...That is an alarming thing to have written on the wall for a variety of reasons, only some of which have to do with the fact that Marlo is very sure that he's dead. 

A door opens and a white-haired man steps in. He looks a bit like a grandfather-- not like your specific grandfather, but like the archetype of grandfathers everywhere, wise and benevolent and continually on the verge of giving you candy.

"Hello, Marlo! Come in."

Of all the things for the person who welcomes you into Heaven to be, the archetype of a grandfather isn't the strangest. Marlo follows him. 

"Sit down, Marlo. I'm Michael. How are you today?"

He sits. 

"I'm doing fine, aside from being dead." 

"You have passed to the next phase of your existence! It's not the Heaven or Hell that you were raised on, but generally speaking, in the afterlife, there's a good place and a bad place. And you, Marlo"-- unnecessarily long dramatic pause-- "are in the Good Place."

He nods solemnly. It's not unexpected, although of course it was never assured. 

"During your time on Earth, every one of your actions had a positive or negative value, depending on how much good or bad that action put into the universe. Every sandwich you ate, every time you bought a magazine, every single thing you did that rippled out over time and ultimately created some amount of good or bad. When your time on Earth has ended, we calculate the total value of your life using our perfectly accurate measuring system. Only the people with the very highest scores, the true cream of the crop, get to come here, to the Good Place."

...sandwiches and magazines are not the examples he'd choose of morally significant actions. He nods again and does not voice this objection, or any of his others. He will deal with the fact that he and nearly everyone he knew was apparently wrong about how people get into Heaven for all of his life later, when he's not in the middle of being welcomed into the afterlife. 

"The point is, you are here because you lived one of the very best lives that could be lived. And you won't be alone. Your true soul mate is here too, and you two will spend eternity together." He ruffles some papers. "Her name is Chris Parker."

...he is more than a little skeptical that he lived one of the very best lives that could be lived, and also the entire concept of salvation by works, but he's fairly sure you aren't supposed to question the judgement of the person welcoming you into Heaven. "Did I fail to meet her in life, or —?" 

Michael is visibly relieved that Marlo ever asks questions. 

"There are seven billion people on Earth, Marlo, it's very unlikely that you'll meet the single person who's best for you in the whole world over the course of, what was it, 24 years?"

He would think that if you had a predestined soulmate then you would be predestined to meet them at some point, but clearly not. "That makes sense." 

"As it happens, although she is American, Chris Parker spent your entire adult life in Japan."

"...can you tell me more about her?" He's leaning forward, interested. 

"Well, mostly we like to leave you to get to know each other! It would hardly be perfect if I told you everything about your soulmate before you even met her! But there are a few issues I should address before you two are introduced."

Nod. He's still leaning forward. 

"Chris Parker suffered some--" He pauses, searching for the correct word. "Traumas, in her life on earth. She coped with them by dissociating herself from her body and presenting herself to the world as a man, to the extent of taking hormones and getting surgeries that allowed her body to more closely resemble a male body. Of course, over time, we expect her to heal from her traumas and feel comfortable in her womanhood. But the Good Place gives everyone the bodies they're most comfortable in, and right now she's most comfortable in a male body. And to avoid distressing her we use male pronouns for her when we're talking to her. I hope that won't present a problem."

"Of course not, she's my soulmate," which apparently Heaven has, which is another thought he will deal with later. "It won't be a problem." 

"Good, good! The other issue is her... employment. Certain humans, on Earth, find their greatest fulfillment in service to other humans. A secret organization called the Marketplace emerged to match those people to people who wouldn't take advantage of them or abuse them. The Marketplace calls its clients slaves, but it is important to understand that it is consensual slavery only, only among those who are most fulfilled by being slaves. Chris Parker herself was a slave when she died, and was widely recognized as one of the greatest slave trainers of her generation."

...well, she's here, and apparently one gets here through good works and not through faith, which he is, again, going to deal with later. "Alright," he says. 

"Do you have any questions you'd like me to answer about the Good Place in general or Chris Parker specifically?"

They said they preferred to let soulmates get to know one another naturally.

"...just to check, one definitely gets into — the Good Place — through good works, and not through faith?" 

"Yes! It's based on the sum of all the good things you did in your life, minus all the bad things you did in your life."

"...obviously you don't have to answer but I'm curious, how does one quantify the positive or negative effect on the world of somebody eating a sandwich?"