Another Perspective on This Odd Place, Pt. 2

Note: This is an Arthur Simmons posting

What started out as a joke became hard-core religious belief for us. We had found Purgatory! This was it. And now we came to realize that it was nowhere near as bad as the Catholic Church had made it out to be.

Purgatory was a farily big room, about 20 ft. by 30 ft. There was a large pool in the middle of it, a small hot tub to the side, some strange pictographs depicting human figures in motion on a wall, some closests and other objects scattered hear and there, and some observatory windows, where, we assumed, God watched. The room itself was farily dark (although there were some hanging lights) and fairly warm. As mentioned before, it was harder to breathe in Purgatory than in the real world. A very distinctive feature of Purgatory, though, was the fact that many old men and women were swimming in its pool, moving unbelievably slowly.

Now, my friends and I found Purgatory absolutely fascinating. It was like Heaven on Earth for us (no religious reference or pun intended). One of my friends, Maxwell, was also convinced that we had discovered Purgatory. Another, Teeler, felt quite the opposite, holding in the tradition of Classical Lutheran Protestantism that Purgatory didn't exist. And others like Michke and Benny-J were simply shocked at the revelation that we had finally discovered the location of Purgatory.

I recall at that fateful swim party when Maxwell, Draw, and I introduced Benny-J to Purgatory. He seemed very distraught and sad, so we thought that it might cheer him up. "Whaa," he said when he saw it. Still, he was very weak and frail. We all sat down at a table in Purgatory. "I'm so sad," he commented, "I'm never going to be able to have kids." He then began to close his eyes and go to sleep. I became very concerned with this, and started to think about all of the moral guidelines and rules in Purgatory. "No," I said, "You are not allowed to sleep in Purgatory." With that, all four of us left and went back outside.

Now, this brought up an important topic for me: What was permissible to do in Purgatory? Obviously, you could not sleep, and Maxwell, Teeler, myself, and another friend named J-Ban decided that talking loudly was not permitted in Purgatory. When J-Ban asked Maxwell why, he simply said, "You must talk quietly in Purgatory." Immediately after saying this, a rather loud, gregarious friend of ours named Jackson was about to open the door to Purgatory and come inside with us. Maxwell recognized right away what would happen. "Now that I just said you have to talk quietly, watch Jackson come in here and scream," Maxwell said. As if a prophet in Purgatory, he was right. Jackson threw open the door, came walking in, and screamed, "Hey!!!" at all of us. Maxwell laughed hysterically at this. I failed to remind him that laughter is not typically allowed in Purgatory.