Unchecked

Mizki is in a waiting room. 

The waiting room is sterile, quiet; say for the faint cough here and there. It's reminiscent of a hospital waiting room, and maybe the point was to make it seem like a hospital waiting room, Mizki doesn't know. 

She looks up at the number displayed on a sign overhead and then checks her own number. The number on the sign is 131,765,349,658 and her number says 131,765,349,687. Mizki's already been here for three hours. 

"What's your number?" She asks the person next to her, a kindly looking old man with a stab wound right in his chest. It takes him a moment… then another… and a few more moments until he faces her and his face is calm. "I don't have my reading glasses."

That makes Mizki chuckle a little awkwardly, nodding her head. "Right. Sorry." The old man turns back to staring straight ahead.

Mizki has been in this place before. The rows and rows as far as she could see and then some of seats all taken up had surprised her at first, but now it was like seeing a pretty boring butterfly; pretty boring, that is.

It was only her second time here and she was hoping it would be the last. Some people only came here one time and that was it, but she still had some things to take care of. She was done with everything, though, and it was going to be her last time in this boring, clean, endless waiting room. It was enough to make her turn to the other person next to her, a big, stupid smile on her face.

"I'm leaving today," Mizki says to the young woman, leaning into her personal space. All the woman does is turn the head – her head - she's holding in her lap so that it faces Mizki before turning it back to stare ahead. 

"Not very talkative, are we?" A weak attempt at a joke. The silence is getting to her. Her leg is jumping up and down at an alarming pace which makes her sneakers squeak against the cold, tiled floor; she doesn't stop. 

It feels like more hours than it is before Mizki sees her number displayed on the screen of the hanging sign and a voice nobody else hears calls out her name. The rows and rows upon seats are juch shorter as she makes her way over to her advisors office, meanwhile her stomach is doing cartwheels with every step she takes, a grin of utter joy on her face big enough to swallow an average apartment complex. This is it, she thinks. I'm leaving!

Her advisor is a middle-aged woman (that's how she looks, at least; Mizki doesn't dare ask her her actual age) in a gray blouse and black pencil skirt, face perpetually emotionless and eyes devoid of... anything. The only things breaking the illusion of her professionalism are the untidy blond hair let down to fall over her shoulders and rope burns around her neck. 

Mizki sits herself down on the chair opposite her advisor's desk which is neatly arranged with only a computer and a list. The computer is used to confirm Mizki's appointment was for today and that she's in the system, and the list is to cofirm Mizki has done everything she's set out to do. 

"All-right," the woman finishes up typing whatever it was she was typing onto the computer before turning to fully face Mizki. She manages a small smile but it's empty and thin. "Hello, Ms. Naegi. Doing well, I assume?" It's obvious; there's not a reason to ask other than to be polite. 

"Yup!" She pops the 'p', legs bouncing, ready to jump out of her seat the second this meeting - if you could call it that - is over. "Doing great. How about you?"

"Well, Ms. Naegi, this is not about me," a hint of resent creeps into her tone, but the smile on her face doesn't leave just yet. "We're here to talk about you."

"Right," Mizki laughs, rolling her eyes as if to say 'duh'. "So, about me..." she trails off, looking at the list her advisor has made a move to check over expectantly. 

"Yes, of course." She glances up at Mizki before turning her full attention back to the list. "That all looks good..."

Mizki's eyes light up more than they've already been lit up as she interrupts her advisor, nearly standing up and just throwing her hands up in celebration. "Yeah? Does that mean I'm free to go? I have no more unfinished business?" 

Her advisor holds up a finger. "Okay, now wait just a second. I still have some things to check over."

Mizki somehow manages to contain her enthusiasm a moment longer. "Yes. Yes, of course. Sorry. Go on."

They're in complete silence until the woman speaks again, clicking her tongue in what could almost be considered dissapointment. "Ah, well..." 

"What? What is it?" Mizki's face falls, a dread pooling in her stomach all of a sudden at those two simple words.

Her advisor points at somewhere on the list Mizki can't see, making a shrug-like gesture and sighing. "Look like you might not be in the clear just yet." 

Mizki blinks, only capable of letting out a quiet, pathetic: "What?"

"You still have one more thing on your list left unchecked." Either her advisor is messing with her or she finds a deeply fucked up kind of joy in keeping important information away from clearly distressed girls because she was royally let down in life more than once and became resentful. Mizki hopes it isn't the latter. 

"What do you mean, I have one more thing on my list left unchecked before I can move on to the afterlife?" She's surprised to not stammer once in that whole sentence, eyes wide as she stares at her advisor in disbelief. "I have done literally everything I had to, okay? And some of that stuff wasn't easy either. Like... like, do you know many tries it took me to do a 720 flip?" 

The woman shows no interest in finding out the answer, sighing as she places Mizki's list down onto her desk. "I don't know. A lot?"

"Yes, a lot!" Mizki might feel tears prickling at her eyes and she quickly wipes them away, sniffling sadly. She calms her breathing, hoping her voice doesn't sound too shaky when she speaks again. "Okay, fine. What-what's the last thing I have to do? Just tell me." She attempts a chuckle but it's wet and miserable. "Can't be that bad, right?"

"I'm going to read this out for you, all right? Word for word." The woman clears her throat. "'Get into a relationship with Delores Tierney and make out a bunch of times'. And in brackets you also wrote: 'super important, don't forget'."

If Mizki wasn't already dead she would ask to be shot on the spot. Damn her horny past self for wishing for the fucking impossible. How was she supposed to get into a relationship with the Delores Tierney when she couldn't even complete one full sentence while talking to her without stuttering thirty times; and that was when she was alive, much less a ghost! 

"But I-" her voice cracks, and her advisor only gives a look that's maybe meant to be sympathetic but doesn't look that way. "I..."

"Mizki," the woman says, "this is your own list. Maybe you should've thought about what you were going to write down before you realized you actually had to complete it."

Mizki Naegi is completely, utterly, thoroughly, fully fucked; and she knows it.

Mizki is in what could only be described as a stupor as she leaves the CTND (short for Counseling for The Newly Deceased), only turning around once she's fully outside to see the sign hanging right outside the front doors of the incredibly dull, corporate-looking building that is the first thing you see once you die. 

CONGRATULATIONS, YOU'RE DEAD!

Yeah. It sure is a joy.