A mandatory survey

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<Ring! Ring! Ring!>

“Hello? This is Jenna speaking.”

“Hello. This is Demon Beta. We are calling from the Grim Reaper office about a mandatory life span survey. It is required that everyone takes this survey. Do you have a minute to talk now?”

“Oh hi. I can talk in about 3 minutes. I’m taking my kid out to the school bus now, I’ll put you on hold then I can be right back. Is that ok?”

“Yes, madam. I’ll hold.”

<hold music playing>

“Hi. This is Jenna. Thank you for waiting. I’m back.”

“Hi Jenna. Can we talk about the survey now?”

“Sure. Go ahead. I can talk now.”

“Thank you. So how this is going to work is, I’m going to ask you a series of questions. After each set of questions, from the information you provided me, I will provide you with a estimate time deduction. Please keep in mind that those are only estimations. We do not guarantee that the estimations will happen exactly within the time frame we provided. We are not responsible to answer any questions that we deem inappropriate. Can I please get a confirmation that you understand the procedure of the survey?”

“Sure. I understand. I confirm.”

“Very good madam. So first question, how often do you use hard drugs like heroin, cocaine, and methamphetamine?”

“Oh, no. I don’t use them. Never.”

“Ok. So your estimate time deduction is 0 for that question. Next question, how often do you smoke cigarrette or consume tobacco products?”

“Uhm. Not that often anymore. I do smoke everyday but I tried to only do once a day.”

“Ok. So your estimate time deduction for that question is 8 years.”

“Yeah. I do expect that.”

“Ok. Good. How often do you drink alcohol?”

“About once or twice a week.”

“Your estimate time deduction for that question is six years. Do you have depression?”

“Depression? No, no. I’m sad here and there, like everyone else, but no, not depression.”

“Madam, I just want to remind you that it’s illegal to provide wrongful information to the Grim Reaper agency. We already had all your information.”

“No. I wasn’t lying. I really don’t have depression. I don’t think it’s bad enough to be call a depression. Where do you get that information from?”

“Ok, madam. So going off from what I have on file about your mental health, your estimate time…”

“I asked you where you got that information from? Don’t ignore me. Answer that. Who said I have depression?”

“Madam, calm down. Your estimate time deductio…”

“I’m fucking calm. Who do you think you are to call my house and called me a liar and told me I had depression? I’m not weak. I don’t have depression.”

“Madam, those questions are considered inappropriate so I won’t answer them. You had confirmed to understand the survey procedure earlie…”

“I don’t care about procedure. I wanted to know who marked me as a wimpy, pathetic, depressed person?”

“Madam, since you are repeatedly violated our initial survey agreement, this survey had to stop here today. Someone from our agency will contact you again in the future to finish the survey. I just want to let you know, with depression, your estimate time deduction range from 5 to 20 years. Your child will be any age from 12 to…”

<toot…toot…toot>

This post is a reply to a weekly prompt from VJ’s blog. I really enjoyed writing up this quick prompt.