Cupid After 8 Years as a Mortal 100th Bead Story

by Atomdancerrr

When 2009 Cupid finally kisses Claire Bear his final bead moves! But between their first kiss and their first making of whoopee is a space of a few hours and for those few hours Cupid is truly a god again! Each chapter can be enjoyed as a separate story.

Disclaimer: Please consider any work of fanfiction a lovingly done advertisement for the original, official creation. There is no better promotion than what is done through love and no loyaler fans than those who spend hours producing our own works. No wise Network or producer bites the hand that is feeding them by discouraging this innocent, wild eyed devotion.

The original show can be watched at Youtube. (Replace dot with .) Both versions are good. For an explanation how Cupid switched Hosts see, "Cupid 1.0 to 2.0 The Transfer." Google Scripts if you want to know where two unaired scripts of the original series are at on the Net plus scripts of all the aired shows.

Only 4-6 degrees of separation! If any one can, please contact Rob Thomas and tell him Cupid keeps failing because he is writing it in the wrong genre! Cupid is for Thinkers and Readers not merely for recreational Watchers! He needs to write Claire's book inter-spaced with protest comments by Cupid himself plus first person point of view descriptions of their interactions with Cupid from the other characters. If he would do that he would have a best seller on his hands as K-PAX was. This always should have been a book as the original Cupid and Psyche was story by Lucian of Apuleius, "The Golden As." This was written in the second century of Christianity! Cupid and Psyche started off as the oldest novel we have that was translated from Latin. They need to become a book again! Almost two thousand years later and we are still writing about this "colorful not crazy" character and his beloved Psyche!

What will we be doing with Sam and Al and Doctor Who, and the Beings of Star Trek two thousand years from now?

Ten thousand?

Each chapter can be enjoyed as a separate story. If you don't like one, try the next.

Chapter I A Matter of a Fragile Heart

Chapter II The god of Love and the Wrath of Lita. (Descent and Ascension)

Chapter III "I Am and Shall Always Be Your Friend." (Cupid/Trevor proposes. Claire/Psyche accepts)

Chapter IV Cupid Does Taxes.

(How to turn an IRS Agent

Into a Human Being)

Chapter V Trevor's New Therapist

Chapter VI Of Gods and Men and Toilet Paper. (Cupid gets his powers back and RT speaks!)

Chapter VII Deflowered, Degodded and Delighted!

When 2009 Cupid finally kisses Claire Bear his final bead moves! But between their first kiss and their first making of whoopie is a space of a few hours and for those few hours Cupid is truly a god again!

Every Cupid fan fiction writer has to eventually write the obligatory 'Cupid reaches his one hundredth couple' story. This is mine. It is 2009 Cupid, because Gumtuu has earned the right to have the final say on 1998 Cupid's and it is the love story of 2009 Cupid's that I wanted to write anyway.

My deep gratitude goes to my first audience, cheerleader and actual writer of some of this material, my friend Icemenace who is a VERY good writer! Please check out her stuff. You won't be disappointed!

I deliberately haven't read Gumtuu's one hundredth bead story yet to keep myself from subconsciously plagiarizing it. So any similarities between hers and mine are the result of working from the same canon.

Cupid 2009 was around so short a time I have to borrow names of characters and past events from the 1999 show. But I make this one clearly Cupid 2009 as much as possible. The two very different Hosts gave the same possessing little g god a very different personality and attitude towards life.

To read how one Cupid ended up flowing into the other, read, "Cupid 1.0 to 2.0: the Transfer.

Claire keeps her license.

By deliberate choice Cupid truly becomes Trevor!

Cupid's Host makes a brief appearance privately to Cupid but causes no trouble.

There! Now! I have relieved you of the agonizing suspense so you can just sit back, relax with omnipresent viewpoint and enjoy the ride!

Google Rob Thomas's website! He does offer a very good script for an unaired show. Write me too. I know where still another one is! I know where written versions of all of them are!

There are 5 degrees of separation between all of us. If any one can contact Rob Thomas, please tell him Cupid keeps getting canceled because he is writing in the wrong genre. He needs to quit thinking of it as a television show and write a Novel! He needs to write Claire's book interspaced with protest comments by Cupid himself! Please spread this idea. It may get back to him!

Uncle Merc and the family show up in the sequel to this, "Cupid's Daughter, Goddess of Serenity.

(Cupid After Eight Years as a Mortal: Part I

This takes you to Cupid's temporarily getting his powers back and their lovemaking.

Part II is called Cupid's Daughter, Goddess of Serenity.

And in

Part III Ascension To Olympus. Claire goes to Olympus, is taken by Uncle Mercury to meet her husband's wacky but definitely divine family, finds out the truth, (obviously) drinks ambrosia, starts the long process of becoming a goddess and is then flown by Uncle Mercury back to her family with her eyes considerably opened!

Several short stories here include "The The Cat Three little g gods, the couch, the Pretty Shrink and the Couch in Cupid's Den.

Part IV, not even started have Claire start getting powers which she will need to deal with her handful of a Kid who has them too plus, worse! Trevor's high IQ, creativity and personality!

Going from end of the saga to the other I am also writing "The Psychiatric Sessions of Cupid and Psyche" which will be a day by day account of Trevor's time in Sachs-Gordon up until the day he tricked his way out.

Cupid After 8 Years as a Mortal

By

8-) Elizabeth Hensley

and

The Icemenace

Chapter I A Matter of a Fragile Heart

Cupid the Greco-Roman God of Love who was also called Trevor Pierce by many disbelieving Modern Mortals stared at the string of pool marker beads strung above his bed, a big grin on his face. Ninety eight of those beads were pushed to the right by his family, the gods!"

It wouldn't be long now until he could go home to his little corner of his Mother's palace, high above the clouds in the mystical and magical Mount Olympus. He would see his stern but loving Papa, Mars the god of War again, whose job is Human herd thinning, and his beautiful Mother Venus also known as Aphrodite who is the relative he resembles the most. (Both Cupid and his Mom are much too kind to harm anyone). He could reacquaint himself with his childhood nemesis-but-sometimes companion; the nerdy and movement challenged Vulcan and his amazing collection of gadgets. He would again get to be simultaneously hugged and ranted at by his Grandfather Zeus; the proud King of the little g gods who was alas, beginning to go around the bend a bit (but medication helped). And he so looked forward to hugging his forever-beautiful Grandmother, Hera, who does what she can to keep her husbands "condition" under control.

And how he looked forward to paling around again with goofy, carrot-topped Uncle Merc who delivers the mail and may actually have been his biological father. Uncle Mercury is as skinny as a rail, tall as a lamppost and faster than the Starship Enterprise at maximum warp. (He has red hair and green eyes because his great grandmother is a valkyrie).

We aren't talking just the physical mountain of Olympus here. There is something on top of that mountain that is hidden from Mortal eyes by a sacred veil if you care to use the old language or a psychic force field if you chose to use the new language. Mere Mortals will not find it for a few more centuries. In the meantime the loud and dysfunctional but loving way of life of these highly evolved, incorporeal, Humanoids known as the Olympian gods is safe from the prying eyes of Mortal Reporters, Scientists and just plain snoops.

No those pests wouldn't show up until the late 23rd century!

Those pool marker beads strung above Cupid's bed represented 98 couples who would be in love until death do they part, one hundred and ninety six People living in the bliss of sacred partnership! Cupid smiled to himself, mentally patting himself on the back! Think of all the Mortal Babies who would be born to stable, loving Parents!

Mortals were sure cute at that age!

He kept up his grin as he got out of his jammies and into his Barkeeping clothes. One hundred happily married Mortals! Not a bad legacy for a being who was considered a Lunatic by most of the Mortals who knew him and EVERY god who knew him!

His Boss, the Mortal known as Felix Araiza came to the open door of his room.

Felix watched his pleasantly deluded friend and employee gazing at his string of pool marker beads. Felix sighed. His calmly crazy employee believed he had been sent to Earth to relearn the craft of matchmaking by uniting one hundred couples the old fashioned way sans magic with chutzpa, persistence and plain not minding his own business! It was a deeply entrenched delusion that even the man's beloved Psychiatrist, Dr. Claire McCrae had not been able to dislodge during eight years of very intense therapy. Trevor had been at it so long, he was now up to 98 permanently united couples and no telling how many temporary match-ups!

The friends and Therapist of this man were speculating with both amusement and deep worry as to what was going to happen to him when that one hundredth match was made.

He claimed he would go home!

But home to Mount Olympus the dwelling place of the Olympian gods?

Felix shook his head and sighed loudly! He needed Trevor's help so much and yet, soon, things would be different. No one was sure just yet how things would be different, but they would be. Of that he was certain!

Trevor "Cupid" Pierce had been way too insistent for way too long that when that one hundredth coupling had been achieved he was not going to be around their neck of the woods any more!

It was scary what was going to happen! Because, just what was going to happen?

Trevor saw that his Friend and Boss was also looking at his beads. He smiled a bit embarrassed. "It took eight years of cupiding Felix to get this far! When I first met Claire in the loony bin I told her I'd have it done in six days!"

They both laughed together. Though quite crazy with delusions of little g god-hood Trevor did have a rather self-effacing sense of humor!

Felix smiled lovingly, "Well it's been a wild and wonderful ride 'Cupid' and I'm grateful to the gods or whomever that I've known you!"

"That's mutual, Mortal!" Trevor laughed

A look of worry crossed Felix's face. "Trevor, just exactly what is going to happen to you when you get to one hundred?"

Trevor smiled a look of pure bliss, "I go home!"

Worried, Felix asked, "But how? By your own hand, Trevor? Do the gods 'beam you up?' Is a chariot coming for you? Just what do you think is going to happen?"

Calmly but with some sadness, Trevor told him, "I will be here one split second and the next I will not."

Felix stared at his crazy employee open mouthed, "That simple?"

Trevor shrugged, "Yes, that simple."

"Are you taking anything from the Mortal realm with you? At least your clothes?"

Trevor shrugged, "NO. Even the clothes stay. The Mortal Realm is like Vegas. What is in the Mortal realm must stay in the Mortal realm."

"Won't that be kind of embarrassing suddenly appearing before your family buck naked?"

Trevor smiled, "Olympus has always been clothing optional, Felix, and I often didn't bother with that option."

"You don't mind your mother seeing you naked?

Trevor shrugged, "No of course not. It's just skin. You do?

"Well yes. I do!"

"That must have made diaper changing and baths very traumatic for you."

Felix giggled, "Well not back then, Trevor, but things are, uh, different now!"

Trevor laughed.

"So you won't be taking any souvenirs at all?

The demented Barkeep shook his head, "No. I can't."

"What about your body?"

"It stays too."

Felix was VERY worried about this! He frowned, "So we are going to have a corpus on our hands! How will we even be able to tell you didn't commit suicide like Claire thinks might happen?

Trevor said firmly, "I promise you I won't and you will be able to tell! I'll think of some way to communicate to my Friends that I am very much OK!"

Felix said, "Claire thinks the man you were before you became Cupid may suddenly appear and be very confused and frightened and we'll have to deal with him!"

Trevor shrugged," I know better than to argue with the Normals. I'm outnumbered and surrounded by them. So soothingly I say 'she could be right!'"

"Well that's quite an admission!"

"Yes. Or I may just be humoring you." Trevor gave his boss a Cheshire cat grin.

Felix shook his head ruefully, "I look at that big head of yours with its fantastic thoughts and dreams and schemes and god-like mountains of compassion and I always wonder, just how crazy are you really, Trevor? Do you really know THE TRUTH? Have you only been fooling us all these years, pulling one long howlin' Mad Murdock, just to amuse yourself and us and to make life interesting?"

Trevor sighed, "I passed a polygraph test. Remember?"

Felix shook his head, "Claire and the examiner said you passed it too well as if you'd been practicing controlling your automatic nervous system for months as a Buddhist Monk would!"

Trevor said quickly, "Or I was just calm because I was telling the truth?"

Felix shook his head. "You are amazing!"

Trevor grinned, "Thank you! Compliment accepted even if you do think I'm nuts or lying or both!"

Felix nodded appreciatively, "Trevor I do not know what we would have done if you hadn't walked in to our bar all those years ago! Not only did your wild publicity stunts and public proclamations of god-hood literally save the bar from doing the 9/1l fade-off into the sunset so many bars and restaurants did these last few years. But this last year when I haven't been feeling well you've practically been managing the place!"

Trevor laughed, "You could always promote me officially! Just think what Dr Greeley and Dr Frechette would think of that! 'The nutcase that got away' is now managing a bar and he still just as nuts as the day he faked normalcy and walked out of the nuthouse a free god!"

"That would make the news!"

Trevor's eyes twinkled. "Hey more publicity, more Customers!"

"Crazy like a Fox, Cupid! Crazy like a Fox!"

Lita came down the hallway then. Her mood was not anywhere nearly as joyous. "Brother we have an envelope from the IRS!"

Felix's mood went from joyous to terrified in a few seconds. "Oh no!"

Trevor asked, "what are you worried about Boss? Our taxes are paid."

"But you did our books in Roman numerals!"

"You didn't have to let me be the one to do them."

Felix sighed, "You know how badly I've felt the last year. I just didn't feel up to doing them myself! It isn't a matter of I could have forced myself. I REALLY couldn't have done them! And Lita just can't either. Numbers terrify her!"

Lita said "You have to go see another Doctor!"

Felix was exasperated! "I've seen three. How many more do I have to be tortured by? And think of the money they cost! Hand me the envelope please." He extended his hand.

Lita handed him the envelope.

He opened it and looked at it.

His face went gray. "It's the sum of all our fears! We're being audited! He sat down on Trevor's bed. It was the closest place to do so.

Lita said, "I'm dialing 9/11."

"No, don't! You know it cost us thousands of dollars last time! We are going to need that if Trevor's accounting turns out to be just fantasies! No offense, Trev!"

Cupid was actually hurt at this. He frowned, "I am not that crazy! I may have done our books in Roman numerals but they are accurate, reality based figures that I can translate into Arabic numbers and I will do so before the IRS man gets here. It is going to be a big headache. I don't think in Arabic numbers. But if I have to, I have to!" He sighed.

Felix shook his head, "That would look like we were re-working the books. That's illegal and highly suspicious! You are just going to have to help their Agent cope with what you've done. Trevor this isn't good!"

Crazy as he was his employee could see that. Trevor frowned and bowed his head in sorrow and worry.

But it was time to get the bar ready for opening. So Trevor left Lita to tend her brother and went down stairs.

Cupid swept up, prepped the food up to the point it was ready to pop in the oven, and was taking the chairs off the tables and counters when Felix came downstairs. Trevor had a session with Claire in a few minutes so Felix was going to take the opening shift the way he always did on Thursdays so his best employee could go get the care he needed to stay as sane as was "Trevorly possible."

Felix thought to himself, It was very nice getting the sweet disability grant the government had given for hiring a so-called "mentally disabled employee." Trevor "disabled?" Felix chuckled to himself! The only disability accommodation they had ever really had to make for Trevor was tolerating his wild but entertaining talk about Mount Olympus and his family of ditzy gods and arranging his schedule to fit in his bi-weekly psyche appointments! Oh yes, in the early days he had taken off frequently from work at short notice or no notice at all to go "cupiding." But that had become less frequent the closer to one hundred matched couples he had come. And it was worth it not to go out of business!

Of course his keeping their books in Roman numerals: that was going to take a bit of explaining! It had worried him a bit at first but it was going to be very interesting to see how the IRS Agent coped with Trevor Pierce! He had a feeling after thinking about it a while that Trevor might actually get the best of the situation!

The poor IRS Agent! He wondered if he should purchase him or her a sympathy card before or after the audit!"

When Cupid realized it was Felix and not Lita coming down to take his shift he was amazed! He said, "Boss you shouldn't be doing this!"

Felix smiled weakly, "Someone has to take over while you go see that knock out of a Shrink of yours! She's seriously hot! God, Trevor! Sometimes I wish I was the crazy one!"

Cupid smiled at that but he was still concerned, "I know! But it shouldn't be you covering for me, not now, not the way you feel right now!"

"If not me than who, Trevor?"

"Can't Lita do it?"

Felix shook his head, "She isn't even here. She suddenly got an audition and off she went!"

Cupid sighed, "Even though she knows you feel so bad? I guess I can call and cancel my session just this once. It's a legitimate reason. I hate to, but…"

Suddenly Felix groaned loudly. His eyes rolled back in his head and he collapsed to the floor!

"Felix!" Cupid dropped a barstool and hurried to bend over him. He checked for a pulse.

None! Cupid checked back to his omnipresent days. Oh thank the gods he remembered watching CPR done a few hundred times! He checked Felix's air way. It was clear. He did what he had seen a dozen Mortals do to his Boss now. Amazingly the Mortals own limited ever-evolving omnipresence, (otherwise known as television) helped him revise what he had learned as a god over eight years ago. In the last few years the Mortals themselves had changed the instructions for CPR. They no longer recommended stopping the chest compressing to help the Patient breath. Apparently that took care of itself. Instead Cupid concentrated solely on the chest compressions. He put the heel of his hand directly on the center of Felix's chest over his boss's sternum and put his other hand over that hand and locked them together. He kept his elbows stiff and repeatedly pressed down one and a half inches, over and over again, one hundred times a minute!

It was exhausting!

Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump,

Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump,

Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump.

Several minutes passed. Cupid occasionally stopped a few seconds to check for a pulse. He wasn't finding one!

It dawned on him he should have called 911 first but it was too late now, Cupid was sure. He didn't dare stop the CPR!

Eleven o'clock came. Time for his session! But of course he wasn't there! But unfortunately that wasn't a rare occurrence. He liked to be fashionably late and many times he was much more than fashionably late just to put Claire Bear in an irritated mood! She was cute when she was angry, and besides it was his way of protesting!

As much as he loved her no one should have to pay as he had paid for committing one harmless and non-property-damaging misdemeanor by spending 90 days in a mental hospital, eight years of court ordered psychotherapy plus blood tests each month with no end to it in sight!

It would have helped if Dr Greeley would put in a good word for him with the court system but the man never would!

He considered Trevor Pierce misfiled since he was running around loose "still delusional" and Dr Greeley hated that!

Did the man really think I would ever get violent? I'm 3000 years old and have never harmed a soul, well other than deliberately mismatching couples. But I have learned my lesson! When would both the Shrinks and the gods understand that?

But due to his being so very late so very often how long would it be before Claire realized something was wrong and thought to come across the street to find out what it was?

Five minutes late. Ten minutes late. Alas he had been ten minutes late plenty of times before!

His cell phone rang. Of course it would! Claire was starting to check up on him, finally!. But of course it was sitting on the counter just out of reach!

Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump,

Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump,

Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump,

Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump,

Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump,

Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump,

15 minutes late.

Cupid remembered his days of having the powers of the gods! There was a time when he could have done 'the Force is with him' bit, reached out his divine hand and had the cell phone float to him like Luke Skywalker's light saber when he fought the ice monster! But those days were tragically gone. All he could do now to help his Boss was pump his chest!

Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump,

Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump,

Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump,

Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump,

Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump,

Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump

He was getting all too humanly tired!

The time when he would not be able to keep this up was approaching quickly!

Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump,

Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump,

Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump.

The cell phone rang again.

The gods often pray to their Mortals when THEY pray! Cupid prayed to his favorite Mortal now. "Come on Claire! Think! Have I ever been twenty minutes late for a session before? Try to put 2 and 2 and twenty together. There's some thing wrong here, Claire Bear beyond your Patient's usual protesting of his involuntary outpatient commitment status! You need to check up on your Patient!

"I'm just across the street! You've crossed the street thousands of times! You'll do it in 45 minutes anyway after our session would be over just to have lunch. So you could do it now!"

"I just can't pump for 45 more minutes! Please Claire Bear you have to get here! You have to!"

Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump,

Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump,

Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump, Pump.

Across the street Claire was fuming!

"Joshie he treats his government mandated psychiatric sessions like they are optional! If I didn't love him so much I'd have had him recommitted years ago just to teach him a lesson! His mental health is serious and he doesn't seem to be getting any better and he still hasn't one shred of real insight. He knows how to humor me and that is all. Either openly or to himself he laughs at what I tell him! He is so sure he is a god!"

Claire frowned, "Eight years! He's been this sick for eight years and I'm not one step closer to the slightest breakthrough!"

Joshie nodded. "Yes, he's a sad case. Maybe you ought to go see why he's this late. It's a new record!"

"I guess I will!" Claire grabbed her purse and stormed out.

The bar wasn't open yet but she had a key since she often visited Trevor during closed hours and needed to be able to get to the living quarters upstairs.

She unlocked the door and locked it again behind her and walked in talking to herself "Trevor Pierce you had BETTER have a really good excuse for wasting Tax Payer's money and my time for a session you can't be bothered to attend! Do you know what a privilege it is getting professional help at Taxpayer's expense?"

Then she heard her problem Patient say, "Claire thank God you got here! Over here! Dial 911 and hurry!"

"Oh my God! Trevor!"

"Thanks for the vote of confidence but right now I don't even feel like a god! I feel like a totally pooped Mortal! Dial 911 then take over please!"

Claire did so and her problem Patient lay down next to his Boss while she pumped Felix's chest.

The Paramedics came very quickly since they only had to come from across the street. Claire pointed out which prone Person was the heart Patient. "He has been feeling less than optimum for over a year. His symptoms include new onset Migraines, dizziness, exhaustion and general weakness that comes and goes. Before 13 months ago he felt fine."

Mischievously she couldn't help adding.

"The other one is my Patient and his heart is excellent both physically and metaphorically speaking. It's his mind we are worried about!"

It was not like Trevor Pierce cared who she told about his mental condition or didn't tell. He'd secretly taped several of their sessions and given them to a geeky friend who had posted them on his blog, just because he could!

It had embarrassed Claire!

It hadn't embarrassed Trevor Pierce one bit! He was pushing for a web cam in her office!

So much for Doctor/Patient confidentiality!

There were times when she was half tempted to oblige and give Trevor his web cam! At least that would demystify for a lot of People what went on during therapy sessions and lead to more seeking help!

Even after his Boss had been carried out Trevor continued to lay there exhausted staring at the ceiling. It was going to be a long workday!

Clare sat down next to him, her arms wrapped around her knees

She smiled at him. "You did good, Trevor!"

Trevor gazed at his beautiful Therapist with love and mock shock. "No psychiatric scolding for me today? I don't believe it!"

Claire smiled back, equally loving. "No you faced reality this time with courage and with honesty. I'm so very proud of you!"

Trevor frowned, "Good thing I wasn't locked up across the street like Dr Greeley and Dr. Frechette want, or that my session didn't start an hour earlier!"

"This is true."

With a twinkle in his eye Trevor teased, "So no scolding? I don't know if I can stand the shock! I think I need some therapy to cope!"

Claire laughed, "Therapy to cope with the fact you don't need therapy? That's a new one!"

Trevor nodded, "Yup!"

They both laughed.

Trevor's cell phone alarm buzzed.

Tres Equis was officially open for the day.

Trevor asked, "Claire, purty please. You go over and unlock the door again. I am going to lay here until I can feel my arms again and/or a Customer needs my services!"

Claire did so and then went over and sat down next to her Patient again her arms around her scrunched up legs.

Within seconds of opening a regular named Charley Wilcox came in. He stared at Trevor on the floor.

With genuine concern Charley asked his Barkeep's Psychiatrist, "Is he OK?"

Trevor answered Charley himself, "Oh I'm fine, Charley. Claire and I just decided to have one of my sessions on the barroom floor to shake up things a bit for my poor, poor, demented mind. You know how sick I am!"

Charley laughed, "That's why I come here and not the Mexican bar down the street. It's the floorshows! I never know what to expect when I come in here. This place and you are so interesting!"

Chapter II The god of Love and the Wrath of Lita.

(Descent and Ascension)

.

By

8-) Elizabeth Hensley

Lita didn't find out about her brother until a few hours later. She had landed the part she auditioned for and since it was a one-man production for a low budget commercial that had simply been waiting for the right Actress to show up, he had filmed her immediately. There was no reason to wait.

The same guy was casting Director/Producer/Cameraman and Editor.

They were at their busiest time of day when she got back. Trevor explained to his boss's sister just what had happened to her Brother.

Lita screamed and started pounding on Trevor's chest.

"Hey!" He said. "It's not my fault! Quit pounding on the god!"

"You are not a god!"

"Then quit pounding on the Lunatic!"

(Still pounding) "You and your darn Roman numerals!"

Trevor took evasive action by dancing around the bar and jumping on top of it. Lita was just a little too short to climb up there.

Trevor tried to calm Lita down, "We'll be fine!"

"Get down off of where food is placed!

"Then quit hitting me!"

"OK."

"OK."

Trevor hopped down.

But Lita wasn't completely done. "No we won't be fine! The Auditor is going to punish us just for you being nuts and us allowing a Crazy Person to do our books!"

Trevor shook his head, "I bet he doesn't! I bet I make friends with him just like I do with just about everybody but Dr Greeley and Dr Frechette."

Lita frowned, "Auditors are just the kind of People who don't like free spirits like you, Trevor! You'll have him just as pissed off at you and just as freaked out by you as that Dr Greeley of yours! We are in deep kaka here!

"I would make a wager you are wrong, but neither one of us can afford to lose one."

Lita just stared at him and screamed in frustration and started to run upstairs.

Trevor called up, "Why don't you go visit your Brother? Wish I could but I have to tend bar!"

Lita admitted to herself, that was a good idea! "Where is he?"

Claire was at the bar at that moment, having her supper there just as she had been expecting to eat her lunch there earlier. She had been watching all this, watching her "extremely psychotic Mental Patient" act sane, and watching the "Normal Person" act crazy. She said, "He's been taken to Sachs."

Lita went hysterical again. "The mental hospital! My brother is in a mental hospital! Trevor you did that to him!"

Trevor shrugged helplessly.

Claire defended her Patient, not that it was hard! "Lita, Sach's IS a hospital. It has an emergency room and an ICU like any hospital and it was the closest one. They want to save your Brother's life not his reputation as a normal Person, as if that matters. Most Folks know now mental illness isn't a character flaw!" She looked at Trevor who was behind the bar again now carefully wiping it down with a damp cloth. He took good care of the place! His lips were moving. She could tell he was quietly praying to his family of Olympian gods. What physical brain illness if any had set Trevor over the edge? She sighed. "Well most of the time it isn't!"

Trevor added, "Look on the bright side! He's close! GET GOING LITA! It was a massive heart attack. YOU DON'T EVEN KNOW HOW LONG HE'LL LIVE!"

That got her out the door!

Patient and Psychiatrist looked at one another, and said together, "Whew!"

Trevor loved his Boss, but he couldn't follow Lita. He had a bar to tend and with Felix physically incapacitated and Lita obviously emotionally incapacitated he was going to have to take most of the shifts!

Claire saw a big problem coming! Gently she said, "Trevor when you go back to Olympus what is going to happen to Lita and Felix if he even lives? He won't be able to stand on his feet long enough to take any shifts anymore, Trevor. At least not for a long time! You know that! And Lita is emotionally incapable of running this place by herself if at all! Ironically YOU are the strongest one both mentally and physically! What do you plan to do about this? Abandon them in their hour of need to go running back to your mother?"

Trevor stared at his Shrink, his gentle face overwhelmed with worry!

She didn't know it but that one statement did more to bring him down to Earth than anything she had ever said to him before or ever would again!

That night after visiting hours were over Lita came back across the street and walked into the bar.

She was sobbing, "Trevor I apologize for the way I acted earlier."

He smiled gently, "Little Lita! It is not your fault! Lots of Mortals say mean things they don't really mean when they are under too much stress. I am afraid there are gods who do that too! And Aliens and even a few Angels! It seems to be a universal flaw that comes with being sentient for a whole lot of otherwise nice Beings!"

Lita ignored that impossible statement. "Trevor I don't know what I am going to do! I can't manage the bar! I just don't have the People skills or the stress endurance! I don't even have the interest. I want to be an Actress!"

Trevor said firmly, "Than I will!"

Lita looked at her Brother's crazy employee as if she had never seen him before. "You, Trevor? Let's face it. You are insane!"

Trevor shook his head, "No. You never have understood me have you? Felix figured me out almost instantly. Claire helped with that but you won't even talk to Claire. Insanity means 'dangerous to one's self and others.' If I fit that category they'd have never have let me go! I'd still be living across the street. I'm not even incompetent and even Claire will tell you that. You can call me crazy if you want, but I don't even think that's true. I think I'm colorful not crazy."

She shook her head.

He insisted, "I CAN run the bar! I've practically been doing so and you know it!"

"But with an IRS audit coming?"

Trevor grinned a mischievous grin, "Being crazy could have an advantage there you know, if I play my cards right!

She stared at him in disbelief.

Trevor smiled and said, "Our books are honest even if they are in Roman numerals. They can audit us all they want! It will take them a while to adjust to Roman numerals but it's not illegal to keep one's private records in a different numeric system as long as it's done accurately and honestly. Figuring it out will wear them out, but by the time they wade through our books they will have to conclude I have every numeric jot and tittle honestly jot and titled."

Lita shook her head in fear and amazement."

Cupid frowned, "Maybe I am crazy but my memories of Olympus are all I've got to go on! Lita, always play the hand you've been dealt as best you can and let life take care of itself!"

He started singing,

"'You gotta know when to hold em,

Know when to fold em!

Know when to walk away!

Know when to run!

You never count your money

When you're sitting at the table!

They'll be time enough for counting

When the dealing's done!

Now every Gambler knows

The secret to survival

Is knowing what to throw away

And knowing what to keep!

Cause every hand's a winner

And every hands a loser!'

He added, "Oh yes!

'The secret to survival is

Knowing what to throw away

And knowing what to keep!'"

The fallen god of love sighed and bowed his head, "I need to know what to keep now and throw some stuff away! It's going to be HARD! I'm giving up so much! But I have to! That's life!"

He looked up and Lita and smiled but there were tears in his eyes, "If I were Schizophrenic I wouldn't even have understood what I just sang about! They can't get metaphors. But I do!"

Lita stared at the floor and sobbed, "I wish I did! Trevor you ARE crazy."

Cupid smiled gently, "But not Schizophrenic. Even Claire Bear knows that and will tell you if you ask her. I signed a release years ago allowing her to talk to you freely. You just never took advantage of it. I remember her amazed expression when she first stated to me, 'Amazing! You are a Psychotic Delusional but you are not Schizophrenic! That's why you are functioning so well!' And that's the operative word here, 'functioning.' Trevor bit his lip, "I need to function! You and Felix need me to function! The Customers do too. Some of our Customers would be lost without Tres Equis!" Trevor got a haunted expression in his eyes. "I'm trapped here because I love you guys and it's horrible, wonderful feeling! Trapped by Love! Trapped by what I AM!"

"But Trevor you are still crazy!"

Trevor smiled ruefully, "That's what folks keep telling me, but am I? Am I REALLY?

Lita insisted, "You think you are a god! I am sorry Trevor but that is very crazy!"

Trevor smiled, "Is it, REALLY? Let's think about that for a few minutes. You are a Christian. You believe Jesus lives in your brain?"

"He lives in my heart, Trevor!"

Trevor bent down and playfully talked to Lita's chest, "Pretty bumpy ride down there, Neighbor?" He laughed and looked at Lita. "Silly Mortals! You can't even get your anatomy straight! "Your heart is your blood pump. It's pretty important, but you are telling me that here is where you REALLY feel the Cosmic Muffin?" Trevor gently touched Lita's chest above her heart, "Not up here?" He tapped the back of Lita's head," "and over here?" Trevor tapped the right side of Lita's head. Isn't that really where you feel my Neighbor?"

Lita got a surprised look on her face, "Yes, but…how did YOU know!"

Trevor laughed, "I'm a god too Lita even if I'm a fallen little g god and a messed up one at that. It takes one to know one! Of course I know our common modus operandi. We don't take over our Host's circulatory systems. We take over your nervous systems starting with and primarily certain parts of your brains."

Lita stared open mouthed at her Brother's "crazy" employee.

Cupid smiled, "Can I speak more frankly to you than I ever did to Claire Bear and not have it get back to her or anyone else? You'll keep it completely to yourself?"

Lita nodded still open mouthed.

Cupid frowned, "We've been around Time a couple of times so by now we are incorporeal, elemental spirits really, Lita. Even your Christian Bible speaks of us. Paul warned new Greek Christians not to get mixed up with us again. We perform a function to the cosmic ecological system, regulating things, as does all life from Albatrosses to Zebras. All life does SOMETHING useful to help the whole cosmic ecology. But we are not NICE gods Lita! At least my species isn't. Mom and I are kind of anomalies just like Claire Bear is an anomaly. I don't trust the psychiatric profession Lita, not after what they did to me and threatened to do to me! But I trust Claire! She's one of the rare few who makes a rotten system work and just often enough you Mortals don't howl and destroy it!

"But back to my point. My Mother and I are like Claire: Good and kind and trustworthy in spite of what we are, or at least as much as we can be. All living beings are prisoners of their biology. You think every Lion enjoys killing, Lita? Some do." Trevor frowned, "You betcha! But the rare reluctant Big Kitty does exist who really regrets having to kill the cute, widdle Gazelles. I have seen looks on their faces, Lita that would rend your heart! You Mortals collect enough wild life footage you will notice that too eventually; the rare but precious, reluctant Predator. Well I am a reluctant what-I-am, too." I also do what I must to survive just as Lions and Grasshoppers and flu viruses do except the flu is a whole lot easier infection to fight off! Now here's the part I won't admit to Claire or anyone else and I really can trust you not to tell her or anyone else what I am going to say here?"

Lita nodded, "Yes Trevor!" As soothingly a possible she said, "I said that already."

"Good. OK here goes. Trevor took a deep breath and continued, amazed at his own frankness, "I'll never admit to her I know. But Claire Bear is correct about me being the Professor RT, or that is, using his body as a host just as the alien prot uses Robert Porter and Jesus uses about one billion of you and counting. With Him critical mass is coming. But when someone makes the foolish, foolish, FOOLISH decision to invite one of US little g spirit guides into their brains, we often do NOT play nice like Jesus does and leave our Hosts with nothing but a nice Cosmic Muffin loving presence in the back of their brains. We take over the whole enchilada! In fact we are neither Christ nor vampires: Most of us don't wait for invitations. We want. We take! Check mythology, Lita. We gods have been taking Human form, Animal form, anything that floats our boat for the moment, any time we want to for as long as we want to and we have been doing so since long before Homo Sapiens was Homo Sapiens!" Trevor bowed his gentle head in shame and then continued, "But my Mother and I have a few more qualms than most. I didn't choose this possessing of RT. But Mamma did! But she's like me; gentler and more compassionate than most of our species. RT had to have asked for what he got or Mama wouldn't have Oked my situation! I know her! So RT has no one to blame but himself! Zeus or Mars or Hera or most of the rest would have just barged in without asking permission but not Mama, or myself, except this wasn't MY idea. Please keep that in focus! I am NOT here voluntarily! I was forced out of Olympus into poor RT against my will but not against his. Poor Cupid is just the big, colorful but not crazy Ham–in-the-sandwich caught between two pieces of whole-wheat craziness. But I get the psychiatric blame for what I myself didn't do! If I had a car I'd put a bumper sticker on it that said 'I'd rather be watching Star Trek on Mount Olympus.' RT made his OWN problem by asking for more of a spiritual thrill than he should have! And my parents were the other culprits looking for a place to dump their problem child who took advantage of RT's BIG MISTAKE!"

Lita could hear the pure exasperation in her Brother's, crazy employee's voice! He insisted, "I' m innocent! I'm trapped, stuck here, marooned, a Castaway like Tom Hanks looking for a soccer ball to talk to, to keep me sane! Cupid among the Mortals, like Tarzan of the Apes! Until my family says I can, or these modern Mind Docs think to perform a good old-fashioned exorcism and it actually works, (most of the time it wouldn't), I can't leave!"

He continued, "So Lita if I am crazy than you are too. You are just possessed by Someone with a whole lot more morality than my species." Cupid thumped his chest. "If you believe Jesus lives in you, you ought to believe Cupid is over here in this other body you see in front of you." He sighed seeing the doubt in her eyes. Exasperated he said, "I'm really in here, Lita! I'm real! I exist! I'm self-aware! I care about you Folks! Hello? Am I getting through here?' This is driving me nuts! How would you like it if you kept standing in front of your best Friends and shouting, "I'm real!" and they keep insisting you don't even exist?"

Kind of scared for new reasons now Lita reluctantly nodded more to pacify him than because she believed him. What it going to happen now that Felix isn't around? If Trevor completely goes off the deep end how an I going to handle him?"

Cupid sighed, "I wish RT would protest a bit, tell my parents off, and/or ask to be released! My folks might listen. Or at least I used to wish this! But he hasn't once gone bump in the night with me, Lita, not once! Usually unwilling Hosts struggle for control at least once in a while but I'm not sensed any sign of him! But Felix's heart attack and my falling in love with Claire changes things anyway. Now I want to stay very badly when before I wanted to go home very badly! But if RT would just go bump in the night even one time indicating he isn't happy with his current situation, I'd still leave, if I COULD. Do you understand that, that I am not the monster Claire thinks I am for controlling RT despite my species having a well deserved bad rep?"

Slowly Lita nodded again. Her mouth was still open. She was still just trying to humor him.

Cupid continued, "If we all take care of each other we WILL make it through the current crisis! Have a little faith, Lita, and I don't mean just in me! Trust your Friend! He's always been a good Neighbor to us Olympians even if he did do a bloodless coop on us. England survived because 'God is an Englishmen so He'll help us muddle through.' Well the Big Guy is a New Yorker too. He'll help us muddle through! He got us through 9/11 didn't He? This is minor compared with that. This is just us. That was the whole city, the entire Planet!"

Then Cupid gave Lita a hug, "Don't worry little Lita, sister of my most understanding Boss. I CAN run this bar and I WILL! You'll never regret hiring Trevor Cupid Pierce for any job you consider him for! I'm not only competent. I'm super-competent and that is almost an exact quote by Claire Bear, and not in private either. She told Dr. Greeley and Dr. Frechette that."

"But you are up to 99 couples!"

He put his arms on her shoulders, bent down and gazed into her eyes, Gently he said, "If you don't believe I'm really Cupid why are you worried about that? I'll get to one hundred and nothing will happen."

Lita shook her head, "Something will happen and we both know it. You'll fall apart on us!"

Trevor shook his head, "Not necessarily. Maybe I'll just say 'whoops I was wrong!' And go about my business. I've got other things in my life now other than just being Cupid. I may adjust just fine. I have that contingency plan you know: Disney World. I'm not the same neurotic god who arrived here eight years ago. I've grown! I've matured! I've become almost Mortal!"

Lita was very worried to the point of fear, "Trevor how could you adjust suddenly to the fact the rest of us have known all along, that your family isn't real, that there is no Olympus to go back to, that you've just been nuts? You know Claire is VERY worried! She doesn't think you are going to be OK at all! She warned us if you claim the last bead moved not to leave you alone, not ever! She made us promise! We are to make you sleep on the couch. She plans to come over and stay and we are to take turns watching you. She says it will have to be like a suicide watch because it could turn into that."

Trevor sighed, "It's amazing how melodramatic my usually placid Claire Bear can be. I'm supposed to be the passionate one of the two of us. Don't you believe it! I've seen the real Claire! This is a fine example of it. Suicide watch indeed! Ha! I do have Friends you know! Knowing that will keep me alive!"

Lita started sobbing, "One less if Felix doesn't live."

"Your Mortals do have your own kind of immortality. There IS Heaven. You build it yourselves using technology and give it to our Neighbor the Galilee Carpenter just because you want to. It doesn't matter what He started off as, Divine Being or just a crazy-wise, loving Carpenter with a Grand Dream. You'll see He gets His Dream just simply because He deserves it! Faith inspires Science. Science fulfills faith. Because of curved Space/Time it already exists."

"Which won't get the bar ran!"

"I, Trevor Cupid Pierce deserve to run Tres Equis." Trevor thumped his chest, "That is what THIS god deserves! I can't run the Universe. Don't have the balls or the character for it! Don't even want my omnipresence back! The crazy Carpenter can keep that miserable mental state! Someone has to watch to make sure electrons know if they are particles or waves. Quantum Physics is such a bear for us gods! But omnipresence doesn't bring any happiness just sorrow! I wasn't even very good at it. I used it very irresponsibly. I was naughty! That's one reason my family kicked me out! But this nut can run Tres Equis!"

Lita was not convinced.

He looked at her gently, "I could just stop Cupiding you know, stop at 99."

Lita sighed and shook her head, "Trevor you are a barkeep and maybe now a bar Manager. You don't really have to do anything extra to unite couples. People meet and fall in love in bars all the time and because you are going to be running it that makes you responsible. You'll notice someone falling in love one day and that last bead will move. You are doing it yourself Trevor. You just don't realize it. But that bead will MOVE. You'll have your one hundred couple eventually even if you do absolutely nothing but serve drinks!"

Trevor frowned and nodded. By Jove! She's right! There were a few beads that moved and I never figured out why!

He sighed, "What did John Lennon say about 'life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans?' It seems I have GOT to find some way NOT to go back to Olympus! Because I have GOT to stay here and 'fight the battle of Bedford Falls!' You guys need me too much!"

Cupid stared at the ceiling for a few moments.

Lita stared at him worried. Was he hallucinating? She could never tell if he was listening to his family despite his claiming he could not hear them or just doing what a lot of people do when they think.

Suddenly Trevor continued, "If I am going to be the working Manager, please for Felix's sake, so he can't come back and take back more responsibility than his heart can handle and youknow he will try! Promote me legally! I want the paper work filled out that makes me full-fledged Manager of Tres Equis! Do it now before you change your mind!"

Lita shrugged, "I can't."

Cupid shook his head, "You can! I checked. You are full legal partner with your Brother. You do have the legal authority and especially now with him incapacitated. It would hold up in court even unless someone pulls a 'Mr. Deeds goes to Town' bit on me and I don't think even that would discount it. I've been running things just fine for months and in the eyes of the court 'crazy is as crazy does.' I can't win a religious tribunal but those are supposed to be illegal the days. I CAN win a competency hearing."

Lita said, "We can't afford to pay you any more money!"

Cupid grinned broadly. "Oh! Is that all that's concerning you? I don't want any more money! I don't need any more. I have my room. I know where my meals are coming from. I even get psychiatric care free due to my legal status and with that comes the occasional prescriptions for other stuff. Remember any Psychiatrist is a full-fledged Doctor. Claire can and has written me prescriptions for other parts of my body than my brain. No. I don't need more money. I need the official title so I can wave it under Claire's nose and say, "See! I am so stable I've been promoted to Manager! I need that so I can use it as marriage proposal fodder."

Lita stared at him. Her mouth was open for a different reason now!

Cupid grinned like the Canary fed Cat, "You heard me. There is one way I can stop myself from going back to my mountain until the day I die in the flesh! If I have sex with a Mortal before I go back to Olympus I become Mortal and I want that to be with Claire! But I don't want a fly by night affair. I want the yard work and the fix the garbage disposal frustrations, not just the bedroom gig!"

Lita stared at him open mouthed. Had Trevor just made his choice and chosen sanity?"

Chapter III "`I Am and Shall

Always Be Your Friend."

(Cupid/Trevor proposes. Claire/Psyche accepts)

By

8-) Elizabeth Hensley

Trevor walked down the streets of New York on his way back from a convenience store. He stuffed a donut in his mouth and thought to himself,"

How do you propose to your Psychiatrist? Where? Do you walk into her office and treat it like another session? Do you buy her a nice meal and flowers just like she were an ordinary Girl Friend? It would probably not be a good idea to do it in a padded cell but even back in the bad old days, that 90-day period of observation from Hell, I was never put in one of those, too cooperative.

As he crossed the street he giggled at his internal ramblings. Several Mortals who knew his "mental condition" looked at him askance. That only made him giggle longer and harder. They always think I'm crazy but if they just knew how normal my thoughts are most of the time! I just have way too many of them!

Where does Claire least think of me as crazy and most think of me as being stable?

A smile crossed his face.

Work of course!

Claire would come in at lunchtime as she always did, to both eat and keep her pet Lunatic under observation.

Trevor arrived back at the bar just in time to stuff the last bite of his donut/breakfast in his mouth, precisely 5 seconds before his workday started. He was almost always late for his therapy sessions out of protest. He was never late for work!

Well he was Manager now. He could take the luxury of being a few seconds late actually getting behind the counter. Instead he walked over to the karaoke bar, grabbed the mic and announced to the few early bird Customers already there, "Folks I'm always putting on impromptu shows here. Stay tuned for the best one I've ever done. Call it 'Cupid shoots himself!'"

Some of the Customers looked up alarmed

Cupid sighed, "Are you modern Mortals that ignorant of the sacred texts? I meant metaphorically speaking with one of my own magic arrows! I'm not bumping myself off here!" He grabbed his wallet and pulled his pockets inside out and held up his hands. "See, no weapons of any kind. Geez! I'm in a good mood right now. Can you at least see that?"

Now the Customers looked relieved but still completely clueless. Sigh.

Claire walked in just as predicted. She laughed. Trevor's pockets were still inside out making him look ridiculous.

He quickly stuffed them back in and gave his Therapist/Girlfriend a sheepish look.

She gave him a "what the heck was that all about?" Look. He just grinned back still embarrassed but slowly his look changed from embarrassed to wise to longing to firmly mind-made up.

He said, "Claire Bear. Come here please, purty please with sugar on top, mounds of brown sugar!"

She stared at her problem Patient suspiciously.

He smiled, "I have something to tell you and everyone else. So come here."

She just stared at him.

He sighed and held up the microphone, "It's the mic, Claire. It's over here. It amplifies sound. Remember? That's why I want you over here instead of over where you are standing now. Got it?"

Puzzled but realizing Trevor had, as usual, some highly detailed and sanely thought-out method to whatever madness his magnificently demented mind was newly concocting, Dr. Claire McCrae climbed up on the stage.

Her Patient gazed into her eyes with stars enough to keep Captain Kirk happy, in his own. "I've been promoted to Manager!"

Claire grinned broadly and clapped, "Wow Trevor! I'm impressed! I KNOW you've been running things unofficially for months, but that Lita would promote you officially, now that is amazing!"

Trevor nodded, "She has always just thought me crazy. But my work speaks for itself. We finally came to the agreement I deserved the title as well as the responsibility. Of course Felix and Lita can't afford to give me a raise, especially not now with their coming medical bill avalanche, but I'm not worried about that. We aren't going to need more money."

"We?"

Trevor smiled, "You and quite a few others have this opinion I am loco."

Claire sighed, "This is not new news."

Trevor grinned, "But have you also noticed that I am local?"

Claire stared at him puzzled. "Huh?"

Cupid explained, "Unlike many others in your life who should have been there for you but weren't, I don't go places much, and never on a whim. I don't LEAVE. I don't bus off to play jazz. I don't fly off to South America to chase glass blowers. I am always HERE!

Claire nodded, "Yes. This is true. And your point is...?"

To her amazement and complete surprise her most complex and problematic Patient got down on his knees and grabbed both of her hands in his!

He gazed up at her, "Claire, marry me! Make sweet, wonderful, glorious love with me then I don't have to go home! I can stay here. In fact the Mortal Realm IS my home now. I don't even want to go back to Olympus! I want to stay with you and Tres Equis and Lita and Felix and my improv club and my Star Trek club! I want to marry you and have little half bloods and grow old with you and moan and groan about my pains and be there in each other's arms when one or the other of us passes on. In fact, I think that would be the most sacred way to spend my life I can think of. We gods don't know what living is. Because we are immortal we devalue it. The shortness of your lives makes it sweet to you. I'm not mortal but I want to be and could be. All you have to do is love me and I'm yours until death do us part!"

She stared at him, "That would sure be an interesting way to cure you!"

Trevor grinned, "It would work! I'd no longer be a god. I'd still have my memories but my so-called delusions of god-hood would be over with."

He added, "It's just about the ONLY way you can cure me! You know how stubborn I am!" There was a twinkle in his eyes. (Cupid knew he wasn't being stubborn, just correct).

Claire looked at Trevor admitting for the first time what she had been feeling for a very long time but as usual doing it the way she always did; by thinking practically. "Trevor until we can find you a new Therapist we have to be sooo careful! I have to hang onto my license! I am going to be our major breadwinner and you know it and I know it and we are both OK with that. Your Bartending salary is just pitiful for the amount of work and hours you put in. Plus it is what I do, like you unite couples. I'd be lost without my practice. As you would put it, 'life would have no meaning."

Trevor said, "We both unite couples, Claire, and sometimes we both keep couples together. Occasionally we even deliberately break them up. I had black arrows too."

She nodded, "Another thing we have in common."

"She added, "Anyway until we find you another Therapist we can't, any of it! We don't even dare kiss because that could lead to the rest of it! We are even going to have to be careful hugging! Professionally speaking I'm going to be darn near impossible to replace! I don't know what we are going to do!"

Trevor smiled. "Put your hand out this way, Claire." He put the palm of his hand out like a stereotypical Native American saying "How."

Claire did so.

Cupid put his hand up against Claire's hand and said solemnly, "I am and always shall be your friend.'"

Cupid added, "There! We can show our love this way."

Claire was amazed and charmed. "Wow Trevor that is beautiful! Is that something you think the gods do?"

With a twinkle in his eyes Cupid shook his head, "That comes from Star Trek, Claire! And I think we can just betcha Dr. Greeley and the other Cupid-cops don't watch anything as romantic and way-out there as Star Trek! Wait there's more. Put your two fingers out like this." Cupid put his pointing finger and his middle finger together and extended them.

Claire did so and Trevor touched his to hers. "That's how Sarak smooched Amanda in public. If anyone from the psychiatric world sees us do this and he or she even realizes what we are doing, which is unlikely, just say I have a Star Trek persona too and you were humoring me. It's almost true!"

He added, "I read the cupid-cop rules remember, Claire? You made darn sure I did! It says 'no kissing, no sex, no passionate glances.' It forgot to mention Vulcan love rituals, because even I can see, 'who'd ah thunk that!'"

He smiled, "In every culture Love finds a way. I'm as unstoppable as a Jurassic Park Dinosaur! 'Life finds a way.'"

Claire said "Didn't they defeat those?"

Trevor laughed, "Nope Claire, the Mortals, whoops I mean Humans just always escaped the two islands though in that third movie the most terrifying Dinosaur of them all almost did them in; Barney! But in Hollywoodland those Dinos are still down there off the coast of beautiful Costa Rica, alive and well, running around like the big, plucked Chickens they are. Shish! You would have thought by now someone in Hollywood would have realized, 'CGI some some feathers on them!' They were actually very pretty, Claire."

Sarcastically Claire asked, "And I suppose you've seen them?"

Cupid shook his head, "Nope: Too young. I'm only 3008 years old, remember? But my grandparents took videos."

Claire sighed, "Of course! Raising Children with you is going to be a challenge! One thing is for sure! We'd better not home school!"

Cupid grinned as wide as it was physically possible to do so, "I take it you've accepted my proposal?"

Claire sighed, "I suppose it was unavoidable. I've always been fascinated with Crazy People and because of the way my Parents were I've always craved stability. You are both stable and crazy in one package! I was fascinated with you from the moment I saw you leading the B Wing in that sing-a-long, but that certainly wasn't love. But the minute I realized you were really holding down your Barkeeper's job, that you weren't going to be fired because Felix was tolerating your 'cupiding,' and you enjoyed working here I was slowly starting to consider you a romantic possibility. It still wasn't quite love but it was already infatuation. Then you were there for me when Jack left, from that moment on, it WAS love! I realized unlike all the rest of the men in my life, you weren't ever going anywhere! Crazy as you were and are, you will always be here for me like a bad penny! After all exactly because of your psychosis no one else wants you and you were sane enough to realize that. You still are sane enough to realize that. I'm no longer 'your ticket out,' I'm just 'the only game in town.'"

Cupid stared at her amazed, "Claire that was six and a half years ago! And I'd love you even if every Woman in the Universe realized I truly am a god and they ALL wanted me."

Claire nodded ruefully, "It's been a tough six and a half years, Trevor!"

He smiled at her with a Trekiverse full of stars in his eyes, "I was in love with you from our first therapy session! It's been a very tough EIGHT years for me!"

Claire looked at her Patient in full professional mode, "Are you sure that wasn't just lust?

Trevor shrugged, "It was fear and lust actually. But with me every strong emotion turns into love. That is just my nature. I AM Love. You did indeed say "I am your ticket out" and that imprinted you on me because did I EVER want out! Being committed turned me back into a helpless little Kid with no way to control my own life and you were Mommy to me. I've always been a Mama's boy. That was one relationship that did work in my troubled childhood. Then you helped me get out and I found a way to grow up and our relationship changed. But you still have always been there for me, whatever your motivations, love or professional interest, or fascination or just feeling sorry for me."

"All four actually."

Trevor grinned, "Our relationship works on so many different levels how can it fail? If one level fails to work the others still might."

"This is true."

Trevor said, "let's risk hugging right now.

"OK."

Trevor took Claire in his arms and playfully whispered in her ear being very aware the mic was still picking it up, "It was The Fates bringing us together, Psyche-iatrist. That book of mythology you tested my knowledge of my family with wasn't wrong. It was just giving us future knowledge. YOU are Psyche. You always were! We even knew it. We just didn't want to admit it."

She whispered back forgetting just how sensitive the mic was even though Trevor hadn't, "That's delusions of reference again, Trevor. You only THINK every book you read about mythology is about you."

He whispered back, "I love it when you talk psychobabble to me!"

She whispered, "and I love it when you talk psychotic to ME!"

They both laughed, laughed at the silly Universe, laughed at themselves, laughed at the silly Cupid-cops at the hospital who wouldn't allow what they were doing but couldn't stop them if they were very careful though it was so very risky!

How could life get any sillier?

How could life get any more sacred?

Suddenly every Customer in the bar was giving them a standing ovation and clapping furiously! A few whistled. Of course they'd even heard every word they'd whispered! That had been Trevor's intentions!

The god of love turned and bowed to his audience.

Claire raised her eyes to the Heavens and implored for sanity to at least make a passing appearance!

Chapter IV Cupid Does Taxes.

(How to turn an IRS Agent

Into a Human Being)

By

8-) Elizabeth Hensley

At first as many did, IRS Auditor Leonardo Factor thought the business he had come to audit was an Adult club. His nose wrinkled. He hated those kinds of places! He felt a little more charitable to his new Victims when he realized it was just a bar and Mexican Restaurant. Coming in the door the delicious smells told him he had miss-categorized the place!

He vowed to be a little easier on them. Maybe they would give him some Mexican food. Of course taking a bribe was illegal, unethical and shameful beyond description!

Tell that to his stomach! There were real bribes like money, etc, and then there was food. Two different things, really. It wasn't unreasonable to be offered and to accept food when what one had to do could take hours, even days!

He walked in and was met by a man wearing the cutest shirt he had ever seen on a male. It was purple and pink and had blue teddy bears and big red hearts. The man smiled and said, "I am called Trevor Pierce but I would prefer it if you would call me, Cupid."

"Cupid!" Leonardo Factor exclaimed. "I definitely will not! I will call you Mr. Pierce and you will like it!"

His new victim sighed, "Well I will accept it anyway. A lot of People just call me Trevor."

"I don't try to become friends with the People I audit!"

The man said, Now that is a tragedy for both of us. I am three thousand and eight years old and I still don't have enough friends. How old are you Mr. ah?''

Leonardo Factor thought, three thousand and eight years old? Leonardo Factor told his victim. "Leonardo Factor, and that is MR Factor to you! And it is none of your business how old I am!"

The man who wanted to be called Cupid smiled, "Do you realize your first name is the same one that Leonardo of Pisa had? He perfected and introduced the Hindi system of counting to the rest of the World and that included the zero my precious Roman numerals do not have. That became known as the Hindu-Arabic Numeral system and is what is used today. He was an interesting fellow. He really, really, really, really loved coffee and he really treated his Camel nicely!"

Leonardo Factor snapped "No. I did not!"

His strange new Client said, "You have the same nose as he does too! What a small genome! You must have some of his genes! You may be a direct Descendant. The fact you BOTH like to work with numbers is also telling! How do you feel about coffee and Camels?"

Leonardo Factor stared at him.

His new victim smiled, "I love to watch genetics and names stay the same or change just slightly from generation to generation. It is one of the nicest things about being an Immortal. Of course I'm giving that up soon." He said calmly. "I've found a better gig than immortality, domesticity."

Leonardo Factor was truly puzzled now, "Ah, how nice for you!"

"Do you want to get right to work?"

Yes! Definitely!" The sooner I am away from this weirdo the better!

Trevor smiled at him. "Our office is upstairs. Follow me."

Leonardo Factor followed the man up the stairs and down a narrow hallway to a pleasantly painted, small room, which had a window overlooking the restaurant; a good security measure that!

His weird, new victim said, "I prepared a pleasant place for you to work. I put some soothing music on, put some daisys in a vase and prepared a plate of fresh-out-of-the-oven chocolate chip cookies. You are going to need it!"

The IRS agent stared at his new victim. Why are you being so nice to me?

Trevor shrugged, "Why not? It's certainly not going to get me anywhere treating you like dirt. You are only doing your job as I do mine."

He gave Trevor a suspicious look. "When folks treat me like you are treating me there is usually an ulterior motive. I bet your books are dishonest or a mess! Or both!"

Trevor sighed, "Neither really. They are quite tidy and honest but they are in Roman numerals."

The man was flabbergasted! "What?"

Trevor swallowed, "For the last few months my Boss has been under the weather and neglecting things. We just found out why. He's in the hospital now with a major heart attack. His Doctor just told us he'd been having little ones for months and that was what was sapping his strength. I've been sort of running this place unofficially for months and officially the last few days. So I've been keeping the books as best I could. I'm not unproficient in math. I am genius level actually. But even Einstein had troubles with his taxes. I think it's the fear-factor. Merely figuring out the Universe just doesn't have this kind of fear-factor! And I'm old school, VERY old school. I'm supposed to be crazy. I don't think I am, but I'm Cupid the god of love. I had math pounded into me by my Pops the god of War and he did it the only way he could back then. He taught me in Roman numerals."

Mr. Leonardo Factor stared at Trevor, "You have got to be putting me on! Your realize an insanity defense won't work here? It might keep you out of prison but we can still take the bar away from your Boss!"

Cupid sighed, "I don't need an insanity defense. I am not insane. I'm not even considered incompetent. I've passed competency hearings twice. Our books are in order. It is just for the last few months I've been doing them since my Boss is incapacitated, and I've been doing them in Roman numerals."

"You can't do that!"

"I did do it.

"It's illegal."

Gently the man shook his head, "No it isn't. I checked, and anyway I did the best I could. Consider it a disability accommodation or an ethnic accommodation. The IRS allows reasonable accommodations for both. Take your pick. I am quite confident you will find all my math checks out and I did it honestly. They just aren't in Arabic characters."

"We don't want Arabic characters. We want English!"

Trevor smiled and shook his head, "I don't think you really want Anglo, sir. You want what you modern Mortals usually use, which is indeed Arabic. Your usual base 10 1 plus 2 you modern Mortals use are Arabic characters. The Muslims borrowed the zero from the Hindis. As I said earlier, Alexander of Pisa perfected it and his method of math is so superior to everyone else's it took over the world peacefully. Check your own Mortal history. Having a zero does indeed make math much easier but it's not what I grew up with. Sorry!"

Leonardo Factor insisted, "I don't know how to do math in Roman numerals. No one does!"

Trevor said gently, "Well I do! I'll teach you. Please be reassured I want this matter settled as painlessly as possible for all concerned and that does include you too. I don't want it to drag on and on and I am not trying to hide anything. I just think in Roman Numerals when I do math. Doing taxes is stressful enough for me without trying to do math in a way I wasn't trained to do it as a Kid! When I filled our income tax form I translated the numbers into Arabic numerals but even that was very hard for me because I was scared. I'm not used to doing taxes! I'm a god! I'm not omnipresent any more but I still am what I am and that is all I am. So even translating Roman numerals into Arabic was giving me a stress headache that even the relaxation exercises my beloved Shrink, Claire Bear taught me was not relieving. I lost my omnipresence when I was cast out of Olympus so I sure don't want to keep all our books in a way that is so stressful I'd get the math wrong if I had to keep it up for long!"

Leonardo Factor looked at Trevor. The look on the poor guy's face was undoubtable. He believes what he's saying! This man is nuts! They've sent me audit the records of a Lunatic! "They actually let you run around loose?"

Trevor nodded, "Well yes actually, though admittedly not far. My mental hospital is across the street. I have a beautiful, lady Shrink who keeps a close eye on me though no one has ever seen me do one violent thing except once I had to defend Lita from a man who had a knife to her throat and the Police said I did the right thing. It was still difficult for me. I don't like violence. I am the god of love. When the other gods started throwing thunder bolts at Mortals and/or each other my Mom and I would hide until it was all over!"

The IRS man continued to stare at Trevor trying to figure him out.

It was very disconcerting. The Lunatic was polite about it but he stared right back!

Cupid said quickly, "Put it this way. I'm managing my own affairs and holding down a job. I am a TAXPAYER. Across the street I was costing hardworking American taxpayers over a thousand dollars a day to confine a harmless being who never hurt anyone and I don't know why! I did do something illegal but I didn't hurt anyone or damage any property and it was just a misdemeanor and quite amusing to everyone really. I thought I was going to just get community service. A Person with the usual, current, standard Presbyterian type, religious beliefs would have been out in a few days picking up trash for a few hundred hours. But just because I am my OWN higher power I was locked up for 90 days and forcibly medicated, not that the meds were so bad. They were soothing and helped me deal with being confined. They don't have me on anything now even though they still make me get monthly blood tests to monitor the levels of the meds I am not on! And they call me crazy! Claire says I don't have a kind of mental illness that responds to meds. But at the price they charge to keep harmless beings like me locked up against our will in the harmless ward at Tax Payer's expense, we should have been able to have our own private Shrinks 24/7. Plus a trip around the world with the Shrink in tow, and at the best hotels too! Just what is the hospital doing with all this money? And yet they howl they need more!"

The IRS Agent nodded. "You are making a sane point there. I will suggest to my superiors they audit THEM!"

Cupid thought to himself, Now there IS revenge for the way they treated me! I may just have got Sach's audited! At least it wasn't deliberate. Claire is right. I need to learn to keep my mouth shut!

The IRS man continued, "But 'Cupid' I need some kind of medical confirmation you are even legally and mentally able to assist me in this audit."

Cupid sighed and reached in his pocket and whipped out a piece of paper "Here is your permission slip to go talk to my Psychiatrist. You notice I have it signed ahead of time. I have a pocket full of these. It authorizes my Shrink to blab to you about me anything she wishes to advocate for me. I've never tried to hide what I am from any one. I am not ashamed, embarrassed or distressed about my so-called 'mental condition.' I feel just fine except for being terribly homesick at times and I'm perfectly comfortable being considered to be both Cupid the god of love and Trevor Pierce, harmless Lunatic, or what is much more likely true: both god and Lunatic which the friends in both realms who know me best keep saying. Call me either Cupid or Trevor, I don't care, or switch back and forth as the mood strikes you like most Mortals who know me do. Just be polite about it. And I'll be polite back to you even when I don't believe you either! To keep things civil I have to humor the 'Normals' as much as they humor 'the Lunatic.'"

The IRS Agent continued to stare at him.

Yikes! Even the worst Shrinks didn't look that judgmental! Time to turn up his considerable charm! Cupid gave the IRS Agent the cutest smile he could manage which was very cute indeed! Cheerfully he chirped, "Look on the bright side! After you are done here you will be the only IRS Agent in the country, in fact one of the few of any Mortals in the modern world who can do math in Roman Numerals! That's supposed to be a lost art! Well I either never did lose it due to being three thousand and eight years old or I've refound this ancient lost art due to being crazy-smart like John Nash. Take your pick!"

Cupid continued, "And you can't call me a madman. I'm not mad at you. I'm not mad at anyone except my Father for starting 9/11! I'm perfectly calm and loving. After all I am the god of LOVE. I bet you get more emotional abuse from almost every other Person you've ever audited than me! Did anyone else ever put on soft music and set out a vase of daisies and a plate of fresh-out-of-the oven chocolate chip cookies for you to enjoy while you figure?"

The man stared at the cookies and the flowers and listened to the soft music.

Cupid noticed him listening to the music, "Is Native American flute music acceptable to you sir? I can also offer you running water, Enya, Loreena McKennitt, African tribal, Tubular Bells, and much more. What is your preference?"

The man stared at Cupid, stared at his cute face and pixy hair crest and purple and pink shirt with blue teddy bears and red hearts on it. He growled, "Are you gay?"

Cupid nodded, "Oh yes! In every way but this: I only love Females to have sex with. I'm picky that way. They must be Female either of my own species the gods or some variation of the many Humans evolve into over the next few billion years. Unlike most of the other gods I won't do Centaurs. There are some gods who call me a bigot because of that, but I'm sorry. I just can't!" He frowned. " It's more of a phobia than bigotry and I'd have worked on that issue with my Shrink but she doesn't believe me. My partner's have to have two legs only because four-legged sex scares me. I know Centaurs are perfectly nice People and I've voted for lots of them in our local elections. But I'm afraid of being stepped on or kicked by them during sex! So my partners have to be female and some kind of humanoid. Nymphs I don't mind. In fact they make great lovers but then they have two legs when they even chose to have legs and they branched off from you, as did we. We've been around the circle of time a couple of times. We're incorporeal now but we sure ain't dead!"

Leonardo Factor exploded, "You are nuts! And you can't be gay if you only love females!"

Cupid grinned, "Are you aware of the original meaning of that word, sir?"

The man stared at him. He was actually. But he didn't want to admit it.

Cupid smiled. "It wasn't even too long ago that word changed. Or else Fred and Barney had something going on that escaped notice of the 1960 era censors! He leaned his head back to the ceiling like a Dog at the Moon and started singing the Fred Flintstone theme song, belting it out for all it was worth!

"Flintstones. Meet the Flintstones.

They're the modern Stone Age family.

From the town of Bedrock,

They're a page right out of history!

Let's ride with the family down the street.

Through the courtesy of Fred's big feet!

When you're with the Flintstones

you'll have a yabba dabba doo time.

A dabba doo time.

You'll have a gayold time!"

Leonardo Factor wondered, Can I cancel this audit? I've entered the lunatic door to the Twilight Zone!

Cupid stared at the IRS Agent thoughtfully. Time to try some other Mortal-management techniques.

Cupid walked out of the room for a few moments and came back with another glass and a half-full jug of milk. He sat down in the other chair, poured himself a glass of moo-juice and grabbed a cookie. "If you aren't going to eat these cookies while they are still soft and gooey, than I shall!"

Hurriedly the Man reached for a cookie.

Cupid smiled, "Perfect! This worked with any Mortal, (well actually it worked with his own family). Give someone something nice and if they show reluctance threaten to take it away again!

Grandma Hera had used it many a time to get Grandpa Zeus to drink the pomegranate juice she had hidden his meds in! Mortals and gods aren't all that different!

IRS Agent and god/Lunatic/victim shared cookies and milk in total and peaceful silence for a few minutes.

Cupid thought, Another great Mortal management technique used by many a god and many a Mortal themselves. Get them to eat with you, (communion) and they start to trust both themselves and their gods.

The tryptophan in the milk that makes serotonin and the love hormone (oxytocin) in the chocolate chips also helped.

A few cookies and a bit of milk and the IRS agent started turning Human!

Cupid watched it happen, heard the Man's heart rate slowing down, saw the muscles on his face and body relax, smelled a change in his body chemistry. It would have amazed his Mortal Friends if they realized what their so-called lunatic friend could sense about them!

The Man was fighting the change but it won. He even took a sniff at the daisies and a small, rueful grin crossed his face. This man was nuts but he was fun!

Cupid smiled to himself. Despite having no powers he had again succeeded in a getting a Mortal under his spell! Am I good or what?

Leonardo Factor opened Tre Equis's books. They were in Roman Numerals all right! "I have never seen the like!" You ARE going to have to explain to me how this is done! Od's bodkins but you are weird!"

Cupid laughed, "Now there is an exclamation I haven't heard in a while!"

"An old and weird expression for a very old and weird Client! I hope you have lots more cookies. This is going to take a few days! And how about some of those enchiladas I smell?""

Cupid laughed, "With the cookies?"

"Absolutely!"

"I admire a Mortal who can pack in mixed cuisine like that! Coming right up Sir! I'd offer you a beer but I think you'd better keep your mind clear!"

"Amen to that! I don't drink alcohol. I'd rather have some ice tea. I just stuff my face!"

"You aren't fat?"

"I stuff and stuff and stuff my face and then I run on my treadmill in front of my TV for hours at a time."

Cupid was impressed, "Wow! What a mixture of gluttony and discipline! Your Mother must have been a Hedonist and your father must have been a Spartan! Sounds like my situation and my family!"

Over the next few days Leonardo Factor got a crash course in doing math in Roman numerals and in the rights and abilities of the Mentally Ill. He learned Tres Equis's Dishwasher had been at his job for 15 years and the Man was Schizophrenic and had never been hospitalized except one time. After that medicine partially stabilized him and Psychotherapy taught him how to handle the symptoms the medicine didn't handle. So even though he often carried on two-way conversations with the plumbing he also used that same plumbing to keep Tres Equis's dishes spotless. All it took to hold down his job was an understanding Boss, which Felix had been, and of course Trevor Pierce was also going be considering his own psychiatric history!

Leonardo Factor asked one day as he was going down the stairs, "You used to bed Nymphs and goddesses and vestal Virgins. So much for their virginity! But what about today? Anybody got the hots for a Lunatic like you today, Mr. Pierce?"

Cupid smiled, "Indeed. But these days I'm only got the hots for one Girl; my Fiance, Claire Bear. Yes that is correct! Soon as we can find me another Therapist my Shrink and I are getting hitched!"

Leonardo Factor stared at Trevor, "You have GOT to be kidding!"

Cupid smiled and held out his hand, wiggling it, "Look at that rock! She bought it for me! She has most of our disposable income. Mine isn't disposable. It just GOES. So she was the one who bought us our rings. She told me unless I was doing something messy I'd better NOT take it off. I don't'! Believe me I feel like Lady as in 'Lady and the Tramp,' when her Mortals, I mean her Humans brought home her Dog license. I finally feel like I belong in this realm, that I'm not a Castaway or an Outsider any more! I've got a god license!"

Leonardo Factor stared at him, "Forgive me Mr. Pierce for being obvious but why would a Psychiatrist, or for that matter anyone, marry a Lunatic who thinks he's Cupid the god of love?"

Trevor laughed, "Think about what you just said there for a few moments. Cupid the god of LOVE! Might it not occur to you I might be good at what I'm named after?"

"But it's all in your head!"

Trevor got a lustful look, "And where do you keep YOUR love making skills and desires? In your sock drawer?'

"But all your experiences are imaginary!"

They walked into the bar.

Cupid smiled a tight-lipped smile, "Don't be so SURE of that, Mortal!

He ran behind the counter and came out with an entire basketful of darts.

Leonardo Factor tensed up. Was this nut job going to hurt him?"

Instead Trevor Pierce grabbed a glass and using it as a mirror flung the darts at the dartboard over his shoulder and spelled out, "Not nuts!" with them.

Leonardo Factor stared at the dartboard. He stared at "Cupid."

The gentle Lunatic just stood there grinning And bouncing on his heels.

Leonardo Factor suddenly ran for his car.

That night he dreamed of nymphs and thundering gods and math in Roman numerals and being in a straitjacket in a mental hospital out of a horror movie! And all through it Trevor Pierce's face kept floating amongst the storm clouds like the Wizard of Oz's and reassuring him that all was well despite his madness and the madness of the Universe and he kept offering him cookies!

By morning Leonardo Factor wasn't sure he wanted a chocolate chip cookie ever again!

Leonardo Factor called in sick that day and went to church that night for the first time since he had left home for college, But his faith was not only rusty, it was messed up! How could what he had learned in Sunday school be true if Trevor was what he said he was?

But how could Trevor be what he said he was?

That ability of his to throw darts was fantastic but it didn't make him a god!

So why did Trevor Cupid Pierce bother him so much? What was it about him that made his crazy story ring true? And how could he avoid more nightmares?

Leonardo Factor grabbed the piece of paper off his nightstand that Trevor had given him that had his Psychiatrist's number on it. He dialed it.

Josie his Client's, Doctor's, Receptionist answered. She promised him her Boss would get back to him. It was a few hours before Dr. Claire McCrae finally did. Leonardo Factor was eating dinner alone as usual when she finally called. He asked, "Is this man Trevor Pierce really both your fiance and your Patient? It's OK. You can talk to me. I have one of those permission slips he signs by the handful and practically throws at People."

The voice on the phone said, "He'd distribute them by air by dropping them from a helicopter if I'd let him and he wasn't so green he can't stand to litter. Yes and yes. Except I need to find him another Therapist so we can consummate our relationship. If I have sex with a Patient I will lose my license. It's taking a while. I am not going to be easy to replace!"

"So you haven't really bedded him?"

"No, and isn't this kind of personal? I know Trevor authorized me to talk about him behind his back but this is not what I had in mind!"

"I just need to know for my own sanity's sake if there is any possibility he might be who he says he is!

Claire laughed, "Cupid the god of love? Mr. Ah, Mr. you didn't even give me your name."

I'm Leonardo Factor. I am auditing ah, Cupid. I am auditing a man who thinks he is the god of love, who keep his financial records in the neatest hand writing I've ever seen and in perfect order. Except he does them in Roman numerals! And he bakes chocolate chip cookies and put on music for me and wears purple and pink shirts with teddy bears on them and he sets out flowers and you are marrying him even though you are his Therapist. You don't think he's gay?"

Claire sighed, "Believe me sir my "Cupid" is not gay, just different! He comes from a different culture or thinks he does. In France for instance Men hold hands and kiss in public and then go home to their Wives and KNOW what to do with them! Trevor thinks he's not only Greek but very ancient Greek and in that day and age, Men of the higher classes did have some of the behaviors and attitudes my Cupid displays. Some completely straight Men even wore makeup!"

"But what if you get him in the sack and he can't perform?"

"That is what Viagra and therapy are for. If it turns out that's another one of Trevor's problems we'll cope together as a couple. At least I KNOW he is willing to go for help! Many Wives don't find out their Husbands have problems but haven't the courage or desire to do anything about it until after their weddings. My Trevor will go to anyone I tell him to, and participate as best his delusion will let him, to the best of his ability in his treatment."

"Now Mr. Factor I would appreciate it if you would drop this subject, because please! This hasn't got anything to do with my Patient's problems or ability to function. It seems to be about your own sexual insecurities. If you are going to have me consult with me about you, you need to make an appointment with my Receptionist and plan to pay me. Now is there anything legitimate you need to ask about Trevor Pierce?"

"Is he really competent to do Tres Equis's books?"

Dr. Mc Crae sighed, "You just said his books were neat and in perfect order."

"Yes, but they are in Roman numerals!"

Claire sighed, "Those were a legitimate method of doing math for hundreds of years. Count yourself blessed! You now know something no one else in the World but Trevor Pierce knows. I read just the other day no one knows how to do math in Roman Numerals! I heard that and started laughing and thought to myself, 'you need to talk to my Patient!"

"But he's nuts!"

Claire said quickly, "His memories are. His day to day interacting with the World and sensory input are normal. Unlike a Schizophrenic he can take care of himself, and can carry on a normal conversation if it can be steered away from any thing to do with 'the gods.' He can handle pressure, define metaphors, and even make them up. His social skills are excellent. He worked at Tres Equis as a Barkeep for over eight years, is managing it now and has been for months, actually. It just recently became official. And most of the time he's as happy as a Clam! He dances when there is no music but the music he keeps in his heart, which actually is very mentally healthy though certainly not normal. Most of us aren't healthy enough to have that! We should all have our own internal music. But we don't. But Trevor Cupid Pierce does. I don't mean he hallucinates music. He doesn't hallucinate! He's not that kind of mentally ill. I mean he uses his imagination to make mental music. He is his own one-man band. Except for thinking he is a god he is the most mentally healthy, self-actualized being I know and I wish I knew how to clone most of what he's got. If I could put Trevor Cupid Pierce in pill form there are many other kinds of mental illness we could cure, and if the side effect was some gentle, humble delusions of god hood that's preferable to what many of us have. Believe me I work as a Therapist and I've seen it all and Trevor is a refreshing breath of fresh air! I look forward to coming home to him without the pressure of having to cure him and I don't envy his next Therapist! She'll be all new and naïve and gung ho on curing him as I was and my new Husband will see that as a challenge to have her going around in psychiatric Wild Goose chases just because he can! He came one day to therapy and talked the whole time in a Schizophrenic word salad. I was getting really worried until I realized it all rhymed and it was in perfect iambic pentameter and it was April 1st!. He had worked on that for weeks! Then there was the time he spent our session reciting from memory the whole psyche med section of the PDR but it was in pig Latin and the time.."

"I get the picture! Sigh. I hope he has the sanity to have not hidden any little surprises like that in his tax records!"

At her end of the telephone Claire smiled, "I don't think he did Mr. Factor. He is SANE. He is on his Boss's time at work not his or mine. He doesn't take therapy seriously because he doesn't really think anything is wrong with him and he's being forced into it however much he enjoys it most of the time. He DOES take his job and his Boss and his Customers very seriously!"

"That's good to know."

"My next Patient just arrived in the waiting room. If there are any other legitimate questions feel free to call me again. Good bye, Mr. Factor."

Click.

He couldn't avoid Trevor Cupid Pierce forever. He had a job to finish! He went back the next day, loaded down with Benadryl, which will work as a tranquilizer for some People as well as an allergy med.

Cupid met him at the door with his usual big, cheery grin.

Leonardo Factor no longer thought the man was hiding anything. It was becoming rather obvious either he was totally out of touch with reality or there really truly wasn't anything dishonest hidden in their books. Trevor seemed to be enjoying teaching him how to do math in Roman Numerals and he was doing so gently, patiently and with great skill and comprehension of how hard it was for his student. It was like there was a college Professor hidden inside of him somewhere!

Roman numerals were really a bear of a way to do math! But apparently it could be done. They were doing it and civilization itself had done it this way for thousands of years! It was the math of Jesus' day and Nero's and Josephus's! It was amazing to think the guy who was teaching it to him thought he had interacted with those Ancients! And yet in other ways he seemed so cheerfully, disconcertingly normal! That was what was terrifying!

Leonardo Factor stared at Cupid, "Mr. Pierce for my own mental health's sake I have to ask you some non math related questions. Is that OK? You don't have to answer them. This is not part of your audit."

"Ask away Lenny boy." 'Cupid' was leaning back with his feet up on the desk staring at the rainwater caused "Rorschach test" on the Tres Equis office ceiling. The roof had leaked at one time. (Roof fixing was another skill the god of love had learned because of sheer necessity).

"You say you are an Olympian god, Mr. Pierce. That is hurting my Christian faith. Is there any way you can help me save it or are you now going to demolish it on me completely?"

Cupid smiled, "I swim in the same ocean as the Big Guy, Lenny. My species are plankton. Your species is well on the way to evolving into the Omega Point, a Blue Whale to us pond scum!"

Cupid smiled, completely at peace with himself, the Universe and being audited. "Who created whom Mr. Factor? Time circles. Did the supernatural create the natural or did you, the natural create us so-called super naturals far in the Future just because you wanted to? Think about that a while! Which Horse is the first on an eternal merry go round that always existed? In a circle stamped on a piece of paper, where did the circle start? Find me the first point on a moebius strip!

"And now for something completely different and yet part of the same!

"One million eggs. Millions of sperm! And that is just one crapshoot! Consider the generation before that, and the one before that, each generation a crapshoot with millions of dice! 42! The answer to the Life, the Universe and Everything really is 42!"

Leonardo Factor stared at him.

"Forty-Two is the number of dots on a pair of dice, Mr. Factor. Douglas Adams got EVERYTHING right in his 4 book, 'trilogy,' The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy." Except this. Earth is far from 'mostly harmless.' We (and I include us gods in here too because we also are loyal Earthlings), are the most dangerous habitation in the Multiverse!"

Cupid smiled as he explained further.

"It's not that the odds don't support the really Big Guy, 'I Am That I Am,' existing! He is unavoidable because so many dice are thrown and at least some of those dice have to land with the right set of numbers up, Survival of the fittest favors His evolution because He is made up of all of us and Valuable ecological niches just don't stay empty. As Ephesians 4:15 puts it you Mortals grow up in every way into Him. So He has trillions of Ancestors. Entire galaxies of Folks could have not come into existence and He would still exist He has so many Ancestors and chances to exist. But that any one of us individuals would exist considering the odds that any one of our long chain of sperm and eggs might not have met up, (and by that I mean both Mortals and little g gods), now, that makes our existence an incredible miracle! So excuse me while I get up and dance a few moments now. I have to take an, 'I exist so I gotta dance, break!'"

The 'god" switched the track on the MP player from relaxing to fast dance music and got up and boogied! As he did so he chanted like a little kid going, 'na na na na na,' "We won the sperm race! We won the sperm race!"

And carefully considering what he had just heard, Leonardo Factor did too!

IRS Agent and divine Lunatic dancing to the beat!

Lita heard the music change and came into the office to see what had happened.

Her mouth flew open in sheer amazement again but also relief this time. Trevor flashed her a "see I told you not to worry look" and turned and wiggled his hips at her as he waved his arms around and moved like the Lunatic he was!

Crazy like a fox!

For the one and only time in his long and distinguished career Mr. Factor broke his steadfast rule not to become friends with a Client. He now understood perfectly how the guy's Therapist would end up falling in love with her Patient.

He was in love with him too! Well not that way! But this was the guy he wanted to go to bars with, to go bowling with, to sit and eat hot dogs at a baseball game with!

Because let's face it he had no social life!

'Cupid' picked up on that right away too. It was like he had radar inside of him that honed in on stuff like that.

"No girl friends? No guy or gal-pals? No one? Not even a Therapist?"

A bit embarrassed Leonardo Factor shook his head.'

"You say you are a Christian but you don't go to church?"

"No."

"Do you have any Pets?"

"My apartment building doesn't allow Pets."

Cupid's eyes actually filled with tears! "Mr. Leonardo Factor you are the loneliest Mortal I have ever met! I've got to do something to help you! I've got to!"

Leonardo Factor bowed his head in sorrow. "I admit it, crazy guy. You are nuts but you have so many Friends! You are amazing!"

Gently Cupid asked, "You are a tad along the Autistic Spectrum aren't you?"

Leonardo Factor stared at him. "Huh?"

"Later when you are home google 'Asperger's syndrome.' But let's do some other kind of googling right now."

The "god of love" went to his room and came back with his laptop. He flipped it open, got the net started and went to .com

He explained, "At one time I hated computer dating. Then a nice Lady I shall call Tamika taught me something I didn't know about it; that done carefully and with Human discretion it can work! So I considered starting my own. Was I ever furious when I discovered there was already a 'Cupid dating service!' I considered suing but of course no one would believe me that I had the name first! I'm certainly normal enough to realize that! I considered other names, and then it dawned on me, I didn't need to start a dating service to get more couples matched. I just had to encourage Mortals to use the ones that already exist!"

Cupid explained, "Forgive the minor psyche tests. It does ask a few questions. I know. Those things are soooo annoying! Believe me I had 90 days of them and if it hadn't been the most beautiful Mortal I've ever seen in my life administering them I'd have ended up in Disturbed! Plenty of Fish isn't just an online classified add site for would be romantic relationships. They also even take people of the same sex who just want bowling partners and that sort of thing if that is your goal. And it's free."

Trevor swung the laptop around. "Here YOU fill out your profile while I go fix us lunch. He grinned, 'Heavy on the hot sauce!' I know!"

A few minutes later he came back up the stairs with glasses of fresh squeezed lemonade and two steaming plates piled high with Mexican food balanced precariously on his arms. How did Waiters do that?

After they finished eating 'Cupid" said, "Now we need a picture. Let's go downstairs for that."

Cupid went and got his camera and they walked downstairs and snapped one of Leonardo Factor standing on the bar's stage. The would be god of love smiled and pointed out, "It sure beats my taking a pic of you doing accounting!'

Then back up stairs again. Trevor Pierce had the picture in his laptop, uploaded to the site and cropped in a few minutes. He said, "If I were up to 99 instead of 98 I would not be doing this for you. It would be dangerous! I don't want to become a god again Lenny! I want my one hundredth couple to be Claire and myself. I want to lose that ticket back to Olympus and stay here with my Psyche-iatrist. I guess I am nuts, but it's the Mental Illness known as LOVE! I have been shot by my own arrows!"

It was a sad thing to finish this audit but that terrible day came.

"I am amazed Mr. Pierce. It is a rare time I do this sort of thing and don't find we have a nice chunk of money coming our way, Though sometimes we find we owe money back. That actually happens quite often too. There are reasons we make the tax code so confusing! But your Roman Numeral accounting got your taxes done just perfectly! H and R block couldn't have done this well. I am impressed! I am very impressed! I am also sorry this is over! I enjoyed your company very much Mr. Pierce! And your cookies and your relaxation music and especially your Mexican food and take on the Universe! But unfortunately I have other Victims, ah Clients to terrify!"

Cupid walked his new Friend to the door for the very last time.

Formally they shook hands. Then what the heck! Leonardo Factor gave "Cupid' a parting hug! He said, "Mr. Pierce that is the first hug I have given or received in over a decade! But I'm going to try and do better! I think I shall try and find myself a, 'Claire Bear.' That would be a start, and try going back to Church. There are hundreds. Surely I can fit in somewhere! And there are bowling leagues and volunteer organizations that need my help. I am not isolating myself from my own kind anymore. Thank you, crazy guy!"

Cupid smiled, "We aim to please!"

The god of love turned and walked back up the stairs.

He checked his pool bead markers.

He grinned, "What a surprise! Not!

Ninety-nine and counting!

Chapter V Trevor's New Therapist

By

8-) Elizabeth Hensley

and

The Icemenace

My new Patient was out of breath and almost ten minutes late for his first session. This was not a good sign that he had any desire to be doing his part of the work in building our relationship or helping himself. He was an involuntary after all, though a long time involuntary, a victim or blessed recipient depending on one's point of view of New York's Outpatient Commitment Law. Having a rare type of Mental Illness that does not respond to medication this man was required to see a Therapist on a very regular basis or he could and would be hauled into a secure facility. He had been caught in this legal quagmire for over eight years! I couldn't really blame him if he was resentful.

I was obtaining him as a Patient because his former Therapist had fallen in love with him, planned to marry him and she was requesting a transfer to avoid losing her license. She had seen me first, explaining she was screening potential Therapists for her problem Patient very carefully, as he would require very careful handling. This was not just because of his deeply entrenched and very unusual delusion but because of his high IQ and Creativity Quotient and because the head of his mental hospital, her Boss did not like him and wanted him recommitted.

There had been years of danger about that. Only the fact most of New York had been openly told by the Patient himself that he was under psychiatric care for being delusional and he had been accepted by the General Public as still deserving to live free was keeping him out of psychiatric confinement. The man had even made Youtube videos explaining his condition, who he thought he was, (Cupid, the Greco-Roman god of Love!) and "would Folks please write letters to the hospital requesting I be allowed to live free despite my 'alternative religious beliefs.' I'm certainly harmless. Because that is what it basically boils down to; my Constitutional right to believe in who I want to as a higher power even if it is my family and myself."

He also had done some incredible dart throwing in that video to back up his claim he really was Cupid. The video acted both as a way to keep him free and bring in loads of business to the bar where he worked.

Thousands of People had written letters! Quite a few Lawyers offered to defend him pro bono. He had done lots of other videos also some just for just plain fun and he was hilarious! He even had a web page with uploaded sessions between himself and his old Therapist he had secretly taped!

My new Patient was going to be a handful!'

His bar, Tres Equis Cantina also stayed jam-packed. I was told he was a major reason!

My first impression of this man was in error. His reason for being late turned out to be completely innocent and totally believable to someone who'd grown up in The City. He said, 'I regret my lateness, but it's not my fault. I told the Taxi Driver we were going the wrong way up Wall Street. But Taxi Drivers always think they know more than their Patients, ah Passengers. Again no one listened to the Lunatic when they should have, and this Guy didn't know me from Apollo, didn't' even know I think I'm Cupid. He just thought he was New York's answer to Crocodile Dundee and couldn't possibly be lost. So called 'Normals' also have delusions."

I was a bit incredulous and quite concerned; "You mean you came here to your first session by yourself all on your own?"

He frowned. "No unfortunately I made use of a Taxi Driver."

I was very concerned, 'But no one came with you? No one is out in the waiting room right now? You weren't accompanied by a Friend or Family member?"

" Someone to protect you from me you mean?" There was a twinkle in his eye, "Claire has to work! So does my Boss, Felix. If I am not at the bar he has to take my shift and vice versa so he and I are almost like Clark Kent and Superman in that regards. Except at the bar itself or during closing hours which are rare, (we try to keep it open as many hours as possible), you'll seldom see Felix and me out in public together! So you face reality. I can't afford my own private Orderly!"

I swallowed and considered the fact he was tall, muscular, new and quite mad and I was Female and weigh 110 pounds. (Well, OK! 115 sometimes!)

My new Patient smiled and said in a very gentle, soothing voice so as to put his Therapist at ease! "I keep telling Mental Health Professionals their offices are not safely designed. The Patient should not be between the Doc and the door! Yes, I could attack you as could any of your Patients. We have you trapped!" He looked down at his hands and smiled even more gently and I started to get an idea of just how gentle this man was. "But I won't. You've got nothing to worry about from me. I've been doing the couch trip for over 8 years. Claire mentioned that you only became a Therapist about one year ago. Claire deliberately picked a Newbie for me who would have no preconceived notions of how a Non-Schizophrenic Delusional should be treated and can function. She knows I can teach you things, and your fresh take on things will make our sessions a Choose Your Own Adventure kind of gig. That's what I want because Trevor Cupid Pierce fits in no known psychiatric boxes! Little Miss Mind Doc I've been at this a whole lot longer than you!" He laughed. It was a sound of genuine delight and had a musical tone to it. Sometime Patients will try to seem happier than they really are but laughter like that can't be faked! He explained, "In all these years of Therapists doing their best to change me into something I am not and do not want to be I never did one violent thing to any of my Mind Tinkerers. That includes the insufferable Dr. Greeley who very strongly dislikes me because I can't be classified, and who has the power to lock me up again and the truly evil (he wiggled his fingers eerily) Dr Frechette who wanted to destroy my mind with an experimental drug straight out of the Soviet Union's 'destroy the Christians' era! So I think we can conclude you are pretty safe, Pretty Lady."

I nodded. I was beginning to see what Claire meant when she said, "He'll have you figured out in five minutes but you will never figure him out."

My new Patient was tall and trim. His hair was just barely starting to go silver, not gray, silver. His eyes were dark, full of humor and compassion. They looked full of mischievous wisdom not madness. I could tell he really loved People or "Mortals" as he called us. He didn't look like my concept of Cupid, which was fat, babyish and golden haired but he was beginning to look like some kind of a Greek god and the illusion would be complete once his hair completely silvered. His movements were joyful and coordinated like those of a Dancer. He also moved like someone who had personal power but felt no need to use it. He moved his hands when he talked as many People from Greece and Italy do, though it was somewhat muted as if he had been in the US for quite some time. Perhaps he was from Greece!

I jotted down a note to test his knowledge of Greek culture and language. Later when I read through all his copious files I found Claire had beat me to it. Trevor didn't just know Greek. He knew just about every dialect of Greek she'd been able to get him tested for including some extremely ancient! He also knew every dialect of Latin, Italian, Phoenician and Hebrew Claire had tested him for! He could read Egyptian Hieroglyphics and seemed to be able to pronounce this dead language, or he seemed to be able to. As the Examiner commented, "He seems to be reading these glyphs fluently and the sounds he is making sound similar enough to modern Egyptian without being modern Egyptian that his performance is extremely convincing! But there are no recordings so how can we know? If he is just making up how they sound, how could I tell? No one really knows how ancient Egyptian is supposed to sound!"

Trevor smiled and continued to try and put me at ease. "I am as harmless as reality will allow anyone to be in this realm. You have eight years of my files in front of you, all of it from the point of view of Mental Health Professionals who think I'm completely delusional with less light at the end of the tunnel for a cure with every passing day. But I suppose they are accurate enough in some ways. I've been under observation much more than any Normal Person and no one has ever seen me do anything the least bit physically aggressive other than on the dance floor where that's considered bold and creative."

He got up at that point and danced around the room demonstrating his "aggressiveness." Then he finished with a "ta da!" gesture.

The man was a very good dancer!

He added sadly, "There was ONE time when I had to defend my Boss's Sister from a knife wielding criminal. When the Police came they told me I had a perfect right to defend her because he definitely was going to kill her. It was still very hard! My Father, Mars the god of War taught me all he knew and when it comes to lifeless targets I'm the tops! I'm better than my Father is. But as for live Targets, I just can't! I'm just not good at violence!"

He smiled at me and gazed at me knowingly, "What you need to relieve your anxiety is not more information about me. It is that you understand Claire and why she wants to do what she is about to do. Somewhere in the back of your mind you are feeling 'there but for the grace of God go I.' Newbie though you are you've already met dozens of Mental Patients. But you've never met a Therapist before who falls in love with one to the point she is willing to do a different kind of commitment. That is what is scaring you. You are wondering if it could happen to you! I can explain what drives Claire in three words. She craves stability. And strange as it may seem I do provide that. She's known me now for over eight years. I'm immortal so Trevor Cupid Pierce doesn't change other than to get closer and closer to matching up his one-hundredth couple. Part of that is because she's in my life. 'Because she's mine I walk the line.' But that the best reason for any male to be completely tame. I've been a Barkeep at Tres Equis for the entire eight years she's known me, since I was allowed out of the loony bin, before actually. I actually had the job a week before I was arrested but hadn't shown up for work for 90 days due to that damn involuntary commitment!"

He frowned here and I could tell there was still a little smoldering resentment at this interruption in his life. He continued. 'The minute I was out of the loony bin, and had talked to Claire for a few minutes I took a taxi to throw her off the scent, Then I turned right around, went back across the street from the nuthouse where the bar I work at just happens to be and persuaded my Boss to give me my old job and my room back. It wasn't hard because I was willing to work for the room and whatever tips I could make. They weren't doing well, hadn't been since 9/11. I turned that around in two days and the place has stayed packed every night since.

"And here I am eight years later in just about the same job and making about the same salary. It does include more than tips now but it is still not much more than minimum wage even though I'm the Manager now! With my mental health diagnosis it would be very hard to find a job working anywhere else! Plus I'm emotionally attached to my Boss and his Sister far too much to leave! My Boss is very sick right now and his sister is emotionally unable to cope with what she has to. They need me and I need to be needed far more than I need more money! This lack of ambition usually wouldn't be considered a good trait in a male from a Lady's standpoint, but Claire doesn't need a good provider. She needs a man who won't bus off to another city to play jazz like her Father did. Her Mother is also a character who used to go running off since Claire was 16 physically, and emotionally long before that. She keeps falling in love with self-centered would-be Artists who don't return her feelings and take terrible advantage of her, and she lacks the social skills to be able to tell she's being taken advantage of. But I'm here for Claire and will be forever here for Claire! Oh yes! Trevor Cupid Pierce is always there for Claire, always a loony perhaps, or perhaps not, but always here! From my viewpoint, which may be cracked but is truly believed I'm giving up going off to Olympus to stay in the Mortal realm to be with my beloved for the rest of my Mortal life. For all eternity if my family, the gods are angered too much by my decision. I am sure they ARE furious but I'm not Schizophrenic. They don't talk to me so I can't really be sure what they think and feel about all this. Claire has never had a man offer that before, sincerely offering to not go somewhere, anywhere to stay with her instead and she knows me well enough to know it is my true, deep-heart decision." He laid his hand over his heart. "She says things about relationships such as 'after two years all that is left as friendship and commitment because the infatuation part dies after about two years.' Trevor grinned mischievously, "That's what she thinks! I'm still madly in love with her! He gave a conspiratorial whisper. "Lets not pop her delusion here, OK? You on my side about that?'

I couldn't help the bemused smile that was forming on my lips. I nodded.

Trevor continued, "My salary still is dismal but as I said she doesn't need money. She needs to know her man isn't running off to San Francisco to play jazz or off to parts unknown to be a Cracker Jack reporter. (She had a boyfriend do that to her too), or Mount Olympus to play god. That last one is a given." He stood up and wandered aimlessly around my office, gesturing expansively. "I have sex with a Mortal I lose my powers. I then can't run off to Mount Olympus. She doesn't believe that Olympus is real, never believed I am really what I am, but she knows I really do believe it and so she knows I love her so much I don't mind giving all that up to be forever at her side. That is what makes Claire see me as a good life partner. I could have had the whole Universe but I cheerfully chuck it back in the face of my family the gods to be with my beloved!"

This sounded like a fairy tale! But the man was in front of me and I was professionally trained to recognize sincerity. One thing did worry me. I asked, "but what happens when you get your one hundredth couple?"

Trevor grinned and flopped back into the chair, the ankle of one leg resting on the knee of the other, "No problomo. If that one hundredth couple is Claire and myself and I have sex with her before I go back to Olympus nothing other than a great honeymoon for her and me! I don't get powers back. I don't 'beam up.' I stay Trevor Pierce, loony and lovable Barkeep until the day I die a normal Mortal's death. He placed his hand over his heart and bowed. After that I have almost complete hope my family will relent and let me go back home again. They may even let me make a goddess out of Claire!" He gazed at me firmly, "And you know that is no crazier than any other perfectly normal religious beliefs about an afterlife."

I had to admit that was true.

I asked, "why don't you match up one more couple other than yourself and see if you can go home first? Then you will either have your powers back or you will see you are not really a god and then you can marry knowing the truth?'

He gave me a very frightened look, "Because if I'm not who I think I am, Cupid the Greco-Roman god of love, then I do not want to know the truth!"

Gently I asked, ''Can you be sure this sudden eagerness to get married isn't just another way of your avoiding facing reality?"

He looked down at his hand and nodded, "Oh that is true, no 'can you be sure?' about it. But it is also a way for both of us for keeping our relationship, and myself stable. Suppose I do get my powers back! How is Claire supposed to handle me then? Her mind set is there are no gods, no magic, no Mount Olympus. Her own mental universe would fall apart if she ever learned the truth; that there are! Her religious faith isScientismand nothing is more pitiful than a Mortal who has lost her faith! She can handle me just fine as a loony but if I suddenly did become a god, she'll be terrified! My patient's eyes had lost their joyful, gentle mischievousness for the first time, becoming completely serious. "It is not possible to love a man who frightens the golly gee willickers out of you! Believe me, whether she will admit it or not, some of her sudden eagerness to get married is based on that fear too; that I just might be a god, and she'll suddenly lose her harmless little power over me; the power of knowing I'm sick and need help and she can provide it.

"Then there is the of the opposite possibility; watching her crazy but content and completely functional Patient fall completely apart if he suddenly realizes he's just been nuts all along! That is also driving her half of the decision. Believe me we are both frightened about that last possibility and very much aware of it. It's not hidden from our consciousness. We admit it up front!"

As gently as possible I told him, "Trevor, neither of those reasons sounds like a rational reason for getting married."

His smile was back, "There are the other sound reasons for getting hitched. We are truly in love and have been for a very long time. I'm not going anywhere and she craves stability. Our financial situation is stable. We both want a couple of kids. We are both willing to relocate to a bigger house or apartment. I'll let her manage the money even though I'd been doing that fine for myself, but someone has to be in financial charge and it probably should be the supposedly normal member of the partnership. IRS just got through auditing me but after going over my carefully kept books for hours. (It took the poor fellow hours because he wasn't used to working with Roman numbers). He could find nothing to object to but my so-called erroneous birth date; February 14th 983 BC. He finally decided to let that slide because he was starting to like me and, 'due to reasons of diminished mental capacity.''

I had to interrupt, "You filled out your income tax in Roman numbers?"

Gently he shook his head, "No. I wouldn't be that stupid. That would attract attention. You don't want to attract the IRS's attention. I fill out the form itself in the usual kind of numbers, what is called Arabic numbers. That is what you modern Mortals use. But I keep the financial records in Roman numerals because it's easier for me. That is how I learned to do math. When it comes to math I think in Roman Numerals."

I was astounded at the level of this Patient's delusions. I didn't even realize anyone knew how to add, subtract, divide and multiply in Roman numerals. Last I had heard Archeologists and Historians are completely at a loss about how that was done. It is considered a lost art. But my Patient who thought he was thousands of years old did know!

He could tell he had lost me to my amazement for a few seconds and stopped talking until he had my full attention again.

"Claire and I have discussed practically everything, even the color of toilet paper. I won that one. She likes colored paper but I firmly insisted on white because it's better for the environment. We even discussed over the roll versus under the roll."

Every time he said her name his eyes would take on a besotted look! Delusional though he was he was actually very sweet! It was very obvious he really did love his "Claire Bear," very much! That part of his mentality was not any kind of a delusion!

He continued, "We hire a lawn guy. I will do the windows but not the gutters. I refuse to fix cars not even to change a tire but I can tell what's wrong with them when they start making scary sounds from having seen so many of them from my former omnipresent viewpoint. I do clean and cook. Claire likes to get up early. I have to stay up late and get up late because of my job. Yes that last one is a problem but it can be worked out. We both would like a Cat but a Dog would be too much because of our schedules. We both decided to see what Cat shows up and adopts us first. We both like houseplants. I have no preferences about furniture or the paint color or wallpaper on walls. She likes art deco. I'm fine with that. I do like a comfortable, beat up couch for what little omnipotence I have left; TV and web surfing and she likes a pretty, brand new couch but is willing to compromise. We'll get a house or apartment with a den. My old comfortable couch will be in there and the nice, new pretty couch will be in the main living room. I can't care less what kind of car we end up driving. Claire likes large sedans. Fine."

I said, "Well! The two of you sure are working out all the details!"

Trevor grinned, 'Claire is THE relationship expert. She always believes in checklists first. How ironic I don't believe in them but once she realized I really was stable in my own sort-of-crazy-but-completely-competent way I matched her checklist item for item in every way but the late sleeping, late staying up part, which is job related anyway. I could adapt to the non-vampire shift if Mortals suddenly decided to do their drinking in the daytime. It ain't a gonna happen. But someday when we both retire I can be up with the Roosters if she wants, crowing her awake!" He grinned.

I grinned back, "I have a feeling your last few sessions haven't been about your traumatic, buried past but your hopeful future."

Trevor grinned, "You've got that right! Claire Bear believes in premarital counseling and we've been doing it in incredible detail the last few months at the government's expense. For once I was completely enjoying my sessions! It such a relief not having to talk about my past! I long ago ran out of traumatic experiences to talk about but she just keeps digging and digging. She thinks I confabulated my whole past but hopes somewhere hidden in all those confabulations is a kernel of truth or a clue as to what caused my 'break with reality.' He made quote marks with his fingers. I never did confabulate my past. Every word I'd ever told her was the truth but I was tempted a few times to make up stuff to get her to quit hounding me for more. One time I looked her steady in the eye and suggested this, 'Maybe I had no traumatic past. Maybe that's the problem. Maybe my childhood and early adulthood had been so utterly boring, so completely nontramatic and lacking in any challenges like a mental version of the hygiene hypothesis my mind had to make up a glorious more colorful past to fill the empty places in my soul.' That shut her up for three sessions and we got to discuss Star Trek, current events and interior decorating instead. That was a wonderful week and a half!"

He looked so wistful that I started laughing.

I said, "Forgive me! I'm not supposed to laugh but you are a trip, Trevor Pierce! I just can't help it!"

His face got a delighted smile, 'Claire Bear and I have been screening Therapists for months. You are going to be the keeper of my insane flame! I do believe I am going to enjoy my sessions with you! Claire Bear seldom laughed at me the first two and half years of my knowing her. She was the toughest room I ever worked! She would have made a good Vulcan! It was a wonderful day when suddenly out of the blue she giggled at something I was saying. It didn't matter that I believed it and her disbelief was an irritation. I had such mixed emotions. It meant she finally was opening up to me! Finally! Then our therapeutic relationship finally clicked as well as our friendship. Pretty Lady if something I say tickles your funny bone, let it come out and dance and I'll dance with it."

It was dawning on me big time why Claire had fallen in love with this Patient!

Suddenly Trevor's phone rang. The ring tone was the song, "Cupid,' of course! He took it out of his pocket and gazed at the screen. He frowned, "it's my Boss, Felix. I am sorry but I have to take it. He knew where I was going and wouldn't be interrupting us if it wasn't very important. He is recovering from a very bad heart attack and we are all very concerned about him! He shouldn't even be tending bar but he insists! I'll put it on speakerphone. You can observe me interacting with someone from the "real" world." He gave me another mischievous grin, "if the disembodied voices that live in little black boxes count as real!"

I laughed and added my own comment, "'Cell phone Schizophrenia.' It's everywhere! It's an epidemic and there is no cure in sight!"

Trevor did put his cell on speakerphone and I heard Felix say, 'Sorry to interrupt your session with the new Therapist, Trevor, but there's been a little fire."

Trevor's eyes grew wide, "WHAT?"

The phone voice said, "It was electrical. It was nothing you or any of the Cooks did. You know that plug in the hallway that never worked? Well now we know why!"

Trevor sat there with his mouth open staring at the phone. He had been using it Captain Kirk style away from his ear. "So do you still have a bar and I still have a job?"

The voice in the phone said, 'yes and yes, but not for the next few days. Repairs will have to be made. I suggest you and Claire go take that honeymoon early. It's on me, the entire thing. You always wanted to go to Disney World."

My new, supposedly severely disturbed Patient started dancing around my office. It wasn't big enough so he opened the door and danced out into the waiting room much to my 50-something Receptionist, Helen's fear and startlement. But he gazed lovingly and reassuringly into her eyes and instantly had her under his spell too! He took her into his arms, twirled her twice then leaned her into a deep dip making her laugh in delight.

Into the phone he chirped, "If Claire can take the time off soon enough then have you got such a deal my forever Friend, my perfect Pal, my bosom Buddy, my main Amigo!"

Felix laughed, "I checked with her first. She can! Congratulations, Trevor!'

Trevor rubbed his hands together in joy! Then he said rapid fire, 'first we fly to Vegas and have an Elvis impersonator marry us. I want the delux Elvis wedding not just the quicky! Then we do a tandem sky dive. Then we go spelunking! Then it's on to Florida to the Mouse House. Oh yes I also want to visit the Kennedy Space Center but that's close to Orlando."

I used my newly given permission to laugh at my Patient and did so, furiously! It took a while but I finally calmed down enough to say, 'Trevor my formal diagnosis is you are truly, truly nuts but I will approve of your decision to marry your former Therapist since she agrees and you both have the details very worked out, but only on one condition!"

He gave me a worried look, "What is that?'

I smiled, 'that you bring her in here before you leave town for some wedding planning and pre-honey moon counseling!"

I added smugly, "the marriage itself you've obviously got covered!'

My next hour just happened to be free so my Patient called his former Therapist and she arrived a few minutes later. It was her lunch hour.

My new Patient grinned broadly as he told her, "Claire Bear she will do. All I have to do is come up with a suitable nickname for her and we're good to go."

Claire said, "Good! Finally! It only took us twenty tries!"

She turned to me. "OK I'm officially turning him over to you. You can thank me or commit justifiable homicide later."

Trevor started bouncing on his heels like a little Kid being told in a few minutes he was going to the circus, "So, I'm am now officially fired from being your Patient, right?

Claire nodded, "But it's OK, Trevor, we can still talk."

"Talk!" He slowly walked towards her with his arms out, but moving and talking quicker with each word, "The… last…. thing… I.. want to do is still–keep-talking!" He rushed into her arms and flung her backwards and gave her the most passionate smooch I've ever seen! It was reciprocated and it went on and on and on!

Wow was it intense! I cleared my throat.

They ignored that.

Then I asked amazed, "Is this the first time you two have done this?"

Claire and Trevor didn't cease their lips and arms lock. But they sort of nodded and Claire put out her thumb in the "OK" gesture.

When they finally came up for air Claire explained, "It was hard but I've managed to hang on to my professional virginity, so this has been a very old fashioned romance. I haven't known him in the Biblical sense. I really, really REALLY wanted to keep my license! We seldom even dared hug! Yes! This was our first kiss and we've been in love without admitting it for years and in love and admitting it for over a year! It took us months to find someone I considered to have the qualifications to handle him that he approved of!"

All I could say was, "wow!

So we discussed the honeymoon. Claire and I managed to dissuade Trevor from the sky diving and the spelunking. But all parties agreed a future day trip or long weekend for the new couple might be a trip to a commercially ran cave with guided tours. I dialed Verizon 411 connect and found an Elvis Impersonator who did deluxe Las Vegas style marriages right in the Bronx! So there was no need to fly off to Vegas.

The Kennedy Space Center was indeed, "close to the Mouse house." So that stayed in the itinerary.

It dawned on me this man really didn't need to be covered under the Outpatient commitment law. He was as harmless as they came and that law was supposed to be used only to protect the public from the dangerous Mentally Ill, not ones as harmless as this one. But maybe it was fortunate he had got mired down in the system due to Claire's disproving Boss. Trevor did need an enormous amount of help, and there was no other way that he could have afforded obtaining it.

I couldn't help grinning as I escorted the happy couple to the door. I wish all my sessions with Patients were this easily concluded!

Chapter VI Of Gods and Men and Toilet Paper. (Cupid gets his powers back and RT speaks!)

By

Elizabeth Hensley

(Changing viewpoint to Trevor Cupid Pierce's).

Trevor smiled at his fiance and said, "Go on down to the car and wait for me, Claire Bear. I have to go to the restroom for a few minutes. Hang tight. It's going to be one of those long trips if you know what I mean. I've been eating too much cheese."

With a pounding heart Cupid entered the Men's room.

Good! The handicapped stall was free! He was going to relish the extra space!

Cupid entered the stall, carefully locked the door and sat down on, "the throne," fully clothed. He took his cell phone out of his pocket and stared at it. In a perfect imitation of Rod Serling he happy-ranted. "Gods and Goddesses, future Mortals with sufficiently evolved omnipresence, Good Neighbor Jesus and any Cockroaches who are interested, we submit for your viewing pleasure one Trevor Cupid Pierce, fallen god; neurotic, homesick, exogenously depressed; a miserable example of sentience who finally realized after years of intense therapy, home is not upon some mythological mountain or in the mists of a demented mind and/or a far off island chain. No my proud pantheon of viewers, home is where the heart is! And where his heart is, is with his Psyche-iatrist, Claire Bear!

"But our crazy Cupid has just obtained his one hundredth couple by kissing that same Psyche-iatrist. But he hasn't had sex with a Mortal yet. So for a few precious minutes, our demented anti-hero is truly in his own private Twilight Zone; a god again fully loaded! But with no desire to stay so for more than the space of a long restroom break and the ride back to his Shrink's house where some god-destroying whoopie is going to be made and made and made! Because what is god-hood compared with True Love? It is nothing but a few parlor tricks, a nice, long buena vista, a few extra billion years of life span. That ain't nothing worth keeping when one can have the love hormone, oxitocin instead!

Suddenly he cocked his head, listening intently.

"I hear my family calling but I will not go! Instead as has happened with trillions since the dawn of time I'm starting my own family!"

He stared at the ceiling, "I'm all grown up now, Mommy! I've kissed a Girl and meant it as more than entertainment! I don't need to live in your basement anymore! I'm getting a life of my own! You want Grandkids? Let me go! Leave us alone! Leave Claire alone! Let me make her a goddess. Don't YOU destroy her! I promise I'll never, never, never EVER let her know who I really am until we both are dead! I'll hide from her for the rest of her mortal life!

"We need to be making more Kids! There are so few of us! If we were Mortal we'd count as a very endangered species!"

Cupid calmly tossed the cell phone across the stall. It did not fall. It floated in mid air!

Cupid got up and danced around his floating cell phone. "Crazy? Ha! Take that Dr. Greeley! Take that Dr Frechette! Even take that Claire!" He smiled sweetly. "But ever so gently. You were the one Shrink who really did help me!"

Cupid looked around the stall for other objects to float, and was pleased to find a Mortal-miracle had occurred. The stall actually had extra toilet paper! He made those two rolls float next to the cell phone. Then feeling bold and creative he tried to make them float and rotate in a circle. The cell phone immediately started to drop to the floor.

Cupid rushed to catch it before it fell. Caught you, you two hundred and fifty dollar piece of plastic, glass and silicon with a 50 dollar deductible on your insurance! Sigh. I never could juggle without using my hands more than two objects at a time like the other god-kids can. I don't know why! Sigh! I'm not clumsy in other areas, far from it! I was and am the best there is!

Cupid reached out with his omnipresence and found out what really happened to President John F Kennedy. Then he hovered over Ground Zero and a look of extreme sorrow crossed his face. Time travel was not a power the gods possessed. It was restricted to Mortals like Ronald L. Mallett, PhD who was REALLY inventing it even as these words are written. (see Youtube "The Real Time Machine"), a certain Samuel Beckett and one very lonely, remaining Gallifreyon.

There wasn't one thing he could do about 9/11! In frustration and anger Cupid pointed his finger and zapped one of the toilet paper rolls with a small bolt of lightning. It burst into flames and fell.

Cupid got up and stomped it out. The last thing he wanted to do was start a fire!

What can a god do to help the hurting world if all the time he has to do it in is a few precious moments?

Cupid looked around the stall hoping for inspiration. He didn't have to look far!

Despite the extra rolls the stall had one of those damn over-thunk, over engineered toilet paper dispensers from Hell. The kind where one can never get to the second toilet paper roll after the first one is used up, because the little door that is supposed to slide, never ever will!

Cupid closed his eyes with a look of Christ-like divine love glowing on his face. Since his god-hood would be short this would be his one and only eternal legacy to the Universe. But it would be a great one! The best gift a god had given the Universe in the last one thousand, nine hundred and sixty seven years! It wouldn't be the Sermon on the Mount or eternal salvation and forgiveness but it would certainly be close!

All over the world, all over the Universe in fact, where ever beings evolved who needed to use such things, every single over-thunked toilet paper dispenser disappeared and was replaced with a simple, multi-roll locking, toilet paper spool. And the key for each respective spool suddenly appeared in the pockets, purses and key chains of each restroom's Attendants.

There! Never ever again would toilet paper be that close but not reachable. Mortals could do what they had to do with a whole lot less stress! Cupid smiled. He was pleased with what he had done! Of course it would be all over the news, Net and papers tomorrow and discussed for the rest of eternity and of course Claire would suspect! But that would be all she could do. She can never prove her *Trevor* had actually been omnipotent again for a few minutes. Not being able to prove it would keep her sane but the mystery would continue to keep him interesting to her!

Cupid wanted more proof though, just in case there was ever another blasted competency hearing! He stared at the one remaining, floating toilet paper roll. Wouldn't it be nice to have a video camera? But those things cost too much moola!

He did have his phone-camera. He sat down on "the throne" again and stared at his cell phone realizing he had no idea how to work the camera part. He tried, fumbling with the most likely combination of buttons producing several nice pictures of the rest room floor. Finally figuring it out or so he hoped he stood up and snapped several pictures from different angles of the floating toilet paper.

Suddenly Cupid felt a presence!

"Ack!" Misquoting Star Wars Cupid said, "I sense a presence I have not felt in a very long time!

And then.

"Arty where have you been!"

The inward presence was smiling at him,
"You crazy Lunatic! You know! Nowhere you haven't been!"

Cupid frowned, "You have the audacity to show up NOW after you put me through eight years of Hell! I've been stuck here for eight years now! All you had to do to get me home was protest a little bit to my Mother. She's not like the other gods. She's have listened! She's have relented and let me go home! You could have had your blasted body back any time you'd wanted it, aches and pains and all. You could have, then! But nooooo! You put me through Hell for eight years and now, Now when I finally get used to the idea of being stuck here and to the point I fall in love and am determined to get married, NOW you have the chutzpa to show?"

Cupid shook his head violently back and forth and frowned savagely, "Well guess what my dangerously AWOL Mortal! It's too late! You are going to have to fight for control now because I AM getting married! All is fair in love and war and this is both! Grrr!"

The Presence was ever so gentle, "Relax Old Childhood Friend! I'm not asking for control back again. I just surfaced just long enough to tell you, "thanks for redeeming us!

Cupid was amazed, "That's it? That's all you have to say to me?"

Ever so gentle: "What else can I say? Cupid you did for us what I could not! You redeemed us from what we both did, your shenanigans with the careless match-ups and me with what I did. You've had more fun, brought more People to belief in your family, and taught more People wisdom than I ever could as a college Professor. When I lectured about your family, my Students took notes but couldn't wait until class was over. When you talk about your divine but ditzy family, folks hang on to your every word because as far as they are concerned you were THERE and that makes it celebrity gossip not the hoary contents of crumbling old tomes! You've entertained more People and there can be no comprehending the consequences of the legacy you've left uniting 200 People in true love plus hundreds of temporary pairings! Could I have done any of that? No! Of course not! You did what I could not possibly do, crazy or not! I am not about to cause you any trouble now that you finally have secured your Psyche."

Cupid whined, "You put me through Hell!"

RT said gently, "But it was The Fates that decreed it. If you hadn't called for you and if you hadn't been forced to come you'd have never met your Psyche-iatrist!"

Cupid softened a little at that. "This is true. I shouldn't protest so much. Maybe eight years of Hell for a lifetime of bliss is worth it even if it's a short life."

Inwardly RT smiled, "Your family will give you your immortality back, Cupid and more, just as you suspect they will. They'll let you keep Claire. Olympus could use a good Therapist and Psychiatrist and we both know that! Everyone in the supernatural realm knows it. Your family's little problem is hardly a secret from anyone!"

Cupid nodded, "That's the truth, and Dr. Hypocrites is so far behind the times it's worth crying about! Grandpa would do so much better if he had more modern help!"

Inwardly RT smiled so lovingly he was out loving what Love could love. "You know there are those who think I created you, 'Trevor.' But I don't. I KNOW you are really from …up there. I just called for you to come into me. That is all!"

Cupid smiled, "That's such a relief to hear! At least the Mortal who hosts me believes I'm real! It's gotten to the point where I often think Claire's point of view first. I have to stop and think, "Hey! Wait a minute! I'm a god not a Lunatic!"

The inward voice chuckled, "I know! She's got you flabbergasted, twitterpated, going around in psychiatric circles trying to find what at one time was crystal clear but now is confusingly, wonderfully, amusingly muddy! Are we a Lunatic or Partners? God and Host or Multiple Personalities? Claire has got us to the point we no longer even know! But…

They said it together, "THE RIDE HAS BEEN FUN!"

Host and mind controlling entity laughed together!

RR said gently but firmly, "Now Cupid you go out there and you marry that knock out of a Shrink The Fates found for us and you live your life without a bit of guilt or fear I'll ever take over! I am not really 'the Man behind the curtain' as Claire keeps implying. I don't push any buttons or pull any levers. I don't control you any at all! I just watch you and experience life through you, but what you do is your decision alone! You have free will, Cupid. Maybe we'll renegotiate my staying completely under your control later and let Claire have the satisfaction of at least partially curing us but as far as I'm concerned right now I prefer to stay hidden. You've had more fun with our body than I ever could have managed and I've felt almost everything you've felt. I've hardly been deprived of anything. Instead you have blessed me immensely!"

Cupid felt tears flowing in gratitude. He could not tell if they were his or RT's.

He decided to accept the feeling as his own. He relaxed and let it overwhelm him. Maybe that was what RT had been experiencing, letting someone else do everything including deciding what emotion to feel!

It wasn't' really a bad thing if his self-awareness had remained intact and he hadn't minded.

It was like deep hypnosis where the gentle voice of some one else decided what you would think and feel and talk about and even do! If you trusted the one doing it (and it was hard to be hypnotized if you didn't) it was actually VERY pleasant.

RT had basically been in a deep self-induced hypnotic state for at least eight years, and apparently he wanted more!

.

Rt of course heard his thoughts and said," I've felt everything you've felt except your pains and heartaches. I've hysterically disassociated myself from those. I'm like half-starved, old, scrawny Buddha. I've destroyed all self-desire and reached nirvana!"

Sarcastically Cupid commented, "Thanks a lot! You leave me to do all the work and responsibilities of living and feeling all the pain while you feel nothing but pleasure!"

RT chuckled, "It's the rent you pay for having full control of the bod, Old Friend!"

Ruefully and reluctantly Cupid nodded, accepting it

.

Cheerfully RT said as if talking about going out for a few minutes for a hamburger, "I'm going under again pal. Thanks again! Goodbye for now! Have a GREAT life, Cupid god of love!"

And the presence was gone.

Quoting Ms Piggy from Pigs In Space from the Muppet Show, Cupid commented a bit bemused, "Somehow I'll miss him!"

It was amazing how unrattled he was about it!

Suddenly he heard a frustrated voice from outside the stall. Come on buddy! Get out of there! Why do you Normals always go right for the handicapped stall? Some of us really NEED it you know!'

Cupid left the stall to see a fellow sitting in his wheel chair. He apologized, "Sorry Pal, its just no job is finished until the paper work is done. And thanks for calling me Normal! My Shrink thinks I'm nuts! I don't know why! What's so crazy about thinking I'm Cupid the god of Love? If I thought I was an Amway salesmen, now THEN I'd be crazy!"

He stood back and held the door open but the wheelchair-bound man ignored him, went in and pulled the door shut with a loud metallic bang. He could be heard muttering to himself. Something about, "why did he have to deal with all the Crazies?"

Trevor smiled, washed his hands free of the ash from the burnt toilet paper, ran his wet hands through his hair then dried them on the back of his pants. "Well, here I go, Mom and Dad. Your little Boy has finally grown up and fallen in love. It won't be long until I'm mortal again but there are no regrets except one…that it took me so long to realize that I've loved Claire from that first day." A voice from inside the handicapped stall interrupted his musings.

"DO YA MIND? Some of us are tryin' t' concentrate here! Geez! Normals! Ya can't live with 'em and ya can't kill 'em!"

The soon-to-be former god of erotic love laughed to himself. Out loud he said, "Yeah, yeah. Like I haven't heard that one before. See ya 'round, pal!"

"Not if I see you fir-rst!"

But Cupid didn't hear that last as he'd already left the bathroom headed for the stairs. The elevator was too slow and he was too eager to be in the presence of his Psyche to wait for it.

He exited the building and there she was, her blonde hair shining in the sun, making her glow. Or maybe it was the light of love in her eyes. Either way, her brilliant smile was all for him and it sent a thrill right through to his stomach, like going over that first hump on the biggest, most spine-tingling roller coaster ever! He smiled at the incredibly apt analogy. Love was indeed the wildest and most exciting ride in the Universe and his and Claire's was just starting!

Chapter VII Deflowered, Degodded

And Delighted!

By

Elizabeth Hensley

On the car ride to Claire's house Trevor enjoyed a few more minutes of mentally googling the Universe with particular attention to his home stomping grounds, Olympus. Bacchus had gained a bit more weight. Papa looked the same. Zeus was half-crazy. Obviously he was off his meds again. His Mother was a ravishing as ever. It was hard having a Mother so beautiful, but Claire Bear was actually prettier.

Whoops! Hope Mommy didn't hear that!

Carrot-topped Uncle Mercury was scratching a very bad itch in a very private spot and reading the Olympian Daily Digest funny papers while sipping pomegranate juice and watching a soccer game by honing in on a Mortal. A bit embarrassed Cupid looked away.

It slowly dawned on Cupid his limited omnipresence-time was better spent closer to his current home address.

He honed in on Tres Equis. Wow the fire was more extensive than Felix had let on! It involved several stories. Half his room was gone! His chest of drawers and everything in it including the money he had been saving for his contingency plan (Disney World not Olympus) had burned to a crisp! It had almost taken his pool marker beads, not that, that mattered anymore! They were still in existence but no longer hanging from the wall. They were curled up in a snake-like coil on the floor. Trevor could tell his Friend had carefully done that for him. No wonder Felix didn't want him to go home, wanted him to go right to Disney World at his expense! Losing that much of his stuff would have upset him badly if he hadn't been in his current, calmer omnipresent and omnipotent state on his way to where he was going.

He suspected Claire knew and was in on the "conspiracy" to soften the blow by moving up their honeymoon and marriage.

Trevor smiled. I wonder if Felix noticed all one hundred beads have slid over now. Even being burned down and picked up and moved hadn't disrupted their position on the string. Surely Felix had to have noticed that!

Or would he equate it to gravity plus being singed causing them to stick together because of the fire? It was amazing the little mental tricks Mortals used to keep themselves from having to believe in things beyond themselves!

Trevor poked around what was left of the bar. Amazingly enough it wasn't the fire that had done the most damage here but water damage from the fire-men's hoses. The kitchen area was mostly OK. That was good. The cooking equipment would have been the most expensive thing to repair but it wasn't going to need much.

Ah so that's where his favorite bottle opener had gone! He floated it out from under the kitchen cabinet and put it back in the drawer where it belonged.

The sitting area was ruined but that was just tables and chairs, a few TV sets and some Mexican knick-knacks.

The Karaoke equipment was soaked. No doubt ithad shorted out. For some reason that hurt! Trevor frowned. Could it be because that was where he had successfully proposed to his Claire Bear?

He easily resisted the temptation to look at undressed Mortals in the apartments adjacent to the bar. Soon he would have Claire and that truly would be enough of that sort of thing.

He grinned proudly to himself. He wasn't the same irresponsible playboy his family had kicked out. He really had matured!

Cupid grinned broadly. Who would have thunk it? Being all grown up actually felt good!

Then Trevor examined what was left of the electrical plug in the hall that had caused all the damage. He traced the wires. To his horror he realized the problem was more extensive than his Boss had realized! Cupid kept tracing the wires going further and further from the current disaster. There wasn't just one bad electrical plug. Their apartment had two more, and then…

…in horror he realized the entire building had them, hundreds of bad plugs! It was too extensive and complicated for him to just suddenly fix! God or not he was a Barkeep not an Electrician! This wasn't toilet paper dispensers. This was electrical! Even gods don't fool with electrical wiring unless they are trained in it. Vulcan could do it but with his bad leg there was no way he could handle this entire building even if he was in the mood to help his old childhood nemesis!

If he told Folks there was a problem and didn't prove he had been a god first, no one would believe him. The building and all the People living in it could be killed eventually. The bar would be lost!

If he proved to Mortals he had been a god, good-bye to his happy Mortal life!

While keeping her eyes on the road Claire's peripheral vision scanned her Passenger.

She noticed how quiet her usually verbose Ex-Patient/soon to be Husband was being. She also noticed his sudden horrified expression.

"Cat got your tongue, Trevor? You aren't having second thoughts are you?"

He looked at her a bit hurt, "Oh NO! I've done all the thinking about this I've needed to do for the last eight years. I'm way beyond thinking now. I want action!"

"Only a few more minutes Trevor we've reached 23rd street."

"I'm just doing some praying here, Claire Bear. I need a few quiet moments to make peace with my family about this."

Claire sighed, "Ah. I forgot! My in-laws are the gods of Olympus! And that won't change. You gave up your god-hood but not your family or your tendency to talk to them at the drop of a hat even in public and very loudly sometimes too! I should be grateful! Somehow I think I'll have a whole lot less trouble with Aphrodite as a mother in law than your usual little lady in tennis shoes from St Petersburg Florida!"

Trevor sighed and thought, don't be so sure!

Felix was doing paper work in the office when he suddenly heard a voice straight out of Schizophrenia-land.

"Hey Felix! Check the safe!"

"What? Where?" Felix stood up and started looking wildly around the office and the apartment but his crazy Barkeep was nowhere to be seen, but he was sure talking! "Is that you Trevor? Where are you? I thought you were on the way to Claire's house by now."

Quietly Cupid said, "I am."

Felix sat down again rather quickly. "How am I hearing you!"

Gently Trevor stated, "I have no words for it in English how you are hearing me. Please don't be scared! I am still me; crazy Trevor. I still need my job and if you treat me with too much respect it'll damage my fragile mental health. But I don't dare use my cell phone. Claire is driving. I'm riding shotgun. She'd hear me and we need to speak in private. I don't want her to know I've temporally got my powers back. It would destroy her mentally."

Felix exclaimed, "And it won't me?"

Cupid said,"You come from a culture that still believes in the supernatural."

Felix exclaimed, "Yes, but that it is Jesus, Trevor not the Greek gods! You're messing me up worse here than making an Atheist a Believer!

Gently Cupid said, "Don't sweat it. Jesus is a good Neighbor of ours. New Jerusalem is just to the North-East of Mount Olympus hovering over Jerusalem waiting for just the right moment to descend. Well actually He conquered us. But it was a bloodless coup. It took less than a nano-second from proclamation to negotiation and our surrender and He's since then been the greatest Neighbor. We Olympians aren't stupid! We saw what He could have done to us, surrendered unconditionally and all that happened is all our woodwork suddenly worked well. (Say that ten times fast). Zeus was actually grateful that darn, stuck kitchen drawer of his was no longer stuck. It had bugged him for centuries! Christ is a Carpenter. I'm a Barkeep. Some things will NEVER change. He's prouder of His amazingly beautiful tables and chairs than His Universe. I can throw thunderbolts for a few more minutes. So what? Congratulations me! I'm a taser! But how useful is that, really? But my margaritas are to die for! What we can do because of biology is unavoidable. But what we learn to do through effort, that's what is self-esteem raising."

Felix wasn't happy. "So why are you scaring the living daylights out of me instead of leaving me in blissful ignorance like Claire?"

"NASA we have a problem! A big one!"

Felix was astonished in a worried sort of way. "Oh dear! If you can't solve it in your present state why do you think I can?"

Cupid explained, "I don't have time. You do. We're almost to Claire's! Once we make whoopie all I will have of being a god are the memories. Thanks for the memories but our happy future together is all that matters to me."

Felix was amazed! "Wow Trevor! She will never know what you are giving up!"

Cupid said firmly, "I am giving up nothing. I get it back when I die. Even if I don't a few decades of bliss with her is worth all eternity!"

Felix admitted to himself, This was touching! "Wow Trevor I am amazed at what love is making you do!"

Cupid pointed out, "Isn't that what I've been trying to teach your Mortals all this time? I'm teaching by example here, but I can't help it and you know it. I'm as caught by the love hormone, oxitocin as anyone. I'm a victim of the eternal and infinite chemical imbalance and I don't want treatment, oh no sir. It's a Psychotic state and please, please leave me crazy! It's the trap I set for others. I'm caught in my own nets, shot by my own arrows and I can't possibly be happier! Great Scotty we've reached 28th Avenue already. Quickly, get this down! You have to buy the entire apartment building and call a dozen Electricians quickly because we have 665 more potential electrical fires all over the building!"

Felix exclaimed,"665 plus 1? That's the number of The Beast!"

Cupid commented, "Pure coincidence I think, or if it's not there are things going on in the Universe even we Olympians don't understand. That's actually highly likely. If there are two levels to existence there are probably an infinite number like our Neighbor says. But quickly here is how you do it."

Felix pointed out, "I can't afford it you know."

Cupid reassured him, "Now you can. As I said, check the safe."

Felix punched in the combination and swung open the door, "Why are some of our salad bowls in here?"

"Look in them, silly!"

"Wow Trevor where did you get all this gold?"

"I'm scraping it off dead electronics in landfills in New Jersey as we speak and let's just say, being a devout Trekker I'm 'beaming it' to you."

His Boss was amazed, "You can't just make gold?"

The Greek god explained, "I'm not a Leprechaun but yes, I can. I could rearrange electrons and stuff and turn dirt into gold. But I'm trying to be green here; One Solar System and all that. They'll be times in the future when we'll need dirt much more than gold. You can't grow crops in gold."

Felix laughed, "Trevor I think we have enough dirt."

"Not when there are trillions of you Mortals and a few hundred more of us and we together start making the solar system into a Dyson sphere."

"What's a Dyson sphere?"

"Never mind. No time. Google it. Here comes some more."

"Wow! It just appeared!"

Trevor pointed out, "I have no idea what gold sells for. I'm scraping it and sending it as fast as I can. I hope there's enough by the time we start making whoopie because when that starts this stops and I won't delay that a second. It's been a hard 8 years Felix and that's true for both of us. I loved Claire totally from my first psychiatric session. Claire started loving me a little bit the minute she saw me at our bar happily holding down my job. From that moment she realized the feelings she was fighting weren't futile. Unlike other psychotics she's treated Trevor could function! There are two sides to Claire, the scared little girl whose Father and Mother were too flighty to love her and the intellectually adventurous Explorer of the vast, inward Universe known as the Human brain. I satisfy both sides of her. Once she saw I could work and like to, she realized I wasn't too crazy to be the responsible guy she needs but I am still crazy enough to be the fascinating creature she craves. Unlike other men I don't bore her. My psychosis intrigues her and keeps her interested. My stability sooths her. And she's never going to know I'm not just crazy because you are going to be a good Friend and not tell her about this."

Felix shook his head and smiled gently, "She wouldn't believe me anyway, CUPID. Your secret is safe for that reason if not just my compassion towards you and Claire."

Cupid thought to himself, That was a relief "Good! Here comes another salad bowl full of scrapings."

"The safe is full now."

"Yes. I can see that. Next bowl goes on the desk. Hide it somewhere."

Felix pointed out, "Trevor I know at this rate you aren't going to be able to scrape enough gold to buy an apartment building before you reach Whoopeevile!"

Cupid sighed, "What can I do? I'm only a god not a Magician!"

"Cupid, do the Superman bit. Squeeze some lumps of coal into diamonds!"

The god was insistent, "You are going to need coal worse!"

Felix found that hard to believe! "Why? Surely in the Future we switch to cleaner energies. I read the other day more Kids are Autistic the closer they live to coal burning power plants!"

"No, you won't burn it any more. You do other things with it. Never mind! I can't be rearranging matter that much! Being able to and being allowed to are two different things!"

"Pirate treasure! Find us some! Use your omnipresence!"

"That means I change the Future. Someone else won't find it some day!"

"Cupid it is either that or we loose everything and many People may die!"

"Good point! And even I am allowed to change the Future. Everyone is. Amoebas can. Butterflies do all the time. Ever read Ray Bradberry's 'The Sound of Thunder? I just watch too much Star Trek and forgot it was OK for me to change a timeline even if Kirk and Spock didn't dare. This should have occurred to me. They are from the Future. I'm not."

Felix was both exasperated and amused. Cupid really was Crazy Trevor all right, god or not! "No time for a literary discussion Trevor! Find us some booty!"

Cupid looked around our Small Blue Dot. It didn't' take long. "Hey Boss did you know there's a hidden cave filled with that stuff right off the coast of Cuba where your Ancestors came from?"

"Good! My Ancestors were Pirates. They probably stole the stuff in the first place. It's poetic injustice that a Descendant of theirs actually gets to make use of it. Most Pirates mismanaged their loot so badly their Descendants never got a penny!"

Trevor said, "Boss get out of the office. This is going to fill it completely!'"

Felix said, "wow!" and then "WOWWWW!" As his crazy Barkeep/Mental Patient/ Employee/Roommate/Trekker/Manager/ football teammate and Greco-Roman god of love filled their office with hundreds of thousands of doubloons, gold bars, gold crosses, gold chains, gold bracelets, gold rings, diamonds, emeralds, sapphires, topaz's and rubies both cut and uncut and at least half a ton of silver bullion and jewelery also!"

Felix exclaimed, "What a haul!"

Cupid pointed out, "Be careful how you fence it, Boss. It could get us in a great deal of trouble! I don't think what we just did was quite legal. There are laws about importing treasure without sharing it with the country it came from."

Felix laughed, "So I'm a Pirate like my Ancestors! Trevor after the bar and the building is saved and repaired I'll figure out how to help Cuba. But I'll help the little Citizens not the government.

"Cutting this conversation short, Boss. We just turned on Claire-Bear's street!"

Trevor quick! I just had thought! Lita would freak out more at your being a god than Mental Patient! Hide all this in our storage area before she sees it! Hopefully I can keep her from going down there. She seldom does anyway."

"OK Boss!"

All the booty disappeared. Felix found it later just where he'd ordered it.

And that was the last Felix ever heard of Cupid, but Trevor was around for decades!

As they came within site of the apartment Trevor Cupid Pierce took off his shirt and started unzipping his pants.

Claire watched him out of the corner of her eye, "I hope you stop at your shorts. The Neighbors may be watching!"

Trevor nodded, "The last thing we need is for me to be hauled off for an indecency charge before we do It. Of course I will stop at my shorts! Until I get in the door that is!"

"Forgive me for reminding you of what should be obvious but remember I am talking to a Man I met because he changed the New Year Eve Ball drop to say, 'Hi Hollie I'm here!' And down through the years you've done many other crazy things like proclaiming yourself the god of love!"

Cupid laughed, "Claire Bear dear, for you and you alone now, I Am the god of love and I am about to prove it to you!"

"And to think I was getting a little worried because you were taking so long in the rest room!"

"I was praying Claire Bear, and other things. But for the time being I got that out of my system!"

Claire pulled into her drive way and stopped the car. She got out. Trevor grabbed her and carried her to the door. Unfortunately of course it was locked. He had to put her down while she fumbled through her purse for her keys.

Cupid jumped up and down like a pogo stick with impatience! How could it take so long! I didn't matter he had given up immortality for her. Just finding her keys was taking all of eternity!

Claire finally found them and opened the door as quickly as possible.

She was swept off her feet again and practically hurled (however gently) into her (no their) bedroom.

A few hours later they finally emerged again just as the Sun started to rise over the western skyscrapers like a ball of fire symbolizing their passion! Claire Bear had only one comment as she brushed her rumpled, golden hair out of her sleep-deprived but happy eyes, "You were right all along Trevor! You are the god of love!"

Part II will include Their wedding and Cupid's Daughter Delightful Goddess of Serenity and a long guest appearance by the lovable and loopy Uncle Mercury.

Part III has Claire climbing Mount Olympus and finding out the truth! With Uncle Mercury's help she enters the Home of the gods, meets Cupid's ditsy but divine family, drinks Ambrosia and has her eyes opened to the realities of the Universe. But she remains faithful to her still Earthbound Husband and returns to him and her daughter Delightful!flying home in the arms of Uncle Mercury.

I also have many short stories finished that take place after the third story and a planned 4th story in this series. I plan to write a story about Dr Frechette's move to New York and attempt to try Thorax C on Trevor Pierce and how Uncle Mercury takes care of him for good! There will be a story about Professor Ron Mallet's REAL Time Machine that you can learn about by going to You tube and typing in "The Real Time Machine." (Yes the US has a real table top time tunnel now that can send back in time, tinier than an atom particles back to the point the machine was switched on so there will never again be another 9/11!) There is also a very long story slowly being worked on about Cupid's 90 day stay that will include every session he had with Claire in the mental hospital and a Cupid Psych cross over. Notice I said Cupid/Psych cross over. Not Cupid/Psyche :) As in Gus and Shawn.