Beezlebub and Me

Beelzebub and Me


It occurred to me, as I waited for the 9 downtown, that the gentleman beside me in the dark blue suit and red striped tie might just be the pure embodiment of evil. Being a conscientious human being I proceeded to inform him of this fact.
"pardon me sir, but did you ever consider that you just might be the pure embodiment of evil?"
"Excuse me?" he replied, not in indignation or disbelief but by mere accident of having misheard.
"I was wondering if you had stopped to consider that you might be the fleshly incarnation of four thousand years of human suffering and cruelty."
"Well, now that you mention it, I guess I hadn't." he replied, brows deeply furrowed as he contemplated this concept.
"Just pointing it out." I said, a tad smug.
"Oh, and I appreciate it, it's just rather disturbing to be pointed out as the solidified essense of iniquity."
"I guess that would put a bramble in one's day." I sympathized.
"hmm..."he agreed, still musing over the concept. "Out of curiosity" he said suddenly," how was my inherent malevolence so obvious?"
"My first clue were the horns...."I admitted.
"That’s a medical condition" he interjected defensively, a hand rising to touch the rather lovely horns in a self-conscious gesture.
"Of course, of course, and they're fine specimen but..." I stopped, afraid that perhaps I was crossing the line into rudeness.
"Oh, do go on" said the gentleman, dismissing the imagined slight with a wave of his hand.
" The horns were a clue, you see, but hardly the only thing that tipped me off."
"Please, elaborate." the gentleman said, eyes alight with either curiosity or the unholy flames of damnation.
"I'd have to say it was....well, a feeling I had as soon as I stood next to you. I sort of sensed that an entire Serbian village was massacred because you didn't recycle this morning. It also popped into my head that a Nigerian Warlord murdered all five of his concubines in a drugged rage because you were five minutes late to work yesterday. A child in Pakistan didn't get a toy he wanted because you yelled at your mother. There's an old man in Siberia suffering from arthritic knees because you had a dirty thought the other day. Lemmings continue their slow, suicidal walk to certain death because you forgot to call your grandmother. It’s actually quite apparent that most, if not all of the evil in the world at one point or another, at this place or that, came about as a direct result of you and your actions."
"oh..."The sharp-suited gentleman seemed rather taken aback by my burst of truth. The his eyes brightened. Or maybe it was those unholy flames again "So, its more like a gut feeling?" he ended hopefully.
I sighed "I'm afraid I'm usually right about these things." I replied regretfully.
"Well..."he struggled for a way out of being the evil in the world " Isn't man inherently evil?"
"Yes and no, man is evil with good intentions. You're inherently evil with subconscious evil intentions. Trust me, pal, always right about these things."
"Certainly not all the time."
"Most. 99.9 "Again, regretfully.
"Well, I guess that settles it then, I’m the ultimate source of wickedness in the world." he sighed, reminding somewhat of a child down on his luck.
"It's not all bad," I said, having been the bearer of this bad news I felt responsible for cheering him up.
"Easy for you to say, you're not responsible for Serbian Genocides" Mr. Evil muttered mournfully.
"True,” I admitted "but consider this, not many people can claim to be the physical embodiment of evil, not many people at all. In fact, none that I can think of off the top of my head."
The gentleman's aggrieved frown slowly turned to a smile as he brightened at the thought. "That's true, isn't it?"
"Very true, moreover it doesn't affect you all that much, does it? I mean, you didn't even know until this morning."
"You're quite right, you know" he replied, undaunted good cheer returned "It's never really affected me before, besides all those bad things happen far away so long as it doesn't happen on my doorstep, it shouldn't be a big deal" He took a deep breath, chest expanding "afterall, I was an American before I was evil."
"That’s the spirit" I cheered him on. My cheering was interrupted by the rather shame-faced arrival of my late bus "There’s my bus, good day to you"
"Good day"
I got on