I swipe to the next page of the digital questionnaire and see a long list of statements with yes/no options. It seems obvious that I have to say yes to them all if I want to proceed.
I hereby agree to install the Thanatos App on all my electronic devices within my home and those carried on my person.Yes/No.
I hereby agree that Thanatos will have access to all previous medical records for me and any immediate family.Yes/No.
I understand that I will not have to pay for this service, but I will sign an NDA if selected as a suitable candidate.Yes/No.
The list goes on and on, page after page. I fill it all in with true enough answers, then hand the iPad back to the too perfect receptionist.
“Thank you, this looks wonderful,” she says, beaming as though I just baked her a bloody cake. “Now I just need to scan your fingerprints.”
I take a tiny step back from the desk. “Why?”
“It’s all part of the process,” she says again, like a fucking robot. “All of our clients have to complete these steps before meeting with the doctor.”
In my line of work the scanning of fingerprints is something best avoided. My mind is racing ahead, wondering why that ispart of the process.
“Can a person’s fingerprints predict when they are going to die?” I ask.
She smiles. Again. “Everything will be explained to you when you see the doctor, and they’ll be more than happy to answer any questions you have then. If you would rather leave, you are of course under no obligation to stay.”
The unspoken threat is not lost on me. I let her scan my fingers and thumbs on both hands because what choice do I have. “Please leave all your belongings—including any electrical devices and all phones—in the locker provided,” she says afterward. “Then you may proceed to room nine, where the doctor will be waiting for you.” Her smile vanishes as soon as she looks back at the screen.
The doctor does not look like a doctor. He doesn’t sound like one either. His face is strangely familiar—just like the receptionist—but I’m not sure where I have seen him before. He also smiles a bit too fucking much, and I’m starting to think that smiling is compulsory in this company.
“Hello, I’m the doctor,” he says.
I’m guessing if he wanted me to know his actual name he would have told me. He’s young, younger than me at least, and everything he is wearing looks expensive and brand-new, the shirt, the fitted waistcoat, the shiny, pointy, leather shoes. The room we are in is a white box devoid of decoration. There are two white swivelarmchairs, a white table, and a discreet camera. It seems they plan to film me.
“Don’t worry about that,” he says when he notices me staring at it. “Just saves me having to make notes while we chat. Tell me in your own words why you want to know when you will die?” he asks with another dazzling smile. He starts nodding before I have started answering, as though trying to encourage the words out of me.
“I’ve had a diagnosis of—”
“Yes, I read that,” he says, as though hurrying me along. “But why do you want to know your end date?”
“Myend date?”
“Sorry, that’s just what we call it. Your date of death?”
Fuck me. Straight to the point then. I guess that’s part of the process too.
“So I can make preparations, I suppose. Say goodbye to loved ones.”
He nods and I think I have given the right answer. But then he frowns. “You don’t really have any loved ones though, do you.”
What variety of tomfuckery is this?
His words were a statement, not a question.
I stare at him, speechless, thinking I must have imagined him saying that to me.
He smiles. “Except for your dog, of course; we understand that you love Sunday. From what we know about you, and we know a lot, you know when a person is telling lies, so it seems strange to us that you would lie yourself. It’s just that, you are an intelligent person with an above average IQ. Your score when you were a child suggests superior intelligence…”
How does he know my bloody childhood IQ score?
“… As does your track record at work.”
I deliberately never told them what I do.
