“That’s right, I have thought it over. I think I’d like it to be called simply, ‘Infernus.’”

“ Hisname,” the publisher paused for effect, “for Hell.”

She turned her head to stare out the window, and began reciting what he considered must be a well-practiced poem. “’Gold is for strength, Green is for pus; White is their neutral, but Red is mineleader.’”

He leaned over the desk and cocked his head to hear her mere whisper. “What did you say? What was that?”

“A poem I translated, but never included in the text.”

He almost believed he saw a thin tear run down her sallow cheek and disappear into her clothes. “And why is that?”

“I thought the colors would be obvious.”

“The colors of the demons? And arethey? Obvious, that is?”

She turned and looked at him, which she seldom did. Her right eye blinked seven times. “Oh, yes.” She paused, and then winced as if someone had spit in her eye. “Oh, yes they areobvious.”

“Well, maybe the people would want an annotated version -”

“I don’t carewhat the peoplewant!” The only time she ever raised her voice during the interview. She was breathing heavily, ending it with a sigh.

He realized she was pressing her hands over her pants often, although they seemed immaculate, creaseless. Her fingers were pencils. Short, chipped, unkempt nails. Brittle, like the rest of her. What was she like before?he asked himself, not sure if he hadn’t said that last part aloud.

“You may wonder,” she said quietly, “if I am a mere shell of my former self. Simply put, yes, I am.”

“Then why not just givethe book to this, uh, so-called ‘Dark Brotherhood’? Why publish it at all? The money?”

“The money?” She laughed, perhaps too much, nearly mocking him. “No, I told you. They willmake me rich beyond my wildest dreams should the book fail to sell.”

“Yes?”

She stared up at him from beneath her brows, just this side of madness. “No, you see, they wantthis book shoved rather rudely into the public eye. They wantothers to read it. To infect them.”

“But… but,” he stammered. “That’s damnable!”

“Interesting choice of words. Yes, that’s exactly what it is. Damning them all.” He rose and extended his hand. She stood, glad that thispart was over, shook his hand, and asked him, “Do you know what the preface was in the beginning of the book?”

He flipped through a few pages in his inbox, and frowned. “I wasn’t aware there wasa preface.”

“No, don’t look for it. I didn’t include one. What the poor soul was forced to write, apparently, was this: ‘As in Hell, so there are tears continually in Heaven. Both weep evermore. One feels only horror and an unspeakable pain; the other sees nothing but beauty, and can only be grateful.’”

As she was leaving, she thrust a small piece of paper into his hand. “You can choose to include this as part of the book, if you choose. I don’t know what to do with it. It was an explanation I wasn’t sure belonged in the book.”

He looked at it. It was seven short numbered notes. He read it as he stood there, and she waited, glaring at him the whole time.

“A few things to remember about ‘life’ in Infernus (I must tell you a few things so that we can communicate in a common language).

1) You (whoever is receiving this as an exercise in automatic writing) are writing what happens to me in the present. Everything you write will come to you in the present tense; it’s up to you to change that, if you feel it is necessary.

2) The reason this is so is because there is no time here. A fitting phrase that is as follows: To live in a nanosecond that neverends. It is a definition that can be understood by you. Everything that will ever happen to you in Infernus happens during the same nanosecond. Imagine every paper cut, every severed finger, every toothache, every disembowelment, every cold, all happening to everyone at once.

3) How you are able to hear me at all from my eternal exile is unknown to me. I just sense that it is so.

4) In Infernus, no one ever tells the truth. There is no longer any need for truth or maintaining the truth — for there is no hope here. Everything in Infernus is in an absolute state.

5) Since allthe pain of allmankind is shared by all, no real conversations take place. Consequently, no permission is ever asked for anything, and none is ever given by anyone. The strong take what does not belong to them — the souls of others.

6) Allof the mouths of allmankind are opened as far as “inhumanly” possible in a permanent Scream Eternal. All happens here through a veritable sea, a tumultuous wall of sound. Ten billion souls screaming and screaming and screaming.

7) Either you are made to do things by those who outrank you in authority (the only thing that determines strength here) or the words scrape through your brain like a migraine. No, a migraine is bearable compared to this. This is like a bag of broken glass that sits in your head that someone can shake when they wish to. No actual conversations take place ever — all is done in the brain as bursts of hideous migraines. The smallest words sound like hammers. However, in order to convey everything I am compelled to share with you, you must write down everything that I dictate to you, so it will flow, as a narrative.”

“See what I mean,” she spoke in a tired voice. “I’m not even sure where I’d put it. Maybe just throw it away, right?”

Then she left his office, and closed his door with a smart, metallic click. She barely stifled a laugh, but thought instead: He bought that, hook, line, and sinker.She walked to the elevator, and pushed the downbutton. DarkBrother hood, indeed.“More like Dark Motherhood,” she said aloud, but hadn’t meant to.

“I thought so,” he spoke softly behind. He pulled the lit cigar out of his mouth and blew smoke between them, obscuring them.

She turned, smiled, and entered the quickly closing elevator. They never saw each other again.

She went home and had a dream that night that she was floating beneath 17,000 layers of flame. The same dream she had had ever since she was a little girl.

A brief silence followed his last words. Then a male voice in the back of the room said, “What the hellwas that?”

Another voice said, “Hey!”

The teacher stood. She sighed, and the class could hear her breathing. “Do you planto come back and finish this story?”

“Yes, I -”

“That story was boring!” an anonymous male voice shouted at the back of the class.

“Boring? What? Why?”

The young man stood up at the back of the class. “It’s just a conversation between two talking heads.”

The old man was clearly surprised. “But, I thought it was exciting because it is so necessary to what follows.”

“No,” he repeated. “I would suggest that you put this chapter at the end of the book, as an appendix, so anyone could read it, if they wished, when the whole thing was over. Just go right to chapter two, where I assumethe meat of the book begins.”

“Hmmm,” ruminated the nude man. “That might not be such a bad idea after all. I’ll think about it, how about that?”

The young man sat back down without speaking again. The nude man smiled, and began deliberately, slowly putting back on his clothes. “You will ask me to stop reciting my book somewhere during the next few chapters. Nearly everyone does.” Bright sunshine was glaring through the windows in amber streams and bathing his naked, hairy body.

A woman in the room asked, “Why?”

“Because people tell me it is hideous, unrelenting and it gives them nightmares.”

Another voice: “Isn’t it justa story?”

“Yes,” he said, pulling his pants to his waist. “I made it up. Completely! We cannot proceed unless that is established first. It is complete and utterfiction.”