring.

"It's not the same thing," she insisted. "My marriage ended because we weren't right for each other. Sarah and David..." She looked at the photo again. "They look right for each other."

Her chest felt tight. "They look happy."

The invitation began to glow softly.

"What the—" Piper almost dropped it as golden numbers appeared above it: +500 points.

"Are you kidding me?" she demanded. "Five hundred points for what? Finally admitting my sister looks good in a dress?"

The numbers flickered: +750 points.

"Now you're just messing with me." She squinted at the cat. "Is this you? Are you doing this?"

Grim yawned and vanished.

"Real helpful," Piper muttered. She looked at the invitation again, at Sarah's radiant smile. "I should have been there," she whispered.

The numbers glowed brighter: +1000 points.

"Okay, this is ridiculous." Piper stood up, still holding the invitation. "I can't just sit here earning points for feeling bad about things I can't change. I need to... I need to..."

She needed to work. Needed to process more files. Needed to understand.

Her apartment door, which normally led to nowhere since she didn't need to go anywhere, suddenly opened into the familiar endless room of filing cabinets.

"Now that's more like it," she said, heading to her desk. Her nameplate gleamed: "Piper Reilly, Soul Processing Specialist, 3,250 points."

She blinked. That couldn't be right. She'd only had 1,500 this morning. Or... was it morning? How long had she been staring at that invitation?

Time was meaningless in the afterlife. Right.

Her "In" box was overflowing with new files. Standard soul processing, not rehabilitation cases. She picked up the first one.

"Okay, Elisabeth Chen, let's see what you've got." She opened the file, then stopped. "Chen? Any relation to...?"

But no, this Elisabeth had died in 1954. Just a coincidence.

Still, something about the file caught her attention. Elisabeth had earned points for standing up to her family's expectations, for choosing love over tradition, for...

"Oh," Piper breathed. Elisabeth had married outside her race in 1940s America. Had faced discrimination and hatred and had loved anyway.

She'd earned over 10,000 points in life.

"How?" Piper whispered. "How did you stay so... sure? When everyone was telling you that you were wrong?"

The file began to glow softly, and Piper realized she was crying. Actually crying, even though she didn't technically have tear ducts anymore.

She processed the file, really processed it, understanding Elisabeth's courage, her determination, her love. The small ding of points being awarded seemed louder than usual.

The next file was for a Muslim man who'd earned points protecting a synagogue from vandals. Then a Catholic priest who'd secretly performed same-sex unions in the 1980s. A Hindu woman who'd opened her home to Pakistan refugees during Partition.

Each file glowed as she processed it. Each ding grew louder.

Her point total ticked up steadily: 3,300... 3,400... 3,500...

"Miss Reilly."

She looked up to find Tom standing at her desk, his mustache twitching with something that might have been approval.

"Time for your break," he said.

"But I just started," she protested.

"You've been processing files for six shifts."

"That's impossible. I just sat down."

"Time is—"

"—meaningless in the afterlife." Piper sighed. "Fine. But I'm coming right back. These files... they're important."

Tom's mustache definitely twitched with approval this time.

As she headed to the break room, she realized she was still holding Sarah's wedding invitation. Somehow, it felt heavier than before. Weightier. Like it meant something she was only beginning to understand.

"Time for my next empathy lesson?" she asked it.

The invitation didn't answer, but somewhere, she could have sworn she heard a cat purring.