“So what is the purpose of living?”
The people at the table seemed to have forgotten I was standing there and had gone back to enjoying their party. Some of them were singing now. The black guy was playing the Lovin’ Spoonful song “Coconut Grove.” Others were eating big fat chicken legs or steaks, slices of pie a la mode. More than anything I wanted to go over and join them. Like a hungry kid, I was itching to be at the table.
“Pay attention, Gallatin! Stop drooling over hamburgers. What I’m telling you is vitally important. People are alive because they have jobs to do. They are meant to improve and broaden the human experience as best they can. The Cylinder is concrete proof of that. After death, mankind comes here if they failed, or to Heaven if they succeeded. But if they knew about this, it would change everything.
“Dangerously few people would work hard, or dream, or love well and with all their hearts. Because no matter how they lived, they get this in the end.
“Mankind’s progress has been slow but steady. But now Satan is attempting to change that. He says there is no more room in Hell and has begun moving the dead back to Earth in greater and greater numbers. Those who have already been sent were told the move wouldn’t be permanent. Life on Earth is made as pleasant as possible for them by allowing them to create their environment.
“God cannot reason with Satan about this, but we know that is nothing new. This forced relocation has been going on for centuries, but until now God overlooked it because the few that were sent back to Earth were regarded by the living as lunatics and ignored. Not anymore.”
“Why? Why is it happening?”
“Because Mankind no longer accepts the idea of Damnation. He no longer feels he deserves eternal suffering for what he did or did not do on Earth. Guilt has grown obsolete. In the past, people were so afraid of what would happen to them in the afterlife that they created the most frightening scenarios possible. So when they did die, naturally those things happened to them. They brought their worse nightmares along and they came true.
“No longer. For the common man today, a fire-and-brimstone Hell has become an old-fashioned idea, and Heaven is a child’s dream.”
“Because we live happier lives, we get to be happier dead?”
“Exactly, and Satan absolutely hates that. When suffering prevailed in Hell, he was satisfied. But since people create their own Hell from what they knew in life, in recent decades it has generally become a rather nice place. He cannot abide that. So he has changed the rules. He is sending the dead back to Earth en masse. And it is clear what effect that will have on things there.”
“Why doesn’t God stop him?”
“Because God wants us to stop him. It is part of our ongoing task.”
“How? How are we supposed to stop the Devil?”
“We must come up with a plan. Perhaps many plans before one works effectively. Obviously some will work, others won’t.”
“Jeez, Bill, are we going to have to drag you over to the table with a rope? We even got your favorite over there-potato salad with extra horseradish in the sauce.” My father was suddenly in front of me smiling that great old smile that had always made me want to climb in his lap and stay there forever.
“Dad, where’s mom? Is she here?”
He smiled and threw a thumb over his shoulder for me to look there. Coming out of the restaurant was my mother. A cry rose up in my throat that I was just barely able to hold onto before it spilled out. There she was, looking like she did before the cancer ate her body. There she was in that red-and-white striped dress, all her black hair long and curly again. Best of all she was chubby like before-“pleasantly plump” as she called herself. Not the hairless stick-thin woman who turned to the wall one day while lying in her bed and never really turned back, choosing instead to disappear into her sickness and never come out again.
In her hands she held a whipped cream cake. Sort of pale pink on the sides, black bittersweet chocolate on the top. It was my favorite. She had always made it on special occasions. The last time I ever had it was on our wedding day. Rae got the recipe from her but was never able to make it right. All Moms have one secret recipe that can’t be copied and this was hers. A whipped cream cake.
She went to the table and put it down in front of an empty seat. Reaching over, she arranged the silverware there. I knew she was setting it up for me. Come over and cut your cake, she was saying. Sit with your father and me and tell us what your life has been since we left. Tell us about Rae who we always liked and your job and how you’ve filled your days. Because we love you and want to hear everything. How many people on this Earth want to hear everything about you? How many people-
“They’re dead, Mr. Gallatin.”
I blinked, looking from my mother to my father. I was in a trance. My mother, my father, her cake, this place-
“They’re dead, and you have things to do.”
Beeflow’s words struck my head like a hammer. They hurt that much. I didn’t want to hear them. I didn’t want this picture of my good parents to go away just because they were dead.
“What do you want from me? It’s my parents! I haven’t seen them-Can’t I have five minutes together with my parents?”
“You’re finding reasons to stay here. And the longer you stay, the more reasons you’ll fine. It’s very tricky that way. Very seductive. But everything here is from your life, Gallatin, it is from life, do you understand? How lucky you’ve been to amass all these fine memories? How good life has been to you? It’s been a good friend. Don’t you owe it something?”
Furious, I turned toward his voice without thinking. And when I saw him, when I saw what he was I began to cry. Because he’d told the truth-he was everything I didn’t want to know about myself. He had no special shape or size. You couldn’t say it’s a man or a monster or a Devil or whatever. He was just it, them, all those things you try to ignore or cover up or argue against or justify or put up a million defenses against just to keep from saying there I am, that is part of me.
But then something amazing happened and I don’t even know if I can take credit for it. I turned away. I turned away from Mr. Beeflow and looked back at that table, my parents, and the things that made my life big rather than small and shitty. I saw the good people, the good stuff on the table, the trees blowing in the wind and the smell of spring and food and life. Despite having “seen” Beeflow, I still had managed to survive and bring all of these beautiful things along to the death that would someday be mine. I was grateful. And I knew he was right-painful as it was, I had to give all this up for now and go back to do what I could to try and keep life as it had always been for everybody.
“Son?” Dad’s voice.
I closed my eyes. “All right, Mr. Beeflow, I understand. Take me back.”
Immediately something warm and familiar licked my hand. This time I didn’t open my eyes. Whatever it was took the hand and pulled it gently to the left. Blind, I walked a few steps, trusting it, knowing that it was Cyrus. It made so much sense-once you made your mind up to go, only your own soul could lead you back to where you began.
“Not so fast, Monsieur. Who’s going to pay for this meal, Bill? The bill, Bill. When you eat at my table, you pay for my cooking.”
The Devil wore a chef’s cap. One of those stupid high white ones that look like something put on the end of a lamb chop at a ritzy restaurant. He wore that white hat and all the rest of his clothes were white too. His face was nothing special-just a face surrounded by lots of white. No, that’s not true-there was one strange-looking thing about him-he had two moustaches. Slim little things, they sat one right under the other like lines on paper.
“I see by your admiring eye that you’re looking at my moustaches. Is this going to be the new trend or what?”
“It looks stupid if you ask me. Plus people can’t grow two moustaches.”