Scrivenings of the King-Beyond-The-Wall

Mirror Mirror #43

“Nice digs,” Ronnie muttered.

The luxuriously-appointed penthouse was located on Park Avenue with floor-to-ceiling windows looking out over Central Park, and it certainly an improvement over his current basement apartment, which had views of overflowing dumpsters and a dingy alley. When they had come inside there was a doorman who even greeted him by first name and called him “Mister.” It was the first time in a long time that anyone had conferred any kind of respect on Ronnie; he was used to being overlooked at best, or downright condescended to at worst.

“You like it?” The Devil replied. “It’s yours.”

“Could you repeat that, please?”

“The apartment’s yours. I’ll even throw in the eight-figure job it’ll take to maintain the appropriate lifestyle in a place like this. And if this place starts to feel a little lonely, there’s a single and very flexible professional dancer that lives next door. I’ll put in a good word.”

“What’s the catch?”

“You’ve seen enough movies, Ronnie. The life of your dreams in exchange for your soul.”

“But ... why me?”

The Devil shrugged his shoulders.

“Isn’t the better question, why not you? Why hasn’t God already provided this? You’re a good person. You deserve to have everything you’ve always wanted. I’m just the one standing here offering it to you.”

It was everything that Ronnie had always wanted. A high-paid career, living like the one percent of the one percenters. It sure beat scraping by, always one step away from being homeless or being forced to move back home. He supposed this is what the Devil does, though, right? Finds the exact thing that appeals to you in exchange for the thing he wants. Ronnie didn’t consider himself particularly cultured, but he had seen enough movies to know that deals with the devil were always tricky business; more often to end badly than well. And for some reason, the Devil was obsessed with collecting souls, those intangible things that good people were so keen to hold onto.

“Deal,” Ronnie said with zero hesitation.

The Devil clapped his hands and produced a contract out of thin air. It floated there in midair, hovering in front of Ronnie along with a quilled pen. There was a faint glow of magicality to the whole thing. Ronnie made a big show of contemplating his decision, squinting as he tried to read the extensive fine print of the contract, and so on. Then, after one last moment of seemingly conflicted debate with himself, Ronnie signed the contract. Once Ronnie signed, the Devil laughed evilly. “Enjoy this life, Ronnie, because you’re mine in the next one!”

Ronnie shrugged. “Fine with me. I’m a Seventh-Day Adventist.”
The Devil’s jaw dropped.

“Since when?”

“Since ... always?”

“You’re Ronald M. Jackson from Spokane, right?”

“I’m Ronald W. Jackson from Spokane. But ... we signed a contract so I still get all this stuff, right?”

The Devil nodded reluctantly and muttered, “This is coming out of the paycheck of whatever moron in data analytics mixed you two up.”


______________________________

(503 words)


Prompt: Write a story about someone making a deal with the devil.