A Short Story by Emma Nisenbaum, Brandeis University
Inspired by Dante Alighieri’s Inferno
It seems ridiculous, now, the pathetic worries I had held in such high regard not too long ago.
Arriving at the outskirts of the campus, where the continued road could not even fit my Fiat, the cedar trees formed a wall of impenetrable black, yet also undeniable allure. Where the placebo purity of a “pious” place met the edge of reality. This is how it always starts, how it was always meant to start, and how it always will.
“Midway through the journey of our life, I found myself in a dark wood…”.
But if pressed about the events of that night, no, the use of that line is far too ironic. Even my pride in my poetry back then waved it off as far too predictable and meta, only a step above, “The woods were lovely, dark, and deep…,” another redundant way to start a tale already told a hundred, a thousand, times. And, my name aside, the translation makes its nuances unreliable, a point of contention between my professors and I that made me feel a bit better about my intelligence. Most importantly, the wording is simply wrong. I did not stumble off the path of righteous life, I purposefully parallel parked on the shoulder of it, and exited.
The “our,” though… yes, that was accurate. I’m not referring to you, whoever’s reading: psychiatrist, student, or too curious nurse. I’m referring to Dante’s ever faithful companion, Virgil. Of course, me, a boy named Dante, would name his dog Virgil. I thought I was so fucking funny. In highsight, it’s all so laughable, for such different reasons.
Virgil, loyal thing, at the time, was just a pawn to me. A tool to achieve my real goal of the night. Bea. Beatrice. Serious as steel, and cold as the heavy fog, how many times I tried and failed to woo her with my sonnets, and haikus, and free verse. I wanted to be the one who unraveled her otherworldly mystique, bring an angel down to Earth.
I spoke to Virgil on the lonely crossroad:
“Now, you are going to be a good boy and stay. When I bring her over, you are going to be so cute, she’ll want to die. And then she’ll want to get cute with me. So don’t you shit on the seats, okay, buddy? Who’s papa’s wingman? Who’s a good boy?”
Virgil just tried to wiggle his way out the cracked window, only managing to get his snout, and dripping tongue, though the crevice. I took my hands and rubbed his face, letting the back and forth of pushing him into the car and his renewed attempts to escape be a small game. He nipped at my hand until I pulled away for the final time.
I had a party to get to.
Though the tangled underbrush, past the “No Trespassing,” and “Warning: Mountain Lion Country” signs was Dis. The name that just kept giving. Not just a crude joke, but with the right knowhow directed you to a building that, while once it had a reputable reputation as a student research facility, became a pit of all manner of debauchery. Dis, also known as “The Dispencerary”. The Dispencerary for, well for whatever really– drugs, alcohol, sex, the yearly fraternity rushes and occasional static ritual. Anything and everything the Christian college it once belonged to condemned, but refused to admit was occurring within its radius.
As such, more than half the student body was there. In front of Dis was a host of bikes and scooters and hoverboards thrown aside. Music made the ground tremble and lights flashed like flares between red, blue, purple, green, then red again. It was painful. It was everything my undeveloped sophomore brain thought I wanted. My Babel to third base.
I sucked the night air into my chest and walked past all the smokers lounging outside, and shouldered open the door. I had considered it good luck back then, and still do, that a familiar face was the first one I saw.
“Bruno!”
Even at the entrance, I had to shout at the top of my lungs to overpower the bass. When Bruno did turn around, he jumped a bit in surprise, a bit of his drink spit out from his lips and back into his red cup.
“Dante? You actually came?” His confusion was odd. Back then, I thought the desperate grab he made at my hoodie was an act of drunken affection. We had kissed before, but it didn’t do as much for me as it did for him, but Bruno by nature was an affectionate man. I slapped his shoulder, already half drunk on the adrenaline of the atmosphere myself.
“Hell, yeah! Bea said she was going to be here!” Bruno looked slightly put off, and again, I assumed it was the alcohol.
“Are you sure? This isn’t her style, man. She goes to job fairs for fun.”
“Yeah, but she said she would come if I brought Virgil.”
Bruno looked at my feet, where no dog was begging for attention, and then back up, his sharp, dark makeup clearly outlining his raised eyebrow.
“He’s in the car, where I’ve got the passenger seat leaned allll the way back,” I drawled, pulling Bruno close and holding my hand out like it was mapping out the stars on a great journey. “She’ll ask where he is and I’ll take her to him, and I’ll offer to drive her home, but first–”
“Okay! Okay, I get it,” Bruno laughed and pushed me away, his silver piercings reflecting the multicolored lights. “Go get something to drink, you Italian loverboy, I’ll keep an eye out for Juliet.”
I didn’t dwell on how fast Bruno sent me away, or how quickly or purposefully he disappeared into the writhing crowd. The only thing on my mind was getting to the bar before all the Bloody Mary supplies had dried up. I had no idea what Bea drank, but most straight and narrow girls in the movies seemed to favor them.
“The Hog,” was by the food and drinks, of course, one of the many plastic chairs close to buckling under his weight as he worked his way through a tray of guacamole and chips.
“Well, if it isn’t Mr. Devil May Cry himself!” He said, already more cordial by belonging with those as gluttonous as him drinking and dancing all around him.
“Hello, Casey,” I replied, fishing a cooler from the cooler. His lips smacked as he kept talking, lips made loose by beer and nacho cheese.
“Where’s Todo?”
“In the car, waiting for me to bring a Dorathy back to the farm.” We exchanged wicked knowing grins, thinking ourselves the cleverest of men. Casey roughly swallowed more tortilla chips and accouterments and kept the conversation flowing as I tried to decipher what was the red syrup in all the technicolor madness.
“Franny and Jason and the other sex happy freaks have staked claim on the old archives room. The one with the fancy vortex fire system?” More chugs of beer and a fistful of green slop. “Stay away from the old storage room– Craus, Fred, Mike and their little cult have set up shop there.”
“Did Fred and Piers work out their beef?”
Casey guffawed, and it sent spit flying into other bowls on the table. I scooted my mixology attempts closer towards me. Maybe I could use this as an excuse to take Bea to a bar, get some uncontaminated food?
“Fuck, no. Piers even came tonight, but he’s out moping in the woods.”
“Damn,” I said, mindlessly.
He gave me more details of the territories of the festivities– Vinnie and Rampo were there so keep an eye on your phone and wallet, the Jolly Friars were doing their hazing: making the froshes wear winter coats in the boiler room. And it’s not too late to bet on the sports games for the next season, Yellow Lions vs Red Geese.
It was all the buzzing of a particularly large fly to me, from the start not planning to stay for long at all. It honestly made me happy to hear of how Nickolas was already piss drunk and hanging upside down in an old kiln, whining about his Bonnie. Or how a group of politics majors were jumping around the old chemical vats, high and getting higher, giving each other nicknames for the Illuminati-esque group they were going to form when they were, apparently, all the president.
It was everything Bea hated. I was going to be everything she not just wanted, but needed. Me and my adorable-ass dog. So I was thoroughly surprised when said adorableass dog shoved his adorable-ass face into The Hog’s very much not adorable-ass face.
“Paws off!” Casey yelled, turning his body away but not getting up as Virgil tried to get to his bowl of carbs.
“Virgil, down boy!” I grabbed his collar, more concerned about what Casey would do than what my dumb dog would.
“How the fuck?” The confused murmur was lost under the music, but I lent down and asked Virgil it anyway, and in response he licked and licked my face, drawn to by the food I’d eaten. “Did you open the door? How the hell…?”
“I let him out,” a voice as melodious as a choir song sang from above me.
A halo was formed all around her light hair that glowed with every color of the rainbow. Her sensible skirt and polo made her stand out like a sore thumb, but it was like finding a blooming flower in a wilting garden. Even with all the grease and weed in the air I could smell her vanilla perfume. I breathed deep and stood up quick, but not too quick.
“Bea! Always good to see you! And so sweet of you to worry about my guy,” I remarked, forcefully casual. I made sure to pet and rub on Virgil. I was a sensitive guy. I wrote poetry and loved my dog. But I was cool. I hung out in these places as often as Ulysses went on study abroad trips.
Bea blinked.
“There are large cats and wolves in these woods,” she deadpanned.
I struggled to recover from that one.
“He was guarding the car, keeping it safe till I could meet up with you,” I looked down at Virgil. Virgil was too busy licking who knows what off the floor. When it was clear both me and Bea were talking about him, he looked up revealing what I hoped was Cheeto dust all over his grinning face. He couldn’t handle a rock.
Bea’s face gave nothing away. It was enticing as a locked locket, beauty kept shut on even richer connection, just waiting to be filled with image and memory. She looked back up at me and I adjusted my hair, my belt, my posture. Subtly, of course.
“You’re going to need him more than your car. Keep him close.”
God, how I had gone crazy thinking about the implications of that. They were all wrong, embarrassingly wrong, but at least my creativity was grand. Was she saying I wasn’t safe from her? Safe from her doing what? She must have seen the passenger seat, and a smart girl like her would have connected the dots. Jesus, Franny and Jason might have to move over to give me and Bea some room.
But before I could say anything stupid, the mindless throbbing noise slowly dimmed and a voice rose up from below like brimstone.
“Denizens of Dis, are you ready for the main event?!”
There was an overwhelming rally of shouts. I picked up Virgil so he wouldn’t get crushed in the crowd rushing to the many balconies. The nature of Dis was like a hollowed out skyscraper that, instead of rising into the sky, dug into the dirt. Its floors all opened into overhangs that allowed even the viewers from the highest floor to see all the way to the bottom. It was like the people who built it knew what it was always doing to decay into. They probably did.
By the time I got to a viewing position, Bea had vanished. I got excited when I felt a hand on my back, but I turned to see it was only Bruno. He moved his hand to grip at my sleeve again, and his mouth moved, but over the sound of the slurred voice coming through the speakers I couldn’t understand a thing. I foolishly waved him off, and returned my gaze to the spotlit depths.
Judas, real name Jesus, led the charge with his two lackeys. They all wore dark towels tied with rope, and they had somehow cleared enough space on the mosh pit below to set up a circle of wine colored liquid, multiple lit Yankee Candles, and a dozen packets of what looked like ground beef.
“We are the sinners! We reject the old world, and we pledge ourselves to the only god worth hanging with! ARE YOU READY TO SUMMON SATAN?!”
The crowd roared. Years of repression, of having things so tantalizingly put in front of them, and then taken away had fueled many an animosity and so, so much curiosity. Being told no, but not why. Being told a place where others like them lived made the undesirable idolized. I myself felt the same things, but considered myself above the mad fervor. But when asked if I wanted to see The Devil sculpted in all his tortured, picturesque, six-pack angst, I covered Virgil’s ears and joined the throng.
I stood in place and screamed even as Bruno’s hand started tugging on my arm.
Music began to play again, drums that sounded like a mix between Evanescence and a soldiers’ march, echoed by a thousand stomping sneakers and heels. Judas’ cohort, presumably “Brute,” and Cassie, took up pocket knives and ran them down each other’s biceps, letting out guttural chanting and flexing as the blood dripped down. The crowd was close to climaxing, I could see them breaching the balconies’ fences and hanging off the side like mad gargoyles and grotesques. We were possessed, all of us, ripping off crosses and beads like they burned. Girls were screeching, beer bottles were breaking, money was being thrown over the edge, fluttering down like the world’s most expensive confetti.
And then a star fell from the sky. Or rather a molotov cocktail was lit cloth streaking like a comet’s trail.
All Hell broke loose.
I can only recall the first few seconds of the onslaught, before the flying things made their way up to the higher floors or Dis began to crumble under the flames.
The first thing that erupted was nature itself, hurricane winds and torrential rains through people into the air and flattened others. Then the flood, of blood and bile, of mud and muck, the first few floors were gone from sight within a few blinks. Then, the first of many figures from the geyser– an old man, naked except for a Gandalf beard and a cloth diaper, riding a gondola like a surfboard, cackled and cheered:
“YOU’VE ALL DONE IT NOW, YOU MORONS! PAY UP, BITCHES AND BASTARDS, PAY UP!”
His raspy bellows were echoed by bellows of a beast, making its way up the stairs in a spiral. Shocked as I was, I could only catch glimpses of a hulking figure, bulldozing its way through the bodies. Some were flung over the edge, or jumped willingly, into the filth and frenzy rising from below. Others still got caught on the monster’s front, piling and piling, skewered on, what I now realize, was the Minotaur’s horns. In my defence, I was too distracted by the arrows that were flying up to where I stood shell shocked, penetrating heads and throats and hearts.
It was at this point another massive body, this one boasting massive wings and a tail of scales, as large and long as a subway train, rocketed straight towards me. I met its eyes, sunken into a facade of a human face. It looked sorry. It wasn’t.
It crashed into the floor where I stood and the world fell apart. I went deaf from the screams, and held onto the only thing I could. I cradled Virgil in my arms, bowed my head to cover him, and apologized profusely. He licked my face, and I began to cry.
But just as we began to fall, my jacket was wrenched up, choking me yet saving me.
I looked up, and squinted through my tears and the smoke to see Bruno, face twisted in agony. When he opened his mouth to speak, it was not full of terror, but only upon writing this do I realize it was grief.
“I’m sorry, Dante–!” He choked out, floorboards splintering under him and the roof imploding above him. A fleeing soul kicked him in his face, and stepped on his torso, but he held fast to me. I should have reached back. It might not have saved either of us our torment, and it might never will, but I think it still would have made a difference.
“I just should have told you to leave! I thought if I could get to her before she got to you, then– then I don’t fucking know!” Bruno sobbed, makeup streaked and nose bloodied.
“I want you to know, even if those assholes up there think you have to go through this every time, that at least, as I am right now, I don’t think you’re such a bad guy!”
Horror had a larger grip on me than confusion, dangling stories above a cesspit that was slowly rising higher and higher, more flying fiends dashing past me in their urge to invade. I heard Bruno’s words, but I did not understand them. I just kept yelling out his name, telling him to pull me up, then trying to get him to take Virgil, at least. But finally, I wailed to try and warn him.
And Bruno heard me. He looked up, and saw the alit beam above him, aimed for him, primed to fall. I saw him wince from the embers that were already burning away his hair and flesh. Yet even so, he did not release me. Bruno turned back to me and just apologized again and again.
Until finally, the wooden beam came loose, and set itself upon him like the Agro to the leader of its fleet.
And I fell, looking up at the starry sky.
I do not feel the need to reiterate what I saw. Like the beginning of this story, you have heard the middle as well. You know how I hike with my companion over the span of that torrurus day, though ring after ring, floor after floor. A bit more disorganized, yes, but still the same Hell as when I travelled there the first time. Less talking maybe, but Virgil stayed the path. He had walked there before too, even longer than I have. Conversation, I suspect, would have been dull for him, you and myself.
My belt still disappeared over the edge of the pit. I still wept at the Occult Club’s fate. I still recognized Capocchio– or Capi as I called him time around, as we went to the same elementary, middle, and high schools– before he was dragged away, clawing at the ground already filled with his fingernail marks. I still kicked Bocca. He didn’t protest anymore, looking up at me through his black eyes stamped by my shoes.
The only difference, the only aspect of my latest journey I still ponder about, is that I went up and not down. And at the top, as my entire body ached from dragging myself and Virgil up the furred leg of Satan, was Beatrice. The final girl standing.
“So,” I grunted, heaving breaths and helping Virgil balance himself on his three uninjured legs, “can I go out with you, yet?”
For a moment, I think her nose scrunched in disgust. But that would be an affront to all she is, and more importantly, to all she is not.
“Obviously not.”
I let out a dry laugh, laying up on the grass, looking up at her. She glowed in the darkness. It made the edges of her from hazy. Her shadow was so much larger than she was. Virgil kept himself tucked close to me, trying to lick at my raw wounds.
“That was a joke.”
“I didn’t find it humorous.”
“I know. I fucking know.”
Beatrice didn’t scold me. She was as indifferent as the sun slowly rising above, and the exact opposite of the urgency in the approaching sirens. Above the mortal Earth by a few inches and at least one or two dimensions.
“Cursing is a bad sign. You’ll need to go again.”
Virgil barked at her a few times, but she clicked her tongue and he sat and quieted down quicker than I’d ever seen him. Usually it takes a treat or two. I, myself, was simply disappointed. She spoke again.
“You managed to make us think you learned the lesson the first time. Maybe you can write another poem? I quite liked it.”
There is a beat, filled with the wails of sirens and Virgil rolling in the grass and my own weak chuckles.
“…That was a joke,” she said.
“… I know,” I reply.
I am sitting in Purgatorio now. It’s a mental facility. It was the only one that would let me keep Virgil with me. It’s also the one I was always meant to be in. It can all only continue, can only finish, now that I am here.
Even after these generations upon generations, I do now know why I am the star of this tragicomedy. I think, at one point, I might have put myself here. Considered myself an expert on things I could not comprehend; I played with sacred order like a child with dolls. I’ve seen online that what I wrote the first time was fan fiction. It’s not wrong: I was a fan, a fanatic. And I wrote my fiction into the folds of reality. Made the divine my own when I was nowhere near it, and now the powers that be have befitted me with the punishment of working on me until I am.
“Contrapaso” will forever be my labradoodle, my pop-up ad, my radar.
But for now, I am to go to a very, very large funeral. I am going to have to tell a lot of lies, which I am sure will be recorded somewhere. Then I will come here, and read the facilities’ lending library’s copy of Aristotle. And I will wonder at TV again. And I will play with Virgil. And maybe, maybe, I’ll try tersets again.
