The office of post-mortem reunions

The elevator doors slid open and Stuart stepped out into the office of post-mortem reunions. It was a broad, dusty, rectangular hall with row upon row of plastic chairs extending halfway through the room. A stale, cardboard smell permeated the air. At the far end of the room was a line of service windows with numbers displayed above them. Stuart reached for a ticket from a dispenser mounted on a pedestal. He pulled number 267. The numbers above the windows read 33, 31, 32. But if there was one thing Stuart had taken away from limbo, it was the capacity for waiting.

He sat for hours. The hall seemed more cavernous than the building could physically allow, and it multiplied every footfall, every shuffling of paper, every sigh. Stuart had waited in limbo for 157 years, but what, he wondered, did a year mean when you have no seasons, no day and no night. The bus station in limbo was one eternal season of mist. It was, upon reflection, almost merciful; Had he a calendar to mark the days, he might have realized how long the scope of his stay truly was. In the end, the arrival of his bus was a surprise he’d almost forgotten to expect. Heaven was to Stuart to be the other side of the same coin. An endless season of plenty. The songbirds never flew south, the fruit trees always bore fruit, it was abundance as far into time as one could conceive. It occurred to Stuart that the salient difference between purgatory and paradise was the weather.

“Two hundred sixty-seven!” called an angel from the service counter. “Ticket number two hundred sixty-seven!”. Stuart rose to his feet and walked towards the counter. Dust motes floated through shafts of light from the windows high up on the walls, and seemed to part before him. A nameplate on the open service window read "Omniel". The angel stood shuffling papers on the desk and looked up as Stuart approached.
"Have you filled out the R-712 form in triplicate?" asked the angel.
Stuart nodded.
"And provided proof of familial or other close relations to the reunited party and proof of identity?"
"Yes"
The angel perused the stack of paperwork, pausing to stamp violently. It reverberated impressively in the cavernous space. The angel looked up.
"Last four digits of your social security number?"
"2974"
More violent stamping.
"Good, within six to eight business days you will be notified by mail of the status of your application. Have a nice day.  Two hundred sixty-eight!"

Two weeks later, Stuart found himself face to face with his mother in a park overlooking a river of milk and honey. Mrs. Macleod was a traditional woman.

"Oh, it's you." She said, her Minnesotan accent chewing on all her vowels "I thought I was going to meet your older brother here.” She gave a happy sigh. “He was such a handsome man, a real catch, don’t you know. I met him right after he’d come back from the war, I was working at the university, and he was so sweet on me when he came to get his registration papers”
“Mom, I don’t have a brother. You’re thinking of dad. Anyway, how have you been?”
“Oh, you know me, I've just been pottering around, I play bridge with a nice group of ladies on Tuesdays, and bingo on Fridays. Nobody ever comes to see me hardly, and your older brother’s in hell so I never see him either..."
Stuart went pale. "He's where?"
"In hell, dear. Something to do with the war, I think."
"Mom, he was an administrative assistant, he never saw combat.”
She paused and reflected on this. “That’s right, isn’t it. I have no idea then!” She shrugged and gave the kind bright-eyed of smile of concession that only the senile can manage.
“Anyway, you’re a nice young man, what’s your name?”
Stuart deflated. He sat down on a park bench, held his head in his hands and sighed deeply.