The sun began its battle against the clouds at 7:19 that morning. The birds began chirping at 7:31, Bice reached full consciousness at 7:41 even though her alarm had gone off near a full hour before. A sigh escaped Bice's mouth as the muscles in her stomach clenched together to bring her to an upright position. Looking out her broad, 1st story windows Bice looked into the gray sky, and then noticed a lone sparrow hopping along the sidewalk.

She then slid into a pair of well-worn but well padded slippers, her feet making muted thugs against the smooth hard wood floors across her room and into the kitchen.

Bice asked her chef to make raspberry pancakes, and then let her elbows come to a rest on the blue granite counter tops. Imagining complex worlds in the veins of gold that danced through the counters.

“It’s a mighty fine day out their miss” Robert, the chef, commented. Layered with almost as much sarcasm as fat on his warm body. Bice then glanced out the windows and frowned. However she soon found her self preoccupied by the steaming pancakes that were set in front of her. The birds chirped, the cook laughed, Bice chewed. It was 8:00.

At 8:15 due to the intense oppression of the gray morning Bice flicked on the local news with flickers of hope that the news would be more than the weather, and perhaps a robbed Shell. Something exciting was what Bice was hoping for while she with a quick downward movement of her finger turned on the TV, perhaps a new celebrity baby, or movie. At 8:16 her cup broke into a million diamonds sprinkled on the floor. The news held more than her deeper fears.By 8:20 Bice was heading full sprint to the home of the Aligheri’s. Neighbors gave out quizzical looks, and hushed whispers.

Once inside their tiny duplex Bice continued her sprint into Dante’s room, running past a poker table and Veronica and Dante’s father exchanging sloppy kisses. Continuing Straight to Isi’s room.



Crouched in a corner she sat, rocking back and forth. Fresh tears gliding down the smooth planes of her face. Isi’s blonde hair looking as if a vulture had made its nest in it, her chocolate eyes clouded with grief. “He, he’s gone.” Slipped out of her mouth repeatedly. Isi remained unchanged while Bice noisily ran into her room. Bice had had her worst fears confirmed. Sorrow began to dance across her eyes, hazing across her vision until all she could see was a solitary tear gliding down the smooth oval shape of Isi’s face. Catching the light, even in a day where the sun had already lost its battle with the oppressing clouds and had retreated into the haven of the asthenosphere.


Bice let sorrow pull her down, down, down. Down to pools of tears and oceans of sorrow. Past all boundaries. She sat there, letting her head tuck itself in-between her two uncovered legs. Letting her tears turn to soundless sobs of an agonized soul. The immeasurable moment of sorrow floated around the two pure, heart-broken souls. Sorrow wrapped its cold, slimy fingers around them, dragging the two further into its realm. Abruptly sorrow was challenged. Warm bubbles of light began to stir inside Bice. They floated up,up,up. Up from the depths of her soul. Up past reason they rose. One by one sequentially severing the chains of sorrow that Bice had been so tightly woven into. Up they traveled to the surface, one golden bubble after another. In the time it takes to inhale and exhale the millions of golden bubbles of light had assembled into one glowing orb. Before Bice’s Sorrow-blinded eyes could see the light she felt it. The radiation from the orb filled her soul. The orb was hope.

With her eyes still fixated on the orb Bice unfurled herself and said a quick goodbye to Isi, whom was unaware of any other presence than that of sorrow. For sorrow had taken a grip of Isi’s soul, blinding it from any form of light or peace.

Knees shaking, hair-swaying Bice followed hope out of the cigarette filled air of the Alighero’s duplex into the crisp air of the mountains. Goosebumps began to form miniature mountain ranges of Bice’s uncovered limbs while the brisk, sharp mountain air penetrated her thin cotton pajama shorts and tank-top. Yet she still followed.

Hope led Bice deep into the woods, off the trail, through the trees, they traveled. Hope always hovering a few feet out of reach. Occasionally Bice would stumble over the rough terrain and hope would float above her, waiting.

The sun’s rays began to dicipate into the walls of jade, and Bice lost track of time.

“one hour?two?” She naively thought. It was 5 o’ clock.
At 6 pm the orb came to a halt, floating in the middle of a large clearing. Wilted wildflowers were the prominent feature of the clearing, all shapes and sizes dropped down. As if in a bow to hope. Deep shadows lurched out from the walls of deep jade. Bice’s cold lips began to chatter violently while her eyes stayed faithfully fixated on the orb.

Deep inside her own mind, Bice failed to notice a lone figure that rested in the shadows of the forest. Gradually the figure took fluid steps towards Bice, the shadows cradling the figure in their misty arms.

The figure stretched out an elongated hand of mist and ran it’s finger tips along the ripples of gold that was Bice’s hair. While it’s fingers danced along the supple ripples of gold the figures eyes, cold as shadow itself, saw hope too.

Hope sequentially descended downward, till it came to a rest. Hope flickered between the two souls, Spreading warmth evenly between them, Gradually Bice’s teeth silented, and she lowered herself onto the bed of wilted wild flowers. The figure melted into the shadows for a flicker of a moment then re-appeared again, lounging on a chair made of night itself.
With one fluid motion the figure created a blanket of swirling shadows, and lay it over Bice, allowing the shadows to become one with her. The shadows danced along her body, her hair, her soul. In complex series of cheorography the shadows danced into her heart and mind, her body and soul. It was 1o’ clook am.
For hours the shadows worked, and for hours the figure watched while slowly Bice’s flesh faded and was replaced by the fluidity of shadow. It watched while the darkness enveloped her being, and her soul’s light began to shine through. In the east the sun’s bravest rays entered the battle field, sensing a victory. The figure sensed victory too. More rays filled the ice-blue sky and swirled around Bice, staying away from the figure. One by one the glowing orbs of dawn’s first dew settled over Bice’s new body.
Her limbs were dense, yet slender swirls of shadow; her clothes were elegant tiers of light. When she opened her eyes to the bright dawn they still held the same startling shade of electric blue, yet the lightness that shined out of them had increased by a ten-fold. Goodness radiated from every crevice and inch of Bice’s body. The figure smiled and stood, Bice floated up and gasped. It was 7:00.
The figure’s soul filled up with pride at the sight of the marvelous creature, Bice, whose pure essence he knew would be plenty of a guide through the darkness ahead.
“Do you love Dante?” the figure questioned, leaning further towards the silky swirls of Bice’s body.
“I believe I do.” Was the semi-blunt answer that floated through the rosy confines of her artfully sculpted lips, due to her intense surprise at the blunt question this barely known yet somehow so vital figure had asked her.
“Perfect. After all true love is the key.” The figure responded, without a dribble of sarcasm in the entire sentence like Bice was used to hearing from her high school peers with the subject of true love. Still chewing over thought of love, and loss her only response now was a quick bob of a golden mass of ringlets that tried its best to hide a glazing over of the eye followed by a solitary tear that glided down the smooth shadows of Bice’s face. The figure stretched his condensed shadow of a carefully sculpted finger out and caught Bice’s solitary tear, and put it into a solitary pouch, out of his solitary coat, that was made of the once solitary essence of his shadowy soul.
“You do realize where he has gone, don’t you?” The figure asked with a hint of a well hidden smirk on his well hidden face.
“Hell.” She replied, so faintly that the solitary syllable was lost to wind, but not to the figure’s excellent ears.
“Then, you realize where we must go?” He whispered back, all playfulness gone, for an eerie oppression had settled over the two. Bice looked up, gazing into his cold shadow eyes, slowly began to form her reply, while every shadowy, golden hair on her body stood on end.
“Hell.” With the conclusion of Bice’s single-word sentence the whole forest began to quiver, and even the shadows tried to hide. However, hope remained faithfully hovering above the two, ready to lead them onward.

Hope led the two to hell. At first it seemed that they were only traveling further into the forest, but then Bice noticed that the trees gradually became more shadow than bark. Then they slipped through the fabric of realized and acknowledged reality and into hell. You see, reader, hell isn’t so much of a place as an idea, and ideas as you will find can become quite lethal. Bice and Figure were about to find that out on their journey. Bice in her quest for love, and Figure in his quest for forgiveness.

“Do you hear that?” Bice whispered, referring to the hushed moans that were rolling through the increasingly thick air in heavy, oppressive, goose bump inducing waves.

“I believe you know what. Didn’t you ever read the divine comedy?” Figure replied cryptically. Followed by a dark, sardonic chuckle.

“I was working on that.” She replied, her thoughts trailing back to earlier in the week, when she had been another student in _______high. Remembering that she had an assignment due on the book her life eerily resembled currently. She also thought of how it laid unopened on her gleaming oak side table, still in the bag from Barnes and Nobles, and how she wished ferociously that she had taken the time to read it.

The pair continued on, gradually getting closer and closer to the moans, and consequently farther from concrete reality, and into hell. The place where ideas rule above all. Reader, I feel as though I must disclose to you a rather valuable tidbit of information; hell is one big idea that is made up of all other bad and evil ideas while heaven is another big idea that is made up by all good, pure, happy, and righteous ideas. Then lastly, Purgatory is a singular idea of redemption. Do not forget this, reader for it will be most important for your understanding.

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Before Bice and Figure lay a field, and on the field countless numbers of souls, doomed to roam around this trampled field for however long their sentence was. ---- Eventually the lost souls noticed Bice’s pure presence and began to make a pathway for her, attempting to turn away so that she would not be able to see their sinful faces of grief. However, they did not turn around quickly enough for Bice’s sharp eyes to miss their misty faces, and not quickly enough for Bice’s sharp brain to not recognize them. For standing an arm-lengths away were what Bice perceived to be roughly half of her school’s cheerleading squad. This occurrence confounded her since Dante was the only one of her peers she knew of as deceased.

“Figure, how am I able to see the living in the realm of the dead?” Bice questioned, followed by a shiver up her spine as she continually saw more and more of her peers.

“Don’t you remember? Hell is an idea and a shadow of reality. Hell’s job is to extract the bad truth from reality, and your peers are real are they not?” Figure replied with a slight smirk on his shadowy lips.

“Well yes, of course they are real, silly shadow man!” Bice hissed.

“That still does not explain why they are here!” Bice ejaculated.

“ahhh… you have so much to learn child! You see, most every human has a part of them that is well human. That part is the bad part of reality, and of one’s soul. That part goes to hell. No matter what stage of life you are in. The people you are seeing on this field have never made decisions. I suppose that someone of your age group would call them one’s posy? Yes, that is the word. See how their soul’s grow upset by that word?!” Figure replied, with a tone that said “I am right. You are wrong. You must listen, young one!” Once Bice realized the absolute truth of what Figure was saying she focused on the depressing scene around her.

The field was but a zone of mud and trampled, withered, limping grass. The souls on the field were not in better condition. They had swallowed out cheekbones, and sunk in, glazed over eyes. They had calloused, knarled, wart-ridden feet from a lifetime of roaming over the field. Their hair was not so much hair as writhing shadows! One might mistake one of these lost souls for Medusa’s cousin. However, the thing most disturbing to Bice about these sick souls was their lips. Chapped, and bleeding, thin, and straight, with a shape of pure hopelessness. The kind of mouth one sees on an orphaned disaster victim, jaw agape, and saliva dripping out.

Bice’s heart reached out for these souls that were so, so lost. It began to ache and throb until her feelings came out in the form of a question for figure.

“Are these people stuck in here forever?” Her heart inquired.

“Some of them are, some of them are not yet trapped in here forever.” He cryptically replied.

“I’m not sure what you mean by some...” Bice admitted after trying to appear to understand his newest answer to her questions.

“Well as you know that an un-numberable number of the souls here on this field of trompled grass are still living, breathing humans on Earth.” He replied.

“Yes, but....” Bice began to say before figure cut her off.

“And on Earth all things are subject to change. Even rocks change. You see, people aren’t truly stuck in one place until the second they demise. Then wherever their soul was in that instant is where it will stay for the rest of time. But as long as the body is still alive, the soul is free to move about the various realms of the universe. Whether it be in some circle of Hell, Purgatory, or for the lucky rare individual... Heaven. Just because most daft humans are unable to comprehend this concept does not make it any less absolute.” Figure said with a hopeful gleam in his eyes.

“You say the word human as though you are not... what on Earth are you??” Bice questioned him with a mix of adoration and fear in her heavenly blue eyes.

“Ah... the question is not what on Earth I am, but what in Hell.” Figure replied before the pair’s conversation was stopped by the fear that was instilled in Bice by the increasing amount of The Gate visible.

The pair continued through the field, silent, and morose. Realizing that these things were but a shadow of the horrors of what lay behind the gates of hell. The gates that were slowly rising on the horizon of field, gradually peeking above the heads of the souls lost. Till it was not peeking above the horizon but glaring at Figure and Bice, showing them scenes of violence, and morbidity, of war, fear, death, and betrayal, scenes too horrid to describe here. All etched seemingly out of fire on the deepest black Bice had ever seen. It was darker than pavement, or the night sky, darker than the black on a record player, or on the back of an I-phone. The kind of dark that makes up peoples deepest fears, and turns some mad.

As Bice neared the gate of hell, her heart began to throb. That intense throbbing one's heart does when it knows it is near the object of it's affection. Her full lips began to quiver, but her tear ducts did not react. She was ready for this. At least that is what she chanted religiously in her mind as they approached the gate. However, nobody ever has or will be ready to face the horrors that lie beyond that gate. The gruesome entrance was but a shadow of the evil that resided behind it. a mere sliver of the heinous things that called the place behind it home.

Soon, above the agonizing screams of the tortured souls, rose the sound of the river. The Acheron River twisted through the thick limestone that lay beneath them. It is a murky brown, much like the polluted Buffalo Bayou that meanders through the humid city of Houston. Nothing like the crystal clear rivers of colorado! Bice's pure mind thought. The closer Figure and Bice inched towards it the more violent it sounded, like kindergarteners banging their chubby palms onto their toy drums, and soldiers marching into battle. Like the furious winds of a hurricane wrapping it's fatal tentacles around the frame of your home. The sound of the Earth being ripped apart, and an infant wailing. The sound of a pencil tapping on a desk, its rthymn off beat. Or nails across the chalkboard. What ever is the most gut wrenching, mind-numbing, pain-inducing sounds that have ever graced your mortal ears this was them all combined. However, at the same time it also seemed to offer a sort of peace, the kind of peace that Dante searched for in that tributary of the Colorado River that stole his solitary, singular soul, and two hearts.

You see, the Acheron River is connected to every river. That one part of the river that is always a hue darker than the rest, or that section of death-inducing rapids. That one part that for some reason you can't logically explain why you won't dip your tender toes into. That part of the river that makes goosebumps rise up on your skin, even if it is 104 degrees outside, that is the Acheron River. Next time you go to a river, look a little bit closer into those shadowy sections, and you just may see a sinful soul being carried across into hell. Or maybe, if you have the luck of a four-leaf-clover you can see Charon, the ferryman.

They then reached the muddy, putrid banks of the Acheron River. Figure with a nervous smirk on his face, and Bice with the look of absolute terror carved into her once placid features. For they both saw hope once more, in a place that was not where they wished to find it. Hope floated roughly twenty feet away, that sparkly glorious thing. Over a not so sparkly, but still glorious thing, Charon. His black robe seems to leek off of him, dispersing into the million shadows that lay within the Acheron. His skin is a lovely olive, the kind of skin that one might expect to find on a Mediterranean beach. Charon's nose has a high arch in it, and it reminds Bice of the noses that she had once seen carved into ancient marble on her trip to the Met last summer. His lips are full, yet not in a girlish kind of way. No, they are the most masculine thing about him. Even more so than his bulky biceps that project out of his arm from thousands of years of transporting the dead. Nowadays, he doesn't have to do the whole pole act, Hell has been modernized too! He grew nearer second by second, approaching on a black speed boat of death! It seems to the pair that Charon is going to pass them by, however that is not the case.

The boat's fierce motor growled as it jerked to a sudden halt, throwing off some of the souls into Acheron, where they were no doubt doomed to wait for another ride for no less than a millennium.

"Excuse me sir, but may you please take my friend and I across to the other side?" Bice pleads. His ruby eyes connects with Bice's Sapphire orbs of knowledge, and he stretches out his hand. For when one looks into her pure, yet determined soul he can see hope too. For the first time in his existence, which is a far lengthier one than you and I can ever imagine, he saw a truly clean soul. Charon picks up the feather-light, or should I say shadow-light, Bice into the black motor boat. Then places her onto a jet black bench, next to a bitter soul that's hissing and cringing at being near her presence. Charon reaches for the power button, but is stopped by the sound of Bice's voice.

"Excuse me, but you have left my friend on the bank!" She says in a delightfully sharp kind of way. The kind of sharp that one who is truly nice tries to acquire. Which is a very pitiful display of anger, especially in a place that specializes in it. Bice draws in a big breath, ready to continue when Charon begins to laugh! His big, bulky, elegant figure laughing. Every part of him quivering, and renewed. His laugh is a deep hearty laugh, the kind of laugh one expects from Santa Clause. Still laughing that deep, guttural laugh he plucks Figure off from the muddy shoreline, and places him next to Bice. Figure crushes that angry soul, and sends it seething to another row. Still laughing, Charon pushes the on button, and then stands on the bow of the boat. While the boat is moving at super sonic speeds,his robe lifts up from him, and wraps itself around Bice and Figure. His fearsome robe protects Bice and Figure as the Acheron tries to snatch them away, for it knows that Bice is not dead, and Figure is and escapee.

Hope stays above Charon's head, invisible to all those tortured souls whose sunken eye balls have not known hope for such a long time. It radiates down onto Charon's onyx black curls that are bouncing and quivering while his boat cuts through the Acheron. It radiates down into his blackened heart, mending and cleaning it out. It radiates all the way down into the once putrid essence of his soul. Hope cleans out all the million of little things that have made him such a bitter being over the ages like a swifter picks up the dust from your keyboard. His mind, now finally clean wanders back to the time before he was feared, and even hated. To time when he was still alive.

To the time when he was not feared, and when he was loved. To a time when he loved. Charon lets out a sigh, and tries to imagine away the agonizing sound of the Acheron. He tries to imagine that the air rushing through his hair is not the stale, muggy air of the underworld but a fresh Autumn breeze in the Italian countryside. That Bice’s even breath was the sound of Lucia’s sturdy lungs as she walked along beside him.

Bice’s every breath transported him further and further back in time until he was there on that fatal night. Charon remembers how they lay on crumpled grass, as they further intertwined their bodies. How they became lost in the wonderful haze of lovemaking, and they each believed they were the only two in the world. How Lucia’s bronzed body glowed from the moonlight and pleasure. Her amber eyes glinting in the moonlight, a giggle escaping her plump lips before they brushed against his own. The way her supple fingers felt as they roamed through his bouncing curls that quivered in the breeze. How her cheeks always had a healthy rosy look to them, and her eyes never quite stopped glinting. The way her voice tinkled and her walk bounced. How her auburn hair had as many waves as the Mediterranean Sea in it. How the vast canopy of stars lay over them and twinkled in her eyes. The stunning stars that his eyes had been deprived of for so, so long.

He can once again hear her sweet nothings whispered in his ears, and the sound of the grass bending under their weight. Charon can once again smell the way her perfume and his sweat blended perfectly together along with the sweet scent of the Summer wild flowers. His mind lingers in the moment, embracing the fond memory. He lets his mind linger over this moment for just a while too long.

For all too soon this moment was lost in the fierce fire that he can never escape. He can smell the village burning, and he can hear his peer’s screams as they are awoken from their slumber. A burning man runs past them, and Lucia lets out a gut-wrenching scream of pain. She recognizes him as her twin. Charon can see her beautiful curves disappear around the corner as she chases her brother, and he feels his feet begin to run after her. He can hear peoples blood-curdling screams, and he can see Lucia’s brother writhing in pain while his skin begins to curl off of him like layers of an onion. His young self helps Lucia, and the two lovers follow him to the river. Charon watches as Amadeus leaps into the river, even though he can not swim. The smell of burning skin being put out fills his nostrils, and he watches as Lucia lets out the most horrible scream that has ever filled Charon’s ear canal as she helplessly watches the life slip out of her other half.

He sees himself attempt to bring her into an embrace, but Lucia pushes him away. She glances over her shoulder and watches as her home collapses. Soon after the rest of their village goes up in smoke, like a cruel offering to the gods. Determination fills her eyes, and with her auburn hair writhing in the wind she looks like a continuation of the fire herself. She lets out a quick prayer before jumping in after her brother, all rationality had seeped from her head. For she can’t swim as well. Lucia remembers this all too crucial fact one moment to soon, and she lets out a yelp as the river claims her too. Taking her down, down, down.

His heart heavy, he follows after her. Thankfully, Charon can swim. He searches for her until the moon hangs low in the sky, and the fire has died. He searches for her until the last soul stops moaning. He searches for her day and night until one dawn his muscles give in, and he too lets the river take him down, down, down. Down to where he is today, still searching for the lost soul of the one he loves with every trip to hell he takes. His eyes are ever searching, his soul is ever aching, and his heart is ever longing. That is why he couldn’t stop himself from helping another who lost her beloved to the river. For he if any soul knows the pain. However, now he at least knows hope as well.

When the boat slid into the dock Charon slid back into the current reality. He then made sure all of his customers made it safely off his vessel, both dead and alive before heading back for another boatload of souls.

Figure glided a shore, and impatiently waited for Bice to venture off of the dock. She was having difficulty because of the shock of what Hell truly is. Figure had become accustomed to the awful sight, but it shook Bice to the core of her existence. The sky above them was steel gray, full of rolling, fearsome clouds. Awful things greeted her pure soul for endless amounts of miles, and the horrors imprinted onto her brain. Much like a camera imprints light onto blank film. Figure reached out his hand, like an official bridge between two worlds, and then she stepped inside the official boundaries of Hell.

When her slipper-clad foot stepped into the first circle a heinous laugh errupted from the earth and sky. Imagine the chilling laugh of the Joker mixed with Darth Vadar. That is the closest combination that I can come up with in hopes that your mortal ears will be able to understand how truly frightening this laugh is. For the morning star knows all who steps into his domain, and truly loves lost love. He of all souls know this most.

What greeted Bice’s eyes in the first circle was not quite what she had expected, or what she had even seen just a moment before. No instead of a horrid landscape razed by fire and filled with tortured things she saw a large house, and I say house not home, of the modern style of architecture. It must of been seventy stories high and just as wide, with only a few lights shining out of it’s glass walls. Other than the house and a black marble path, for as far as Bice and Figure could see was nothing. Just gray piled on top of gray, the horizon blending into the sky before dropping off into eternity.