The bar was decent looking and I was also relieved to see it had a decent amount of people in it. We went ahead and sat ourselves at a table over at the darker side of the room. A waitress came up, the devil ordered vodka for himself and I asked for a glass of wine. We kept an odd silence between us until the drinks arrived. I sipped some of my wine to calm the knots of my stomach and took a deep breath.
"Why are we here Ivan?"
He looked at me oddly, like it was obvious to everyone else but me. "Do you want to go some place else?"
"Non, it's not that." I groaned with frustration. "You know what I mean. Why are we meeting in public? Why did you drag me out of the bakery like that?"
Ivan shrugged. "We made a bet. I figured meeting outside our usual 'work' would be easier on you then playing twenty questions while I loomed over you like usual. I know you feel distressed enough when I am around."
I snorted. "So you picked up on that." As mad as it sounded, it actually made a bit of sense. So his plan was to get me into a false sense of security and drunken enough to loosen my tongue. Well, that devil had it coming, I wasn't going to fall for that.
"And what guaranties do you have that I'll talk with the likes of you?" I sipped more wine for courage, I was going to need a lot a nerves to keep this farce going on long enough to figure out how to get the information I needed.
"You are talking now aren't you?" He was smiling way too amused for my taste.
"I need to get you talking too don't I?" I smirked myself, the wine was making me bolder. The game was on.
The devil finished off his vodka in one gulp and requested the waitress for another one and to keep both our drinks coming. But he kept staring at me, smiling as he had already won. That was unnerving me enough to drink more myself.
"So comrade, how should we begin?"
"How about you tell me why you're a mobster?" He was going to turn the question down anyway, but I decided that being blunt was going to be the best course in dealing with him for now. I did not want to give him the impression that I would be enjoying this game of ours. The sooner this farce ended the better. And who knows, maybe he would get drunk before me and end up answering it after all. But he just looked at me displeased.
"You disappoint me Francis, it is too early for those kind of questions. Perhaps if you ask nicely, next time I will tell you something." He looked at me with those harsh cold violet eyes, making me feel like he was searching for something deep into my black soul. I drank more just to keep me from shaking. "Nyet, I want to start with you. Where do you live?"
I was taken with such surprise by the simplicity of that question that I almost blurted out 'down town' but I caught myself in time. "The suburbs." He was not going to get a single honest answer from me for any of his random questions. He squinted his eyes and his smile twitched, as if he sensed the lie but did nothing but take another sip from his vodka.
"How old are you?"
"Twenty nine." Another lie, I'm actually thirty four but I still look remarkably young and most people buy that answer. That smile of his twitched again. He didn't seem to believe it.
"Any siblings?"
"Single child." Another lie, I had a younger sister, Marianne. But she was far away from here, someplace safe with a life and a husband of her own. We had barely spoken to each other since she married years ago. The devil squinted his eyes again and his smile twitched. He was making me very uncomfortable with all that twitching and suspicion. He also seemed very displeased with that answer for some reason.
"How long have you owned that bakery?"
I wanted to lie, but I knew I couldn't. The mob had known that information before they pursued me. He was sure to known if I lied. "I bought it eight years ago." His face didn't twitch this time and he seemed pleased with the answer. I knew something was wrong then.
"How about your favorite book?"
I took a deep gulp from my wine and sat back on my seat, trying to get myself as far away from him as possible. "What I read or don't read dose not concern you. You already got a fair amount of questions and answers. I want a few answers myself."
"Fair enough. Ask your questions then." The way he smiled was frightening me.
"Why the sudden interest in me?" Honestly, I could have gone with a better question, but that one still bugged the hell out of me. That devil sipped more of his vodka before answering me.
"It wasn't sudden at all. We have known each other for five years. Da. I'll admit thought that I have only become interested in you in this sort of way during the last couple of years."
A felt chills running down my spine. That thing had been watching me for years? It was one thing if this happened to be a whim of his out of boredom, but knowing he had actually taken interest in me while I did my best to ignore him for years before he actually decided to make this entire mess was just something else entirely. My confidence of winning this bet was shot straight down. He had years to have searched for my background, years to have asked around the reason why I had accepted working as the mobs body disposer, he had years and I had nothing. I chugged the rest of the wine I had and took another glass that was already set on the table for me.
"My turn again? Do you have any pets?" That devilishly sweet childish voice of his had such an enthusiasm on it that it twisted my guts. He had obviously looked at my information and background, this was just part of his game to see if I would be honest with my answers. It would even explain why he had seemed to have seen thru my lies. Or the fear and the booze where simply making me paranoid.
"None." That was another lie, I owned a pet dove called Pierre. His smile twitched. I was sure now. He knew more about me then he admitted. Yet he also let that one slip unmentioned.
"My turn. What are you trying to accomplish with this?" That hell spawn thing had to be scheming something if he was playing like this. Maybe he just wanted to give me some hope so he could be the one to take it away and watch me suffer. Being a sadist seemed to be a norm among the mob anyway. Crushing my hopes to break me before forcing himself on me might just be the sort of kick he wanted.
"All I wanted was for the both of us to relax and have a simple, honest conversation. There is no harm in that is there?" That smile of his was utterly terrifying, and yet it was pissing me off more then scaring me.
"What's the point in asking what you already know then? It seems a bit redundant to me."
"And what makes you think I already knew any of that?"
"Because your stupid creepy smile kept twitching every time you knew I lied you damn Russian." Merde I really should stop drinking right about now. There is a limit between being bold and being life threatening stupid and I might have passed it. If I didn't control my mouth I was going to be in a lot of pain. But the damned devil simply looked absolutely pleased with me for some reason and he even giggled. I was sure that giggle would haunt me for the rest of my life.
"There are not a lot of people that dare speak to me like that Francis. Are you usually such and angry drunk?"
"Non, I'm usually more the flirting kind. Guess you just bring out that side of me." I was drunk. I had to be drunk or I really had a death wish. How had I become that drunk? I didn't remember drinking that much. How many glasses had it been? Three? Four? "How much did I drink?"
"I counted six glasses for yourself. You were sipping your wine non stop since we sat down." Oh the way his eyes were sparkling with amusement just gave me shudders. He was going to be the death of me, most likely by his own hands.
"Why do are you doing this?" My voice was hoarse, barely audible. "Do you enjoy making people fear you? Making people suffer?"
For the first time that night and for all the years I have known that devil in human flesh, his smile felt sad. Even if it had been just a glimpse, even if I had imagined it, even if I was just drunk enough to start seeing things that were not there, I had seen it, and somewhere deep inside of me I felt pity for him.
"If you wish me to admit the truth you must be honest yourself Francis. Tell me one thing that is true about you and perhaps I will answer you."
I sipped more of my wine. What did I dare tell him that was true? Should I be honest? Did it really matter to me to know the reason behind the first glimpse of human emotion I had seen from him? Would he know if I lied again?
"You scare me." That was as far as I dared. He probably knew it already, but at least it was something true. I half wished that by finally admitting out loud what I had known all along, somehow I would become less scared. It didn't happen, but he seemed pleased none the less.
"I suspected as much." He drank some more. That smile of his just seemed that less creepy and that more sad. "It is not like I intentionally want others to fear me Francis. I just never learned how to make them not fear me."
I was stumped. I didn't really know if he had been honest or not but I just couldn't seem to figure out what to do with such answer.
"Even your friends fear you?" What was I doing? I had to be drunk to pity him. I refused to feel sympathy for that hell spawned ash blonde violet eyed devil. It was just a trick, a way to get me to talk.
He shrugged. "I don't have what you would call a friend. All my colleagues have a healthy fear of me so they don't freely approach me. Even the ones that I work closest with are reluctant to speak more than the necessary."
I was reluctant to believe him. Yet it was too believable for I felt the same way. That feeling of pity just refused to leave me.
"Isn't that lonely? To have no one close to you?" Damn me and my drunken state. I can't believe I actually pitied him.
"I have my sisters. I love both of them well enough, but my eldest sister wasn't made for the cruelty of my world, and my youngest always brings me more trouble then I ask for when she visits. So we tend not to see each other as much as we wished."
He had a family? I had to take a moment for myself to rationalize that yes even he would have parents and maybe a sibling or two. For so long I had simply assumed that he was a hell spawned devil summoned to be my personal nightmare that I forgot that he actually had to come from somewhere beyond my kitchen door. But I wasn't very sure if I should believe it or not. He seemed to be speaking honestly enough but he had no reason to do so.
"Why would you tell me all of this?" It felt too surreal to start thinking of him as another human being and not the devil. Perhaps that was how he wanted to make me open up to him so he could win the bet. It seemed to me I drank enough to start believing everything he said.
"You asked. My sister always told me that to get others to be honest with you, you had to be honest yourself. So I am being honest now so that you will be honest with me."
I had to take a deep breath and have a big gulp of my wine to swallow my emotions back inside. Anger, fear, pity, confusion, shame, everything was just swirling around my head and I didn't know how to react. I think for the first time I was being forced to face the fact that the man seated in front of me was not the devil I had always pictured him to be, but just a man, a possibly cruel, monstrous man, which haunted my dreams and forced me to do horrible things, but still a man none the less. A man that in his twisted sense of logic was somehow trying to force himself on me with a bet for reasons I still did not understand.
I kept quiet, staring at my wine cradled in my hands. I didn't want to keep this farce up and end up seeing that devil as the man he was. It was safer for me to keep thinking of him as something evil, to be able to blame him for all the monstrous things I had been forced to do. I didn't want to feel anything for him other than hate and resent.
"Are you out of questions for now?" He was leaned forwards, his head resting on his hand as the other one held his vodka. Even with the table between us he felt very near, and that's when I noticed I had somehow slumped over the table and that he was indeed much closer to me that I wanted to and the fear rushed back to me. What was I doing? I was letting that devil in human flesh manipulate me. I was just another puppet dancing in his hands and he was soon going to crush me.
"If you are out of questions I guess it is my turn again. Da? Tell me, what do you …?"
Before he even managed to finish the question a very familiar loud booming voice called out my name interrupting him and I felt cold stones setting on my guts.
"Francis! Dude, what a coincidence to find you here." Alfred took a chair and sat besides me, wrapping one of his arms around my shoulders. "Arthur is going to flip knowing you are here." He laughed and placed his officer's cap above the table with the badge proudly displayed to the monster sitting right in front of me. I was frozen solid, afraid to even breathe.
"Arthur! Over here old man!" Alfred yelled and waved the arm that was not wrapped around me, Arthur was walking towards our table with his permanent frown. I was never more aware that both of them were wearing their police uniforms.
By the time Arthur pulled out a chair and sat at my other side I was dripping in cold sweat and just about ready to pass out. This could get messy very quickly, and chances were that everything would go to hell any second now.
"Yo Franny, aren't you gonna introduce us to your friend?" Alfred might have been too busy smiling a little too smugly at the monster to notice how I panicked but Arthur sure picked up on it because I felt his hand patting my back softly trying to calm me. The devil also noticed it and took matter to his hands.
"There is no need for that as I am taking my leave. Until next time Francis." He sat up leaving a few bills to cover his tab and left the bar. When he was finally out the door and out of sight I practically collapsed over the table. My heart was beating so fast it was likely to burst out of my chest.
Alfred and Arthur were understanding enough to let me catch my breath and calm down before questioning me.
"So, who is the bloody creep? Did you manage to get yourself a stalker frog?" Arthur's foul mood had never been more comforting to my senses. But I still had to treat this carefully or else I was likely to finish digging my own grave.
"Non mon cher, he just happens to give out that impression. But I do have to wonder as to why you two are here?"
"Well, Matt called me in a panic saying that you were kidnapped by some huge guy in a scarf, so being the hero that I am I came to rescue you." Alfred boasted proudly. "According to him, you were ghost white and trembling the second you saw him."
Matthew was definitely the sweetest, most caring person I knew. Yet I just felt the urge to snap his neck. His stupid phone call could have just worsened my already very delicate situation. Now the devil knew I had relations with the police and the next time I saw him I might just end up dead. And even if I did survive the next encounter with the devil, now the police knew about my relation with him, if any enquiry showed up, I just might get myself sent to prison for life. I could just feel the way my life was crumbling, slipping away from my hands.
"Are you sure he isn't trouble frog? You seemed bloody scared enough of him, when we got here."
"You don't have to worry mon cher, he doesn't mean to be like that, it's just, I just don't really know how to deal with him." That was true enough if whatever he had told me earlier was true, I just wanted Arthur to drop the issue and go home.
"You mean that you actually know that creep? Bloody hell frog, he is a stalker isn't he? You bloody slept with him and now he is asking why you didn't return his calls. Is that it? Have you no dignity? Have you no standards?"
"In Franny's defense Artie, I'd over look his over all creepiness with an ass like that." Both Arthur and I turned facing Alfred.
"What? He dose have a nice ass."
Arthur started scolding the both of us, Alfred made silly jokes and teased, and I just laughed hysterically. I prayed that they may remain as oblivious as they are now.
