Inevitability

"William Zin Bauhb."

He wasn't finished, "Call me Bill."

"Yup," and he didn't seem to care about my lack of etiquette. We shook hands, but I felt dirty after touching his cool skin. It wasn't that I was any better than he was, just cleaner.

"D'you ever read the Bible? " He actually sneared. He was partially missing part of a tooth, what was left was a weird brown.

Bill would be in and out of my life, throughout the stages I sped into and out of. I realize at this point that I possessed a strange sort of blindness in regards to his role in the events that would follow after a visit from him.

It wasn't because he was charismatic, no. He was probably capable of charm, but wouldn't have been caught dead.

Bill slid into my ego like a molecule of heroin, altering the chemistry of perception. From there, ideology, space and even time possesed a subtle skew, a degree in a change of course, but the more time passes, the greater the divergence.

Back then, when he insisted he was the Devil, I felt embarrassed for his delusion. He was overweight, mid-forties, balding with a beard that made him look almost hip. Beanies were the chosen mask for his shaved head. He had two tattoos I could see. A forearm piece depicting the Bible cut out in the shape of a handgun and a crude upside down cross on the back of his neck, green after years of sunburns.

He knew how to pursue a theme. He was also a very happy drunk.