Requiem for the Devil

by Jeri Smith-Ready

  “What are you doing?”

  “What does it look like?” He pushed his shirttail back to reveal a tan, taut torso. “I’m trying to get you to come hither.”

  “Your mind-control techniques won’t work with me, remember? I’m an angel, just like you.”

  “Of course, of course.” Beelzebub crawled towards me and knelt beside my chair. “And how long has it been since you were, you know . . .” he swept his fingers across my knee, “. . . touched by an angel?”

  I closed my eyes and searched for a single fragment of strength to resist him. It cowered in a cold, abandoned recess of my mind.

  “Not long enough,” I said. His hand halted in its journey up my thigh.

  “What?”

  “Look, Beelzebub . . .” I turned to him and began to button his shirt, taking care not to be singed by his flesh. “You are my most delightful diversion, always know that. But right now I don’t want any diversions, male or female, mortal or immortal.”

  He pulled away from me and walked back to the fireplace.

  “Lou, I don’t . . . I . . .” He picked up his beer and took a long swig. “I don’t get it. You’ve never turned me down before.”

  “Maybe it was because you only asked when you knew I’d say yes. What happened to your intuition?”

  “Nothing happened to it. You’re the one who’s fighting it.”

  “Fighting what?”

  “Come on. I saw the way you’ve been looking at me all night.”

  “It’s the drugs,” I said.

  “Bullshit.”

  “Okay, it’s not just the drugs. It’s the whole setup: the drugs and the scotch and the chicken and the conversation, and that cologne—”

  “The one I only wear for you.”

  “Yes. It’s obvious that this whole evening was a calculated seduction attempt.”

  In a moment he was kneeling before me, his hands on my forearms.

  “I’m not known for my subtlety. So let’s go fuck.”

  “No.”

  “Come on . . .”

  “What did I just say?”

  “I didn’t hear you,” he said. “You know, I learned a few new tricks at the Delta Gamma house. Actually, I didn’t learn them, I invented them.”

  “What kind of tricks?”

  “Good ones.” He slid his hands under the rolled-up cuffs of my sleeves. “Or bad ones, depending how you look at it.”

  “Tell me.”

  “You think I’d give you my new secrets for free just so you could try them with your girlfriend?” His thumbs caressed the soft flesh on the inside of my arms. “I’m so bad with words, anyway, I’d never do it justice, so I’ll have to demonstrate.” I frowned. “Lou, come on . . . if you want . . . I’ll wear the wings.”

  “Stop it.” I pulled my arms out from under his grasp.

  “But you want to, right?”

  “Yes, but—”

  “So what’s the problem?”

  “I want to,” I said, “but I don’t want to.”

  “Lou, is this some kind of game?” He cocked his head. “If it is, I kinda like it.”

  “No, it’s not a—”

  “It makes me feel like you’re in control.”

  He gazed at me from under his thick brown lashes and parted his lips a fraction of an inch. My eyes fixed on the wet darkness between them, and I felt myself tip towards him as if drawn by gravity. Beelzebub closed his eyes and tilted his chin.

  When my mouth was only an inch or two from his, I stopped, and peered into the cherubic face of sweet, aching temptation. The fire flickered warm shadows across his skin and through his hair.

  I kissed him softly on the forehead and felt his brow furrow under my mouth. He pulled back a little to study my face, a tentative smile playing about his lips. I slid my fingers through his silken hair, lingering at the ends of the golden strands.

  “What’s up?” he said.

  “Nothing. It’s just . . .” I ran my fingertip along the curve of his jaw. “You are . . . so beautiful.”

  “You don’t have to sweet-talk me. I’m right here.”

  “No . . . Beelzebub, you don’t understand.” I clasped his face between my palms and stared into his eyes. “I don’t know who I am anymore.”

  “Then let me remind you.” He moved closer, insinuating his body between my knees. “You are Lucifer, the Prince of Darkness, Emperor of the Underworld, the second most powerful and single most cool being in the Universe . . .” With every hyperbolic piece of flattery, Beelzebub unfastened one button of my shirt. “Author of All Evil, the Adversary, the Arch Fiend . . . this is how the world knows you, those who hate you and those of us who . . . don’t hate you so much.” He slid one hand down the front of my trousers. “You are the Infernal Serpent.”

  My breath escaped in a low moan of lust, and my mouth watered. “You’re not nearly as stupid as you pretend to be,” I whispered.

  Beelzebub’s fingers tightened. I gasped again and clutched the arm of the chair.

  “I know what you like,” he said. “But if you want, I could pretend I don’t, and you could show me.”

  His right hand burned on my chest as it crept up to brush my shirt back. He held my gaze like a vise, unblinking. I tried not to show fear, but every muscle in my face was beginning to tremble.

  “No,” I said. “Please stop.”

  Beelzebub’s eyelashes flickered. “Oh, so now you’re the one to beg. An interesting twist, I must say.” He pressed his body against mine.

  “Don’t make me push you away.”

  “You’re going to have to.” He slid his tongue along my jugular vein, sending waves of heat down my throat and into my heart. “If you can.”

  My hands gripped his sides, uncertain whether their task was to embrace or reject. Beelzebub writhed underneath my grasp.

  Every cell in my body except one screamed, “WHY NOT?!”

  Only rage could give me the strength to separate us, to counteract the heat already sealing our flesh together.

  “Stop!” I hurled him to the floor, then stood to loom over him. “You do as I tell you. Remember who you are, and who I am!” Beelzebub gaped at me, every trace of smugness gone.

  “You can play your cute little boy toy games with the other fools,” I said, “but when I say no, it means no!” I slapped my forehead. “Listen to me, I sound like a fucking public service announcement!” I turned away from him to button my shirt.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. From the corner of my eye I saw him sit up slowly and run his fingers through his hair. “Do you want me to leave?”

  “Not unless you want to.”

  “Doesn’t really matter what I want, does it?” he murmured.

  “What?”

  “Nothing.” He stared at the floor.

  “I don’t want to hurt you, Beelzebub.”

  “Hurt me?” he scoffed. “I’m not hurt, I’m just horny.” He stood up and retrieved his beer, then pulled the pack of cigarettes from his jacket pocket. I said nothing. He sat in the chair opposite me and began to smoke. After a minute, he said, “Stop feeling sorry for me.”

  “I’m not feeling sorry for you.”

  “Then why else would you let me smoke in your apartment?”

  I held up my hand. “Let me have one.”

  He smiled a little. “You only smoke when you’re sexually frustrated, my friend.”

  “Just give me one.”

  He tossed the pack to me. We smoked in silence for a few minutes, then Beelzebub cleared his throat.

  “I still don’t get it, Lou. You always used to play along.”

  “That was before.”

  “Before Gianna.”

  I took a long drag before replying. “Yes. Before Gianna.”

  “Well, I don’t understand it, but I’m sure you know what you’re doing.”

  “Say that like you mean it.” I needed to hear it.

  He gazed at me for a moment, then said, “Wanna watch the hockey game?�
��

  22

  Quid Sum Miser Tunc Dicturus?

  When Gianna opened the door, she was wearing a Santa hat with a jingle bell dangling from the white puff ball.

  “Hey, you’re early,” she said.

  “I know.” I took her hand and led her into the apartment towards her bed. “There’s something we have to do before we leave.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Fuck.” I lifted her onto the bed and began to unbutton her blouse.

  “On Christmas Eve?” she said. “Are you crazy?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I’ve never had sex on Christmas Eve. It almost seems sacrilegious.”

  “Even better.” I gave her my finest wicked grin before pressing my face into her neck.

  “You are such a heathen.” She laughed a little, but pushed against my chest. “No, knock it off.” I didn’t. “Lou, we can’t do it now. I’m all out of condoms.”

  “So?” I knew we didn’t need them, but didn’t feel like explaining why at the moment. I reached under her and unzipped her skirt.

  “So you want me to tell our firstborn child that he came into existence when Daddy date-raped Mommy on Christmas Eve?”

  I froze. “What?”

  “I said no.” She pressed her first two fingers into the base of my throat. “Now get off me.”

  I held up my hands and backed away. “I’m sorry, Gianna, I—I got carried away.”

  “Yes, you did.”

  “I was way out of line.”

  “Yes, you were.”

  “And I’m sorry.”

  “Apology accepted.”

  “I could run to the drugstore and—”

  “No, Lou, that’s not the point. Besides, we don’t have time.” She looked in the mirror. “Look what you’ve done to me already. My hair, my clothes—I can’t show up at my parents’ looking all post-coital like this!”

  I moved next to her and gazed at her image in the mirror. “I think you look sexy. And as long as you look like we’ve been fooling around, why don’t we—”

  She pulled my hand off her waist. “Go sit on the couch and don’t move.”

  “Okay, okay.” I ran my hands through my hair and gnawed my lip. If Beelzebub could see my frustration, he’d be laughing his ass off. “I need a cigarette.”

  “You don’t smoke,” she said.

  “Hardly ever.” I sat on the edge of the couch cushion.

  Gianna stepped to the edge of the bedroom area, a hairbrush in her hand. “Look, Lou, while we’re at my parents’ house, can you just follow my lead when it comes to public displays of affection?”

  “You mean, don’t touch you unless you touch me first?”

  “Basically. I have to feel them out first, see how comfortable they are with you. Please let me handle it as I see fit.”

  “Fine.” The walls of the next two days were already closing in. I bounced my heel against the floor.

  “You don’t have to come with me if you don’t want to,” she said. “I know you hate Christmas to begin with, and meeting my family during a holiday adds so much more pressure.”

  “I want to do this, Gianna.”

  “Are you sure? I could still take the train.”

  “Don’t you want me to come?”

  “Oh yes, I do, Lou, more than anything.” She sat next to me and took my hand. “I want this, I do, but my family can be a little scary.”

  “Not as scary as mine, believe me.”

  “I just . . . I don’t want to lose you.”

  “Gianna . . .” I caressed her cheek, then pulled her close to me. “No one will ever come between us. No one.”

  “I believe you,” she said. “I don’t know why, but I believe you.” She kissed me, then examined my face. “You look like shit. What were you guys up to last night?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  “That’s not surprising. Your eyes look like candy canes. Why don’t you take a nap while I pack?”

  I stretched out on the couch. Antigone leapt onto my chest and burrowed into the crook of my arm. Gianna pulled a suitcase from under the bed and opened it. She stood in front of her bureau, hands on her hips, deep in thought.

  “I can feel it when you stare at me,” she said.

  “What’s it feel like?”

  “Ever heard the expression ‘mind fuck’?”

  “It sounds nice,” I said in a low voice.

  Gianna looked at me and smiled a little. “Kinda . . .” She turned back to the dresser. “Stop it, Lou.”

  “Stop what?”

  “By the way, I told my parents you’re Episcopalian.”

  “What!?”

  “It’s at least marginally better than being an atheist.”

  “I told you, Gianna, I’m not an atheist.” I sat up and brushed the cat onto the floor. “I believe in What’s-His-Face, I just don’t worship him.”

  “In any case, it’ll make it a little easier, just for Christmas, if you would pretend.”

  “I can’t pretend to be an Episcopalian when I don’t know anything about them. You could have at least given me a little more warning so I could do some research.”

  “Episcopalians are basically like Catholics, except they don’t believe in transubstantiation or the Pope. And a few other little things, but basically they’re Catholic Lite.”

  “What’s transubstantiation?”

  “It’s the process by which communion becomes the body and blood of Christ.”

  “You mean symbolically?”

  “No, for real.”

  “Let me get this straight,” I said. “At the moment of the sacrament of communion, a little cracker and a cup of port somehow magically transform into the body and blood of someone who’s been dead almost two thousand years?”

  “Yes.”

  “You believe that?”

  “Yes,” she said. “Sort of.”

  “Isn’t it a little . . . macabre? Cannibalistic, even? Not to mention impossibly silly.”

  “It’s one of the holy mysteries. You can’t examine it and pull it apart like a science fair project.”

  “The big holy mystery is why you people believe your god still cares about you.”

  I was relieved to discover I hadn’t actually said that last comment out loud.

  “Anyway,” she said, “you sound like a pretty authentic Episcopalian.”

  “Method acting. I have to get into the part.” I crawled to the end of the couch closer to her. “So what do Episcopalians think of premarital sex and birth control?”

  Gianna stopped folding the sweater in her hands, then replied without looking at me, “They’re cool with it, I guess, as long as it’s within the context of a loving, committed relationship.”

  “Uh-huh. And what’s the Catholic party line on those issues?”

  “You know very well what it is.” She plopped the sweater in the suitcase.

  “So why don’t you convert? That way you won’t be such a sinner.”

  “Stop toying with me, Louis.”

  “I thought you liked theological debates, or was that just naked theological debates?”

  “I’m not going to convert.”

  “Or was it just theological debates where you know what you’re talking about?”

  “Where I know what I’m talking about?” She slammed down the lid of her suitcase. “You didn’t even know what transubstantiation was.”

  “Yes, I did, I just wanted you to give me the chance to make fun of it. I’ve forgotten more about religion than you’ll ever know. As a matter of fact—”

  “You’re an arrogant prick.”

  “—it’s a favorite subject of mine.”

  “You study religion so you can feel superior to it? So you can mock others for their beliefs?”

  “No, I—”

  “Or do you think you’ll find God that way? You’ll never find Him by going through your head.”

  “Then how do I find him, assuming I want to?”
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br />   “You won’t,” she said. “He’ll find you.”

  “Not if I see him coming.”

  “You won’t.”

  “You’re giving me the creeps, Gianna.”

  “Good.” She took her purse into the bathroom and began to fix her makeup. I picked up her suitcase and carried it to the door. While I waited I heard her singing:

  God rest ye merry, gentlemen

  Let nothing you dismay . . .

  I had to stop her. I searched for something to throw at her, but all I saw were shoes, and none were soft enough.

  Remember Christ our Savior

  Was born on Christmas Day . . .

  I put down the suitcase and moved toward her.

  To save us all from—

  I grabbed her arm, spun her around, and kissed her hard. She responded with equal force, then pulled away.

  “Trying to shut me up?” she said.

  “No, I just wanted to kiss you.”

  “I don’t believe you.” Gianna pushed me up against the wall and kissed me again. Before I could trap her in my embrace, she backed off and picked up her makeup case. “Let’s go,” she said. “We’ll be late.”

  23

  Te Decet Hymnus, Deus

  “Can we listen to Christmas carols?” Gianna asked in the car.

  “No,” I said.

  “Please?”

  “No.”

  “I thought you loved me.”

  “I love you, Gianna, but not as much as I hate Christmas carols.”

  She didn’t respond.

  “That was a joke, of course,” I said, “a joke that will be repeated whenever you pull that line on me again, just so you know.”

  She was silent for another minute, then she said, “You said no one would ever come between us. But that’s not true. God comes between us all the time.”

  “Yes, he would.”

  “Why? Because He hates you?”

  “That’s right.”

  “How do you know He hates you?”

  “Because he told me.”

  “Very funny,” she said. “You know, sometimes I think you get God and your father mixed up in your head.”

  “You think so?”

  “That’s why you think God hates you, because you think your father hates you. Well, I’ve got news for you. God loves you and forgives you for whatever you did. And you know what? I bet your father does, too.”