Sympathy for the Devil

by Christine Pope

  “Right now nothing is working for me,” Nina replied, tossing her heavy curls back over one shoulder. A few feet away, a couple of guys in UCLA jerseys stopped and stared. “I’ll get over it. Anyway, everything all set for the big date?”

  “I think so,” I said. “Mani/pedi at eleven, and Bethany was able to squeeze me in at four for hair and makeup.”

  I still felt sort of strange about all the preparations I’d made for attending the opera, but Nina had assured me they were necessary. It had taken me a moment to recall the last time I’d even had a manicure — I think it was right before my cousin’s ill-fated wedding a couple of years ago. Pedicures in the summer, sure, just because painting your own toes is a pain in the butt. Besides that, though, my hairstylist was taking care of my up-do, and another girl in the salon was going to do my makeup, since Nina had told me she didn’t really trust me to do an adequate job. I wasn’t one of those girls who never wore any cosmetics, but I liked keeping it simple. Simple, however, was not what you paired with an evening gown.

  Turning away from Nina, I looked up at the movie listings. Unless we wanted to wait almost an hour, we were stuck between choosing a romantic comedy, which I would have liked but wasn’t sure Nina could handle at the moment, or a psychological thriller which, according to the reviews, wasn’t all that thrilling.

  “So which is it going to be?” I asked.

  Nina shrugged. “Whatever. Actually, shocking as it may sound, I’d rather watch the comedy. It’s got Gerard Butler in it. Even if it’s stupid, at least I can stare at him for the next two hours.”

  So much for Nina’s journey to the “dark side.” It sounded to me as if she were pretty firmly back in hetero territory. Then again, I had to admit that Mr. Butler was definitely worth looking at.

  We went up to get the tickets, and I couldn’t help feeling a little smug. Movie stars were fun to dream about, but I had someone equally stare-able taking me to the opera the next night. The thought sent a little tingle down my spine.

  If nothing else, I couldn’t wait to see what Luke looked like in evening wear.

  Well, fabulous, naturally.

  He’d told me he would pick me up at six, but I’d been ready for about twenty minutes by that point and was hovering nervously in the living room, occasionally stopping to peer through the blinds to see if he’d shown up yet. Thank God the weather had decided to cooperate. It was clear and cold, but the rain had taken itself off for a few days.

  Then I saw the Bentley glide to a stop at the curb, and after a few seconds Luke got out. Looking at him in his tuxedo, I thought, James Bond’s got nothing on you, baby. It seemed a little childish to be watching him through the blinds like that nosy neighbor from Bewitched, so I stepped away from the window and waited, listening for his knock.

  Even though I’d been expecting it, my heart beat a little faster when I heard the light rapping on my front door. Taking a breath, I stepped forward and opened it.

  He looked even better closer up. I don’t know what it is about a guy in a tuxedo, but Luke just oozed gorgeousness.

  His gaze fell on me, and I could see his eyes widen slightly. For a few seconds we both stood there in silence, partaking in mutual admiration, until he cleared his throat and said, “You’re beautiful.”

  “So are you,” I blurted, and then he laughed.

  “For you,” he said, handing me a bouquet of red roses from seemingly out of nowhere.

  “Uh — thanks,” I said, taking them a little awkwardly. Maybe someday I’d get used to the way he made things materialize out of thin air. “They’re beautiful.”

  The flowers matched my gown perfectly. I wondered what he would have come up with if I’d been wearing black.

  “Let me just go put these in some water — ” I began. But the words had hardly left my mouth before a crystal vase appeared on the coffee table, ready to go with water already inside. I shot Luke an amused glance. “Now you’re just showing off.”

  “I am?” Without waiting for a reply, he neatly plucked the roses out of my grasp and put them in the vase. “We should be going — the reservations are for six-thirty.”

  “Reservations?” I echoed. “Really? How...mortal of you! What happened to doors opening and all that?”

  “On special occasions I do try to observe the correct protocols.”

  “And this is a special occasion?”

  His gaze lingered on my mouth, and then flickered for the barest second to the low neckline of my gown. I could feel the blood rush to my cheeks. “I hope so,” he replied, a world of meaning in those three small words.

  I didn’t think I could manage a reply. Instead, I leaned down and picked up the little silver beaded evening bag I’d bought to go with my ensemble. After double-checking to make sure that my lipstick, ticket, and house key were inside (the purse wouldn’t accommodate much more than that), I turned to him. “All right — I think I’m ready.”

  He glanced at my bare shoulders. “It’s quite chilly out.”

  That particular point had been worrying me as well, but I said casually, “Oh, it’s all right. I couldn’t find a wrap I liked, so I figured I’d just go without.”

  Something soft and indescribably warm draped itself around my shoulders. I looked down and saw that a coat of silvery-gray fur had, like the roses, appeared out of nowhere.

  As beautiful as it was, I knew I couldn’t wear it. “Luke, it’s gorgeous, but I can’t wear fur. I don’t believe in it, and besides, if my mother found out, she’d skin me alive!”

  His blue eyes laughed at me, at what he no doubt thought were foolish mortal scruples. “Don’t worry, my socially conscious little friend. It’s not real.”

  “It isn’t?” I asked in dubious tones, and reached down to stroke the amazingly soft material.

  There was an undercurrent of amusement in his voice, but he sounded neutral enough as he said, “They do wonders with synthetics these days, don’t they?”

  Fine — if I had to be a source of constant mirth for him, so be it. At least now I didn’t have to worry about freezing my ass off. I just hoped, as he ushered me out of the apartment and down to the car, that no over-zealous animal rights activists would do as I had and mistake my faux fur for the real thing. Dodging balloons filled with red paint wasn’t exactly my idea of a fun Saturday night activity.

  Luke didn’t bother to head back to the freeway. Instead, he pointed the huge car east on Wilshire toward downtown Los Angeles. Street lights seemed to stay magically green for us much longer than they should have, and I reflected that, among other things, the Devil was obviously a handy person to have around when dealing with L.A. traffic. On a Saturday night, though, there weren’t a lot of cars heading into the downtown area. That section of town had a high concentration of financial buildings, law offices, and other commercial facilities, most of which didn’t have much business on the weekends. A little farther south than we were going lay the Fashion District, which was very busy seven days a week, but even those shops would have closed up by this hour.

  I watched the buildings and other cars move outside the car windows as we made our majestic way through the streets. More than once I saw people on the sidewalk stop to stare at the Bentley as it glided past. Maybe I wasn’t quite Cinderella at the ball, but I definitely had the feeling that I’d stepped into another world as I sat there in my evening gown with the luxurious coat nestled against my bare neck.

  We didn’t speak. I think Luke could tell I was enjoying the ride itself as I drank in the sights and even the smells. I love the scent of leather, and the car was redolent of very fine hides, as well as the slightest spiciness that I thought might have been Luke’s cologne. Soft classical music emanated from the speakers. I didn’t know what it was, but it sounded vaguely familiar. Mozart, probably.

  A little while later we reached downtown, and we came to a stop outside an elegant older building. A valet hurried over and opened the door for me, extending a hand to help me out of the car,
even as Luke came around to the sidewalk and gave him the keys. The kid’s eyes widened slightly — I had the feeling he didn’t get to park a Bentley every day — but he nodded and hurried over to the driver’s-side door.

  Luke extended an arm. “Shall we?”

  I took it, reflecting that a girl could definitely get used to this sort of lifestyle. He opened the door for me, and we stepped inside.

  The building was lovely, old but meticulously restored. What surprised me, though, was that the maitre d’ led us through the main dining room and on into a separate chamber, an incredible room with a fountain in the center and gorgeously coffered ceilings. Only one table occupied the cavernous space, which had been decorated with some of the most amazing floral arrangements I’d ever seen.

  Feeling a little apprehensive, I shot a questioning glance up at Luke. “All this, just for us?”

  “Just for you,” he corrected, and pulled out a chair for me.

  The maitre d’ handed me a menu as Luke took his own seat. Not even bothering to look at the elegant leather-backed bill of fare, Luke said, “We’ll start with the capesante in padella, and a bottle of the Schiopetto sauvignon blanc.”

  “Very good, sir.” He gave the two of us a slight nod and then disappeared back the way we had come in.

  I had no idea what he’d just ordered, but I figured I’d better just trust him and go with the flow. My surroundings almost overwhelmed me. What kind of strings had Luke pulled, and what kind of expense had he gone to, in order to procure this room for just the two of us? Under normal circumstances it looked like the sort of space that would have been used for banquets or possibly small wedding receptions.

  “You don’t do things by halves, do you?” I asked.

  “Not usually, no,” he replied. “Besides, I wanted to take you out to dinner, but I also wanted some privacy.”

  “Heck of a way to do it,” I said, waving at the slightly echoing chamber around us. From somewhere I heard soft background music which sounded like a string quartet, but it couldn’t completely mask the slightly hollow sound of a large space that didn’t have enough people to fill it.

  Luke smiled. “Perhaps.”

  At that moment our waiter appeared with a bottle of white wine, which he deftly opened, and then poured out a precise quantity into each of our glasses. Task accomplished, he deposited the bottle in a silver wine bucket that had been placed off to the left of Luke’s chair and asked, “Anything else, sir?”

  “Not for the moment.”

  The waiter nodded and left. Luke raised his wine glass toward me, and said, “To trying new things.”

  I wondered precisely which “new things” he was referring to, but decided it probably would be better not to ask. Instead, I lifted my own wine glass and smiled at him. “To new things,” I repeated, then drank. The taste was clean and cool, with the slightest hint of a mineral flavor at the finish.

  “I think you’ll enjoy Faust,” Luke went on, as if the only thing in the world he possibly could have been referring to was the opera itself. “The music is really quite exquisite, and the story involving…even though it’s a pure fabrication.”

  “So no one ever sold you their soul?” I asked, only half-joking.

  For a second he was quiet, holding the glass of straw-colored wine in his hand. The reflection of the votive candle at the center of the table glimmered against its surface, gold on gold. “People have tried,” he said. “But you can’t sell that which is not yours to give.”

  “Are you saying our souls aren’t our own?” That idea didn’t sound very appealing to me.

  “You misunderstand me.” Finally he lifted the glass to his lips and drank, then replaced it on the cloth-covered tabletop. “Of course your soul is yours, and yours alone. That’s why you can never sell it or give it away.”

  Frowning, I thought that sounded like circular logic. I sipped my own wine, then said, “I’m afraid I’m not following you.”

  Once again he smiled. “God gave men souls, and free will. But a soul is not a commodity — it is a part of you, like the color of your eyes or the sound of your voice. It can’t be separated from you, any more than you can bottle your eye color and sell that.”

  “So why all these stories about people selling their souls to the Devil?”

  The smiled faded. “If a person comes to the psychological point where he feels his soul is of no worth to him, that it can be traded for wealth or power or any of the other temporal things he might crave, then he has lost touch with the bit of grace God has granted him by giving him a soul in the first place. Once a person is in such a state of mind, he allows himself to commit whatever acts he feels are necessary, because he has ‘lost his soul,’ so to speak. It’s a way of giving up responsibility for one’s actions. You know — ‘the Devil made me do it,’” Luke added, with the familiar glint in his eye.

  Well, that actually made some sense, although I had to sit and think about it for a minute. After sipping at my wine as a cover for some serious cogitation, I finally asked, “I’m not — I’m not imperiling my immortal soul by having dinner with you, am I?” Even though I tried to keep my tone light, I had the feeling my inner anxiety seeped through a bit.

  At that he laughed outright. “Hardly. I asked, and you accepted. You haven’t made any bargains with me, or with yourself — except possibly to have a good time.”

  “Some people might say that ‘having a good time’ is the quickest route to Hell,” I remarked. “But they’re never any fun at cocktail parties.”

  “Exactly. Besides, why would God have given humans a capacity for enjoyment and the ability to experience pleasure if he didn’t actually want them to do so? This is what I find difficult to understand about so many of the tenets of people’s faith — that self-denial and self-abnegation somehow leads to enlightenment.”

  “And it doesn’t?” If that were really the truth, then I guessed all those monks I’d read about in my history books, the ones who wore hair shirts and fasted and scourged themselves, must have felt pretty stupid after they died and realized it had all been for nothing, that God actually would have preferred for them to go out and eat meat and drink wine and get laid.

  “Sometimes. But only because the person in question has cleared his or her mind of enough extraneous things to do so. It’s certainly not guaranteed.” His gaze moved past me, and I turned slightly to see the waiter arriving with our appetizer.

  He laid down the plate between the Luke and me, and then set smaller plates in front of each of us. I didn’t know what it was, but it smelled delicious.

  “And for the entrée?” the waiter asked, and I cast a guilty glance at my menu. I’d been so busy talking to Luke I hadn’t even thought about what I wanted to eat.

  Seeming to notice my discomfort, Luke asked, “If you’ll allow me?” and gathered up both our menus.

  Normally I would have gotten on my feminist high horse about a man presuming to place an order in a restaurant for me, but somehow I knew I could trust him to get me something I liked. I nodded.

  “For the lady, the filetto alla rossini, and for me the entrecote di manzo peppe rosa. And a bottle of the ’99 Ornellaia.”

  “Excellent, sir.” The waiter took our menus, smiling. I could only imagine that whatever Luke had ordered, it was very expensive.

  “So what am I eating?” I asked, turning to my neglected appetizer.

  “Bacon-wrapped scallops. They go beautifully with this wine, I think.”

  Scallops had never been on my top ten list of favorite foods, but I did love bacon, so I figured I’d give it a try. The blend of flavors turned out to be amazing, though, subtle and smoky, and the clean, light taste of the wine seemed to both cut through it and harmonize with the dish.

  The Devil was apparently both an epicure and a hedonist. However, since at the moment I was reaping the benefits of his predilections, I wasn’t about to argue. No wonder the stories painted him as the one who led people into temptation — it was
hard not to be tempted by the sorts of pleasures he’d given me so far.

  I could only imagine what others might soon follow.

  Dinner was a decadent dream, and the opera sublime. The experience of actually sitting there, watching the entire spectacle and hearing those perfectly trained voices bring the tragedy to life, was so different from just listening to a CD that it hardly seemed to be the same art form. Faust is sung in French, and I’d worried that I wouldn’t be able to understand anything that was going on, but those nifty supertitles they projected above the stage took care of that problem. By the end I was so caught up in the story and the haunting beauty of the music that I had to breathe deeply and concentrate on not crying. Maybe Luke would have understood, but I’ve never found it a good idea to dissolve into a weepy mess while on a date, especially when your eye makeup has been meticulously applied by some Southern European eyebrow expert and probably wouldn’t survive the ordeal.

  To say I’d never experienced anything like the opera would be an understatement — my parents had taken the family to a few musicals when I was younger, but that’s not the same thing. For one thing, this crowd was better dressed and better behaved. In fact, the audience was so somber and respectful that the standing ovation at the end actually caught me by surprise. I laid aside the opera glasses Luke had given me and stood, clapping until my palms tingled.

  After that we had to deal with all the confusion of navigating the crowded halls of the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion amid the mass exodus to the parking structure. Luke took my hand and steered me through the throngs without incident. It wasn’t until we were in the warm, leather-scented confines of the Bentley that he spoke.

  “So you enjoyed it.”

  “Very much.” I leaned back against the headrest, not caring what I might be doing to my hairstyle. It had served its purpose. “I didn’t know it could be so — so — ”

  “So what?”

  I turned a few words over in my head, then answered, “Thrilling. Exhausting. Uplifting.”