[ WP ] You 're not allowed to die until you pay off all your debts .

I am in Hell. I have been living in Hell for so long now, I almost ca n't remember being alive. 
 
 But I remember rest. I remember sleep. That's my favorite memory of being up top, on solid ground. There were so many opportunities to sit down and relax and just rest. 
 
 You ca n't relax down here. There's no rest for the wicked. 
 
 I hand over my report to the demon sitting before me. I like this demon. Most of the demons here do n't talk to us, or acknowledge us at all aside from providing us instruction. This demon, though he keeps his words short, will actually speak to us on occasion. Well, I guess that's not right. He never speaks, just projects his thoughts into your brain. It's kinda fuzzy, like thoughts that are only half formed, but you still understand them anyway. 
 
 To describe him, he's about 20 feet tall, he wears a long and ragged robe, and his head is a ram's skull. Not unusual for a demon down here in Hell, though they come in all shapes and sizes. 
 
 He takes my report, shaking his head as he does so. `` Late again,'' he thinks at me, and I sigh. 
 
 `` I'm trying,'' I say, and the words are bitter on my tongue. Who down here is n't trying? 
 
 `` Trying,'' the demon thinks, reaching into a dimension I ca n't see and pulling out an ink pen, `` is n't achieving.'' 
 
 Because his head is a skull, he has no eyes. Yet the empty sockets bore into me as he speaks, and I feel rooted to the spot. `` When you came here, you owed a debt.'' He reaches into the other dimension again, pulling out my file and adding my report to it. `` And debt is stopping you from moving into Heaven.'' 
 
 Just so you know, what he calls Heaven, I call rest. 
 
 No Pearly Gates, no grandmas from generations past, just peaceful, final, rest. An eternity of nothing - no life in my bones, the way it should be. No bills, no worrying, just rest. 
 
 I look forward to rest like a person in Hell looks forward to swim practice. 
 
 I'm kidding, of course. It is n't fire and brimstone down here. It's work. Always work. 
 
 Must pay off our debts. 
 
 The demon flicks through my file. `` A person, be they righteous,'' and I hate the way he says that word, because he makes that word look just like my older brother, `` or evil, can not go into Heaven-'' 
 
 `` Rest,'' I correct him, because if I'm stupid enough to end up in Hell I'm stupid enough to correct a demon. 
 
 His horns point down at me and I shut my mouth. He continues, `` A person can not enter into Heaven, *or rest*, until they have paid their debts.'' He looks up into the sky, where far off in the distance, we can see souls taking their journey to their final resting place. He points to them. `` Prudent people, like those, have no debt when they die. They get to pass right into their rest.'' 
 
 `` Yeah, well, not me!'' I exclaim, gesturing to my bulky file. `` I ended up in Hell! With *demons*! I am an evil sack of shit who actually ended up in Hell because I'm an awful human being!'' I scream, tugging at my hair, because I ca n't believe I actually ended up here. I did n't murder anyone, or rape anyone, or anything horrible. But I was that awful of a person that I ended up in Hell, of all places. 
 
 The demon, reading my mind, reaches his long, bony fingers down and pats my shoulder. `` You simply have to pay off your debts.'' He reaches back for my file, and reads off of it. 
 
 `` When you died, you arrived in Hell due to a need of repayment of debts. Those include: a debt of love to your mother. A debt of trust and respect to your brother. A debt of friendship to your former best friend. A debt of compassion to your dog. And a debt of general politeness to the world.'' 
 
 I bury my face in my hands. 
 
 To tell you the truth, I was n't a bad person. I did n't cheat, steal, lie. I had good people in my life. Good people who offered me more than I deserved. And I never repaid them for the kindness they showed me. When I died, I was n't allowed to rest, because I owed them a debt for the love and respect they showed me that I never returned. 
 
 Hell is a good system, really. The demons give us instruction, guidance. They show us how to pay back those emotions, even though some of us have never even felt emotions before. It's hard to come to terms with the idea that you left the world behind while people were still there, waiting for you to come around and love them back the way they loved you. I wo n't rest until I right my wrongs. 
 
 I wo n't rest until I pay back my debts.
