It all started with the mysterious invitation. Which was pretty obvious since it was an invitation to dine with the most notorious person throughout history. Needless to say it was an offer I couldn't resist. Plus the curiousity was devouring me as to why did he choose me??? Of all the people in the world why me???
I did not brood much on that since there wud b loads of tym 2 figure that out. What was more pressing was the humungous problem of what to wear for the special evening. I mean what exactly is the appropriate wear for a dinner in Hell???
I decided on a simple black outfit (if nothing else, it would go with the decor I assumed). The chauffeur was at my door on the dot. Suddenly apprehensive, I stepped into the darkest tinted car in the world. Then after what seemed like a drive for an eternity, we stopped n the door opened. I stepped out blinking into the absolutely bizarre room (Yeah the car stopped right into the room, call it class or weird, the guy got full marks for originality!)
Why bizarre? Well, for one it has a kind of lighting I had never seen before. It wasnt exactly gloomy, just eerie. It kept on flickering, focusing on different parts of the cavernous hall. As soon as you tried to focus on any one thing, it disappeared into darkness. As I tried to take in as much as I can of this truly amazing place, my eyes fell on the guy I came to meet. Dressed in a simple black dress suit, it was hard to take your eyes off him. Though you couldnt really see his face properly, (remember the flickering light? His face seemed to keep on changing. At one point i could swear He looked like Mr bin Laden)you kind of knew that he was amazingly beautiful. In fact that's the first time I really understood the phrase, hauntingly beautiful. And he had charm. Tons of it. It oozed out from every pore of his body.
He steeped towards me and said, in a slow n gravelly voice " Good evening, I'm Lucifer. Welcome to my humble abode. I cannot thank you enough for coming all the way over here. You really cant imagine how unbearingly stifling solitude can be."
I cant really remember what did I say in reply. I think I mumbled out something like it being my pleasure or something equally banal. Actually I could not remember how to form words in front of him. He had that effect on me.
"Shall we go in for dinner, or would you like to start off with some drinks first?" I guess I must have made a face or something as he quickly added "Dont worry I'll not offer you blood in a goblet or any such gross like that. I'm well aware of my reputation of being unnecessarily gory. All I'm going to offer you is plain vintage wine." Plain? Right.
We moved on to a corner of the room where there was a sort of a mini bar. Thats the best I can describe it. He poured out some golden brownish liquor into two goblets and we moved on to a seating area where we settled down on a plush settee.
"Go ahead, I can see that you are dying with impatience to ask your questions. I can understand your curiousity. I know how much I'm being talked about all the time. I cant. Talk about me all the time, I mean. But I will try to answer your questions the best that I can."
The funny part was that though I had formulated some 10 million questions in my mind before coming here, I couldnt think of a single thing to ask when given the permission to do so. So I started of with the stupidest, and yet extremely fascinating, atleast to me, question...
"How old are you??"
"I truly dont know. Somehow age never counts for much with us immortals, you know. Its a concept specially designed for people with an expiry date, like you. When I came into being, days, dates, months, years, nothing was in existence. So I cant really tell you my age, but I can assure you that I'm old enough to drink, drive and run for presidency" replied Lucifer with a twinkle in his eye.
"So, have you lived here forever?"
"Yup, more or less. After I had that slight disagreement with you know who, I was actually pretty desperate to find a place to stay. You see everything belonged to him. It was just luck that I found this place. This may be Hell to everyone in your world and the other, but for me its heaven. No pun intended"
Wow! The man had a sense of humour too. I started to warm up and start asking questions on some of the most famous controversies when he interrupted me and said "How about we take the questions and move to the dinner table? I'm kind of starving, and I guess you are pretty much hungry too." Which I was, so we moved on to this absolutely huge dining table. Laden with food of all imaginable kinds(and some unimaginable kinds too!). Seeing the look of horror on my face, Lucifer said "Dont worry you dont have to eat all of it, of course not. I just did not know what kind of cuisine pleases you, so I just took a precaution of making everything that you could posible like. Treat it as a buffet dinner, and eat just how much and whatever you want."
It wasnt easy. I'm anyway extremely bad at taking decisions, and somehow choosing something to eat from over was nothing short of a nightmare for me. But I finally did, and as soon as I sat down, the other dishes just vanished! Excellent, as if I needed another reminder of how extraordinary this evening was.
"Alright, so where were we?" Lucifer's question reminded me of why I was here, to clear up some doubts, to get his take on some controversies.
"How much of the accusations against you through the time is true?"
Lucifer thought for a moment and replied "Well you know most of them are neither true nor false, its just different perceptions of different people. When I was talking about the disagreement earlier, I didnt start it thinking that I was wrong. I thought I was right, so was He. But you know what they say, its always the victors who write the history, so... here I am."
"So the Adam -Eve fiasco was also a misunderstanding?"
Lucifer bristled and said "Misunderstanding? Of course it was a misunderstanding. I actually dont understand how I got mixed up with that. Firstly He created those two twits with tons of sexuality and zero sense. They were the stupidest creations i had ever seen, honestly. Apples as aphrodisiac! What was that all about? I'm sure you have had apples all through your life, did you ever feel like making out with the nearest naked guy? Its all his fault, letting them romp around in that garden with no responsibilities and as I said hormones rushing all over the place. I knew they would do it sooner or later. But what I didnt expect was me being dragged into it! They came up with the world lamest story of serpents and apples and He swallowed it. I'm sure he wanted to get rid of those stupid bastards anyway and I got maligned in the process!"
"Hmmm, that does sound unfair. But you did try to corrupt Jesus, you cant deny that. How can that be a misunderstanding?"
"How can that not be a misunderstanding? Why would I offer him the world and all that crap? It wasnt mine to start with. All I did was I gave him some well meant career advice. I was always fond of that litttle guy. He was the brightest chap I have ever seen, brilliant orator, and genuinely nice. I didnt want him wasting his life trying to drill sense into humans. I just showed him the whole world and told him that there are a million things you can do here. Being a saviour of mankind would screw you up totally. For one no one would believe you, except one or two guys. And then I knew men better than him, they are the most insecure pathetic creatures ever. They are never gonna let you be in peace and let you do your job. But he wouldnt listen. That was his biggest fault, he was too stubborn. Well it turns out that I was right, but the brilliant stragetist that he was, he turned all that in his favour. And look at his following now. As for me I was anyway cast as the biggest villians of all times, this made no difference to me."
And surprisingly it did make sense. I started sympathising with him, but I was not done yet.
"So, all the crazy things that are happening in the world now, you are respoinsible for any of it? No instigation, no worldwide destruction so you could rule, yoiu have absolutely no part in it?"
"Of course not. A, I wouldn't want to rule this world even if I was paid a trillion bucks. Ruling a world is for fools, you get screwed up from all directions, ask any president on earth. and B, why would I try to destroy anything, when you guys are doing such a marvellous job by yourself. You know I did tell Him when he created man that he made the biggest booboo of all times. He did not like my criticism at all. If we were on talkin terms now, I would have said I told you so! He must be tearing his hair out by roots now. Making them in his own image, He should have given them some brains in his image too. Thats his entire problem, he's too stubborn too, never listens to me. I warned him against dinosaurs, that ended in a disaster, and now mankind. Atleast they lasted longer than those stupid mammals."
I couldnt help but shiver at his words. If he is comparing us with dinosaurs than what chances did we have of surviving for long? And if he is generally right in his prophecies, then we are definitely doomed, just a question of when will it happen. I wanted to ask him if he believes in the 2012 theory, but I was too afraid to. You know you should never ask the questions of which you are scared to hear the answers. But there was still one important question that I had to ask....
"Why did you ask me out for a dinner date, whats so special about me?"
"Yeah, I was waiting for this question all evening. You see...."
And the alarm clock started ringing.
