There's a traffic jam on the highway to hell

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This story was commended by the Short Stories Unlimited competition in May 2023. It is now published in the anthology Leaving Home and Other Stories, which you can buy and read among other great stories here.

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Realising that humanity was facing extinction because of my hubris was even more surprising than learning I had died.

At first, I had had no idea where I was, who all the people around me were or what we were doing. I couldn’t even recall where I had been before I got there when I was abruptly jostled from behind. Confused and off-balance, I fell into the person in front of me, then scrambled back to my feet, turning to face the victim of my clumsiness. Raising my hands apologetically, I asked if they knew what was going on.

“I think…” The woman paused, clutched at her sleeves and peered at the crowd through squinted eyes. “I think we’re dead…?” She forced out in a whisper so only I could hear.

Well, that’s a bit dramatic, I thought. But in a flash, I remembered the hospital room, the priest and the tears…

I shook my head of the image and allowed more elbows, shoulders and hips to bump and steer me away from the hand-wringing woman. Beyond her, I saw that the sea of people was actually separated into huge queues.

Picture an airport on the day before Christmas, only these lines had far, far more people than any airport I had been to. More people than I had ever seen in one place before. They would lean in to those standing next to them for a brief conversation, shake their heads, then turn to the next person and repeat the exercise. Some were crying and yelling, while others just looked stunned. I saw one or two try to run toward the back of the queue, but they were caught and forcibly returned to their original spot. As my queue shuffled forward, I began to feel nervous.

Beyond the throngs of people, at the head of each row, people were being ushered into all manner of vehicles with the efficiency of people who manage those non-stop gondola lifts. Each car, bus, truck and even tuk tuk only slowing down enough for people to jump in and slam the doors shut behind them, never actually coming to a full stop. They would then drive away towards the biggest highway I had ever seen. Actually, it would be more accurate to say multiple highways, layered on top of each other. That thing was epic. Some roads snaked down and around, out of sight, some curved up and joined up with other roads which appeared to originate from somewhere above us, while others disappeared into the horizon. What I truly found hard to fathom, however, was that every stretch of those roads was packed with barely-moving vehicles. I didn’t know that so many cars even existed. It was like the whole world existed of nothing but asphalt, concrete pillars, bridges and metal boxes on wheels.

As officials tersely motioned for people around me to move forward towards the looming highway, a brochure was shoved into my face.

YOU ARE DEAD read the title.

“Oh.” I said aloud.

WELCOME TO HELL the subtitle continued.

Despite myself, I kept reading. It went on to provide instructions on how to behave in an orderly fashion while in the queue. In big, bold letters, there were warnings to follow directions and quickly get into a vehicle when advised.

I lifted my head and was about to ask another person next to me what they thought of all this, but realised that I had arrived at the head of the queue. That had come sooner than I expected. I was bundled into a car and squeezed between two older men, while a young woman sat in the front passenger seat. The car pulled away from the immense crowd and out onto one of the roads, turning to merge onto a six-lane flyover.

I was in one of the countless cars sitting in the biggest traffic jam known to man. I had gone from a sea of people to a sea of vehicles.

Maybe it was because of the quiet inside the car compared to the clamouring we had just left behind us, or the slow crawl we were doing, or maybe because each of us were coming to terms with our demise (either I was dead or I had lost my mind), but none of us spoke for some time. Every so often, the car would start moving, but these moments were only short-lived inches at a time.

“What’re you here for?” The man to my right eventually asked, breaking the silence with his gruff voice. He was a bit too close for me to comfortably turn and look at him, and it didn’t help that he had arms and shoulders the size of my legs. Perhaps sensing my confusion, he continued. “I mean, what did you do to end up in hell? Or you two?” He finished, directing the last question to the other passengers.

The woman in the front seat turned back to look at him, tugging at her seatbelt as she snapped. “That’s a bit forward, don’t you think?”

“I killed some fuckers.” He shrugged. “Been in prison for most me life. This is the first time I seen so much sky.” He said, looking out the window. “Can’t barely remember the last time I was even in a car.” He kept gazing outside while gently running his hand along the inside of the car door.

“Jesus Christ…” The woman said softly. She shrank back into her seat and stared forward, hugging her over-sized jumper tighter around her.

“What about you, mister?” The killer asked the man to my left, leaning forward for a better look.

“I…” The man to my left shakily started and wiped his hands along his suit pants. He pushed his wire-framed glasses up his nose and looked at me, then the killer, perhaps deciding that it didn’t really matter anymore. “I stole millions by tricking older people to invest in bogus companies.” He declared with a sigh.

“Fuck, man, that’s cold.” The killer’s moral indignation surprised me. With mild disgust and sudden disinterest, he turned back to me. “You gonna speak, or what?”

“I honestly have no idea what I did.” I admitted. “Maybe it was an accumulation of things? I didn’t care for recycling, I ate meat, I rarely donated money to charities and my car consumed far too much fuel. I guess I did all these things despite knowing better.”

I could hear the woman snort softly while the suit to my left sounded as unconvinced as I felt. “Right…” He said, waiting for me to continue.

I went quiet thinking about my life. Sure, I was a jerk to River when we were young, and I definitely made mistakes in my relationships… I thought of Ash and winced a little. Ash had always been disappointed that I hadn’t used my skills or intellect to do good for the world, frequently accusing me of being too oblivious to know what was important or how I could make a difference. Ash would now never know how much that had stung, how much I had wanted to be better. I was suddenly struck by the realisation that nobody would ever know my regrets.

Before the killer could ask any more questions, the car radio spluttered with static and a crackling voice blared “DRIVER 4879, REPORT TO THE NEXT CHECK POINT. PASSENGER HARLEY ANDERSON IS REQUIRED IN THE GREAT HALL.”

My heart stopped and in the rear-view mirror I could see my face go grey. Everyone else seemed to notice, too. I felt the two men beside me turn to look at me, simultaneously trying to pull away as though I was contagious. The woman in the front seat stared at me with wide eyes. “What did you do?”

Maybe Ash was right, after all.

The driver pulled off onto an emergency lane, saving me from having to repeat that I had no idea why I was there. We weaved in and out where there were gaps or obstacles, and other vehicles moved aside if they were in the way. It was like being in a police car with lights blaring and I wondered if the mysterious radio voice had told the other cars to let us through. I think we were all holding our breath until we reached a grey building on the side of the road. I was escorted inside, glad to be away from the wild driver, the killer and the judging eyes of other passengers.

“Harley Anderson?” I was asked countless times by countless officious-types as I was escorted down one corridor, through many security doors and up an escalator. “Harley Anderson, transport logistics?” I was briefly curious why my profession would be of any interest if we were, in fact, in hell.

I was directed from the building to a helicopter on the roof. As it took off, I could see out over what appeared to be a city entirely made up of a patchwork of snaking highways. We weren’t flying for long, but not once did I see a tree or body of water, or even many buildings. It was a disconcerting sight. When we landed, I was again asked for confirmation of my name, then ushered this way and that through a building which could very well have been the same as the one the helicopter had taken off from.

Finally, I was standing outside a door in the most grandiose, opulent and beautiful buildings I had ever seen. Before I could take it in properly, the official next to me quietly tapped at the door. Another official opened it just enough for me to squeeze through, holding a finger to his lips and gesturing for me to quickly take a seat in the back row.

On a stage at the front of the room, a panel of speakers were arguing about the traffic jam. I almost felt like I was back at university watching a Q&A session with esteemed professors sitting on fabric chairs while hundreds of adoring nerds eagerly listened, waiting for an opening so that they could say something to demonstrate their intellect. This event, however, was far more heated. Each of the panellists was yelling over each other and barely seemed able to be contained by their seats. More like politicians in parliament, actually.

“We have the brightest minds in history in this room and we can’t even agree on the problem!” Bellowed a large man. “It should be patently clear that we need bigger gates to hell. And the gates need to be staffed appropriately to manage the increased processing workload.”

“We need more roads and cars!” Yelled one of the audience members, earning them loud applause. I cringed violently at the familiar catch cry I had rallied against for so many years.

“More roads and more cars won’t help, we need to carry more people, faster!” A young man said angrily, leaning forward in his seat. “We need buses and trains.” A number of people in the audience cheered and clapped.

“Public transport?” The large male panellist almost spat towards the audience. But then he held a finger in the air thoughtfully and the audience obediently hushed. “Actually, people hate public transport, maybe this isn’t such a bad idea.” He leant back and vigorously rubbed his stubbled chin.

I sat, horrified, for what felt like hours as the panel members debated logistics with occasional input from audience members. It was like being at work: crammed in a small space, surrounded by morons who had no clue what they were talking about and who were unable to make a decision.

I wasn’t just dead, I thought to myself – either with sudden clarity or a complete surrender to madness. All of this queueing, being stuck in a traffic jam, sitting in a meeting, the constant confusion, never getting where you’re going, idiots everywhere, having no control… This was legitimately my hell.

“We’ve been through this before.” A ginger-haired woman on the panel said, all but rolling her eyes. “Traffic jams, public transport and confusion are a nightmare for most people. It seems like these present to us an opportunity to be efficient and use this time to start people’s punishment, but it’s never worked. Some people like public transport, while some others relish the down time of being in a traffic jam.”

Through the ensuing clamour and incomprehensible shouting, the middle panel member who I instinctively recognised to be the devil, leant forward and spoke. The whole room fell silent, like a switch had been flicked. “We have been increasing our population for years, and bravo to us for our great success. Look at us all – we can influence global markets and politics. We are very good at bringing out the worst in humanity. This traffic jam is testament to our accomplishments.” He sighed and stood up, straightening his suit and smoothly doing up the top button. “I know this is hard, but I will say it again: we need to think bigger.”

Even from the back seats, I could see that the devil was tall with stunning dark features. He walked deliberately across the stage and directed his voice both to the stage and the audience. I looked around the quiet room at the hundreds of faces fixed on his every word. Of course, I noted cynically: it made sense that hell would have sycophants, too.

“This isn’t just about a traffic jam. This isn’t about the fact that every highway to hell is in gridlock. We don’t have housing for when we get souls to where they’re going. We don’t have the services needed to meet projected demand, which we know is sky-rocketing. We have tried pumping in extra resources, but just increasing capacity hasn’t fixed anything. This isn’t just about what we can do here, but what we can do in the living world.” He paused and looked over the crowd to make his point. “This is what I mean when I say we need to think bigger. We need to think differently. Why are we here? Is our business model working?”

I thought I saw a moment of sadness mixed with kindness cross his face. I wondered how someone so regal-looking had found himself having to micro-manage such a tedious debate. Perhaps this was his hell, too?

He turned back to the other panellists. “I’m not saying that we stop, but we need to stem the flow so that we can invest in existing infrastructure – more housing, more hellscapes, better support to help process new entrants into the system and, indeed, more efficient transport. Then, and only then, will we redouble our efforts for a bigger underworld, unprecedented in scale.”

“You…” The ginger began in disbelief. “You want us to stop trying to turn humanity towards sin?”

The audience held its collective breath.

“Yes.” Said the devil.

The ginger looked like she had been slapped, her face even reddened a little. The other five panellists looked equally shocked and began talking quietly among themselves. A loud murmur began to spread contagiously among the audience.

“Perhaps…” I said loudly, completely shocking myself that I had spoken. “Er…” I began because the murmuring had quieted and people nearby were looking at me. “Maybe we could give humanity something to collectively fight against rather than turning on each other?”

The devil, the panellists and audience all turned to me.

“What?” The fat one growled.

I slowly stood up and then kept speaking. Maybe I could make up for a lifetime of ambivalence, maybe I could have a positive impact for once. “If you have all that control in the world of the living, why not create some global disaster? Maybe catastrophic weather or a plague. Something which humanity can only fix by banding together?”

The devil’s eyes pierced through me and I withered.

What was I doing? It seemed that I was just as susceptible to bouts of arrogant displays of intellect as the rest of them. I could almost hear Ash telling me for the hundredth time that I was too smart for my own good, and too dumb to know it.

Before anyone could speak, the devil held up a hand for silence. “People tend to be good to each other when they have a common enemy, this is true.” He looked thoughtful.

But my mind raced ahead and I realised that I was catastrophically wrong. “I mean, it could easily backfire, too. There’s a chance that people could become divided when faced with a big, complex problem. They might blame each other and throw up walls rather than work together. You could actually end up with an increase in people coming to hell.”

“Yes, that’s possible.” Mused the devil. The panellists were looking at him in the same expectant way that dogs stare at their owner preparing dinner. “But it might work. It might distract humanity enough and give us some breathing room if there are more opportunities for the living to do good. Let’s give it a go.” He concluded firmly.

So anyway… The devil was wrong.

And that’s how I doomed the world and made an enemy out of the king of hell, all in one go.