The First Sin
By Lisa Beth Darling
Copyright 2017 All Rights Reserved
Chapter One
Exodus
Well, I finally made it out of that wretched place, let me tell you, getting out wasn’t half as easy as getting in. For millennia I sat rotting away in air so hot it scorched the lungs with the every breath. It was filled with ash. That damn shit got on everything from hair to clothing, skin, it clung to every bit of food and swirled about like slime at the top of every cup. There I sat, listening to the screams of the guilty and the damned day in and day out while my true talents wasted away.
The method of my entrance into Hell and my exit therefrom would be the same. It wasn’t easy to piss off God but it could be done. If anyone should know that it’s me. They say that Patience is a Virtue, for that they are correct, however it wasn’t never my strongest suit. For a hundred years I plotted my escape. For three hundred more I quietly implemented my plan. Until finally, Hell became a place not of punishment for sins and crimes but of torture for pleasure, that of course was never its intent. Yes, one day the place became so utterly corrupt that my Father showed His face to me.
Stand there, face to face, I wanted nothing more than to tell the Old Man off—so I did.
I don’t remember much after that outside the sensation of extreme acceleration of going so fast the skin on my body threatened to peel away from the force. Then, I was here, the only other place that I could possibly go; Earth. Father’s Greatest Creation or so He’s always thought. Being the one tasked with eternally punishing them for their crimes I’ve always seem then from a different perspective than Him. I see their vileness, their evil, their greed, their corruption, their sheer drive for power and material possessions that makes them do the most unspeakable of things.
Here I was smack dab in the middle of the world from whence they came.
The air was crisp it made my now bare and aching skin prickle with little bumps. It filled the air in my exhausted lungs with a cool sweetness I hadn’t felt since Good Old Dad first created this place. There was an odd mixture of sand and hard stone beneath my feet. All around me was dark except for the sky above glimmering with the stars that hadn’t met my eye for so long the sight made them water with the unfamiliar feelings of joy and relief.
Then it happened.
A bright light shone upon me, at first I thought it was Him come back for another round I readied to stand my ground then it was knocked out from under me. I remember the sensation of flying only to have it end when my body met that hard stone that had rested beneath my feet. There was a high pitched sound so loud it hurt my ears and then the stench of something burning met my nose. My body leaked what I knew to be blood my shoulder flattened I could hear the crunch of the bone as it broke. A sickening sound indeed. Without its support, my head was next, it slammed against the ground so hard it made my ears ring and then everything went black.
Some time passed, I awoke in a small room. The first thing I noticed as my eyes struggled to focus was the window across from me with its yellow linen curtain trimmed in white lace billowing in a soft breeze. The bed below my aching body was soft and warm as was the matching cover to the curtain as it laid across me. As my eyes adjusted to the light the brass footboard came into view as did the small stone field hearth nestled on the wall beyond it. It sat there cold but ready to be lit at a moment’s notice. I tried to sit up but the pain in my shoulder and then in my head prevented it and I laid down again.
Pain is such an unaccustomed feeling to me. Oh, don’t get me wrong, I’m very accustomed and adept as doling it out to people but not so much on the receiving end. For the most part, it’s a nasty sensation relegated to the beings of Earth so remind them they are fragile. They are mortal.
Looking down, I saw the tight bandages wrapped around the wounded shoulder and across my bare chest. I noticed my arm was in a sling keeping it held upwards. Reaching up I touched bandaged wrapped around my head when I brought my fingers back to my eyes they were tinged with blood.
“Mortal,” I muttered to myself as I gazed at the fear inducing sight. “You can’t do this to me, Father. No.”
One again I tried to rise, this time I swung my legs over the side of the small bed, just as I planted them firmly on the wood floor I felt a sharp bolt of pain in the hip below the wounded shoulder. Ignoring it, I tried bring my head to bear I hadn’t the strength. For one small moment there I was, body half off the bed, body half on the bed, stuck. Then my legs won the battle causing my upper half to slither along and I crashed to the floor unable to get up. Never in my long life had I ever been so weak, so pitiful, and so helpless.
The door opened and a woman walked in. Seeing my laying there she rushed to my side, dropped to her knees, and cradled my sore head in her lap. By Mortal standards she was no stunning beauty, not anymore anyway, age had begun taking its toll on her freckled face as it laid a road map of her life across the corners of her dark eyes. Hair that once was the hue of the setting sun sparkled with the glimmer of silvery moonlight and her body was soft as she held me to it. In days long past she would have been considered Pleasingly Plump but today’s world there were many who probably considered her simply fat. My head nestled between her breasts I heard her heart beating in a concerned rush and felt her breathing catch up to it. It was those eyes as she stared down at me those eyes were so deep it seemed, for one second, I could see eternity within them. Beneath the worry for me they sparkled with mischievous innocence.
Then she spoke to me, this Angel of Mercy.
“Are you alright? You really shouldn’t try to get up just yet.”
I felt her arms roam from being laced across my chest to under my good shoulder with the other pressing again my back. I realized she was trying to haul me to my feet without causing further injury to my wound. I did my best to help her as she laid me back on the bed and covered me with the blanket. I watched her brush a long strand of her hair away from her face and tuck it behind her ear just before she knelt next to me.
“You know, for a while there I didn’t think you were going to wake up. What were you doing in the middle of the road so late at night?”
Of course I didn’t have a logical explanation and I never lie so I changed the subject and held out my good hand to her, “Lucifer,” I said in warm greeting as I continued staring into those enticing eyes. She flinched as she changed gears with me before taking my hand in hers.
“Evie, I’d say it’s good to meet you but the circumstances are kind of shitty. Lucifer,” she laughed and gave out a little smile, “You Catholic?”
“Me? No,” I muttered, “Why? Do you Catholic parents would be more likely to name a son after me?”
“After you? Ok, maybe you hit your head harder than I thought. But, no, I guess they wouldn’t be, I mean, what kind of parent names their son after a fallen angel?”
Her words echoed in my head; a fallen angel. Not, ‘the devil’, ‘not Satan’. I found that odd but didn’t say anything at the time, “No, I guess they wouldn’t be good parents if they did that.” I thought it best to discuss my current situation with my hostess, “Why aren’t I in a hospital?”
Evie sighed as she clasped her hands together, “The nearest one is just over a hundred miles from here just getting the ambulance out here takes over an hour. I put you in the truck and brought you home, here, my home. I cleaned you up, bandaged your wounds, I set your shoulder, and put you to bed. I kept watch over you once I realized you were stable I thought the need for the ambulance had passed. After all, there isn’t much else they will do for you and, besides, well, you were naked.”
“Didn’t know how to explain the naked man in the middle of the road?”
“Well that too but, you know, insurance and all. If you didn’t have any clothes you probably don’t have any money the last thing you’d need is a sky high hospital bill.”
That thought took me aback but I managed to mutter, “How very practical of you. I could sue you for that, you know.”
“You could but then you’d have to explain why you were naked and penniless in the middle of the road so late at night.” She returned with a smile.
“Touché,” I replied with a grin as I realized I was beginning to like this woman. “I guess I was lucky to be run down by, what are you, a nurse?”
“Me? No.” She laughed a sad little laugh. “I’ve just been around a lot.”
The look in her eye and the way her skin turned to deeper creases around them made me understand she was telling the truth in her own way. No one lies to me, Mortal or not, Angel or not, Devil or not, no one lies to me. “In your learned opinion, how long before I get better?”
“A few weeks,” she sighed, “your head will be fine, your hip isn’t broken but it is badly bruised, your shoulder will take the longest before you can use your arm right again.”
She must have easily read the look upon my falling face as she quickly hurried on.
“You can get out of bed and try to walk around in a day or two.”
“Am I to be your guest, then?”
“I guess you are, Lucifer, welcome to Chez Amiara, its small, its cozy, but its home.”
“And, if I might ask; where is this home?” I gestured around at the room I recognized as being part of a log cabin.
Rising to her feet she scratched her cheek, “Wow, you really were out of it, dude. You are in the lovely little town of Gray Village, Arizona. That’s in the United States, in case you wanted that information too.”
Before I could ask, she answered every other question that was rising to my mind.
“You must be hungry, I’ll bring you something to eat and something to drink. If you need to use the bathroom ask me and I’ll help you.” She reached to the nightstand, picked up the remote control, and placed it on the bed. “Just push the green button and the TV will open.”
“Open?”
“Yeah, push it.”
So I did as she advised only to watch the stone chimney rising above the hearth open up and a TV slowly jut from it. “That’s pretty cool.”
“One of the few luxuries we have, I’m afraid. You can adjust it to any angle. I have a laptop, the Internet signal out here isn’t great, but if you need to check your email or something. Do you want to call anyone? I’ll get you my cellphone.”
Did I want to call anyone? “No, thank you, Evie.” Who would I call? It seemed that, at least for the time being, it was her and me. When I got better, I told myself, I would get out there in the Mortal World and start doing what I do best; I would engage in their debauchery from money, to power, to-best of all—sex, drugs, and rock and roll that would ultimately lead to finding the guilty among the Mortals and punishing them for their transgressions. That had to be far more fun when the Humans were alive than it was when they were dead. Maybe a slow entrance into those things was best. Resting here I could use her TV and her Internet both of which were excellent for coming to understand Human Nature or so I’d heard. I would study them from afar in here before making any further moves into their world. Evie, kind soul that she was, would unwittingly help me with that transition. By closely interacting with her I would learn better how to communicate out there. “I am famished,” I whispered suddenly realizing that was true. There was a strange rumbling sensation in what now a working stomach.
“Sure, I’ll get you something. Are leftovers alright? I made a nice roast chicken with potatoes and gravy tonight.”
I looked towards the window at the sunlight streaming through on to discover it was fading fast the blinding yellow of day was easily giving away to the rich reds, oranges, and purples that heralded in the night, “What time is it?” Time was a Mortal Concept it was utterly useless in Hell and in Heaven’s Silver City. Here it was a cruel task master and it was never to be ignored or the consequences could be dire depending on the circumstances.
“A little after six, you’ve been out of it for eighteen hours.”
That didn’t seem like such a long time, especially to an Immortal being like myself, but not being able to recall any of it all was perplexing, it was unsettling, and I didn’t care for it. “Roast chicken sounds delicious.” Although I couldn’t say I’d ever tasted such a dish the smell of it in the air was very inviting to my rumbling abdomen. It was very strange to know that in just a few moments I was actually going to taste something from their world the way they do. During my short but impressive stint on Earth with the Garden of Eden I had watched Adam devour the fruits and vegetables freely offered to him. He did so with much glee upon his rugged face and in his nearly lifeless eyes. I tried them all several times but there was never any taste to them only texture. I never did come to feel his delight but I understood it was there just the same. I understood that his desire for such pleasures could be used against him.
I lay there in the very comfortable bed with the flat screen TV angled just perfectly for my viewing pleasure flipping through channels and stopping upon what they called The News. Just today there had been an earthquake that killed nearly four hundred people, a terrorist attack that took out three dozen more, wars in the middle east were still brewing, an outbreak of small pox—a disease the newswoman informed me hadn’t been seen in any measurable quantity in 1977 and had, indeed, been believed to have been completely eradicated. As I was enrapt in the information flooding to me I failed to notice the door had opened and Evie had placed a standing tray of food next to my bed.
“I hope you like it.”
I sensed fear in her as I watched her back away from the tray but I ignored it in favor of the delicious aroma filling my head and causing my stomach to thunder once more. Looking at the tray she’d laid before me I was nearly astonished to see it overflowing with food. Having been absent from the Mortal World for nearly all of its life I didn’t know what portions Humans ate but this seemed beyond the pale. There was a pile of white meat smothered in a steaming sauce, a glob of some deep red jellied concoction, a pile of a brown substance that almost looked like wet bread, a pile of a white substance with a small glop of yellow melting into it, two warm rolls, a glass of water, a glass of a dark black liquid that was making little bubbles, a steaming mug of another black liquid, and, of course, utensils I had never used nestled on top of a swatch of cloth. “Thank you,” I stammered wondering if all of this would actually fit into my yearning stomach.
“Let me know when you’re done, just call for me and I’ll take it away.”
Without another word she turned around and left the room closing the door behind her. I dove in to the hot plate of food. As the first bites hit my new taste buds I thought the sensation running ramped through me must be the same as a man starving for weeks in the desert feels when he finally comes upon the smallest oasis. At first my demanding belly roared and commanded that I eat faster, it seemed that it would never be sated as I ignored the quaintness of the utensils and at with my fingers instead. I bypassed the water for the cup of bubbling brown only to find it icy cold and wonderfully sweet. I sucked it down in one gulp and let out an expulsion of air that was loud to my own ears. At the end of the meal, my face and fingers covered in the remains of what I would come to know as roasted chicken, mashed potatoes, gravy, stuffing, and cranberry sauce I picked up the linen napkin to clean myself. While the portion seemed large when I looked at it my stomach took down every single bite to the point of sopping up the remains of the meal with the last chunk of bread, I had the strangest inkling it would soon be hungry again.
As though she had a second sense about such things, just as I put the napkin down, Evie entered and took the standing tray with its pitiful remnants away. This time she left the door open and I could hear her running water to wash my dishes. As she did so she called to me, “Do you want more coffee? I have brownies if you want dessert.”
Coffee that was what they called the hot brown liquid I drank and liked. I didn’t know what a brownie was but I understood the word dessert, “Yes, please,” I called back craning my neck to see if I could get a look at her but she was out of sight. Instead I saw a small hallway and understood the room I was occupying was at the beginning of it. Just to the left of my sight I saw the opening to a larger room that appeared may twenty of their feet across. I couldn’t see much of it but enough to know there were paintings on the walls, large throw rugs on the worn wood floor, and what looked like the arm of a very comfortable blue couch. It all appeared very inviting and I wanted to see the rest but Evie was right and it was best if I lay still at least for a while longer. Maybe tomorrow I could get up and have a look about my new temporary home. Then I saw her come around the corner and straight into the room where I was recuperating. In her hands, each finger of which bore a ring of some kind, she held the standing tray with its cargo of food. She stopped a bit short of the bed, extended the length of her torso and settled the offering next to my bed then she stepped away a few feet to tell me that it was getting late then to ask if there was anything else she could get for me.
“No, I think I’m set for the night,” I told her.
“Alright, I’ll collect the dishes in the morning. My room is just down the hall—it has a lock on it…”
“I mean you no harm, Evie. I am a guest in your home how rude would it be of me to return your kindness with such treachery?” Although my words, as always, were true, I saw her blush a bit as she tucked that strand of hair behind her ear.
“Well, just letting you know, that’s all. Other than that, if you need anything, just holler out and I’ll hear you.”
“Will do,” I readily agreed feeling a bit sat about watching her leave my injured side for the night. “Good night, Evie.”
“Good night…Lucifer,” she stammered then turned around and left the room.
After that I lay there enjoying the coffee and brownie she’d offered me as I watched the news catching up on the comings and doings of my Father’s creations. I felt a different sensation in my lower regions. It wasn’t hunger. It was more of a tingle and I wondered if I was going to feel my cock harden with desire but that wasn’t to be, it laid between my legs limp and sleeping. The sensation grew worse and most uncomfortable as it distracted me from the TV. My legs shifted from side to side in what seemed an intuitive attempt at soothing the swelling sensation but it didn’t work for very long. Soon a hot liquid ran from the tip, it drenched my thighs before it soaked into the sheets. Grabbing it with my good hand to stop the flow I remembered that Humans put out everything they take in.
I had to urinate.
Doing so in the bed was considered inappropriate unless you were an infant or an elderly person.
With no other choice I called out to my gracious hostess, “Evie! Evie?”
“What is it?” She asked as she rushed into the room barely skirting the tray at the bedside. “What happened?”
With what I can only describe as being embarrassment I pulled the blanket aside to show her the wet sheets. “I’m sorry.”
“That’s alright, no worries,” she left his side to scurry across the room and grab an old clay pot suitable for the purpose. “Here, use this.”
The ceramic was cold as she placed it between my legs then turned her back so that I could complete this bit of nasty business in something resembling privacy. As soon as my hand let go the hot streamed ushered forth, the swelling sensation in my abdomen subsided and my eyes rolled back in my head as I unwillingly let out a satisfied ‘ahhhhh’. It seemed to run out of me for a very long time but when it was done I once again felt relieved. “I think I’m done.”
Evie turned around with her eyes averted toward the ceiling as she reached between his legs and removed the pot. She placed on the floor before turning her attention to the condition of the sheets with just the feel of her hand. “Do you think you can sit in the chair while I change the sheets? It will only take a few minutes I don’t think it soaked through to the mattress.”
Not wanting to lie in a pool of my own making I let her help me to the small wooden table and chair set in the middle of the room. She settled me down gently and covered my nakedness with an afghan from the foot of the bed. I watched her take out the empty tray of food and the pot with its newly expelled load. I heard the dishes clink as they hit the sink and the sound of rushing water as she flushed away the contents of the pot. Without a sound she came back in, stripped the bed of its covers and laid new ones over it. To my mild amusement I noticed the new set was also yellow but the trim was done in a white eyelet instead of lace. Unfortunately that amusement didn’t dull the pain of my bruised thigh which I now got a good look at. Where there should have been flawless dark olive flesh there was a patch of black and purple so large it covered the whole of the hip as it reached down for my thigh and up for my waist. She was right, it wasn’t broken, but it wasn’t in very fine shape either.
The bed refreshed and made ready for company once again she helped me back into it. As I settled down she produced a small amber bottle from the pocket of the fuzzy black robe encasing her in warmth and shielding her body from my view. She opened it and put two white pills in the palm of my hand telling me it was a painkiller and I should take one now, wait a little while and if it wasn’t helping much then I should take the other. They would help me get the sleep she insisted I needed. Before taking her leave for the night she pointed to the cleaned pot at my bedside telling me to use it in the night if I needed she would take care of it in the morning.
I popped one of the pills into my mouth believing it wouldn’t have an effect on someone like me but I was wrong. Within a few minutes my sore head began tingling and my eyes seemed to float in my head. “That’s lovely,” I muttered to no one as I felt my wounded body begin to relax. Me being me, before it could fully do so, I popped the other one into my mouth. The feeling intensified and I felt myself smile as I drifted off into a world that wasn’t real but felt so all the same. All of the junkies and drug dealers I’d punished in Hell I finally came to realize why they took the drugs they did and the desire it produced in them to keep doing more.
Just as Evie foretold, other than having to engage the Human function of getting rid of the solid waste my body produced, it was two days before I felt I could manage to get out of the bed under my own power. The hip roared in agony for which Evie gave half of one of those white pills. The pain subsided, my head tingled but not to the fun degree it had before. Leaning heavily upon her small frame, I wandered out of the confines of my bedroom to have my first look around the cabin we were both calling home. I looked out at the expanse of desert from a massive set of floor to ceiling windows at the far end of the living room. It seemed to stretch on forever as far as my eyes could see there was nothing but sand and dust. “We’re in the middle of nowhere.”
“Yes,” Evie agreed holding her arm around his waist as he slung his over her shoulder, “That’s what I’ve been telling you. That’s why I still can’t fathom why you were in the middle of the road that night. There’s nothing here so you couldn’t have been stumbling around drunk.”
It was clear Evie still wanted an answer that question and equally clear she had a right to one. I never lie but I do, from time to time, stretch, bend, and/or, omit the truth. I cleared my throat as I continued gazing out the miles of sand. “I’m not really sure. One moment I was home arguing with my Father and then next I was here naked and penniless in the street. I think He sent me here as a punishment.”
“It must have been one hell of an argument.”
I couldn’t help but let out a little laugh as my arm tightened around her shoulders, “You don’t know the half of it and trust me, dear Evie, you don’t want to know.”
Still Evie pressed forward just a small bit, “Your father must be a very powerful man if he can have you kidnapped and dropped off in the middle of nowhere. Aren’t you old to be living under his thumb? He must be rich too.”
“I am and he is.” I turned away from the window and looked at the closest chair with its soft velvet cushion beckoning me to take the weight off my throbbing hip. Stumbling my way over to it I absently asked, “What is there to do around here? Why are you all the way out here?” Reaching my destination I sat down and found the chair reclined lifting my legs greatly reduced the pain in my hip.
Evie sat down on the couch across the way, “Not much, but the town, what there is of it, isn’t very far only about twenty miles or so.” Looking down at her hands she added, “I’m here for the same reason everyone else is here; to leave the outside world behind.”
“You don’t care for it? All of you? Why is that?”
Without hesitation she quietly said, “It doesn’t care for us. We didn’t belong there so we came here.”
I couldn’t very well say that I blamed her or them for the decision. Nearly everything I seen on the television or read on the Internet boded very badly for the state of the Human Condition. They were killing each other all over the world they were so ignorantly polluting despite what seemed like numerous warnings from learned people. What they didn’t kill off in a few hundred years the changing climate would. Just as I always told my Father; his creation was doomed by its own hand. Not that my Father ever listened to me. “I see. Well, I can’t wait to be able to get out and about and see this little village of yours.”
“We’ll have to find you some clothes first,” Evie reminded him, “You can’t go walking around town in one of my old bathrobes.”
“Quite right,” I nodded and began wondering how I was going to get my hands on a pile of money. Humans were big on that. They used it for everything and without it, for a start, I wasn’t going to get any suitable clothing. If I couldn’t dress the part, if I had to wander around looking like some beggar, it would make my journey to the top that much more difficult. “How do you propose we do that?”
“Well, it’s not like there’s a Men’s Warehouse in town or anywhere around for that matter but there is a second hand store in town. It’s where we all go to get clothing.”
I wrapped my head around that idea for a moment before venturing the words to see if I understood, “Your entire town shares clothes? You just keep passing them around?” The idea didn’t seem very clean to me.
“Sort of, I mean, sometimes we do to the bigger towns and even into the city to get things but mostly we stay around here so we rely on each other a great deal. Grey Village is a lot like a commune in that way.” Evie explained and shrugged her shoulders, “If you tell me your sizes I’ll go to town and pick you up some jeans, shirts, and boots. The sock and underwear I’ll buy new from the All-In-One.”
I wanted to ask what an All-In-One was but realized I had a larger problem; “I don’t know what size I am.” Even to my own ears that sounded weak and ridiculous but it was the truth and so was this, “Someone else usually dresses me.”
Evie felt silent before she slowly began to nod even as her eyes narrowed, “Wow, lucky you. Too bad you lost your wallet.” She stood up. “But rest assured, no one will be dressing you here, so get up while I run and fetch the tape measure.”
Then next thing I knew I was standing there and she was wrapping a piece of gold cloth will numbers in precise increments about my chest, waist, thighs, and bicep before using it measure the length of my arms and legs. She even measured the length of the soles of my feet from the top of the toe to the heel. As she did all of these things I heard her say unexpected things under her breath.
“Nice.”
“Pardon me?”
“Thirty-six waist, thirty-eight long, those are good measurements especially for a man of your height.”
“My height? What’s wrong with my height?”
“What? No one’s ever told you you’re really tall? What are you six-four?”
“About that, yes.”
“With those measurements, your dusky good looks, those piercing blue eyes, that straight as an edge jaw, and the brand name Lucifer—if you don’t find your rich daddy and get him to take you back—you could be a model. You’d make a lot of money.”
Out of the mouths of the innocent can come words that inspire the wicked. A model. I could do that once I got out of this place. “Do you really think so?”
“Yeah, I do.” Evie pulled her cellphone from her pocket to check the time. “I’ll run to town and get you some clothes. Do you want me to help you back to bed first or do you think you’ve got it until I get back?”
Her absence would give me the chance to snoop about the place and find out any of the things my hostess might otherwise like to hide from me. “I think I can handle it,” I reassured her, “Thank you, Evie, I really do need to cover myself. You’ve been very kind I will pay you back for this when I get on my feet.”
“No need, just get better.” Evie grabbed up her purse and her keys before walking out the front door of the cabin and to an old Ford Truck covered in dust and sand.
END CHAPTER ONE of THE FIRST SIN by LISA BETH DARLING COPYRIGHT 2017-ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
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