God

God wandered along in a bit of a daze, kicking absently at passing clouds as he went.

It was something he did a lot these days. Just meandering through the clouds with his head bowed, arms clasped behind his back, thinking. Mostly he was thinking about where it all went wrong. He shouldn't hate his flock, but he did, and though he couldn't be sure, he suspected they hated him too.

He looked up and sighed, because striding his way, was possibly the member of his flock that he hated most of all. As ever, surrounded by his henchmen.

"Morning," said God.

"Jew Lover!" bellowed the little man with the beady eyes and the stupid moustache.

God sighed. "Yes, you know we've been over this many times Adolf, I love all my flock, not just the Jews," he said. He was almost cringing, waiting for the outburst. He was a terribly angry little man when he got going was Adolf, and he got going very easily indeed.

"Dummkopf! Schweinhund!" He was thumping a balled hand into the open palm of his other hand. "Einszeller! Hosenscheizer!"

Behind him, the entourage was getting excited. "Sieg Heil! Sieg Heil!" they shouted, their arms raised in that strange salute they always gave, the Nazi salute he'd heard it described as.

"Yes, well, nice meeting you again, but I must be on my way. Things to do, busy, busy," said God and he gave a half-hearted Nazi salute and turned away from the group.

"Kotzbrocken! Stinkstiefel! Speichelleker!"

The words rung in his ears as he walked away from the agitated little group. He took another kick at a passing cloud; in a few hours it would become known as Hurricane Horace and devastate the lands surrounding the Gulf of Mexico.

"Socken-in-sandalen-trager!" And since when did wearing sandals become an insult he wondered to himself. Soon enough though the sound faded as he left the group behind. He was left alone with his thoughts again.

He'd thought he'd had it sussed, but right from the moment Adam had taken the bite from that apple this lot had been trouble. What was he thinking? Sometimes, as he pondered the mysteries of existence, he would end up replaying the moment he decided to create mankind.

He'd been bored, he had nobody to speak to, and he thought it would be nice to create something. It would give him something to do, a bit like having a dog, he'd thought.

The next time that's what he'd do, just get a dog. Okay, you would need to pick up poo now and again, but at least they didn't insult you.

A Pain in the butt, that's what they were. Even after he'd decided that enough was enough and he was only going to keep the good ones.

The rest of them could go to hell as far as he was concerned. And God alone knows what it was like down there if this was the riffraff that made it to heaven. Well, that wasn't true either, because he was God and he was clueless, it must be hell down there he often thought.

At times he was sure he'd made some mistake or another, that perhaps the selection procedure had gone a bit askew. But heaven was full of clergy and the religious, so he didn't think it could be that. The only other conclusion that he could draw was that he'd created a monstrosity.

And talking of monstrosities, his heart sunk as he watched the slight figure walking towards him. According to her resume, she'd done great things on earth, surely this one deserved to be here, but he was often left wondering. She just seemed to be a bit.... Nasty, he supposed.

"Good morning, Mother Theresa," he said, with forced cheerfulness.

"Fuck off you child murdering bastard!" said Mother Theresa.

Within a few hours, weather forecasters would be informing the inhabitants of a large area of the American continent that an unprecedented second hurricane was due to smash onto their shores.

He often pondered to himself whether she had a point. Where were the children?

They at least should have been pure of heart. He'd expected heaven to be full of them, it had been something he was looking forward to and a family atmosphere was always how he'd imagined his paradise. But, there was only a handful, and as far as he was aware, they all had checkered pasts too. There were child murderers and rapists, arsonists and poisoners, child rulers who had decimated the population they ruled over - all sorts of nasty backstories.

There didn't seem to be any normal run-of-the-mill children, with their sweet smiles, filling heaven with the happy voices of children at play. He'd imagined himself with children sitting on his knee playing with his beard as he guffawed with laughter. But no, the only time he'd tried it they'd set his beard on fire.

He wouldn't be doing that again.

Maybe he should have another word with St. Peter, he was reluctant to though. The last time he'd tried to ask the man had gone off in a huff and a plethora of libel lawyers killed in a bus crash had taken legal action against him for delaying their admittance into heaven.

And he couldn't blame Saint Peter, the system was simple and flawless. The green gate was Heaven, the red gate Hell. Even a fool could work the system and St. Peter may be a grumpy bugger at times, but he wasn't a fool. That's why he'd selected him, he was a man God could trust.

He ducked behind a larger cloud at the sight of the man walking toward him, but he was too late.

"Why you hide from me? I kill you! I kill everyone!"

God sighed and emerged from behind the cloud. "You can't kill anyone, Pol, we're all immortal."

"I no care, I kill you and your family!"

That was another thing, he'd sent his son Jesus down to earth to save mankind and he'd never returned. He'd been resurrected as planned, but then nothing, he'd simply vanished from existence. And Jesus's mother too, she'd also disappeared. He'd looked forward to all the family get-togethers, but that wasn't happening.

"I bury you in a field and take over your kingdom!"

"Well, it's good to see you still have some ambition. I must dash, good luck with your plan." God scarpered off as fast as his sandals would take him.

He would love nothing better than to head for his throne and just sit and be at peace for a while. But the last time he'd looked Ghengis Khan and his tribe's folk had camped beside it and were defecating on it. It was months before that lot had left the last time, and months before it was fit to sit on again, and he'd worried about picking up poo if he'd got a dog instead.

Additionally, There was nothing compulsory about having to take a crap in heaven. So, it must have been a conscious effort, I mean, who would take pleasure from such a thing?

He checked his phone, he had seven hundred and fifty-two million unanswered prayers. Most were just spam or people praying for the lottery numbers.

He walked on still with his bowed, one hand absent-mindedly stroking his beard.

"God!"

Ah a familiar and friendly voice at last, a rare thing these days. God raised a smile and turned to greet his friend.

"Oh my God!" exclaimed God. "Gabriel, what happened to your wings?"

Gabriel sobbed, "I don't want to talk about it, they're just horrid people."

God inspected the bloodied stumps of Gabriel's wings, a mash of blood and feathers. Gabriel had been a peacock, proud and bronzed with his beautiful wings, shimmering in the glow of heaven. Now here he was slumped and bent and broken, his tear-streaked face wracked with sobs.

"Tell me who did it!" roared God, and a thunderstorm of biblical proportions roared across the entire earth.

Gabriel sat down and stared at his feet, "I was just painting my toenails when they came up behind me," his face twisted into a grimace, mascara streaks ran down his cheeks.

"Who was it?" God almost whispered the words.

"It was that fat and horrid Capone man, him and his gang of ruffians." Gabriel burst into a fresh batch of tears. "They said I hadn't paid my protection money for keeping Stalin from destroying my business."

"We don't have money, and you don't have a business. I mean why would you need either, you have everything you can ever wish for in heaven," said God.

"I told them that!" bawled Gabriel. "But they still chopped my beautiful wings off and said worse was to come if I didn't pay by Friday."

"We don't have days either," said God.

"I told them that too!"

God pinged Gabriel's wings back to their former glory, and sat down with a sigh, followed by a yelp. God sprang back up groping his behind.

"My piles are aggravated," he explained as he gingerly sat back down.

Gabriel sat down beside him and stared at his half-painted toenails. "Heaven's pretty horrid, isn't it?" he said.

"I don't understand it," said God. "They should be perfect, I created them in my own image."

Gabriel looked at God as if to say something, then quickly returned his gaze to his feet.

"What were you going to say?" asked God.

"Nothing."

"Gabriel, you can confide in me, I am God, you know."

Gabriel blushed, "well, it's just that, you aren't really perfect, are you?"

God raised his eyebrows. "Whatever do you mean?" he asked.

"Well, there's your piles for a start," he said. "Then there's all the other ailments, back pain, dodgy knees and hips, rheumatoid arthritis, gender dysfunction, cataracts..."

"Yes, yes, I take your point," said God, interrupting before Gabriel could get into full flow. "But I have to suffer all of them, at least I spread them out evenly among the flock. I mean take you for instance..." He stopped and glanced at Gabriel who had found a bottle of nail polish and was touching up his toenails. "You only have to cope with gender..."

"Constant back pain," said Gabriel.

"Hmm, yeah sure, whatever," said God.

"Anyway," God continued, "Everyone has a burden to bear, with Old Beezelbub downstairs it is a case of clubfoot, Michael has a slipped disc, Remiel varicose veins, I don't think it's too much to ask, is it?"

"I suppose not," said Gabriel, who was holding a mirror and touching up his makeup. "What about Peter, what's his burden to bear?"

"Let me think," God stroked his beard as he thought. "Oh yes, he's colourblind."

"That affects greens and reds mostly, doesn't it?"

"Yes," said God and the realisation hit him like a thunderbolt. "Fuck!" He shouted, "Fuck, fuck fuck!" And he put his head in his hands and began to cry.

God wept for 40 days and 40 nights, no one had built an Ark.