Consultation 78.

“God, can I hug you?"

I squinted my eyes suspiciously, extremely wary the instant I heard her request.

“What are you after?”

“What do you mean? I just want to hug you.”

“Don’t think I’m not onto you, you definitely have some sort of hidden agenda. Any woman who comes to me does. Could it be you’re planning to scream rape as soon as I hug you?”

“What! I’d never do such a thing. I just want to hug you.”

“I don’t buy it. This is far too suspicious. What is your true objective here?”

“To hug you.”

“Could it be you’re trying to find out how to destroy your world?”

“No, I just want to hug you.”

“Could it be you wanted to find out how to perform some sort of degenerate sexual act with some inanimate object, organism, or scientific concept?”

“No.”

“Then you wanted to kill someone?”

“No.”

“You want to enslave your people? Or perhaps you want to NTR something or someone close to you”

“No, and no! I just want to hug you!”

“Tch. A tough cookie, I see. Let’s just get down to business, what do you really want?”

“God, I really just want to hug you...”

“Still not giving in? Stubborn. How much of this will it take to get you to spill the beans?” I gestured by rubbing my index and middle fingers together against my thumb up and down.

“It will cost you a hug.”

“Hah! I knew it. So you were after something after- wait, what? It will cost me a hug for you to tell me what you’re really after?”

“Yeah.”

“I’m not going to fall for that. I’d just be falling into your elaborate trap if I did that.”

“Fine, I’ll change my question. I want to know how I can convince a certain God I know to allow me to hug him.”

“So this was the true request you were hiding. I see. I knew it had to be something like this.”

I didn’t miss when she rolled her eyes, but I chose to ignore it.

“Let’s see, what sort of God is it that you actually wanted to hug?”

“A God that is very similar to you.”

“I see. I see. To convince a God similar to me to hug you would certainly be an astronomically difficult task to achieve.”

“Are you saying there is no way?”

“I’m not saying it’s impossible, but the only way would be if you trick that sort of God into letting you hug them.”

“I see. And how do I trick him?”

“Well, if it is a God in a similar line of work, the best thing you could do is to ask him a question like, ‘How do I hug someone?’ After that God explains how to hug someone just act like you don’t understand and say you’d like for that God to let you practice once with him.”

“Oh! That’s pretty smart.”

“Does that answer your question?”

“Yeah, it does.”

“Alright, then please scram now.”

“What? But I still have one more question.”

“I don’t want to hear it.”

“God, how do I hug someone?”

“Tch. Fine. But this is the last question I’m answering and you have to leave after, you got that.”

“Yeah.”

“To hug someone, all you need to do is open your arms wide then wrap them around the person you want to hug.”

“That sounds really complicated. I don’t really get it. Can I practice on you before I go to make sure I’m doing it right?”

“Uh, sure.”

She stood up, walked around the side of the table then came to a stop in front of me. 

“Is it like this?” She asked as she opened her arms wide and wrapped them around my head.

My hand shot out and extended six feet long at lightning speed. With my hand pressed against her forehead, I kept the two of us separated.

“Eh~ God, what are you doing?”

“This is how you hug someone these days. Air hugs from six feet away are the norm.”

“What! This wasn’t what we just discussed!”

“Get with the times, woman. Hugs have changed.”

“No way! I want to hug you without six feet of air between us.”

“I don’t want to catch any human bugs. It could potentially introduce an invasive species to heaven. And what will I do if I catch something from you and it mutates into something that infects all the other Gods in heaven? My paycheck will be heavily docked to compensate everyone else for sure if that happens.”

“I don’t care. I still want a hug, hug, not an air hug!” She tried to take a step forward but her feet slid back and she failed to budge an inch from her spot.

“God, this is tyranny. I have the right to hug you. I paid for this consultation. I’ll file a complaint if I don’t get to hug you. What if it leads to your paycheck getting docked, God?”

“My pay… no… you wouldn’t. You… m-monster. Why does everyone target my pay! What has my paycheck ever done to you humans! Leave my paycheck alone and out of this. My paycheck is innocent and doesn’t deserve to be subjected to such inhumane acts of cruelty.”

“Is your pay really that bad by God standards?”

“Budget cuts. Heaven’s got it tough these days.”

“I… see.”

“Good, if you understand, then please give up.”

“God, put your hand down… or the paycheck gets it.”

“Are you threatening me? A God? You dare?”

“Stop being such a pain in the ass and let me hug you and I’ll leave both you and your paycheck alone.”

I grit my teeth, removed my hand from her forehead, and chose to sacrifice to save my long time brother-in-arms, Paycheck. I couldn’t betray Paycheck. 

Paycheck is love, paycheck is life.

‘Twas truly one of the most profound natural laws that governed this world.

After she got her hug, she departed seemingly content with the result of her consultation. I was left behind seated in my chair waiting for the unexpected plot twist. But even after I patiently waited for five minutes, there was no degenerate twist of fate as I’d anticipated there would be.

Wait… it was really only a hug she wanted? That was it? That’s all… there wasn’t anything else?

WHAT THE HELL WAS I SO SKEPTICAL ABOUT THEN!

Thud.

That was the sound of me slamming my forehead against the desk hating myself for overthinking things so much.