Attack of the Cupids (14 page)

So she was using it as her desk.

This wasn't as good an idea as it seemed at the time. A living heart has no flat surfaces, is a bit sticky and tends to move up and down rather a lot. The moving up and down isn't immediately obvious when it's hidden under the forest of marking, reports, files, letters, memos, test papers and coursework, the indefinite storage of which is what this angel thinks a desk is for. But it's there beneath it all, valiantly labouring on, loving its lost lover. Occasionally the weight of bureaucracy is just too much and it has a seizure, whereupon the angel has to resuscitate it by thumping it as hard as she can with her fist. But she's the sort of angel who thumps her desk from time to time anyway so there's usually no problem about this.

On it beats, on and on, although the woman and her lover both passed the gates of Death long ago. And the towers of paper shake and shift gently with each pulse, and every now and then another pile of marking sidles to the point where the not-very-flat surface becomes a not-very-straight side, and there it gives one last teeter, a slight wail, and tumbles and spills all across the Tiles of Willing Sacrifice until it comes
to rest at last against the Wall of Desire, or against the foot of a full-length Mirror of Burning Glances (whereupon it starts to smoulder). That might have bothered another angel, but not this one.

It's not that she doesn't focus on things. She just focuses differently. She has an instant, total kind of focus where suddenly the only thing in the world or the universe that matters at all is whether someone called Jules will look round and see someone called Sarah watching from the crowd. Zoom, and she's there! The eyes lock, the pulses bounce, the rest of the room goes blurry and it's job done. Love can do this a million times in an hour, although generally she doesn't work at that rate because it takes a few seconds for the heart to cook properly and she thinks it's better not to rush it.

She once shocked the entire Celestial Staff Room by suggesting that every angel in Heaven should have their own computer. This was not because she wanted to catch up on her paperwork. It was because she had heard about online dating and reckoned that if the rest of her market was going digital then so should she. Heaven, she told her colleagues, should move with the times.

(The Staff rather struggled with the concept of
‘times'. The Choirmasters asked if she meant 3/4 time, 4/4 time, 5/8 time or something sort of jazzy. The Appeals Board never even got as far as ‘times' because they were still struggling with the word ‘move'. This is pretty much what happens every time she comes up with an idea. Deep down, Love is one really frustrated little archangel.)

More facts about Love:

1) She likes being a woman;

2) She likes giving orders;

3) She
doesn't
like Tradition. Tradition goes around in whalebone corsets and an ankle-length dress, insisting that everything be arranged through the parents, preferably with a bride-price and while the couple are still too young to think of thinking for themselves.

In a place like Heaven, it's always going to be an uphill battle for her. Even her own cupids prefer to think of ‘her' as a ‘he'. Somehow they just felt that life as a cupid is tough enough what with being short, fat, naked et cetera, without having to take orders from a girl as well. They like to see her in one of her male forms, such as Eros, the winged archer, the God
of Passion. As Eros, she is as close as she ever comes to being a cupid herself. That is, she is about the same weight and only several times the height.

Not that they
call
her ‘Eros'. No way. They are cupids. They call her ‘boss'. Or sometimes ‘Dirty Erry'.

As in . . .

‘Yer've visitors, Erry,'
said her secretary.

‘Visitors?' says the angel, in tones of honeyed surprise. ‘Am I expecting anyone?'

She is not expecting anyone. And since it is her secretary's job to be expecting anyone or anything that she isn't expecting so that he can tell her in time for her to expect it, and he hadn't, everything is his fault. This comes as no surprise to the cupid, who learned on his first day that ‘
Everything is your fault
' is his job description in four words.

‘They're ‘ere anyways, Erry.'

‘Then you must show them in, my darling, mustn't you?'

She knew who it was. She felt his approach before he entered, like the pull of gravity from a huge dark star. She felt the billions of years, the slowness, the patience, the coldness of death, the inevitability of ending. She felt him coming closer. She rose to her feet.

Love met Doom in the chambers of Heaven.

They were two ancient creatures. She was warmth and a great light, he emptiness and everlasting cold. Both were massive in their knowledge and power and understanding. There were few secrets of Creation that one or other of them did not know. In a moment of depth and silence, they bowed.

The moment was interrupted by Mishamh, who stepped between them with his feathers all fluffed like a robin about to fight. ‘We have come,' he announced, ‘to warn you that we are raising a complaint with the Governors about the Department of Love.'

Love blinked at him. ‘You're so sweet,' she said.

Complaining to the Governors was the Heavenly equivalent of sending in the tanks. ‘
You're so sweet
,' was not the answer Mishamh had expected.

‘The Department of Love is obstructing the work of the Appeals Board!' he said sternly.

‘Aw, shucks!' said Love.

‘The Department of Love,' declared Mishamh, ‘has for thirty centuries frustrated every date and deadline for the End of the World that has ever been decreed!'

said Love.

‘As detailed in our list of charges.' The young angel
held out a scroll written in letters of meteorite trail upon the stuff of adamant, which is what the Physics staff tend to use when they are upset.

‘We assume you will provide us with a copy of your response,' said Mishamh haughtily.

Love smiled. A scroll of moonlight appeared in her long fingers, inscribed with the notes of a nightingale's song. She blew it as if it were a kiss towards the dark figure of Doomsday. He read it. His mouth twitched, a little.

Mishamh looked to his master.

‘She requests that you be transferred to her department,' he said. ‘As soon as your duties allow.'

‘
What?!?
'

‘He's just so handsome when he's angry,' said the Angel of Love.

‘But . . . our Complaint . . .' stammered Mishamh.

Before his eyes the Angel of Love tossed the charge sheet of adamant carelessly into the air. At once it became a cloud of sparkling dust, from which troops of little cupids seemed to fly with mocking, silvery laughter to circle around his head. Every one of those little naked creatures was himself.

The room seemed to be spinning. The desk at which the angel stood was definitely going up and
down, which didn't help matters at all.

He heard Doomsday say, ‘I fear my subordinate is engaged on a project of considerable importance.'

‘Which will soon be considerably
un
important, I believe,' said Love. ‘At least for the next two thousand six hundred years. You could apply for him to be transferred back once your asteroid was on its way in again, couldn't you?'

‘I could . . .'

‘But . . . the Great Curriculum!' cried Mishamh. ‘We're making a mockery of everything it says! We
have
to destroy the world!'

‘What, all of it?' said the Angel of Love.

‘All of it,' said Mishamh, rallying as best he could. ‘Every last living thing. The earth they stand on. The air they breathe . . .'

‘The children? The little furry animals?'

‘Yes, all.'

‘Isn't that rather – sad?'

‘Sad?'

‘
I
think it's sad.'

‘It is indeed sad,' said Doomsday. ‘And it is Right. Sorrow is a part of the Curriculum. For a time.'

‘The Governors want it to happen!' said Mishamh.

‘Are you sure of that?' said Love.

‘Of course I'm sure!'

‘Maybe they like little furry animals . . .'

‘The Governors have said “All must be made Perfect,”' Mishamh cried. ‘If a thing cannot be made perfect, then it must not be. That means the Earth
must
be destroyed. The deadlines for destruction are set by the Governors themselves.
Why
won't you let it happen?'

There was a moment of shocked silence. It seemed to spread out far beyond the room, beyond the towers of Love. It rolled down the corridors and galleries of Heaven like an icy chill, and hidden within its shivering heart was that whisper:
Why?

It was felt everywhere. Souls were distracted from their lessons. Choirs faltered, sentinels looked over their shoulders. The Governors, meeting in committee, ruffled their papers uncomfortably. Behind the doors of the Head's study, something stirred and sighed.

‘Ah,' said Doomsday.

‘Oh,' said the Angel of Love.

‘I'm sure my colleague didn't mean . . .'

‘I'm
sure
he didn't,' said the angel sweetly.

‘. . . to use that word,' Doomsday finished. ‘Of
course, Love is also part of the Curriculum. It is ordained by the Governors, who are the source of all order in Heaven. We understand that. We do not question it . . .'

‘I'm
so
glad . . .'

‘. . . in quite the way that my colleague may have implied. Nevertheless' – the angel raised a dangerous eyebrow – ‘nevertheless, my colleague – whom I am afraid cannot be immediately released from my department – makes a number of points that seem apt. Simply put, that the Great Curriculum moves with the Laws of Heaven. The Laws of Heaven point to the ending of the world. This conclusion is inescapable. Creation has no meaning if there is not also Destruction. Perfection cannot be perfected if it is shackled to Imperfection. Yet, because of the actions of your servants at the Appeals Board, the Destruction of Imperfection continues to be postponed.'

‘You've said this before, you know.'

‘I have. I note, however, that this time you have not denied that it is your servants who are responsible for the delay.'

‘Dear me! Did I say they were?'

‘According to the Great Curriculum, the world must end,' Doomsday went on mildly. ‘Therefore the
Appeal will one day be decided. At that point, the very large number of additional souls who have been born since the first deadline was postponed (most of whom are still waiting in the Gallery of Penitence, the Stair of Sincerity and the Hall of Lamentation) will have to start their classes. And since most have appealed on some ground or other connected with the subject of Love, one may imagine that Love will feature heavily on their timetable.'

He paused, as if waiting for an answer. The angel made none.

‘You will be busy, I think,' Doomsday concluded. ‘Dear me, yes. I do not know if you are looking forward to this. But I certainly am.'

Another silence, colder by several degrees than the last. The two great angels bowed once again to each other. Then Doomsday left, with his young assistant trailing in his wake. Love watched them go.

‘Silly old fool,' she muttered.

She said it, but she felt less serene than an angel should. Doomsday was neither silly nor foolish. He had existed for billions of years longer than she, since the days when Heaven had been a much emptier place with only the Head, a few Governors and a handful of wild-eyed astronomers to get things
started. He was patient. He was calculating. He was saying that in the end the Governors would be forced by their own laws to side with him. And if he was right, then yes, there would be a terrible amount of clearing up to do.

But was he?

Love knew quite well that she and her cupids had been upsetting Heaven's Appeals process for three thousand years.
That
didn't bother her. She also knew the answer to Mishamh's question ‘Why?'

It was because she was Love. Just that.

Love couldn't be put in a box. Certainly not in a witness box. It couldn't be made part of a process. It must keep bursting out, getting in the way, turning black into white and white into all the colours of the rainbow. This was what Love was. It simply wasn't in her nature to do things any other way.