Sheos continues to answer the voices in his head-- I mean prayers. Have a problem? Sheos can't help; he's a delusional guy in a mental ward. He's named his watch 'Domino', and keeps saying "Beam me up, Scotty!"

     Is this the person you want to help you with your life problems? Go ahead and write, but don't say I didn't warn you.  sheos@susurrusmagazine.com

--Rev. Brian Worley

Lies from

Prayers to Sheos


     There had to be seven bottles of water in Lucifer’s refrigerator, along with a dozen grapefruit, and an even larger stock of pears. Apparently, after all the years on Earth, after trying everything this place had to offer, there were certain things he felt one always needed to have on hand.
     Ice cold water. Check.
     Grapefruit. Check.
     Pears. Check.
     What more could a renegade angel need?
     “How about some of those Asian pears?” I asked.
     “You mean sex fruit?”
     “Sure.”
     “There’s a place down on the corner that sells fresh fruit and produce,” Lucifer told me. “You can probably find some there.”
“Thanks,” I meant to say, but instead I heard a voice that didn’t resemble anyone presently in the room.

Dear Sheos,
     I'm in love. {exhale} Not with my husband. Not anymore. I'm in love with someone else. In love in a way that stimulates every fiber from my ovaries to my scalp and back again. You can imagine, it's like being in love with a rock star who loves you back. And even though you know that you’re just a groupie, and he may only love you for a drunken night, you don't care because it’s the kind of love you will one day describe to your granddaughter when you want her to understand you were once a beautiful woman, not a withered old hag. This love was unexpected and has rendered my gut useless as a functioning organ. But my spine has strengthened enormously.  I can't make myself stop pondering the possiblilties. I won't.  Sheos, how fucked is my Karma?
        It was everything I thought it could be; Everything the devil told it would be. But I made the choice. It's a woman's prerogative, right, to change her mind? Question mark? I seek your approval.
  
  Mistress A





 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

     You pray to me about karma?
     Perhaps the better prayer: “Is there such a thing as karma?” and then the addendum: “If so, is mine completely fucked?”
But taking this as it is...
     No, your karma is just fine. I find that, on the whole, most people that actually inquire upon the state of their karma are inherently mediocre folk with no reason to wonder. However, on the opposite side of the paper (though still directly connected to my answer), you should know that the belief involved with karma is increasingly fake. Hence, the power of karma is extremely weak, and to wait for this force to raise its hand and smite all your woes is probably going to end in futility.
     Of course, praying to me probably won’t help either.
     How about you take control of any situations you find displeasing and become an explorer for happiness.
     And when you’re seventy-eight years old, lazily moving to and fro on some rocking chair on the front porch of an old folks home in Georgia (not that this is going to happen to you...), you’ll have all the decisions that you made in life to keep you company, rather than the bitter sting of “Fucking karma!” ringing through your head.
     As for your failing marriage: That didn’t last long.
What? Did you go get some get some guy who scored his credentials off the internet to perform the ceremony? There’s a reason those kinds of things are ridiculed. My only hope is that your new special friend is a woman with strong feelings against procreation.


     “What the hell was that?” Lucifer asked as he grabbed up a pear. I was still a bit too lost to question his use of 'hell' in conversation, but it didn’t seem to faze him. It simply rolled off his tongue naturally. Maybe he’d been away for too long.
     “Prayers,” I answered him, wondering if he’d recently whispered promises to any Mistress A., but finding it highly unlikely.
     “Oh, the privileges of a god,” he jeered. “I’m glad he didn’t build us with those capabilities. Especially with me. I mean, I’m sure he gets some bad ones, but I would definitely get the worst of the lot cutting into my head.”
     “So far, I haven’t had anything too bad,” I said.
     “Right.” He shrugged it off. “Through the grape vine, I heard about your breakdown in that parking lot, and then about your stint in the insane asylum.”
     “Oh, yeah?”
     He nodded, the pear crunching behind his closed lips in crisp snaps. Hard to imagine him having much access to his old crew, with the way things had been going down in his former home. Last I heard, mankind and demonkind were at a standstill in the fight for Hell, but without their leader it was only a matter of time that the latter fell to the rising numbers of humans. And here stood the supposed ruler of all condemned spirits, sinking his teeth into that dull-green pear, while a Korean cityscape unfolded in the nearest window frame.
     What a place to land.
     After my brush with death, after soaring through the air like a charter flight with an undetermined destination, I had crashed into the choppy waters of a Korean coastline, about two miles from the nearest shore. I waited until the sun strolled to the rear of the horizon, and I waded in under the cover of nightfall. The sand touched my toes as I was in mid-swim. I felt like a sea monster as I neared the beach, cutting through the waves in slow, underwater strides, coming as if to terrorize the locals--Godzilla on the loose.
     It was about that time that I noticed one of the men sitting on the sand. Not to say he wouldn’t stand out to the other slim-eyed people around him; this particular being appearing to them as a white Protestant male. However to me, the thing that highlighted him against any other person was his blue skin. Under his large J-Crew sweater, blue jeans and beanie, to me, he had blue skin.
     And still, even after the initial meeting, after the awkward “Hello, what the fuck are you doing here?” from him and the “Long story” from me, I hadn’t yet asked a most important question.
     “Why Korea?”
      But before I could hear his answer--

 

Dear God,
     Please give me the strength to destroy my enemies, give me the ability to lead my country toward prosperity, and look after my own well-being (both financially and physically). And please stop sending the natural disasters my way. They are making me look bad. I know you’re mad at me, and you have reason to be, but don’t make the peasants suffer. They still have to last another couple of years, and the way it’s going, I just don’t see that happening.
In your name, I pray.
George
 





 

 

 

 

 

 

 

     Man, you are seriously on the wrong frequency...erhm...so... don’t worry about it, mister. You’re doing a fine job with the direction you’re taking things. You’re a true American, if ever there was one, and let me tell you, I love me a good American! So, you keep doing God’s work. Maybe move on to flat-out genocide before the end of your term. And remember, you have a direct link to me if you ever need some words of encouragement. Now, go and lead your people into a brave new world!

     “I’m sorry,” I stopped him mid-sentence. “I didn’t get any of that.” I grimaced. “Fucking prayers.” And then added under my breath, “Can’t even get his fucking gods right. No wonder he’s such as lousy leader. He's fun to mess with, though. Like a reverse prank call, but from a god.”
     “Right,” he said, surely ignoring me, and instead of repeating himself, he merely commented, “It’s not important.”
     And it probably wasn’t.
     Those that didn’t know him would look for the signs: Korea’s failing relationship with Japan. The sexually repressed people teeming from the misunderstood signals reporting from their loins. The shifty generational relations. Differences in ideology all throughout the country.
     There were so many ways a city in Korea, such as Pusan, was just aching to be destroyed. So many buttons were flashing to be pushed. Life here was on edge, sure, and had they known the Devil, not just some meguk or wayguk or whatever, but the actual Capital-D Devil was in their midst, everyone would start building their minds on what scheme he was going to launch against mankind this time.
     That’s what they would think, but humans are generally ignorant of the few words of wisdom that they have.
     Time, as a matter of fact, does heal all wounds.
     Lucifer had done awful things in the past through anger toward Jehovah. He had been the father of destruction, revolution and condemnation. But he had done these things while in the throws of a vengeful hate for being beaten by the Clone (formerly known as It, shortly after known as the Holy Zombie, and presently known by too many as the Christ).
     Yes, there were grounds for the labels attached to Lucifer.
     But that was back in the day, so to speak, and though people rarely do because of time restraints, things change all the time, just as immortals do.
     Now, I know what you’re thinking: Sympathy for the devil, and all that jaundice, but I’ve known him since his creation, and befriended him shortly thereafter. So yes, I do have sympathy for him. I’ve also forgiven him of the wrong he had done to Jehovah—because poor Jehovah was so defenseless and all.
     You people will believe anything.
 

Dear Sheos,
Can you give me the power of teleportation?
Domino






     Sure, if you’re willing to become digital. Only after that, what would be the point? Once you go digital, you can’t go back. But, well, you asked for it. Shazaam!

     The fact that Satan, Prince of Lies (only a prince because the god Smota held the title of king), had ceased to swing either way in terms of good and evil would have caused generations of bible-thumpers and Satanists to turn over in their graves, but he was keeping this information low-key. No longer in the game, he wasn’t influenced to make his resignation public, because that would have kept him to his old purpose--to defy his enemy, because so much of what goes into Jehovah’s fight relies on Lucifer playing the part of Villain. To refute that role may cause questions to whatever Jehovah (or, as Lucifer had gotten used to calling him, Professor J., on account of his inventive nature) had planned for this experiment in which all humans live.
 

Dear Sheos,
     I humbly crave your indulgence in sending you this prayer, and I want you to study it with all seriousness of purpose. I am the attorney at law to Engineer David A. Meadows, and am writing to you about his untimely death on the 22rd of October 2005 were his entire family was involved in a Plane Crash.
     I have contacted you to come forward and claim the inheritance from the Bank, in which both you and I will share the profit.
     I await your urgent response. Do accord this transaction the confidentiality it deserves.
     I look forward to your mutually beneficial partnership.
     Due regards to you.
     With god all things are possible.
     Hope to hear from you as you receive this prayer.

     I hope this prayer will be given the sincerest consideration.
     Richard A. Butlers
 





 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


     I think this is the thirtieth time I’ve told you to fuck off. You know what? Forget it. You’re dead. You should’ve tossed these greedy thoughts elsewhere, because now you’re just a grease spot on the putting green, an inconvenience for the country club that never actually liked your business in the first place and only put up with you, and I quote, “Because a dollar’s a dollar.” It’s not often that I liquefy a man, but you just won’t shut the fuck up. Hasta Lechuga, douche-hat!


     Lucifer just didn’t want to care anymore. Good or bad. He didn’t want to see how any of it mattered. In his head were conflicting thoughts of pride and shame and apathy for all the things he had perpetrated during his time in existence. Sometimes I would catch snippets of his thoughts out of nowhere—AND WE DEVOURED THEIR SOULS!— (evil laugh)—But for what?— and I would look up to see Lucifer’s countenance composed, as it always was, staring right back at me.
     “What?” I asked.
     “What?” he asked.
     “Why are you looking at me like that?”
     “Because you were deep in thought. And that wasn’t a prayer. That was all you.”
     “It was nothing.”
     “Coming from a god, it must be truth,” he said.
     “So, what’s there to do around here?” I asked, while starting to peel a grapefruit. The juices ran down my forearms and dripped to the floor. Lucifer didn’t seem to mind.
     “Well, you could go through about six years of Sinfest archives.” He pointed to his laptop--a fancy looking Dell, equipped with an expensive webcam and stylish speakers--that sat active on his desk, the morphing flower screensaver ricocheting off the sides of the screen as it folded in on itself ad infinitum. “It only took me about seven hours. And the representations of me and Professor J are pretty funny, though not very realistic.” I handed him a slice of grapefruit. “I mean, do I look like the kind of guy that would wear a hunting getup?”
     I didn’t bother to answer, the question obviously rhetorical.
     He sighed.
     “Okay. Come on, I’ll show you around town.”
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