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Knox Bridger was first to call me fool. I remember smelling wet grass after he grabbed my brown paper bag and shoved me to the ground, his screechy fifth-grade voice demanding, “Gimme that, stupid fool!” Looking up—from a vantage point not unlike my present one—I saw torn jeans and caught the reek of matted curls. He needed that lunch more than I did.

My college roommate would call me fool, too, every time I rolled my window down for that man with the sign. “You’re a fool to give them money! They only drink it away.” But I had to believe my ten bucks would meet a real need. Lack turns humans into animals. So, what’s missing for these agents... ?

“Fool!” was also the last thing Andie said to me. She finally had enough of my evenings on the phone with strangers. I don’t blame her. I just wish she had understood how being present for the lonely ones who stare into the abyss holds more significance than sitting with me in the dark, staring for hours at a screen. If she were here now, she would understand...

~

My leg—the one under his boot—is completely numb. Crimson tributaries carve paths horizontally across my brow. I could vomit... that baton to my brain? The ringing is deafening, but the masked men are louder, “Stay down, fool! Stop moving!” The woman I had asked them to release still sobs, reaching out her cuffed hands to a runny-nosed boy just feet away.

Was I a fool to intervene? What is wisdom anyway? And why am I parsing philosophy when I can’t even breathe? Another unsolicited thought appears; an ancient saying, repeating, even as my consciousness fades: “…the foolish things of this world—will shame the wise…”

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AFTERWORD

I was challenged to write some micro-fiction (less than 300 words) with the theme being “The Fool.” Daunted by the task of telling an extremely concise—yet still potentially interesting—story, I set out with vague thoughts on April Fool’s Day rolling around my head.

Where I ended up, through no real intention, was with some words from the New Testament that sum up the “upside-down” (or we might say “foolish”) Kingdom of Jesus.

²⁶ Brothers and sisters, think of what you were when you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth. ²⁷ But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. ²⁸ God chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things—and the things that are not—to nullify the things that are, ²⁹ so that no one may boast before him. ³⁰ It is because of him that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God—that is, our righteousness, holiness and redemption. (I Corinthians 1:26-30)

I hadn’t set out to write a Good Friday meditation, but in fact, this first chapter of 1 Corinthians puts the crucifixion at the center of Christian theology. The cross itself is described as “foolishness to those who are perishing,” but to those who are being saved, it is called “the power [and wisdom] of God.” What could be more upside-down than the death of God?!

My theology of the cross doesn’t look much like it did when I was younger. But even if I don’t agree with an orthodox view on the nature and mechanism of God’s salvation, it’s not difficult for me to embrace the idea that what appears wise in our world is actually foolish, from an eternal perspective.

And sometimes, those whom we label as “fools,” are the only ones who really understand what’s actually going on. Fools, like the one in my story, are often the real heroes of the Human Story. In this respect, Jesus, for his cross, is rightly to be labeled: “King of Fools.”

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The Idea had arrived. Not just “an” idea—THE Idea; the one I’d been waiting for my entire thinking life.

I had always carried this visceral sense that it was within reach—just below the surface, around the next corner, on the tip of my tongue… Probably behind my tongue and up several centimeters.

For decades, my brain was apparently a mere synapse away from bridging the right two neurons to spark The Idea into consciousness. But how exactly to harness these cagey intracranial powers? If only there were some proactive measures I could undertake to coax The Idea into existence. Finally, I settled on a suspiciously simple method. I walked.

Every evening, without fail, I would set out at 7 p.m., following the same familiar three-mile route I always took. This designated path entirely removed the distraction of having to think about where I was going. Thus, my thoughts were completely freed to wander through the mind fields, plucking virtual wheat straw, and ruminating over each kernel—asking once, and again, and then again: “What is it? What is The Idea?”

I soon grew use to returning home with my brain full only of ideas, lowercase “i.” You know, those regular little thoughts everyone thinks; things that help us hang on and muddle through our regular little lives. Stuff like: I must get enough sleep in order to be my best at work tomorrow. And: I should not worry myself with the things I can’t control and focus on the things I can. Even such mundane and unrevolutionary musings, as: Make sure your socks match and your underwear is clean, for you never know who might be looking.

Nothing revolutionary. Nothing extraordinary. No ideas to change the world. That is, until one night, about three weeks ago, when everything changed...

I was late heading out for my walk that evening. (Perhaps this subtle time shift had something to do with the ensuing revelation.) I was just rounding the first block, when suddenly, I tripped. To this day, I’m not sure if it was a tree branch, a rock, or one of those buckled sidewalks that have fallen victim to old oak roots.

Ultimately, such detail doesn’t matter. In fact, everything before that moment became suddenly and utterly insignificant. The Idea had arrived! The electrical pulse that had been ambling along the alleys of my brain for years and years, lost and loitering, finally found its synaptic bridge and willed to cross it.

Corporeal energy pulsed, colors flashed, The Idea was projected in Kodachrome 10k high def 3D on the back of my brain. It was striking and vivid. From my conscious perspective, all I know is that The Idea was instantly there, when just a moment before, it was not.

I do not have a lawyer, the way some people casually mention, “I could have my lawyer take a look at that,” but I do have enough sense to think that when one has an Idea so thoroughly groundbreaking, it’s best to get the lawyers involved.

My Idea was not an innovation to develop over time. It was an Idea that, once shared, would be immediately recognized as imminently and eminently promising. I had no doubt that The Idea would subsequently be fast-tracked to implementation, world-wide.

Unlike A.I., there would be no haggling over costs in the trillions, no ecological concerns over energy consumption. (In fact, I knew the Idea would solve the energy crisis, virtually overnight.) The Idea—my Idea—was so simple and so profoundly ingenious, there’s not a human being I can imagine, of any class or creed, who would hesitate to put it into effect without delay, and as fast as humanly possible.

Now, re-reading what I just wrote, I should pause to acknowledge that I probably sound like an arrogant prick. You’re thinking, “Who talks about their own idea in these terms?” I understand that my confidence may come across as hyperbole, especially from the perspective of one who does not know the gist of The Idea. But I am here to assure you, I am only speaking truth. There is literally no way to talk about It without sounding hyperbolic.

The Idea is beyond disruptive. To simply call it pioneering, would suggest that it still fits within the realm of some idea that has already been pursued in the sciences, philosophy, or even religion. No. It is truly “out of left field” as they say; and that is only if the field in question were a yet-unnamed realm of inquiry, perhaps even a dimension apart from our experience of reality.

I could go on, but suffice to say, I am speaking in the humblest terms I can muster for an Idea of this magnitude, with the most certain potential of far-reaching and world-changing effects.

After a brief search, I did find a lawyer. My selection process was not too precious; I knew I could waste no time, now that The Idea had finally made itself known. Martin J. Jones was not one of those billboard lawyers, his marketable name notwithstanding. Conversely, Jones wasn’t one who had brokered billion-dollar deals, either. He confessed as much in our first meeting:

“May I ask if I am the first lawyer you’ve consulted?” he inquired, then continued, “I am utterly confident in my knowledge of law and procedure related to rights and ownership, but I must confess, I have never guided a client in a matter this unique.”

“Of course, you haven’t,” I asserted, trying not to sound condescending. “But perhaps after our partnership, you will have no need to qualify your evidently solid, though somewhat limited, experience.”

And that was that. I had my lawyer.

Martin and I went straight to work generating the appropriate documents to secure my rights as related to The Idea. There were some interesting questions to answer, given the uniqueness of this situation, but Jones soon proved he was the right man for the job, creating protective addendums for the standardized documents, and detecting loopholes that we could then ensure were closed, using a variety of law techniques, which I will not bore you with, here.

In a mere 72 hours, we were able to prepare and submit the legal package that would protect me and The Idea. Once we submitted these to state and federal authorities, it was time to share The Idea with the world.

But where to start? Martin J. Jones rose to the occasion again, with the simple, yet elegant suggestion of a general press release. His thought was that if we could concisely state The Idea with enough color to attract attention, while still withholding the essential details, we would have no problem generating ample interest. He was right. We put out the release on a Tuesday at 8 a.m. Pacific Time. By 8:03, we started receiving emails. By 8:05, calls.

The first to respond were representatives of the medical community. One of my first calls was with a skeptical pediatric oncologist. After just 10 minutes on the phone with her, she was in tears. She couldn’t hang up fast enough in order to begin spreading the news among her colleagues that there would no longer be children suffering with cancer in our world.

Over the next several hours I also spoke with representatives in other fields of pathological research—Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, Lou Gehrig’s disease, Huntington’s disease, M.S., C.F., HIV/AIDS, and even diabetes—all of these doctors utterly flabbergasted to recognize that soon they would be looking for a new career.

But it wasn’t just the medical community that was affected by The Idea. Later that morning, I spoke with a very bright gentleman (that’s what we call an ‘understatement’) from the California Institute of Technology. He had read our press release and was curious if The Idea had any promise for solving some of the conundrums of Physics. I’ll admit, he was briefly (very briefly) disappointed, when he learned that I was not a scientist.

However, after only a few minutes discussing The Idea, he sounded less like a reserved scientist, and more like an ebullient Idea-evangelist, fresh off the road to Damascus. He spoke with an almost laughing tone, rattling off how The Idea, all at once, unified the theory of gravity with quantum physics, while also solving the mysteries of dark matter and energy. Fifteen minutes later, he was still enumerating the implications for finally understanding the nature of time and the origin of the universe. Though I couldn’t entirely understand him, it made me smile.

Barely had the corners of my mouth been raised, revealing those subtle dimples and high cheekbones my mother had always admired, when I received a FaceTime call from the president of the Academy of Gerontology and Elective surgery (A.G.E.). As I described The Idea, I was somewhat perplexed by the lack of expression on the president’s face. Could this be the first domain for which The Idea would have no effect?

But my fears were soon allayed, as she mentioned, almost in passing, that there would be no more need for Botox injections, a fact that she herself found incredibly satisfying, though her face was unable to show it. Still, I imagined a smile on her wrinkle-free visage, as she went on to describe how the age-old pursuit of eternal youth would now simply be “old news.”

It wasn’t just the sciences that were upended by The Idea. As I had presumed, The Idea was also to have profound implications for the fields of philosophy and religion. Just hours after the press release, I was drawn in to a three-hour video conference, convened by a council of ecumenical clergy, along with inter-faith representatives from around the world.

In just the first few minutes of the call, the towering trouble caused by the infamous Problem of Evil was effortlessly toppled, and with it, the heretofore unsolvable questions about suffering, free will, and morality. Not only that, the question of the existence of God was definitively answered, and with it, the questions about consciousness, the meaning of life, and life after death—all in one fell swoop. With “God” as my witness (or whatever we will say now), I believe that future arguments over religion will just be exercises in historical memory.

As that marathon metaphysical discussion was wrapping up, my brain entertained the unsolicited notion that with the greatest questions of religion and philosophy no longer nagging at the human psyche, we might actually have hope for peaceful political relations between even the most hostile and antagonistic nations. No sooner had I recognized the thought in my mind, when Martin J. Jones (who had been feverishly fielding calls on my behalf), tapped me gently on the shoulder. As I turned, he offered me his phone and spoke in a unexpectedly calm tone, “Sir… it’s the President.”

I had never spoken with the President of the United States before, but I quickly realized that, given these particular circumstances, there was hardly any need for formality. After one or two clarifying questions, which I proudly answered as succinctly as possible, the President did the rest of the talking. I almost couldn’t keep up with the list of global conflicts he said would be resolved tomorrow, all because of The Idea.

Not only would there finally be real peace in the Middle East, there would also no longer be any need for borders, anywhere. In fact, fighting—with any group, for any reason—seemed now to be completely off the table. War, forevermore, would truly be resigned to the history books, along with violence, fear, and famine.

Ah yes, famine! I almost forgot to mention one of the few visitors I received in person. None other than the world renowned chef and humanitarian José Andrés appeared on my doorstep at about quarter past noon. “This news you’ve shared… eh… my friend… this is too big—too big for a phone call,” he almost whispered with his warm Spanish accent.

“Well, I’m honored you would…”, I began to say.

“Bah! No, no—no need for such humility. Please! You must not hide from this,” he suddenly erupted, with a passion not unlike what’s displayed as he’s on location, feeding victims of a natural disaster. “I am here—yes—representing World Central Kitchen… of course… but also, eh… as a representative of so many others, no? So many who have given everything to this fight to end hunger across the globe… the World Food Programme, FAO, UNICEF, Action Against Hunger, Feeding America, Oxfam, World Vision…”

Andrés was still listing organizations, when Martin J. Jones tapped me on the shoulder once again. This time, he whispered in my ear, so as to not interrupt, “Sir, it’s your mother.”

I whispered back, “Please tell her I will call her right back.”

I didn’t like to make my mother wait, but it would’ve been rude not to invite the chef in for at least a morsel and a cup of tea—oh, the irony! He had been undeterred by Jones whispering in my ear, so I let him finish his list, which went on for at least another minute. Once he was done, I asked him inside for a bite, though he politely declined, with the reasonable excuse that there were still many more people in the world who would be starving to hear about The Idea.

“Hi, Ma.” I wasted no time calling her back.

“Son, is that you?”

“Of course, it’s me, Ma. You don’t recognize my voice?” I was internally gleeful, knowing that this feigned unrecognition was just a playful set up for the praise she was about to heap on me for The Idea.

“Yes, yes. Sorry. I must’ve forgotten to turn up my hearing aid. I can hear you now.”

I couldn’t wait to tell her that, because of The Idea, she would soon have no need for that hearing aid, not to mention her insulin shots, and her high blood pressure medication. “Have you called because you heard the news?” I asked, trying not to sound too eager.

“What? Oh yes. Yes, I have. And I have to say, son, I’m really glad.”

“Thanks, Ma!” It was nice to hear her say those words, but I couldn’t wait to hear what else she had to say about her son changing the world.

“Yes, yes. When I heard that you had managed to get off work on Friday, I was very excited that you’ll now be able to help with the garden before the weekend. You know, I’m having that party for aunt Gladys’s 90th in the backyard on Saturday morning. Didn’t I mention it? She’s been talking about it for months, and you know how she likes everything to be pretty and pristine. Since your dad passed, and with my sciatica, I just haven’t been able to keep up with those pernicious weeds.”

“Oh. Right,” I said, trying to hide my growing disappointment. Weeds? Backyard party? Aunt Gladys? What about… The Idea! Perhaps she just hasn’t heard about it, yet? Certainly it’s been on every news channel and across all media. Maybe she’s been cooking. Hmm. Wait a minute… I’ll bet she’s working on a celebratory meal in my honor. Yes, that’s it!

While on the phone with my mother, Jones had been speaking with representatives in the fields of computers, engineering, biology, climate science, astronomy, and even sports. It turns out, The Idea has real promise to eliminate injuries related to American football; to uncomplicate the rules of Cricket for the average person; and even to (here’s the real miracle), make baseball less boring. Home run!

As I hung up the phone, I saw Jones through my kitchen window. He had walked outside while on a call with some Hollywood director. He was pacing, but I overheard him say, “Mr. Spielberg…” and shortly after that, I thought I made out the words “film rights.” Who would they pick to play me? I wondered. It was thrilling to imagine how human creativity, in general, was destined to flourish, now that we were freed from attention to all those necessary evils!

I pushed down the window above the sink until it sealed and noted immediately how quiet it was. For the moment, no one was knocking at my door, no phones were ringing, no Zooms were incoming on my laptop. I looked at my watch; it was 7 p.m. On any other day, this would’ve been the exact time when I’d be stepping out for my walk.

I fell back on my couch, closed my eyes, and felt the silence inviting me to rest with it a moment. Aware that the next few days and weeks were sure to contain a whirlwind of activity—consultations, photo ops, a Nobel prize?—I was glad to take these few minutes for myself.

As my consciousness began to fade, I let it. Drifting off, I embraced the utopian dream that was now filling my head, permanently replacing the former question, which had been ever-present, as long as I could remember—but that was now, definitively answered; and along with it, all the most pressing questions of our fallen world.

POSTSCRIPT

I am writing this by candlelight in a bunker, about 150 miles east of Los Angeles. The space is cavernous, dim, and includes a faint dampness that has somehow tickled my olfactory nerve, despite the stagnant air. Looking past the others, a dozen or so fellow refugees, I glimpse towering rivetier that spans an entire wall and is stacked with canned goods. This is good. We might be here for a while.

It has been six months since I told the world about The Idea. I could not have imagined this scenario if I had tried. For all its overt promise, The Idea triggered a number of events and effects that one might label as “unintended consequences.”

In my naivety, I had believed that removing friction from human life would finally free us to achieve our greatest potential. Isn’t it intuitive to believe that a world, absent illness, starvation, and energy challenges, should flourish? I’m shocked and deeply saddened to learn that the opposite is true.

After a very brief period of exultant jubilation relating to the collective triumph over human obstacles, global society has since rapidly devolved into an empty pool of meaningless existence. Of course, all vacuums must be filled, and this black-hole of meaning sucked up nearly everything that was left in the wake of friction’s exit, including: the impulse toward learning; the natural desire for growth; and worst of all, any form of motivation. Only one thing has survived: the human ego.

You may recall how, back on that day when Jones and I announced The Idea, there was no mention of any conversations with psychologists. At the time, I made nothing of it. I now understand the reason. It wasn’t that no one from the psychological community had heard about The Idea. They had all heard. They also understood that any idea, even one as grand as mine, would not solve the most difficult problem of all, which is the problem posed by incorrigible human personality.

The Idea could eradicate physical illness, but it could not eradicate the mental pathology to which we’ve all succumbed; been born into, really. Those with a religious bent call it “original sin.” Students of evolution call it “maladaptive traits.” Whatever we name it, our tendency toward self-preservation (and once we are safe, self-exaltation), is incredibly potent and hopelessly irreversible.

Of mysterious origin, this trait is just as mysteriously subjected by nothing. Not even the power of The Idea can tame the human capacity for hatred of the “other,” and that dark, irresistible impulse for each of us to join with “our own kind” and dominate.

I do not know how long we will remain here, in this dark place. (As I write that sentence, I recognize the double meaning.) Though we sit in a shelter made for protection from nuclear fallout, we’re not huddled here for fear of radiation. No, we’ve locked ourselves in this shadowy, musty bunker to hide from what turns out is the only real threat known to Man, and that is man himself. We are refugees, scattered and forced into hiding by zombie-free, dystopian criminals.

If there is any irony left in my story, perhaps it will be that this new challenge—the challenge of surviving roving bands of murderous, thieving gangs—might be just the “friction” that motivates us to learn, grow, and help each other once again. Without any such motivation, I fear we are truly lost…

That’s all for now. I have to go. The musty air suddenly carries with it the click of can openers and the aroma of room-temperature legumes. My beans await…

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I had To Go On Living: Stories by Narine Abgaryan on my desk at work the other day when a co-worker stopped by. “That’s a bleak title,” he quipped. I mumbled something in response. I hadn’t quite found the words yet to describe the book. On the jacket, this fictional work is described as a collection of “poignant short stories [that] show how the people of a village ravaged by war pick up the pieces and carry on.” It definitely is this.

But this book is more. Through Abgaryan’s unique approach to storytelling, through her illustrative prose, and through the host of interrelated characters, To Go On Living creates a montage of community survival that is marked by perseverance, compassion, and hope.

The author weaves together these 31 stories (plus epilogue) using a very unique literary approach. Each 4-7 page vignette stands on its own, but when read consecutively, the stories present an intricate meta-narrative. However, it’s not a chronological series of events that connects these tales; it’s the relationships between characters who appear and reappear—and reappear again—from story to story.

For example, a gravedigger known only as Tsatur appears as a peripheral character in the story titled “Merelots.” Then, in the very next story called “Tights,” we meet Mayinants Tsatur in the central role.

In another example, a woman named Antaram is first mentioned briefly in the story “Gulpa,” when the character Khoren confesses, “I couldn’t keep my own daughter, Antaram, safe.” In the very next story, “Rug,” we find that Khoren’s granddaughter, Krnatants Lusine, is getting married and receives a rug as a gift from her groom. It is a rug made by Lusine’s mother, Antaram. The rug, along with Antaram, had both been lost for years, ever since she took it to town for an exhibition during a ceasefire, only to return the next year—her body and her arms in separate bundles. Finally, in “Valley,” we not only learn the name of Lusine’s groom, Karen, we also find him shooting an Azeri (Azerbijani) boy while on watch duty, and subsequently planning to exchange this injured prisoner of war for two Armenian prisoners—or perhaps for one prisoner, plus Antaram’s lost rug, which he has promised to recover for his beloved bride, Lusine, Antaram’s daughter.

This imaginative approach to storytelling is thoroughly engaging. After I recognized Abgaryan’s method, I found myself approaching each story with great expectation, “When will the next character reappear? Who will it be? To whom will they be related, and how?” Beyond its novelty, though, this compelling literary approach also serves to effectively introduce the broad and diverse Armenian community of Berd.

Berd (which also happens to be the author’s actual birthplace) is a rural town on the border of a war. The village is “tiny, no bigger than a pinhead,” as one character describes it, but it’s caught in the middle of a large conflict, the Nagorno-Karabakh War.

When the Soviet Union was collapsing in 1988, ethnic Armenians—who were the majority group living in this region of Azerbaijan—voted to join neighboring Armenia. This sparked ethnic violence between Armenian and Azerbaijani forces, which lasted for six years. Around 30,000 people were killed and a combined number of one million Armenians and Azerbaijanis were displaced. Fighting was renewed in 2020 and escalated again in 2023.

It’s an interesting history, but it’s not at all necessary to know the details of this conflict to appreciate Abgaryan’s stories. That’s because the specific geo-political details do not matter as much as the specific consequences of the war, which are described in brutal and beautiful detail throughout the book.

There’s Ninek, a widow of war, whose baby (her dead husband’s child) also choked and died while under Ninek’s mother’s care. Nevertheless, Ninek “loyally and lovingly” cares for her infirm and unappreciative mother, while carrying her own debilitating grief and pain with “wordless, humble dignity.” As the author observes through another character, “Life has meaning for as long as you have someone to take care of…” is a theme that resonates throughout the book.

There’s twelve-year-old Anna, who is shoved underneath the sofa by her grandmother when soldiers storm into their apartment. From that hiding place, Anna is forced to watch one of the intruders stomp her four-year-old brother to death. Another character editorializes, “The worst thing about death isn’t its existence so much as the fact that it enjoys deforming and humiliating the human body.”

Then there’s Nuzgar, who carried the corpse of his dead brother (murdered by looters) for three days through forests, fields, and rivers so that he could bury him somewhere he could visit, to keep his memory alive. Nuzgar finally arrives at his sister’s home with “a bunch of wild daisies he had picked along the way.” He was out of money, but had been raised to “never to visit people empty-handed.”

Bleak? Definitely. So, then, why would someone want to read To Go On Living? As I read these stories, I found a profound empathy building in my soul, not just for these fictional characters, but for their counterparts in our contemporary world.

I found myself thinking of the everyday struggles of Gazans, caught in a conflict between their own corrupt leaders and neighboring Israel. I thought of the Israelis waiting to find out whether or not their family being held hostage would be returned alive—or dead. I also thought of the Ukrainians, under constant threat of missile strikes, while their children still attend school, and the parents of those children still go to work.

In addition to these lessons in empathy, Abgaryan’s stories have reminded me about the importance of presence with the ones you love. And her characters have modeled attention to the ordinary, and the beauty therein that is everywhere around us, all the time. Even in spite of their ongoing struggles with death—of parents, children, siblings, beloved animals— the residents of war-torn Berd have discovered boundless ways to celebrate life,

“ …admiring the lilac-colored eyes of a young girl; loving a stepson; listening to the sounds of morning through a bedroom window; sharing a huge tray of baklava; mastering the art of rug weaving; feeding crusts of bread to hungry sparrows; composing poetry late into the night with a cup of thyme tea; teasing jokes between life-long friends; being surprised by a stranger; strolling casually through town; tasting sour apples; standing beneath the cypress grove; smelling summer in the canned vegetables…”

Now, if someone inquires about the bleakness of To Go On Living, and the value of such a book, I have a simple (and difficult) answer that’s illustrated in a variety of colorful and poignant ways, through each of Abgaryan’s stories. And this answer is also neatly summed up by the author herself, in the very last sentence of the epilogue:

“Life is fairer than death, and that’s what encapsulates its unbreakable truth. It is necessary to believe this in order to go on living.”

Through fiction, To Go On Living makes the argument that “Life is fairer than death.” And it’s proven to be true, inasmuch as the characters reflect the broad and beautiful capacity of human life, even in times of war.

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I do recommend this book. If it sounds interesting to you, you can find it here, or wherever you like to buy books.

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I thought I’d try exploring this grim reality through a story. And what better time to introduce story of violence than Halloween? Read on… if you dare… [cue: spooky laughter]

In a heavily segregated neighborhood lived a family of five—a young father and his wife, who was the mother of their three little children: a girl, age 9, her brother, age 5, and the youngest, an infant boy.

Across the street from them lived a man who hated this family. He hated them because they had moved into his grandmother’s house—a house in which he had once lived, many years before. It was a house that held fond memories for him. This man had hoped to one day inherit that house and live there himself, but through a variety of unfortunate circumstances he was unable to make it his home. Instead, he lived across the street, in a house that held no memories for him.

This consolation house was large, with many empty rooms. On cold winter evenings, he would crouch for hours in front of the brick fireplace, in his vacant sitting room. He would stare into the blackened recess illuminated by flames, until the logs he’d lit were reduced to embers. Then he would pile on more sticks and poke at those glowing, leftover coals with his fire iron, pushing and pulling with the long curved hook; prodding until the crimson turned orange, then white, re-igniting the blaze.

Standing so close, the heat felt uncomfortable—but comforting; like a friend who understood his pain. This elemental partner’s infernal existence seemed to the man to reflect his feverish thoughts; the thoughts that smoldered inside, quietly volatile, combustible at any moment.

Directly behind his consolation house was a small back-house, which he also owned. Into it was crammed another family of five. A man, a woman, and three young children—about the same age as the three across the street—existed in the tiny, two-room bungalow. They were poor and cramped, but they were doing their best to get by; doing their best to live honorably, despite the unkind and thoughtless actions of the man in the big house, to whom they paid a crushing amount of rent.

One day, without warning, the landlord crossed the street, entered the house that once belonged to his grandmother, pulled out a pistol, and started shooting. He shot twice, killing first, the mother who answered the door, then the eldest, the daughter, as she came down the stairs, lured by the sound.

As the mother and daughter lay bleeding on the floor, the man leapt up the stairs and found the middle son playing with toy trucks next to his baby brother’s bed. He shot again, emptying the gun of bullets. Mindlessly, the murderer retreated in haste to his house, back across the street.

The father of this murdered family was on his way home from work, and so initially escaped the senseless wrath of his neighbor. But only minutes later, he arrived to discover his family was gone. He wept and wailed over their vacant bodies.

Once the father returned to his senses, his sad heart quickly turned cold and grew hard, like a stone. His thoughts slid from sadness, right into revenge. At that vengeful moment, he suddenly noticed the red shoe-prints that started at the foot of his staircase and led outside the front door, across the street to his neighbor’s house. He knew immediately that it was his neighbor who had brought such evil upon his family.

With no hesitation, the father sprinted across the street. He had lost everything, including fear. Also lacking any sense of reason, restraint, or mercy—qualities that were recognized in him before this tragedy—he entered his neighbor’s house and saw the bloody footprints continuing upstairs. Glancing to the right, he noticed the large, empty living room where he spotted an iron poker leaning up against the brick mantle. He grabbed the poker and bounded up the staircase.

One of the doors in the upstairs hallway was slightly ajar, and he saw a dim light coming through the crack, casting a thin yellow shaft across the darkened hallway. He could also hear the sound of a running faucet. Flinging the door wide, he caught the perpetrator off guard and thrust the poker hard into the man’s chest. With this force, the landlord fell back into the bathtub. Then, the father removed the poker with a wrenching twist, extinguishing once and for all the conflagration that had burned white-hot in the murderous neighbor’s bosom for so many years.

But unlike a beating heart, revenge is not so easily extinguished. The father’s anger, now fueled by bloodlust, turned into blind rage. He—who just a day before had been sweetly reading his young children to sleep, and tenderly kissing his wife goodnight—now could not suppress his vengeance.

With the crimson stoker in hand, he exited the back door of the now-dead landlord’s house. Taking up his neighbor’s mantle of murder, the father burst into the back-house and coldly ravaged the poor family who lived inside. The father, the mother, and three young children were all slaughtered, despite being innocent and completely uninvolved in their landlord’s murderous actions. Once victims of poverty and a harsh life, they now, in death, could also claim to be victims of a cruel, unwarranted, and bloody revenge.

Finished, but unsatisfied, the father left the scene of his crime immediately, pausing only to toss the poker high up into an old oak tree. The oak hadn’t been pruned for decades, thus its thicket-like branches were ideal for concealing a murder weapon.

It took a while for the authorities to sort through the mess. It was hard to make sense of it all. There were three separate crime scenes, each with its own set of bodies. The corpses, once accounted for, revealed something truly astonishing. This unexpected revelation was confirmed when the captain heard the cry of a baby, coming from the upstairs of the first house.

Had the infant been in the crib, next to where his older brother was playing with trucks, the landlord would surely have shot him, as well. But the baby was sleeping in his parents’ bedroom, where his mother often left him in the afternoons, in the middle of their queen, safely flanked by two large pillows. This is where the authorities found the child, red-faced and distraught—not from the trauma of the day’s events, but from many hours of neglect.

The infant became a ward of the state for three weeks. That’s how long it took to track down his next of kin, his grandmother, and for her to make the decision to come and take charge of her grandson.

Ignorance is bliss, and having had such an unformed mind and soul at the time of the massacre, the young boy grew up knowing no malice. His grandmother raised him well—despite her grief at the loss of her son’s family, and the pain caused by the horrendous actions of her son-turned-killer. All that unused love she would’ve spent on her son, daughter-in-law, and the other two grandchildren, it was now more than enough to lavish on the boy.

He even felt his grandmother’s love the day she died. He was 18 at the time. She had lived long past what was expected. Her life ended, asleep in the queen, the very same bed in which the captain had found him crying, seventeen years earlier.

Once his grandmother passed, things took a turn. She was no longer there to care for him and shelter him from the wiles of the world. Twenty-four hours had barely passed before a knock came at the door of the house where his grandmother had raised him. It was the handyman. He was the handyman to the boy, anyway. In fact, this man was the real owner of the house.

You see, after the family’s tragic end, no one wanted to live there, and no living will existed to keep it in the family. At auction, the handyman had acquired the house for almost nothing, but instead of living in it, he took pity on the surviving child and his grandmother, kindly allowing them to live there, virtually rent-free.

The handyman would come around often, first to clean up and make repairs after the murders, then for weekly maintenance—to fix a leaky faucet, repair a loose door hinge, or trim the hedges. The boy was just as much in the dark about the house ownership, as he was about his family’s tragic end. He had assumed it belonged to his grandmother and that it would be passed down to him.

This current visit from the handyman cleared all of this up. The boy, now on the doorstep of manhood, would need to find his own way and find another place to live. Having little ambition and even less money, he managed to rent a room in the house across the street. That house was full of renters who would come and go. Every room in the house was occupied by a different person. And the small bungalow—which sat just behind it, beyond the modest yard and towering, old, oak tree—was also filled with a frequently rotating roster of tenants.

The young man managed to get a grant to attend the community college. There, he studied math. It wasn’t long before he found he had a knack for accounting, which naturally led him to a job in finance.

He became quite successful monetarily. And his grandmother had taught him to be frugal. This combination of dogged earning and inexpensive living made him quite rich in a relatively short amount of time. He had soon amassed enough money to accomplish his dream: to buy his parents’ house back from the handyman.

The handyman had been renting the house to a new young couple and he had no reason or interest in moving them out. Though he felt some compassion for the young man, knowing all that had happened to his family those years ago, he still said no, even after he was offered an amount nearly twice the appraised price.

Defeated, the young man, who was now thirty years old, retreated to his consolation house. That’s what it would become after he took the cash that was meant to woo the handyman and used it instead to buy the house in which he had rented a room for 12 years.

He was now a home-owner, and by default, a landlord. The young man set about the task of claiming his new space. It wasn’t long before he booted the renters from the other rooms. He didn’t need the income, and with no family, he found that he preferred to live a quieter existence, undisturbed by transient students, and other such nomads with no real concern about where they lay their head.

For some reason, he did allow a newly married couple to remain in the back-house, figuring they would mostly be out of sight and out of mind. Maybe it was the spirit of his loving grandmother, or the heart of the generous handyman that had imbued a lasting sense of compassion.

Nevertheless, something was happening to his heart. Every day, when he walked out the door of his new house, he saw the old house where he knew he was meant to be. Throughout the day, intrusive thoughts of his displacement kept poking at the smoldering embers in his chest.

To distract himself from this building fire, he spent time tending to the overgrown yard, trimming the weed-ridden grass, and pruning the old oak tree. It took him three weekends to cut out the overgrowth on that arbor. On the third week, while thinning a particularly thick and high part of the tree, he noticed something heavy fall to the ground. It hit the ground with a deep clang, causing him to wonder what, other than a branch, could have shaken loose.

Once back on the ground, he discovered that it was a poker, the kind one uses in a fireplace. It was very dusty and covered in what appeared to be rust. He took it inside to wash it off and found that the crimson oxidation that covered the sharp end was quite thick and took some elbow grease to remove.

At just thirty-nine, he had become a bitter, monkish soul. His daily routine was to go to his office, return to his consolation house, eat scraps of leftovers or nothing at all, and retire to the nearly vacant sitting room of his nearly vacant house.

Every day, his thoughts were consumed with regret. Regret for the family he never knew. Regret for the family he never started. And most of all, regret for his failure to reclaim the house that had once held so many good memories for him.

Why did he care so much about that house? Perhaps it was because he imagined that his parents we the first and only owners. But he wasn’t certain this was true. The house wasn’t new when he was a child, and his parents were very young. Surely, someone must have lived there before his family. Perhaps even another family before that one. And another before that? He didn’t like thinking about this.

The only history that mattered was his. It was the place meant for him. Anywhere else was alien. It felt as if his personhood was tied to that house; like his DNA was in the floorboards and walls. The thought of never returning, which seemed more likely as time went on, was unbearable.

It didn’t help that the young couple in the back-house had spent the last eight years creating their own family, a girl, aged nine, a five-year-old boy, and a newborn, who had just recently arrived. It seemed they had found their place. Their joy was his pain and he punished them for it, charging more and more for that tiny dwelling, despite the fact that he knew their growing family was squeezing their pocketbooks dry.

They were poor and cramped, but they were doing their best to get by; doing their best to live honorably, despite the unkind and thoughtless actions of the man in the big house, to whom they paid a crushing amount of rent.

Meanwhile, every evening their landlord would crouch for hours in front of the brick fireplace, in his vacant sitting room. He would stare into the blackened recess illuminated by flames, until the logs he’d lit were reduced to embers. Then he would pile on more sticks and poke at those glowing, leftover coals with his fire iron, pushing and pulling with the long iron hook; prodding until the crimson turned orange, then white, re-igniting the blaze.

Standing so close, the heat felt uncomfortable—but comforting; like a friend who understood his pain. This elemental partner’s infernal existence seemed to the man to reflect his feverish thoughts; the thoughts that smoldered inside, quietly volatile, combustible at any moment…

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Just Desserts

Wils reluctantly straightened himself and attempted a positive tone. “I’ll take a slice of Devil’s Food Cake. Can you make it a double?”

“By double, I assume you mean two slices?” asked Willa.

“Yes. That’s it,” said Wils.

She turned to Liam, “And you?”

“I have a silly question,” Liam started, the way people do when they are about to be a little high maintenance. “How is your Angel’s Food Cake?” This made Wils crack a smile like probably nothing else would have at that moment.

“Well…” replied Willa, with a pause that suggested what was to follow might not be what he wanted to hear. Then she spoke and surprised them both, “… it’s actually my favorite thing on the menu…”

“Really?” exclaimed Wils, with sincere disbelief.

Liam cut in, “That’s great! I mean… Good,” toning down his over-eagerness. I’ve always wanted to try Angel’s Food Cake, but it’s just never quite… felt like the right time.”

“To be completely honest, it’s not really popular with the customers,” confessed Willa. “But I think that’s probably just because most demons feel a little weird ordering it. In my opinion, I think it’s a solid choice. I think you’ll love it.”

“Awesome. Then, yes!” said Liam, a little louder than he had intended.

“Make it a double?” Willa suggested.

“Uh… no, no. One slice should be enough. I don’t wanna get sleepy. We still have a long shift to ahead of us,” said Liam with resolve, but also with a whiff of disappointment.

“Now, look at that!” announced Willa, matching Liam’s loud tone and to no one in particular, “He’s already acting like an Angel!” She turned away to the kitchen once again and left Liam blushing, though you wouldn’t have known, on account of his naturally rouged skin. Looking on, Wils was still cracking a smile.

They sat in silence staring out the window at the unfinished sign and the large letters: T-R-U. If not TRUth-tellers or TRUckers, then what? TRUculent TRUants? TRUceless TRUstees? Whatever it was, this TRUncated gate sign was TRUly TRUbling. (Though they loved word games, demons weren’t always the best spellers.)

A minute later, Willa was back with their cake. The demon diner was still hella busy, which made it seem a little odd that she had returned to their table so quickly. It was becoming clear that she felt an affinity for these fiends. She balanced both plates of cake on her left arm and held a half-full pot of coffee in her right hand. Effortlessly easing the plates onto the table, she announced, “Devil’s Food for you and… Angel’s Food for you…”

Liam took a bite of that Angel’s Food cake as soon as the plate stopped moving. He closed his eyes and focused on the flavor. It was light and pleasantly spongy. The airy, subtly sweet crumb was topped with smooth whipped cream that was also not too sweet, but had a hint of vanilla. It was obvious to Wils—and to Willa—that Liam was enjoying his dessert.

Wils dug into his Devil’s Food, a dessert he had ordered literally a million times. It was also good, but Wils had become immune to its richness. He was actually feeling pretty envious as he looked across the table at Liam’s disappearing angelic dessert. Willa seemed a bit envious, too. Liam noticed and shyly offered her a bite, “Would you… would you like to try?”

She hesitated at first, “Um…” hesitating, as she topped off their coffees. Then she grinned and said, “Sure.” As Wils and Liam went for their mugs to wash down the cake, Willa pulled a clean fork from her apron pocket and took a meaningful bite of Liam’s Angel’s Food cake. Almost immediately she made a loud and unexpected sound, “Mmm!”

Wils and Liam looked up at her with surprise. Wils figured she probably hadn’t eaten since the start of her shift and was happy to be having even just a bite of cake, “Its good, is it?”

Liam wasn’t thinking about her hunger. He was thinking about the shape of her lips as she tasted the cake and he was noticing the corners of her mouth that turned up in a subtle smile.

“Mmm!!!” With her mouth still full, Willa made that sound again, this time a little louder while also pointing out the window at the gate. They all turned to behold the fourth letter of the gate-sign title. It was the letter M.

And All That Jazz

All three demons stared in silence. Now it had become pretty obvious to everyone what word was to be set above this gate. The options, at least in English, were very limited. T-R-U-M… They all were certain they had solved the puzzle. Willa was first to speak, “I dated one once,” she paused, then continued, “It figures there’d be a gate just for them.”

Wils was perplexed, while Liam sat there confused about why this made him feel a little jealous. Wils said to her, “You dated one? How was it?”

“Oh, it started off nice, but it was hell in the end,” Willa explained.

Shaking himself out of it, Liam asked, “But wait. I don’t understand. Which one did you date?” In addition to his feelings, he was also confused about the details of this mysterious relationship. Liam felt she owed him some kind of explanation, even though the only thing they had ever shared was a bite of Angel’s Food cake.

“I doubt you’d know him,” Willa replied, “unless you’re into jazz. But I think this gate is probably not just for him, but for the whole lot of them.”

Wils was literally and metaphorically on the edge of his seat, “And…?”

“You know, all the TRUMpeters,” Willa said, matter-of-factly.

This is not what Liam or Wils had been thinking. She continued, “I think it has to do with their lifestyle… always traveling, late nights, drugs all around… and the women…”

“So, you dated a—trumpeter?” asked Liam.

“Yes. Worst decision of my eternal life.”

Wils joined in, “Yeah, I could see it. I mean, jazz musicians, you know?” It was the kind of dangling question that was meant to sound competent, but also really meant nothing. “Plus,” he continued, “isn’t there a long tradition of musicians selling their souls to the Devil in exchange for musical success?”

“Oh yes,” Willa jumped in. “Everything they do is for the music. Music, music, music. No time for their girl. Never even a few moments for a stroll in the park or an evening off for nice dinner out. Always a gig or a rehearsal or some meeting with a producer. Half the time I wondered if he really was at those rehearsals, or if he was actually out somewhere with another woman. And then there was the drugs.”

Wils and Liam nodded their heads gently in synchronized agreement, while still wondering how they had been so off. TRUMpeters was not what they had imagined the sign would say.

Time to Pay

The time had come for paying the bill. Willa reached into her apron pocket again, this time pulling out a paper with a few scribbles and numbers at the bottom. She placed it in the middle of the table. Wils reached for it with T-Rex arms, like some mooching Mephistopheles. Liam was familiar with this move and ignored it, swiping up the check and pairing it with the cash he had already pulled from his own pocket.

“Here you are,” Liam said, as he handed Willa the money.

She could sense the pride Liam took in his gesture and after she counted up the cash, she sensed his generosity in the considerable tip. “Thank you! Now, will you boys be sticking around for the rest of the sign, or is it time to go back to work?”

“I think we’ll hang out and sip our coffee until the final quake,” suggested Wils, “if you don’t mind us taking up space in your section.”

“That would be more than fine,” said Willa, “Looks like the lunch crowd is already on their way out anyway.” Willa turned and left to put the money in the till.

After a beat, Wils asked, “Whad’ya say, Liam?”

Liam nodded in agreement, but was still distracted by the revelation of Willa’s dating history.

So, the two demons sat and stared silently into their mugs. Both were thinking about all the T-words they had previously guessed. Terrorists, Truckers, Transvestites (ah hem, Transgender folks), Truth-tellers… Never in a million years would either of them have guessed Trumpeters. It did make sense though. Music had apparently succeeded in leading more humans down the path to Hell than many of the other, more-obviously-crooked vices.

Without thinking, Wils began drumming on the table with his hoove-hands. It was a slow, lilting beat with a swing. Even with no melody, one could imagine Cab Calloway singing the blues…

Folks, here's a story 'bout Minnie the Moocher
She was a red hot hoochie-coocher
She was the roughest, toughest frail
But Minnie had a heart as big as a whale

Liam lifted the sole spoon that remained on the table and joined the impromptu jazz fest, working out a complimentary syncopated swing on the edge of his coffee mug.

After a round or two of their tabletop 12-bar blues, the earth began to shake. Neither of them noticed at first, thinking the low rumble was part of their devilish drumming. As the shaking grew in intensity, they both realized it was time to return to work.

Just then, Willa appeared at the table to say goodbye. As they rose from the table, they glanced out the window with no real intention, but what they saw shocked them all. They had expected the gate-sign crew to be finishing up the sign, adding the final letters: E-T-E-R-S. Instead, the letter-hangers of Hell were completely gone. The ladders, tools, and box truck had all vanished from the scene.

“Well… I’ll be damned,” whispered Wils. Liam and Willa just stared.

Only the five-letters remained, garish and gleaming in the light of Hell, like the marquee atop some yuge casino. In fact, this word is already quite familiar with the tops of buildings. Of course, affixing it to the top of a gate in Hell was definitely a first.

The word’s ostentatious appearance and everlasting nature would surely be judged as “winning” by all those incredible people who were destined to inhabit this hot hotel. Grifters, swindlers, blackmailers, cheaters, and some of the best liars you’ve ever met, would all soon be checking-in to enjoy the flaming games of whack-a-mole and all the other “great” (and hellish) amenities one could imagine. The experience was bound to be tremendous. And also, sad.

THE END

Afterward

This short story was inspired by a phrase the late Pope Francis wrote as part of the Stations of the Cross, which was read during a Mass held on Good Friday at the Colosseum in Rome—only three days before the Pope’s own death on April 21, 2025.

That phrase, “Theirs is the construction site of Hell,” resonated in my brain and prompted my imagination to create a scenario in which the They of “Theirs…” were not only constructing a site in hell, but They were also the ones who would eventually inhabit that place of their own making.

Who are They? According to Francis, it is the “mighty” who are the builders of the “construction site of Hell.” They avoid taking up the cross of Jesus (a necessary and orthodox tenet of Christianity) and instead they “desire to grasp at heaven.”

The mighty tell us “there is no room for losers” and that those who fall along the way (as Jesus did while carrying his cross) are the losers.

In contrast, Francis says that “God’s economy” builds the opposite. It does not crush the weak, or find interest in power, but instead “cultivates, repairs, and protects.” Those who follow the way of the cross are working alongside Jesus on a different project. The are builders on the construction site of Heaven.

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You can read an excerpt from the Pope’s Third Station: Jesus Falls for the First Time below, or read it in the larger context here.

Even the way of the cross is traced close to the earth. The mighty withdraw from it; they desire to grasp at heaven. Yet heaven is here below; it hangs low, and we can encounter it even when we fall flat on the ground. Today’s builders of Babel tell us that there is no room for losers, and that those who fall along the way are losers. Theirs is the construction site of Hell. God’s economy, on the other hand, does not kill, discard or crush. It is lowly, faithful to the earth. Your way, Jesus, is the way of the Beatitudes. It does not crush, but cultivates, repairs and protects.

Excerpt from: MEDITATIONS AND PRAYERS FOR THE VIA CRUCIS 2025 WRITTEN BY THE HOLY FATHER FRANCIS

Palatine Hill
Good Friday, 18 April 2025

Truckers & Transvestites

“Well! Would you look at that…” said Liam with a triumph-tinged tone. “The second letter is not an E. It’s an R!”

“An R. Yes, right.” Wils was a little embarrassed having been so sure of the E. He thought it best to move right along to guessing what the R might mean and avoid any chance for Liam to belabor the point of his error. “TR… doesn’t really suggest too many options. It’s gotta be TRuckers.”

“Whaa-t?” Liam was puzzled.

“Oh yes. Latest estimates confirm that medium and heavy-duty truck transport accounts for almost 25% of all greenhouse gas emissions,” bragged Wils, as if he had done the research to arrive at this statistic.

“And how in the hell do you know that?” asked Liam.

“I’m smart.”

“We’ve established that.”

“Plus, I overheard a trucker in Sector Five the other day.” Wils was attempting to bolster his believability.

“Sector Five? You mean MURDERERS gate?” questioned Liam.

“That’s right. I guess the trucker was officially sent here for that. You know, one of those Dateline serial hitchhiker killers. But still…”

“I’m just gonna say it,” interrupted Liam. “It’s NOT truckers.”

Wils really wasn’t convinced by his own suggestion, either. It was just the first TR word he could think of. As Willa swung by to drop off their coffees, Wils had a new flash of inspiration. “Then it’s probably TRansvestites,” he paused as if considering the validity of this new guess. “Of course. Yes. It’s so obvious when you think about it.”

Liam was surprised, “You know that’s considered an offensive term, right? No one says transvestite anymore.”

“And I suppose you’ll also be offended if I dub you the ‘Demon of Wokeness’ now?” chuckled Wils.

“Ha—ha. Call me whatever you want. The preferred term these days is Transgender. And that goes beyond just cross-dressing, by the way. To the larger point, though, what are trans folks guilty of besides simply identifying with a gender other than the one they were assigned at birth?”

“Exactly!” said Wils, as if Liam had just made his point for him. “It’s an abomination, as THEY1 say—to forsake one’s obvious and god-given nature for a lie.”

“You know, Wils, if you put it that way, you and I are really not that different from transgender folks.”

“I am NOT trans!” Now Wils was offended.

“No, but you were—we were—created to worship the LORD and look at us now.”

Wils was speechless. First of all, they weren’t supposed to mention that Name. Second of all, Liam was right.

Liam continued, “But actually, I would frame the whole thing a little differently. I think there’s a big difference between demons and trans folks.”

“You better believe there is,” declared Wils with a paranoid tone.

“The difference is, when we stormed out of Heaven with the rest of the antichrists, we betrayed our god-given nature. We could’ve stayed and worshiped, but we chose to leave.”

“Uh-huh,” Wils was tracking so far.

“But trans folks are actually being true to their god-given nature. The gender that feels most right to them is in conflict with their external biology. And to ignore what they know deep down to be true for them would mean choosing to live a lie. Instead, trans folks choose the harder, but ultimately more rewarding road that leads to them being their most authentic selves. They are actually becoming more like who they were created to be—not less. This makes non-binary folks fit for Heaven, not for some sub-region of Sheol.

“Non-binary? You really have gone woke,” Wils apparently only heard the part that he wanted to hear. Lucky for him, Willa arrived at that moment to deliver their lunch.

Lies Trump Truth

“Anything else I can get you two?” she asked.

“Can I buy a vowel?” joked Liam, seeking some levity. Though he believed his own words, it made him uncomfortable to think about how transgender folks were closer to God than he would ever be.

“A vowel?” Willa was puzzled for a brief moment. Then she got it. “Oh! You’re talking about the sign. Yeah, I’ve been wondering about that.”

“Then maybe we should ask you!” Wils meant this as a joke, too.

Then Liam turned the joke around into a real request, “So… Willa, is it? Willa, we’ve got a T and an R on the board… Who do you think this new Gahenna ghetto is being constructed for? TRuckers or TRansgender folks?”

Willa suddenly erupted with a laugh, like when you sneeze unexpectedly and accidentally spit a little bit. “Nooo!” she laughed. “Definitely neither of those!” She gracefully covered her mouth with one hand, attempting to stifle another giggle-snort. After a few seconds, she gathered herself and said, “But… I do think the next letter is U.”

“A U? asked Wils, sincerely curious. “Ok. So if you’re right, but it’s not TRUckers, then, what?”

Willa paused for dramatic effect, then smiled and said, “… I’ll be back to check on you,” as she spun round and was on to the next table. Things had gotten even busier in the diner.

Liam was intrigued. “I’ll bet there’s a story behind that.”

“She’s a tease. Never trust a female demon,” Wils added, with a hint of seriousness that suggested he knew what he was talking about. Then he took one look at the platter of a dozen Deviled Eggs (that’s six eggs, halved) and slid them down his gullet like spoiled oysters on the half-shell. They were very rotten and very delicious, at least from a demonic perspective.

Meanwhile, Liam dug into his sandwich. The finely chopped ham had a faint smokiness (there weren’t many things in Hell, food included, that didn’t have a faint smokiness to them) and it was mixed with just the right amount of nose-tingling horseradish mustard. That combination, along with the Hot Cheetos, made Liam cry real tears. Liam really liked that feeling of the moisture around his eyes and the drops rolling haltingly down his cheeks.

Even though these tears were not connected to a real emotion, Liam secretly pretended he was feeling bad about something. It may be hard for a non-demon to understand, but being unable to truly feel sadness made Liam feel, well… sad. Or whatever feeling demons are allowed to feel that approximates sadness.

Finishing his last rotten egg, Wils felt filled with whatever demonic feeling approximates joy. Then looking up, he suddenly shouted, “YOU!”

Startled out of his imaginary sadness and wiping away the tears that had been accumulating in his demon ducts, Liam looked back at Wils and asked, “Me?”

“No, U!” repeated Wils as he pointed out the window. Above the gate, they now could read three letters: T-R-U.

“Maybe it is TRUckers after all,” Liam admitted, reaching for another handful of Cheetos and hoping he still had some cry left in him.

“I have another idea,” Wils said. “And it’s a good one.”

“What’s that?” Liam said with genuine interest, scooting forward to the edge of the sweaty vinyl seat.

Wils continued, “You’re going to like it. I can’t believe I didn’t think of this before. But now that the U has been revealed, I’m certain I know the name of this new gate.”

Liam was getting a little anxious, “What? What is it? Tell me!”

Wils was intentionally stringing Liam along, building up the anticipation in hopes that it would lend weight and authority to his words. “This section of Hell is being built for… TRUTH-TELLERS.”

Liam shrunk back in his seat and sat silent.

“Not lying,” Wils added, trying to prompt a response.

Liam finally spoke, “I don’t think I’ve ever seen a gate with a hyphenated title.”

“Really?!” responded Wils. “Why does that matter? Maybe this is going to be the first one? Anyway, think of all the truth-tellers on the surface who are trying to ruin the plans of Hell. You know that one of our best strategies for finally winning the world is lies. And of course the Devil, he’s the Father of Lies. Don’t you think he’d like to see all those honest humans on fire for all eternity?”

“Interesting thought, Wils.” As usual, Liam was trying to be encouraging, even though he utterly disagreed. Liam continued, “But… it’s actually the other way around. Don’t you remember that old children’s rhyme that goes, ‘Li-ar, li-ar—pants on fi-re!’? He uncomfortably mimicked the sing-songy tone of a bully on the playground.

“Of course I know that rhyme,” answered Wils, as he proceeded to quietly chant the rhyme to himself.

“Well… it’s the liars who burn in Hell, Wils. Not the truth-tellers.”

“I don’t follow,” puzzled Wils.

Liam tried explaining it another way, “You know how the Son of God says, ‘I am the way, the truth, and the life…’? If God’s Son is ‘truth’ then how on Earth (or in Heaven or Hell) could THEY justify sending truth-tellers here?”

“I see what you’re getting at,” said Wils, appearing to concede Liam’s point.

Liam went on, “You know those so-called rogue politicians who are finally starting to call out the deception of the earthly governments and their corrupt leaders? Unfortunately for us, they are already experiencing the Kingdom of God, and that’s spelled: H-E-A—V-E-N. I don’t think truth-tellers are going anywhere but up.”

Liam’s explanation really got to Wils. Not only had he thought he’d finally guessed the gate name, he was also invested in the idea the liars trump truth-tellers. After all, watching human society for thousands of years, this was so often the case.

Wils and Liam had seen it over and over again. Those in power lie and lie and lie. Then they lie about the lies. Before long, everyone loses track of the truth, even the corrupt leaders themselves. Repeat a lie enough times and it becomes the truth. Evil kings and authoritarians are word witches and lies are what they use stitch their spells together. The sorcery of their half-truth hexes binds society with an almost unbreakable enchantment.

Liam was right. Truth-tellers were not Hell-bound. That would be the greatest lie.

As Wils slumped back in the booth and sulked, Willa returned to the table. “Any room for dessert, fellas?”

T—R—U… what letter comes next? Maybe it’s not what you think. Will Liam and Wils have room for a slice of Devil’s Food cake?

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FOOTNOTES

It ended up being long enough to share in three installments. Everyone likes a good cliff-hanger, right?

I don’t want to give too much away for fear of spoiling it, so at the end of Part 3, I’ll share more about where the inspiration initially came from and why it captured my attention.

Meanwhile, please enjoy Part 1…

Soundtrack of Sheol

From where they stood, they could see a duo of diggers, each with a giant claw suspended on an enormous extended arm that clacked and clanked obnoxiously as it was raised, imitating the vibration of a decrepit, ascending rollercoaster. Against the dim light of a thousand fires, the shovels’ silhouettes looked like ancient reptilians nosing at the steaming ground as they excavated the earth (below the earth).

To their left, huge tilted vats containing a mixture of limestone, clay, and hot coals were rotating. From each of these hundred or so tumblers came the sound like a roaring lion. The din of this pride was deafening. Thankfully, demons are impervious to such ear-damaging decibels. Having been in the presence of God eons ago, where the sound of heavenly praise is like eternal thunder, fallen angels still maintain their ability to dampen acoustic vibrations.

It’s funny—people think those horns are just a ghastly decoration meant to manufacture horror. Fear is definitely a side-effect, but those hardened outgrowths are really part of a complex auditory system. (Yes, proper angels have horns, too. They’re just more fastidious about keeping them neatly trimmed.)

To the their right, idling dump trucks were backed up along a winding road that disappeared into rising embers and distant smog. There must have been 500 trucks or more, brimming with the essential building blocks of Hell—magma, pyroclastic rock, cinders, and ash. Their puttering motors were like a chorus of giant box fans that had been clogged with dust and dirt over time; consistently rhythmic, but with intermittent interruptions.

And of course, continuing steadily just beneath the noise of the machinery, was the steady soundtrack of wretched moans and muted, guttural screams.

While the sound of Hell’s construction didn’t bother the demons’ ears, it did make it impossible to have a conversation. They could exchange smirks and knowing glances as they went about their mundane jobs, but meaningful discussions had to be reserved for the irregularly scheduled coffee breaks.

Most demons found this limited communication to be frustrating. Despite what humans think they know about Hell, it’s actually quite a dynamic environment where even those souls enduring eternal torment (and especially their captors) still care about important issues—things like the rising price of rotten eggs, the road to Hell’s need for re-pavement, and climate change. (If you think global warming is raising temperatures on earth’s surface, just think how hot things are getting down below.)

While they waited for the next pause, the demons went about their jobs. Today, these two demons were assigned to random-fire duty. They were dropping blast caps into the ground holes at random intervals. The floor of Hell is riddled with millions of holes, each about a foot in diameter. Like satanic Swiss cheese, these holes lead to a vast system of tunnels that wind around and connect to other holes that could be located in an entirely different region of Hell, thousands of miles away. Or they may connect to a hole just a few feet away.

There’s no way to tell where the fire will appear until a demon drops their detonator into the dark, earthen orifice and some “innocent” bystander is singed by the leaping flames that emerge from the connected hole miles or meters away.

Such is the entertainment of Hell.

Wicked Wheel of Fortune

While these incendiary incubi went about diligently dropping their detonators, they stood facing the future entrance to a brand new nether-region. As with all damned developments, this one was to have a sign fastened to the steel frame above the gated entrance.

Now, everyone’s familiar with the famous main-gate inscription as described by Danté: Abandon hope, all ye who enter here.1 [rollover, tap, or click number to read footnotes] But the subdivision gates of Hell are much more specific. For example, some gate signs describe the type of sinner sentenced to that region, like: “IDOLATORS,” “RAPISTS,” or “THIEVES.”

Other gates display earthly occupations that encompass and promote a variety of sins, such as: “LAWYERS,” “POLITICIANS,” and “BARBERS.” (It’s a lesser known, yet verifiable fact, that haircuts have had an inordinate influence on bad human behavior throughout the ages. Have you seen Caligula’s high bangs?)

And there are gates with the specific names of persons above them, too. These proper-name gates designate an area that is both for incarcerating a particular individual who committed heinous atrocities, and also for all those admirers who were motivated to sin by the named-one’s actions. These gate signs include names such as: “NERO,” “ATTILA,” and of course, the most notorious “HITLER” gate.

The question that was literally right in front of these two demons today as they worked their wages of sin, was: What word will be hung on the arch above the entrance to this brand new section of Hell? Like wicked Wheel of Fortune contestants, they highly anticipated the alphabetical reveal. And their excitement ballooned when they saw a box truck roll up with the “Satan’s Signs” logo painted on its side.

As they watched the gate-sign ghouls open up the rear door of the truck, the earth began to shake violently. No one was alarmed at this—except in the sense that earthquakes in Hell typically function as an alarm—part of the netherworld notification system. Such tremors usually indicate the end of a shift, or a worker break—and in extremely rare cases, the death of the Son of God. This time it meant lunch.2

Eager to eat and chat, our demons were the first to enter the pop-up diner that had been brought to this edge of Hell by some enterprising evil spirit. They chose one of the red booths by the window where they had a clear view of the naked gate. As they scooted in across the garish vinyl seats, they noticed the first letter of the satanic subdivision was already being hoisted up onto the frame above the gate entrance…

“The letter T! I knew it!” exclaimed Wils, who was a typical demon in many respects. He was prideful, cynical, and possessed a general lack of empathy, not to mention the kind of mean-spirit you’d expect from a son of Satan.

“And… you knew that how?” replied Liam. Liam, on the other hand, was rather optimistic. He was simple, which lent him an air of innocence—a rare quality among demons. Most of the time, Liam’s words and actions came surprisingly close to approaching “goodness,” or they were at least circling the neighborhood.

“I knew because I’m smart!” Wils blurted out.

“Yes. And also humble,” affirmed Liam with gentle sarcasm.

A Billion Williams

Wils and Liam had not always been known by these names. In fact, personal names for devils were technically not allowed by the capital ‘D’ Devil.3 You see, of the 777 trillion angels God originally created, 666 billion rebelled against him and were thrown out of Heaven along with their fearsome leader. Instead of rewarding his followers for forsaking the LORD and fleeing Heaven with him, the Devil decided to further humiliate the hoards by replacing their Heavenly names with numbers, as if they were inhabitants of some god-forsaken Salvadoran correctional facility.

Formerly honorable appellations, such as Gabriel and Michael, were reduced to meaningless digits. One Raphael became 665,855,302,222. A Uriel became 9,031—and so on. And as a nod to Satan’s favorite super-terrestrial hell, Auschwitz, the Devil had these number-names tattooed on their arms, so that demon 665,855,302,222 could not be confused with demon 665,855,302,221.

This was not only demeaning, it was also complicated. But being resourceful little monsters, right around 3 million H.E. (three million years into the Hell Era) some demons came up with a secret naming system. One particularly smart hellhound (originally called Remiel) had met a poor soul named William along the way who had arrived from the surface, destined for eternal damnation (something about torturing kittens).

After some interaction with this William, Remiel learned that a nickname for William is “Bill,” a very respectable name—which also happens to function as shorthand for billion. Remiel started calling his friend “5 Bill” for short. (5 Bill was formerly known as: 5,755,443,108). When 5 Bill was in the company of another demon with a number-name in the 5 billions, he became 5.7 Bill and so on.4

As more and more Bills emerged, they were delighted to realize that William has a lot of other variations, too, including: Will, Willie, Wils, Wim, Billy, Liam, Guy, and Gill. Demons—at least the ones with number-names in the billions5—started choosing from these nicknames for themselves. As a result, nine-figure numbers or proper names with preceding digits, might not even be necessary to address all those in present company at any given time. Such is the case with our diner demons.

Word On the Steaming Asphalt

Back in the diner booth, Liam6 continued, “If you’re so smart, Wils7, then what letter do you think comes next?”

“After the T? After the T? Wils was stalling by restating the question. “Well… that’s easy... It’s… It’s got to be… the letter… E.”

“TE? For what, then? TEachers? TEamsters? TEch Bros?” Liam was stretching the limits of his brute brain.

“No. TE for ‘TErrorists,’ of course,” said Wils with an obviously overblown sense of self-regard.

Liam thought about this for a minute. “But there’s already a gate called TERRORISTS. You’ve seen it, right? It’s just east of Devil’s Fork, closer to the Lake of Fire.”

“Nah, Liam, you’re thinking of BIN LADEN gate,” replied Wils, trying very hard not to sound condescending—though it wasn’t working. These two were long-time fiends and though they were known to argue from time to time, ultimately, they were very close—as close as evil angels could be.

“Oh, right. I—suppose that’s specifically reserved for ISIS,” said Liam, mustering a more confident tone.

“Pre-cisely,” replied Wils, with the accent of an Oxford professor.

A moment or two of silence passed as they thought about what other kinds of terrorists might exist. Meanwhile, a waitress dropped off a couple menus without stopping or slowing her pace. After only a few weeks, this diner had become a real hot-spot and was always immediately filled on the heels of an earthquake.

Mindlessly flipping over the large, laminated menu, Liam asked Wils, “So… if you’re right that this new nether-region will be for terrorists—but it’s not ISIS—who exactly do you think will live here?”

Wils curtly declared, “Clearly, it’s immigrants. Word on the steaming asphalt is that immigrants are all gang members… and everyone knows that gang members only live for one thing: causing terror.”

“So—domestic terrorists, then?” questioned Liam.

“No, definitely not domestic,” asserted Wils. “That would imply they belong in the country. I’ve heard that immigrants, at least the ones in America, will never be legitimate citizens. They belong back in their own land, causing terror among their own kind.”

Liam thought this didn’t quite sound fair. “But…” he paused for a long time, “… what about the immigrants who are not gang members? Surely they can’t all have committed crimes. What about the ones who only left their country fleeing persecution and looking for a better life for their family? And what if they’ve become productive—even necessary—members of their adopted society?”

Wils wasn’t convinced. “Send ‘em all to Hell, I say. There’s no time for sorting out who’s who and who’s done what—or not done whatever. Better and more expedient to just deport them all—no due process needed or habeus corpus required. To their country of origin first… then straight to Hell!”

“Ok, so maybe I agree that they should be deported, but sending them to Hell seems rather harsh—especially for the non-gang affiliated.”

“Ah Liam…” Wils said fondly and a bit dreamily, “You’re cute with your attempts at compassion. Better if we stick with what we know. Where’s your heartless indifference gone? Have you totally lost it? I say, let ‘em burn.”

Just then, the waitress appeared at their booth. “Hi. I’m Willa and I’ll be taking care a you today. What’ll it be for you two?”8

“Definitely coffee,” started Wils, flipping the menu over, “And—how are your Deviled Eggs?”

“We’re actually known for them,” replied the waitress.

“And would you say they’re sufficiently rotten?” Wils inquired.

“Oh yes. But I can ask the cook to add extra sulfur if you like,” she offered.

“That’d be great,” said Wils, before preempting her next question, “Also, about that coffee... black as night and super hot, if you wouldn’t mind.”

“We’re also known for our tongue-singeing coffee,” Willa proudly announced.

“Delightful,” he replied.

Willa turned to Liam, “And you?”

“I think I’ll have… the Deviled Ham sandwich with a side of Flaming Hot Cheetos. Please and thank you,” said Liam.

“My, what a polite demon,” said Willa, a hint of surprise in her voice. “Coffee for you, too, hun?”

“Yes, please. Though, I take mine with a splash of sour milk,” Liam said.

“You got it.” Willa quickly turned and disappeared into the kitchen. Meanwhile, the two demons returned their focus to the large window for an update on the gate-sign show. The second letter had been placed while they were busy ordering…

What will the second letter of the gate-sign be? Do you think the waitress will play a more pivotal role in the story? Will the Deviled Eggs have enough sulfur for Wils?

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FOOTNOTES

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ICYMI, you can read Part I here:

“I am Erica,” she whispered to herself as she stood looking out of the floor-to-ceiling window that faces her backyard. “I am… Erica.”

Since she was a child, she would speak this emergency mantra any time she felt in need of reassurance. The self-identification grounded her. It was a simple way of reasserting her identity when things felt out of control and it always brought with it a sense of security. She needed that now.

What she witnessed as she looked outside was not promoting security in any sense… except maybe literally. And her feelings were only amplified in contrast to how she felt at her wedding ceremony, which had taken place just 12 hours earlier…

Following their November engagement, they had wasted no time choosing a winter ceremony. When January 20th arrived, she was the model of a blushing bride. Not a virgin, to be sure, but she had never felt this way before.

They moved the ceremony inside last-minute, due to the potentially “dangerous” temperatures that were forecast. While this limited the seating, it was very nice for the bride, groom, and guests (who could make it inside) to not have to wear hats and gloves. Still, many guests who were originally invited were now unable to attend.

The bride played her part, as expected. She was a picture of grace—the perfect balance of tradition and openness to the future. After her solemn and thoughtful vows, the groom made his vows with the expected bombast.

Erica First?

His comments started off on a positive note as he slid the wedding band on her finger and announced it would be a “golden era” for them both. As he went on, it soon became obvious that these were less vows and more like an oddly misplaced speech.

The bride was the focus of his remarks, to be sure, but his words took on a strange tone as he continued. “Erica,” he said, “would soon be greater, stronger and far more exceptional than ever before.”

As she stood there in front of him—and in front of all their guests—she felt confused. His love for her was evident, especially if she took his words at face value. However, there was an underlying tone (she wondered if anyone else noticed this) that implied how broken he thought she was now. All his lauding of her character seemed focused on the future Erica, rather than celebrating who she was at this moment in time.

Nevertheless, his obsessive faith in making her “great again” might have been flattering, had it not been for the fact that he appeared to be vesting all the credit for her emerging greatness in himself.

Then there was the crudeness with which he ended his longwinded monologue-masquerading-as-vows, saying that his Erica project would commence that very evening when in their bed he would “drill, baby, drill!” But rather than engendering shock, his closing comment sparked smiles and some light (perhaps nervous) chuckles, even as his bride felt her cheeks flushing and her insides tightening.

No Climate Change

Most of the bride’s friends had grown used to his hyperbole and rambling narratives. Many of them didn’t bat an eye, although there were a handful of guests who felt the only thing comfortable about the climate in that room was the physical temperature.

Inexplicably, the bride also gave her groom more latitude and grace than she would have any other sharp-tongued fellow who spoke of her with such self-aggrandizing swagger and disrespect.

It was as if the room that was sheltering the guests and wedding party from the bitter winter elements was also sheltering them from their own rational thoughts—thoughts that would have most certainly also been bitter, had the guests allowed them to exist.

But instead of flooding that space with disgust, the groom’s comments invaded the room with a palpable, yet wholly unwarranted, sense of hope. One thing everyone could agree upon: this was a union for the ages, a marriage that would be remembered and talked about for generations—even if for all the wrong reasons.

The day after the ceremony, Erica had awakened with more verve and optimism than she could ever remember. Her husband was already up and gone. She figured he was in his home office working. This wasn’t surprising to her. What was surprising was that she had no recollection of “drilling,” to use his term.

“It must have been the champagne,” she thought, stretching her legs beneath the covers. She did recall reaching for a flute every time the roving servers passed by with a tray. She resolved to trust and believe that their marriage bed had been a worthy kick-off of this golden era which lie ahead—even though the only thing she could actually recall of this morning was his pre-dawn snoring.

Before he was married to her, he had been married to his work—and this was no secret to anyone. Still, she did wish that on the morning after their wedding he would have at least lingered in bed for just a while, putting his lips to her before putting them to them to work making deals. Shrugging it off, she decided that putting a coffee mug to her lips might be the best idea.

Future Cemented

As she strode, smiling, toward the kitchen, she felt a low rumble that stopped her in her tracks. The sound appeared to be coming from outside. She went to the front window and parted the curtains to behold a cement truck that had been backed into the driveway.

The giant drum on the back of the truck was noisily rotating as a worker guided the flow of thick, gray cement out of the back, down the discharge chute, and into a large, waiting, wheel barrow. As the barrow filled, she saw another worker walk up and turn it away from the truck, running it down the side of her house.

“Aha!” she beamed, “He’s ordered the construction of our pool and gazebo so it will be ready for spring!” Her husband had said that he would be getting many important things done on “day one,” and apparently he meant it. Even the very day after their wedding ceremony, he was already at work fulfilling his promises! For one joyful moment, her heart swelled with love.

Her backyard (now their backyard) was a full acre. It was far from a royal land-holding, but in this suburban residential context it felt enormous. She had purchased the lot and considerable house with her own money, when she was just a young woman. Her early career success afforded her the independence to acquire this impressive dwelling, and she had spent the intervening years lovingly turning it into a comfortable home.

But she had never gotten around to the backyard. It remained an undeveloped placeholder for her hopes and dreams. And what she had always dreamt of was to turn that sprawling backyard into an oasis for family, friends, and neighbors. She imagined a large pool where neighborhood children could come and swim, with an adjacent gazebo where parties could be held. She even imagined that children from beyond the cornfield might come and have a chance to feel the freedom and joy they might not often experience in their own neighborhoods.

Forgetting her coffee, she jogged with anticipation down the long central hall, which lead to the great room that ran along the entire backside of the east wing of her house. The south-facing wall of this room was almost entirely made of glass. This provided radiant light that warmed her living space thoroughly, even in the dead of winter.

Normally, the massive windows also provided an unobstructed view. Standing there, one could see her undeveloped yard and the cornfields beyond that, which acted as a picturesque and natural border for the edge of her property.

Beyond the Cornfields

Not only that, before today you could even see beyond the cornfields, glimpsing neighborhoods further south—the ones out of which she imagined those eager and needy children might emerge one day, when her oasis was complete.

Her imagination was not unfounded. It was about five years ago now when standing at the window in this very same spot, she saw two figures just in front of the last row of cornstalks. They were not moving and one of them appeared to be holding a large basket. Without really considering who these people might be, or whether or not it was safe, her curiosity got the best of her. She walked out into the backyard and across the overgrown grass to the edge of her property.

As she approached the cornfield, she could see it was a woman, perhaps about her age, and a child—a girl. The woman smiled and said something in Spanish. The girl, who appeared to be about ten or eleven, translated: “Would you like some tamales?” Erica bought twenty tamales that day, without any thought about who would eat them all.

A few months after that, the woman and child returned, this time selling handmade bracelets. Erica bought fifty. One month after that, this duo from the south arrived with a dried chiles and mole. The woman said (through her daughter) the mole was a traditional recipe that had been passed down through generations. Erica didn’t understand why, but this made her very emotional.

After the fifth or sixth visit, Erica finally learned their names. The woman was Maya and her daughter was Fernanda. Over the next four years, Maya and Fernanda visited regularly, always bringing food or crafts to share. Once they got to know Erica, they refused to take her money. Everything they brought with them (and they always had something) was given freely, with smiles. This puzzled Erica.

Erica had gathered that Maya and Fernanda’s family, though apparently tightly knit and mutually supportive, was not a family of means. And through the stories she heard Fernanda tell (or Maya tell through Fernanda), Erica realized that the neighborhoods to the south were not always a safe place to live or a good place to raise a family. These, she thought, were the families she wanted to come to her backyard parties.

Nothing to See Here

Ever since her first meeting with Maya and Fernanda, Erica would stand every day at the window, looking south past her yard to the edge of the cornfield and out toward the invisible neighborhoods.

But just now, after seeing the cement truck and hurrying down the hall, she stood by the window and saw… nothing. No gazebo. No pool. No cornfields. Actually, that’s not entirely true. There was something: a gray wall built of cinder blocks, stacked about twenty feet high and held together by hastily applied concrete.

This enormous wall spanned the entire width of her backyard and appeared to line up with the edge of her property, just in front of the cornfield. And now, the workers were extending the cinder-block wall down each side of the yard.

So many questions raced through her mind. Where was the gazebo? Where was the pool? Why was this wall so high? Why was there a wall at all? How come there was no door and how would Maya and Fernanda get in? How would she even know if they had come for a visit if she could no longer even see the cornfield… ?

As the questions multiplied and overlapped in her mind, her heart rate began to climb and her insides tightened just like after his “vows.” Her husband was indeed getting things done, but what exactly was he doing?! Didn’t he realize what that backyard view meant to her? He definitely knew about her relationship with Maya and Fernanda—so does that mean he no longer wanted her to see them? And who was paying for all of this?

Even before she had made the conscious decision to confront her husband, she felt her body pivot and start back down the hallway. Once her mind caught up with her legs, she realized that confronting him was exactly what she needed to do.

His office was in the west wing of her house. She had been standing at the window in the great room, on the far east side. (Yes, this was a big house.) The minute-and-a-half it took her to walk across from one side to another did not serve to calm her down. In fact, she grew more frustrated during that 90 second trek—and more angry with every step. If she had to walk even a few seconds further, she might have imploded with fury.

Approaching his office door, she noticed it was ajar. Through the crack, she glimpsed his feet up on the desk. And she could hear him on the phone. From his tone she could tell he was having a fairly serious conversation, though she was unable to tell what it was about. It didn’t matter to her. He needed to learn exactly how she felt about this egregious breach of trust and there was no reason to delay.

She drew a long, deep, slow, breath and whispered, “I… am… Erica,” then gave the large oak door a steady, confident push…

[Part III next week]

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It shouldn’t have come as such a big surprise. She had been seriously dating him for several months—and that’s not counting the significant time they spent together eight years ago. Had it been that long already?

Much of their first go-around seemed like a dream. She remembers feeling secure and enjoying life with him, although many of those memories come to her now as if seen through a frosted window pane. Clear in the middle, but blurry around the edges.

“They were good times, weren’t they?” she would tell herself. It was meant to be rhetorical and reassuring, though her self-soothing always came out with a slight tone of uncertainty.

But never mind that. One thing she could say for certain was that those good times—or at least, probably not bad times—were in the past. This was a new time, and she was more receptive than ever to his charms.

Their fall engagement was, indeed, a surprise to many. She did have the feeling that something unprecedented might happen on that mid-autumn evening, but no one, herself included, suspected how quickly things would progress. He swept her up, winning over much more of her than anyone could have predicted.

All those months of courting now culminated in a very clear proposal. Without any real resistance, she gave herself to him. At first, she only surrendered part. And then another part. And another. Soon, she had surrendered a majority of herself to him; parts she had once thought might never give in to his embrace.

Many believed she was utterly smitten. On the one hand, this was completely understandable. He did have his charms. And though he may have been unlike anyone she had ever been with before (their previous relationship aside, and not including her torrid affair with Jackson—but that’s another story), there was this strong magnetic pull emanating from his very core, and it reached out to her with incredible force.

After their initial relationship, she had distanced herself from him. At one point, some of her friends thought that surely, they would never even speak to him again. Her most cautious friends wished that he would just fade into the background, eventually to disappear completely.

But slowly, imperceptibly, she felt his inexorable gravity. Her orbit tightened and shrank, from ellipse to circle, faster and faster, until she was drawn so close to his rocky surface that her descent became inevitable.

The landing was a spectacle, for sure. By the end of the engagement night, a large number of friends had gathered and there was a huge party that lasted into the wee hours of the next morning. Speeches were made, the couple was congratulated, and everyone left the betrothed with a sense that the future was brighter for them than anyone could have ever imagined.

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I never thought it would happen to me. I don’t mean that literally, of course. Everyone knows everyone dies. What’s the saying? “Two things in life are certain: death and... death… and...” Hmm... I’m a little foggy right now. Must have something to do with the dying. And maybe the stabbing. But before you go feeling sorry for me, there’s something you need to know. I wasn’t the stabb-ee. I was the stabb-er.

I still welcome your sympathy, though. The reason for my violence is justified—at least from my perspective. But that’s a story for another time. Right now, I’ve got a more pressing narrative to unravel, and it’s the one that’s unfolding right before my eyes.

Not that there’s much to see. It’s very dark. And there’s a smell. It’s pleasant enough, but I can’t put my fing... er, nose on it. The scent is something between bacon and roses. I know that sounds ridiculous. Maybe it’s more of a feeling than a smell. Like that feeling when you’re on vacation and you have absolutely nothing to do­.

It’s a pure sense of peace, but somehow… it feels even deeper than that. I have no concerns about the future. No regrets about the past. Not even for my quite recent streak of violence. My mind is blank. Or maybe “clear” is a better way to say it. Except for these thoughts I’m having right now, in this moment.

And that smell. Maybe it’s a fire? Yes! That’s it. It’s the smell of a campfire—the scent of smoldering wood. But it must be somewhat distant. I can’t hear the crackling or see the light. I can’t see much at all from here, standing in what feels like the exact place where it all ended. My life, that is.

After the stabbing, I heard a loud pop and felt a powerful thwack against my back. It was as if a two-by-four hit me between the shoulder blades. I struck the ground, landing face-down, unable to move at all. Next thing I know... I’m here.

When I passed out—or should I just say passed?—I was nose down on the concrete floor of a warehouse. But when I woke, my nose was in the dirt. Not like dirty dirt, but more like pristine potting soil—soft and slightly moist, with an earthy quality that made me think of mushrooms. I like mushrooms.

Now, as I’m standing here in the loamy soil, my eyes are regaining their focus. The light is increasing at an unearthly pace, like a scrubbed sunrise video on YouTube. I imagine the hand of god steadily rotating the sun’s dimmer dial to the right to manufacture this high-speed dawn. God! Now there’s a thought. I’ll bet there will soon be some revelations one way or another on that topic.

It appears I’m in the middle of a verdant thicket. The leaves are a green color very much unlike the burned-out brown of my hometown. Pasadenans all benefit from an almost perpetual summer—unless you’re counting the resident leaves. That poor foliage is in an almost constant state of seasonal disorientation. Is it fall yet? No. Autumn never really arrives. And so, the leaves stay on their branches far too long, turning brown and crunchy and only falling to the ground when the Santa Anas blow.

No, these leaves appear to be thriving in perpetual spring. With the divine dimmer at full rotation, the saturated green almost hurts my eyes. I reach out and push the large, leafy fronds aside so I can move forward. Is it forward? I guess so, but only in relation to the direction I’ve been facing. I have absolutely no bearing on any direction, apart from up and down.

As I push apart the plants, a scene from one of my favorite childhood books comes to mind. Like Lucy, I’m pushing apart the fur coats. Only instead of furry fabric, I’m parting lush greenery, seeking the mystery on the other side... if there is an “other side.” For all I know, this dense forest goes on and on, forever.

But it doesn’t. The smell of fire is growing stronger and I’m starting to see through the leaves what appears to be a clearing. Stepping through the last bush, I half expect to see a lamppost surrounded by snow and a satyr bearing parcels and parasol. Instead, I find the origin of my olfactory observations: a crackling stack of logs with an inviting warmth.

Scanning the scene, I see a small pond and a person sitting on the large rock, right at the edge of the water. Their back is to me, but it appears to be a man. Judging by the rod in his hands, he’s fishing. How odd! Of all the ‘near-death experiences’ I’ve ever heard, none described a camping trip.

And yet, taking it all in... the fire with its calming crackling and soothing smell; the fertile earth and lush landscape; the unhurried pace of a fisherman... it’s quite the serene scene. Not altogether unheavenly on these accounts.

With no apparent worries to trigger my habit of over-thinking every situation—and with literally nothing else on my calendar—I move towards the angler, uncertain of which conversational angle I should take. Do I introduce myself? Is a handshake customary in these parts? Will I startle this person who presumably has no idea of my immediate presence, let alone my existence in this eternal forest?

I decide to keep it simple: “Hello.” I say.

[to be continued]

A Note for the Reader:

I think the best definition of theology is: how we think about God.

As I think about God—and as I rethink many of the thoughts about God that have been handed down to me—I’m finding that it’s most helpful to explore these ideas through story.

For example, I have many questions about what happens next—as in, after death. Our popular spiritual sources talk about such things in rather vague terms. In response, authors throughout history have used their own imagination to fill in the blanks.

Some authors, like Dante Alighieri, have invented such convincing narratives that many of the things we believe today about the afterlife actually have their foundation in his fiction!

Whether Dante’s imagination has gotten it right or wrong is kind of missing the point. What’s important is that these metaphysical questions of humanity aren’t going away and can’t be left unanswered.

If we’ve been created in the image of god, by god’s imagination, it may be one of the most honorable things we can do to use our own creativity to imagine answers to the existential questions that have been left dangling. These questions are like strands of wind-blown hair, begging to be braided into a narrative that gives them some shape to satisfy our spiritual sensibilities.

To satisfy my spiritual sensibilities, I’ve decided to serialize a story about the afterlife. In this age of serial streamers, we’re all accustomed to stories that unfold gradually. But long before Netflix, many famous writers—Dickens, Tolstoy, Melville, Poe, even Stephen King—presented some of their most famous works initially as serial publications. There’s something deliciously daring about an unfinished story that only comes to life one chapter at a time.

My hope is that you’ll find this tale to be an entertaining narrative and maybe even a helpful theological exploration. At the very least, I hope it helps me braid together my thoughts about heaven, hell, redemption, grace, mercy, forgiveness, justice… and many more of the dangling strands in my head that have yet to be tamed.

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