Brenda Jennings had a dispute on her phone bill. So she called her carrier, navigated through an impossibly complex choice-menu, and was immediately placed on hold. After 27 minutes of listening to mind-numbing wallpaper music, Brenda Jennings and 250 other esteemed customers were dropped from hold, and placed on hold-hold.

The problem: too many dissatisfied callers are overloading the hold-system. The solution: simply dump them onto a waiting list for the waiting list. This innovative and profitable new process is known as “hold-hold”.

Hold-hold is an indefinite, horizonless purgatory. The music is a suicidally-depressing loop of Kenny G and Christian self-help rock. Every five hours, a pleasant female robo-voice interrupts your hibernation, calmly telling you to “hang in there” and “tough it out," because a “customer care professional will assist you any minute from now”.

“We have nowhere to put you,” explained crowd-storage expert Blake Slumsworth, “so we simply cart you off someplace and forget about you. But we appreciate your patience.”

This “cellar of forgotten souls” now makes up nearly 19% of the population. They sit, voiceless and paralyzed in a perpetual doldrum state, waiting for the opportunity to wait.

Paul Boseman's phone died after 3 days of being on hold-hold. He had to start over.

Michelle Manley gave birth to twins while on hold-hold. She birthed them alone on her kitchen floor, afraid she might lose her place while trying to make an appointment at the DMV.

Howard Finkle was found dead from dehydration after two months of being on hold-hold. His skeletal hand was still clutching his phone, in the hope that he might receive customer care advice on how to change a printer cartridge.

Rule #6 for those on hold-hold: keep a phone charger and a supply of water nearby.

“I need to get back to my life,” said a malnourished Brenda Jennings.

No worries Brenda! Those who are willing to pay a little extra are put on expedited HoldPlus®. For only $89.95 per hour, HoldPlus® customers are placed back on regular hold, with the increased likelihood of being answered by a customer care professional in this lifetime. And the music’s better.

Warning: if you’ve been on hold-hold for more than five years, you will be dropped from the call.