#mispellings

“Dear Satan,” the letter began, scrawled in a very wobbly hand writing. He wasn’t unused to receiving letters in horrendous handwriting from mad people, but this was exceedingly terrible; almost as if it was written by a child.

“I am your biggest fan,” Satan rolled his fiery eyes, of course it was another fan letter. What was he expecting?

“I am very happy with the fire truck you sent me last year,” Satan raised an eyebrow at this, generally people only thanked him for burning down the buildings of their enemies (which he didn’t do, it’d be a waste of his massive power), but thanking him for burning down their own? That was new.

“I only have one wish this year,” the letter continued, Satan slumped in his chair. Of course it was a begging letter.

“I want my stepdad to have an ambulance to match the fire truck. My mom said she’d love to see one coming for him,” Satan laughed. He’d received many requests to kill parents, but this one would go unfulfilled as usual. He didn’t mettle in human affairs for the murder of such lowly things as parents.

“I’d really like it, especially because my stepdad is a pastor and he’s always telling my mom that it’s only that by the grace of God that she always makes it home when the ambulances come for her,” A pastor that beats his wife? That was nothing new. Satan was often blamed for such urges, but he never appreciated being blamed for such pointless evil. It didn’t make God blink an eye, the great git had always been a violent mess.

The letter was signed “Jonathan Gabriel Castor” in very poor cursive. The silly sot had even made lines in pencil to sign it so it would be the proper height. He hadn’t even remembered to erase them completely. Satan went to slide the letter into the bin to his right but caught sight of a post script scrawled on the back.

“P.s: What is your favorite color? I thought it was red, but I’d like to know so next year I can send you a special envelope,” it said. Satan paused and folded the letter into his opulent royal purple suit’s jacket pocket, grinning his infernal grin. Maybe he could make a wish come true for once. After all, it was December 24th on Earth. What was it that the humans said? ‘Tis the season.

Satan sat on a bench luckily placed directly across from the church Pastor Castor was currently preaching a midnight mass at. The post mark from the letter he had received indicated that the person who had sent him that letter had been in Nebraska. Unfortunately the silly person had only put the town, and not his home address. A quick look in the phone book led him to the only church in town.  Of course they would be evangelists. When were they ever not?

Satan slipped his hand into his jacket pocket and unwrapped the candy cane he had snatched from an unsuspecting baby he passed on his walk there. The child had wailed and he had laughed inwardly, slipping the thing into his overcoat’s pocket. He listened the mother try to console the squalling infant but to no avail. She didn’t even notice him as he walked away.

He’d always enjoyed candy canes. Even though they had been bent to look like a shepard’s staff, they were more or less ways to get children to shut up and hear the word of their glorious God in church. Bribes were a wonderful evil that he didn’t even need to coerce from men, they’d done it all by themselves.

The bell in the steeple began ringing. It was Christmas day, the celebrated birth of the son who had actually been born during the summer. He sighed, biting into the sweet as people began to filter out into the street. He sorely missed the pagan holidays that had taken place around this time in antiquity. He never missed a Saturnalia party.

As the crowd began to dwindle, a man in robes with a child in tow slipped out of the church doors and locked them. This was clearly Pastor Castor. He was an ugly man with a scrunched face, no hair, and poorly caked on foundation trying to hide his gin blossoms. Normally Satan would love a man like this, but the high scarf on the woman’s neck, and her much better foundation told him a story that he sneered at. Killing a man of God was something he enjoyed, even if he preferred to torture him first.

The family climbed into an ancient looking station wagon, the Pastor quietly growling at his wife when she tried to tell him he was too drunk to drive. When the little boy hesitated the man sneered at him.

“You too, Jonathan,” the man whispered, fury in his whispered words. Satan raised his eyebrows, this child was no more than 7. He sent his first letter to Satan at 7? The devil smiled inwardly and cracked his neck as the station wagon wheezed to life. Winning them early was always important, this would be so excellent.

Satan disappeared from sight and chased the car, following it to the house of the Pastor. When they parked the man all but dragged his wife from the passenger’s seat, wrenching her shoulder. The woman bore it, but only because he’d hurt her worse if she screamed. Tearfully he heard the woman whisper to the child quickly that he needed to go to bed so Santa would come to leave the presents. The boy, old enough to know what would happen, tore up and ran into the house; pounding up the stairs and into what Satan presumed was his room. He only hoped the boy would be drawn down when the ambulance came.

Satan slipped inside before the door closed behind the couple. The woman looked directly at where Satan now stood, invisible. She’d felt his infernal heat brush past her. The man, however, was too drunk to notice. His had went to the woman’s throat.

“How dare you try to tell me what to do, woman?” the man screamed, squeezing his wife’s throat until her eyes bugged out. “You need to know your place.”

Satan chose to make himself visible to the Pastor at this moment. He showed himself in all his devilish glory, forked tongue lolling from his mouth, eyes on fire and his spade tipped tail waving behind him.

The man screamed and clutched at his chest, letting his wife fall to the floor coughing.

“Be gone demon!” the man ordered. Satan laughed, his baritone voice ringing off of the walls and shaking them, the cross hung above the hearth falling down.

“You have no power her Pastor Castor. Not even God can save you from me,” Satan said, stepping across the room and grabbing the man by the shoulder. “Your lord has forsaken you, I’m here to take you to the pit with me.”

Satan plunged his hand into the man’s chest and squeezed his heart. The pastor called out in agony as his heart was gripped and Satan’s nails slid through the muscle. It throbbed harder and harder until it finally stopped. To the woman it would appear that her husband had doubled over, clutching at his heart, in the midst of a heart attack. The doctors would believe it too, but the immortal soul that ended up immersed in boiling blood would know that Satan himself dragged him down. That made Satan smile.

The man dropped, dead finally, and Satan stood above him. The man’s wife scrambled to his side and pressed at his pulse point. When she realized fully what had happened, she screamed and ran into the kitchen to call an ambulance. There was no saving this sack of flesh, even now he could tell that his minions were welcoming the pastor to the seventh circle.

The little boy, Jonathan, came running down the stairs as the red lights began to flash through the windows, and the sirens wailed in the street. Satan showed himself again, but this time he was a handsome man in a Santa suit. Didn’t Santa bring presents on Christmas? He didn’t want to scare the boy.

When the boy caught sight of the man by the tree, his eyes lit up.

“Santa!’ he cried, Satan smiled.

“Yes Jonathan, I received your letter, but I’m not Santa, I’m just a helper.” Jonathan nodded and stepped closer to the man. He hugged at Satan’s knees, tears welling in his eyes.

“This is the best Christmas ever!” The boy said, grinning up at the devil. Satan almost felt that his heart, if he had one, would have grown three sizes. He patted the boy’s head as he heard the EMTs running up to the door. Satan leaned down to the boy’s ear.

“My favorite color is royal purple,” he whispered, stepping away and into the hearth’s blazing fire. As he watched the EMTs rush into the room he gave Jonathan a wave and a wink, disappearing back into the pit smiling over a job well done.