The receptionist behind the hotel’s front desk wasn’t a creature I had seen before. Several wings, several eyes, several of most things that rendered them unnerving. I couldn’t place which foundational scripture the creature was from. But they smiled, bright and welcoming, as only it (perhaps an angel) truly could, and waited with a queer patience as I approached. Briefcase at my side, naked feet silent over the leviglass-finished floors, I stamped dirt onto the marble with every step. They continued to smile, as though I were tracking in undiscovered blessings, not filth. Ember burned slowly through the cigarette tube I clung to, timing my trudge. I could let it burn down to the filter as I reached the finish line, and I was sure the receptionist would still be grinning.

“Welcome to Paradise Hotel!” they chirped when I was close enough to place a hand on the moon-shaped desk; thrum my dirty nails over it.

“Hi…” I took a drag of my cigarette unconsciously—I shouldn’t have had it inside—but the clerk said nothing of it. Absurdly, I ducked my head to blow the smoke, as though I could conceal it. I spotted a holder for brochures. On the face of one:

Welcome to Paradise!

24/7 Buffet. Want something? Ask the chef!

24/7 Casino. THE HOUSE ALWAYS LOSES!

24/7—

“I have an appointment,” I explained, too quickly.

“Of course! May I get your name?”

I said it, and they typed away on a silver desktop. “Hmm… I don’t have you in our system, Miss Dora, but perhaps—”

“It’s all one name, not first and last.”

“Ah! Perfect! That explains it.” More typing.

There was a frayed thread on the stitching of my briefcase handle that I had to actively stop myself from picking with my thumb. I imagined the case accidentally falling open and shuddered.

“You’ll be meeting with our president.”

My lungs collapsed in relief. At least this was cleanly in order. But I suppose here, everything was exactly as it should be, nothing shocking or unplanned. “When should I expect him?”

“When you desire! God will be with you whenever you wish!”

I shook my head once. “No, I’m idol-affiliated.”

“Ah! Perfect! Egyptian ‘Ra’? Roman ‘Jupiter’? Sumerian ‘Inanna’?—”

“Zeus. Greek.”

“Perfect! He’s added you to our guest list, I’ve just checked you in.”

“Yes, I’m sure he would like me to stay. We’ll see how my meeting goes, first. Please, just check me out of the hotel.”

“Oh, it’s no trouble! Just a formality. I can leave you checked-in—”

I waved my hand dismissively. “Check me out.”

The entity paused, mouth posed to ramble. “Perfect,” they said, softer this time. “Would you at least like a tour? We have a twenty-four-seven buffet, casino, gym, theater, beauty bar—”

“Beauty bar? Are the guests here vain?” I was genuinely curious.

For once, the receptionist frowned. “I’m sorry, I don’t understand the word.”

“Ah—no, I am fine without a tour. I won’t be using any of the facilities.”

“If it makes you feel better, reluctancy is quite common in Paradise! Some guests find themselves guilty of their enjoyment. Some are hesitant, think it’s too indulgent, believe they might be above surrendering to baser desires. We have their god come and explain, this is what Paradise is for!”

“Who else stays here? Is Paradise an afterlife?” I asked, though I didn’t think it was. Not yet.

“The angels stay here! The Sumerian sukkals can’t get enough of it! But, hmm, how should I say…” They stumbled like they found fault in a translation. “The gods are hoping to… expand.”

Then my business here might be fruitful.

“Well, I’m afraid I will have to pass on a tour.”

“Would you at least like me to take your luggage?” Their many eyes flickered to my briefcase.

I gripped it just a bit tighter, holding it close to my knees. “No.”

“Very well.” They hesitated. “What is that you’re holding, may I ask?”

“Oh.” I glanced at my cigarette. “It’s a vice.”

“Ah. Perfect…” If they were puzzled, they politely didn’t share it. “If you would like to wait in the lobby, until you’re ready.” They gestured with an elegant wing.

“Perfect.”

“Perfect!” they crooned back.

“Um, would you mind if I steal some clothes from lost luggage?” The receptionist only blinked. “I’m naked,” I explained, lamely. But their dumb stare was, disappointingly, predictable. When their confusion persisted after I attempted an illustrative gesture, “Just a spa robe would be helpful.”

A minute later I was sitting on a lobby settee, wrapped in puffy cotton. Paradise was printed at the fringed trim of the silvery robe, as though one might forget their whereabouts, and this served as a gentle reminder. I was aware of the terrycloth soaking up the oil on my skin.

Zeus had not appeared. I marveled at this for a moment, trying not to scold myself.

Then I straightened my shoulders as well as my backbone.

From behind me, I heard the receptionist call, “Good day, President Zeus! Eve is—sorry, Pandora—is here to see you! She’s waiting in the lobby.”

His light came into view first, glazing the pale lobby into oblivion. A hundred hairs rose from the dead on my scalp, as though they’d played with a balloon. Or lightning was about to hit.

A glowing, white-bearded man rounded a coffee table and sat in the steep loveseat across from me. If he wore anything, it was too bright to see, and it was an effort not to squint, lest it seem rude.

“Pandora, what a pleasure,” he greeted appropriately. We shook hands. His electricity singed the hair on my knuckles.

“Zeus. Thank you for meeting with me.”

“Mmh. And how have you been?”

“Well, I’ve been trying new things, hoping for inspiration to strike. Hobbies are difficult to come by,” I said it like an inside joke.

“I’m sure you will find something that sparks your interest.” He spoke sincerely. He either did not know of the limitations or needed convincing to acknowledge them.

“Perhaps I’ll find something soon enough.”

He scratched his frothy-white beard, trying to figure me out. “I heard you deny our fine receptionist a tour.”

I cleared my throat. “I’d like to place an order. I understand you’re an adept businessman: an investor as well as a merchant.”

“Very well. Straight to business. What kind of order would you like to place?”

“I'd like to order a Genesis. A large one, preferred. The more profound and impactful the Creation can be constructed, the better.”

He gaped at me in silence, then laughed once. “You do realize you are in Paradise.”

“I do.”

“A Genesis would require the start of something completely new. Unknown change. Bedlam. Implosion. Explosion—a lot to invest in, you understand.”

But I could see the spark in his electric eyes, as if I’d shucked coal into his generator. I said nothing, simply finished off my cigarette and crushed the stem into the wooden coffee table, leaving a shallow black crater. Alas, a blemish in nirvana. But it disappeared in an instant. In a blink, the ash was gone.

“This place is different from what I pictured. Gambling. Gluttony. I hadn’t imagined both vices and virtues.”

“Everything here is to be enjoyed. There is no sin in Paradise. No concept of wickedness.”

I wondered what Paradise would do if it noticed me, then: the hair caught in heaven’s throat. The disappearing ash was now disturbing.

I yawned, stretching back, and stared dully at it all. I saw colossal marble behemoths. Fruity vegetation. The Sumerian Cedar Forest, the Abrahamic Garden of Eden, overwhelming with bejeweled luster. This was the lobby of Paradise. I cannot fully fathom paradise, so I cannot offer a full description, and how biblical gardens fit with marble floors—comprehension is nearly irrelevant here. But it bored me.

He eyed me sharply, all static.

“When was the last time you were scorned? Raged, thundered on high, let your lightning fly?” I wondered.

“All right, Pandora, I’ll bite. What did you have in mind for your Genesis?” His eyes found what I guarded. “I notice you didn’t come here empty handed.”

I felt the leather of the briefcase near my dirty feet. After overcoming a bit of hesitation, I pulled it up onto the table. “I wouldn’t open it until we’ve reached an agreement, if I were you.” I had to be careful with my hand, as this briefcase was my only good card.

THE HOUSE ALWAYS LOSES!

“I’m at the edge of my seat.” He wasn’t—he was immobile and relaxed, though something in his stillness revealed his patience was wearing thin.

Still, I’d practiced my lines and knew the best way to sing them. I couldn’t blare the secret chord; it was best to crescendo.

“Can you guess what’s inside?”

“Sure, I’ll take a guess. A fountain of youth. Endless riches. A diamond too faceted to look upon.”

“Not every diamond is meant to be cut. Ugliness, I hope, may be of interest to you.”

“So you brought me a case of coal—and no, that was not an invitation for cheap electricity jokes.”

My lips twitched. “I wouldn’t dare.” This was good. Rapport, good. We were somewhere on the same page, the same scripture. Hopefully, the same epic.

I smoothed a hand over the case. “This was left in my care. There are many who might say that I’m not sure what it contains, but I know exactly what’s inside. It took a while, but I’ve figured it out.” Before he could feel insulted by being made to ask, “It contains Grace. It contains Trust, Blessings. It contains all nature of good virtues, and when I open this case, they will flee, and the world will be without them. Whatever comes from our Genesis… the earth will be empty, letting Ugliness and Evils to fester. Sickness to ravage. Loss to plunder in the midst of Misfortune.”

“Bleak. And this is something you thought might interest me?” To his credit, his voice was slow and neutral.

“You’re Zeus of deep thunder. You ordered your blacksmith to plaster earth with water, and I sprouted. You equipped me with Desire and Longings that wear out my body, granted me Treachery. I am the first of what I am. I don’t think you would have gone through the trouble, if there was not something of these that excited you. You must feel powerless when no one commands the aid of your power. Isn’t that your whole schtick? If I open this case, disorder will ensue, troubles will find their footholds, and you will be sought.”

“Ah. A sales-pitch just on the border of insulting. Neatly done. But—I’m still not sure I’m convinced. The repercussions could be severe, you understand, without insurance. Hmm, what about you, Pandora? What do you expect out of all of this? Is this on a whim?”

“Yes.”

His brows made moons.

“On a whim. Curiosity. Haven’t thought it through.”

“A bit underwhelming.”

“Isn’t that the point? That I haven’t thought it through? That I cannot possibly think it through, for understanding what happens next is quite impossible? And what is not perfect and planned is Chaos, and that is exactly what I have brought to you.”

“You drive a hard bargain.” But he was smiling. “So I am to spark mankind, and you are to endow… humanity?”

“Humanity? Hmm. Essentially.”

“I have your scripture here,” he said, and indeed he did, pulling a thin manilla folder from seemingly nothing. It was slow reading—the cosmos churned as he perused. Though it may draw confusion, the scripture in paradise is protean: a kaleidoscope of timelines in which stories have both yet to happen and already have.

He continued reading while my thighs grew numb, my heels twinged of broken calluses, my eyes grew dry, and I let the discomforts wreak havoc, drawing great satisfaction from them. I wasn’t borne of light and thought like Zeus, but made of earth, and felt grounded with it. Secure with its gravity.

“Your texts write, presently,” he said after an eternity, “that you, in a single instance, let curiosity rule you.”

“Ah.”

“And that is all that is said of you.” I could see it on his face, in the tight distress, the ‘who are you?’ that the stories do not clarify. I could see him puzzling over it, realizing my briefcase and I were one of the same. No one will ask me what I think of the danger I keep huddled at my side, clutched in my delicate hands.

My answers were not good enough for him, as I, too, was a mystery. To which I shall remain, as there truly is no need to look into the mouth oblivion and believe you can quiz it with inspired trivia. I will provide less answers than the gods themselves, as I am that question itself. Some—I shall call the word ‘men’—will name me the antecedent of all wickedness, though that is because they would have failed to ask it.

And so we sat in silence.

I was careful to wait unobtrusively, air inching in and out of my lungs like two sides at tug-o'war—see, I feared a mere breath could turn into a gust that could sway his decision.

“All right, I’ll buy in.”

I smartly just allowed a short nod.

He leaned forward. “Let’s open that case of yours and release these virtues, as you say.”

“Oh, no. I’m not offering one hundred percent. The best I can do is ninety. I’m a fool, as it were, not a villain.”

“You’d like to keep a share? Something you wish to remain amongst the Chaos? And what virtue is that?”

“Hope.”

His eyes blazed as he considered. Then he reached across the table, and we shook hands, a deal struck.

He glanced at the briefcase.

I saw what he saw: a plain, but sturdy thing, incapable of wonders. Though I did love a good wiseacre-proven-wrong tale. Constructed from the chills in our veins, patented in an internal inferno, obtained by trickery and a bit of filching, I could have said, though I was not one to taunt.

“I’ll do the honors,” My fingers were confident as they played with the straps of the buckles. The leather giving way felt friendly, though I was mostly unfamiliar with it.

For a moment, I thought Zeus might be squinting at me. “Are you sure? It may be difficult. You might want to cover your eyes.”

But that was silly, like warning to look away from a jar shattering because it could no longer contain the cosmos.

♧

March 21, 2026