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Hell had never exactly been famous for its sunsets. They were breathtaking nonetheless, and nowhere was this truer than here in Lust. The sky was big and blue and endless; lichen tendrils of purple dotted each one of her cheeks, her complexion warm and jewellike and she blushed.
As though she’d fallen in love just then and there before Asmodeus’ eyes. As though she’d taken this gaudy, mortal sprawl of land right by her celestial hand, careening wild and free into a whirlwind romance.
A tale as old as time, he thought with a twitch of a smile. Infinite and ephemeral, brought here, brought whole by the transient flower-bridge of the horizon. As Asmodeus had been sitting here out on the balcony, it had started to rain– a simple burning sprinkle, but he found he hadn’t minded much. He’d never been bothered by the rain. It was beautiful as it fell in strings of silver beads over the neon heads of the buildings, as though someone just above in a parade float was tossing down necklaces, turning the realm entire into a reverent carnival. As though it could be something to be celebrated after all, being born here.
It was a peaceful scene– a rare sight in Hell. A thing that would never last; a thing that never should’ve been at all, but was. Truly a shame that Fizzarolli was not home yet to see it. Asmodeus always found himself wishing that the sun could set twice on evenings like this. In order to make up as much as possible for the dimness and the dullness that was Fizz’s absence…
From far beyond, a sound caught his attention— the click of the front door of his tower– and Asmodeus felt his antennae prick up. Not a minute later came the little birdlike noise of bells: a soft jingle-jangle that made his heart do funny flutters; then echoed the pitter-patter of Fizzarolli’s slippered footsteps as he entered the penthouse.
“Ozz?”
“Out here, darling.”
His small silhouette materialized in the doorway, and as he plodded forward, Asmodeus noticed the subtle droop of his jester’s hat, the sure sink of his tail that let him know that Fizz was battered. It was correct to say that Fizzarolli walked lighter these days. He worked for no one but himself– his heart at last was kept intact and his soul remained unbartered for– but his was a draining line of labour, that much was certain. Asmodeus wasn’t convinced that he would be able to comply with the lofty list of standards for success the imp set for himself daily. Not even if his own immortal life had depended upon it. It was peculiar. But it was Fizzarolli’s own special-brewed brand of peculiar, and so Asmodeus made peace with it in the only way he understood how to:
By being here. Steady and safe. By asking nothing more of him but for his hand. His touch. His company as the sun set and the sky fell all around with its brash and brazen beauty. As though it had nothing left to lose. Nothing else to hope for. The day sang its beautiful haunted scream as it wasted and perished, he and Fizz the only two witnesses to its precious demise, as far as this Deadly Sin knew or cared. To Hell with it. To Hell with them all. This was everything that mattered to him now.
“I’m glad you’ve returned, Froggie,” came his voice. Delicate, rumbling. “You almost missed it.”
The little imp blinked where he stood now at Asmodeus’ side, arms folded primly behind his back, as if in silent servitude. He rocked a little, absently, on his feet– a tired, electric rhythm. His Fizzarolli never could sit still, not even here. Not even now.
“What?” he croaked. “Miss what?”
“The sunset,” Asmodeus answered, setting a gentle claw atop his partner’s head, snickering fondly as both those golden bells tolled tinnily once more. “Isn’t it glorious?”
“‘Glorious,’” chorused Fizzarolli in a low murmur. He tipped his head up as though to drink in the last wine-red rays of hellish starshine. Asmodeus watched as a small smile, weary and delicious, crossed the side of his cheek, spreading like marmalade over the wispy white of his face. “Well, yeah. I guess so. But I don’t see the big hurrah in it. There'll be another tomorrow.”
“Never another like this.”
A sooty snort of laughter escaped out the imp’s nose. “Getting all sappy on me, are ya, Ozz?”
Asmodeus hummed ambiguously. “Perhaps.”
“‘s all right,” he responded, sightline never leaving the horizon. “Kinda like it when you’re mushy. It’s hot.” These were insipid words, spiceless– no buzz or brimstone-burn accompanied them, nothing more than a sleepy sighing quiver.
Ozz slid his hand downward to caress his partner’s cheek, tilting Fizz’s head over so that their gazes met, noticing the soon-surfacing bloom of pink on his face at every point of contact– the indecisive rabbitish leap his eyes made from Asmodeus’ lips to his lap; from his lap to his lips.
“Are you well, Fizz?”
“Huh?” Fizzarolli startled. “Oh… Yeah, fine.”
Asmodeus tsked. “Could’ve fooled me,” he quipped sarcastically. “Come now, that ain’t so convincing… Something happen?”
“Mm’yeah, I…”
His brow eased. “What?”
“... don’t wanna talk about it.”
Color him surprised; Fizzarolli was typically a tough man to get to shut up. Asmodeus had been subjected to many longwinded rants on countless cool-footed nights such as this. But now, as he looked up at Ozz with that flower-lidded, moony-eyed stare, in an instant it was comprehensible exactly what Fizz wanted. Or needed, rather, but was reluctant and wordless to ask for.
Asmodeus set a hand over his own knee, touching it invitingly. “Go on, then.”
Fizzarolli clambered onto him the way a child may leap into a pool. Tentatively, tastingly, then all at once. He swung a leg and then the other over the rail of the chaise’s plastic armrest, his tail flicking with languid excitement as it lapped up the evening air. Then he settled immediately onto the blue fur-fluff of Asmodeus' chest, half-consciously pulling open the robe he wore with determined fingers to reach it better. Then, clumsily, he curled, cattish, atop Ozz’s body, rolling soon onto a side, legs bent and nuzzled together like a cicada’s. His drooping gaze was fixed over Asmodeus’ shoulder (where his chin perched now) and onto the hellish heaven above. The colors were fading now and fading fast, but even at rest they remained exotic. Alive.
There was something in Asmodeus: some small shaking speck of his soul, that held its breath whenever Fizzarolli stilled; whenever he fell asleep like this. It happened again now, as his lashes fluttered and his eyes slowly coaxed themselves shut, paired exquisitely with a slipped sigh. He dreaded the day, clutched it tight against his throat–this, his personal Armageddon. The day, inevitably, when this precious body would lay cold and barren forever. Fizz lay crossed over his chest, tail wrapped round the stripe of robe that blanketed his waist. Perpendicular– a mathematical improbability; two little powerlines of life that were never meant to meet at all, but did. Dizzy DJ’d lyrics of incompatible melodies. A sleazy jazz scat-song and a circus cancan. Contradictory. Complementary.
The sky would darken without him. Color would never again mean anything. But for now it meant everything, this tiny truthful eternity.
The last morse-dashes of blue and purple chased each other like painted carousel animals over the pale scaly canvas of his face; the pink of his beak was suddenly eclipsed by a brilliant flash of gold. Asmodeus tapped it amusedly– Fizzarolli’s nose twitched, lips parting to reveal a set of sharp sleepy teeth– but he did not rouse beyond a momentary stir. The imp had really worn himself ragged. It was a good thing that Asmodeus had been round to rescue him from ruin.
He would not be able to protect him forever.
But what use was eternity without a tongue-taste of pleasure, temporary though it always was?
Lust– love– was a foamy froth of frenzy. A sliver of candy you sucked on and sucked on until it was through. It always shook your hands a little to unwrap it, to deflower it, but the warm weight it added to your belly and the smile it wrought over your eyes made it worth spoiling your appetite for. Ozz had been born hungry. He had been hungry all his life. He would hunger each night that lay after these next hundred-odd years, every second that loomed over this evil starless horizon. But he wasn’t starving now.
A gentle snore rumbled out from the man that twitched and dreamed over him, freeing Asmodeus at once from the poison of double-thought that had claimed him. It was far easier to feign faith in a world that was righteous and smooth, simpler to pretend that a bad tomorrow would simply never come to be. For now, Fizzarolli was here. The light rain heavied and Asmodeus summoned an umbrella to shelter him. The whole horizon blurred with the weight of the water until Ozz could no longer tell where the breaths of the earth ended and the eagle-cry of the sky began. They were inseparable. Touched, internal. Eternal.
For now, the sun set and Fizzarolli slept on, unmoved, unbothered. This hour– their hour– was calm and perfect. All was quiet.
And it was beautiful. It was so beautiful.