The Devil in Marv’s Café

I tuck the laptop under my arm and run the last block in the downpour. The bell above the café door tinkles, signaling my nightly appearance. 

“If it ain’t Hemingway,” Marv says, the cigarette dancing between his lips. Marv is the owner, cook, and my best friend, although neither of us would ever admit to such foolishness. 

“Evening, Marv,” I say breathlessly. I sit down in my usual booth and brush the rain droplets from my computer with a fistful of napkins. “How’s your night going?”

Marv snorts as he brings me a cup of coffee. “Living the dream, Hemingway. Finish your piece yet?”

My laptop makes its little electronic jingle as it comes to life and I gaze briefly at the blank document on the screen. I look up at Marv and shake my head. “Writer’s block.”

“Writer’s block, my ass! Better get cracking. When’s the literary world expecting this magnum opus of yours, anyway?”

I smile. Marv always makes me smile. He has a rough way about him, but inside he’s all pussycat. He loves giving me shit about my dreams of becoming a writer. In his friendly, ball-busting manner, of course. 

“It’s just a little writing contest. It’s due by midnight tonight.” I look at the clock. 9:00 p.m.

“Well, shit, Hemingway. I suppose you’re gonna expect me to stay open then. Pour coffee down your throat as you compose this masterpiece?”

“You always do. Besides, your sign does say ‘Open ‘til Midnight.’”

Marv grunts something and flicks the cigarette’s ash onto the wet tile floor. He sits across from me, looking around his empty restaurant. “Looks like you’re the only one who got that memo.”

I shake my head. “Yeah, but don’t bullshit me, I know you rake in the cash for breakfast and lunch. Plus, you stay open late because you don’t want to go home to the wife, so it’s your own damn fault.”

Marv scoffs and pops back to his feet. “Holler when you need a refill or something, Hemingway.”

I’ve come to Marv’s café to write every evening at 9:00 for at least a year. I started the day my wife left me. I don’t think he knows my real name. I’m just “Hemingway.”

The whitish-gray blank page mocks me as I take a sip of coffee. Whatever Marv lacks in conversational prowess, his coffee is downright redemptive. Damn good, especially on a rainy night like this. 

As I’m fighting the blank page for the next half-hour, the ever-intensifying storm drives the rain, pelting it into the roof of the old café. Marv curses and places buckets and dishpans in a few strategic spots to catch the leaks. As he places one near me, he catches a glimpse of my blank screen.

“Damn, Hemingway! What’s the problem? You’re usually clacking the shit outta that keyboard.”

“Writer’s block!” I said a little too loudly. 

Marv nods and looks at me sympathetically. “How the hell do you fix that?”

I shrug. “Beats me. Figures this would happen. I put my novel on hold, thinking that writing short stories will bring the creativity back. Just wanted to try this little contest, get my mojo working again. Plus, the rent’s due. I could sure use the prize money. Two hundred and fifty bucks.” I shake my head and turn back to my blank document. 

“You’ll think of something, Hemingway.”

“I need a win, Marv.”

“I know you do, kid.”

I smile. Marv can’t be but three or four years older than I am. “I’d sell my soul to be a paid writer.”

Marv slaps me on the shoulder and walks behind the counter. Alone with my jumbled thoughts, I sigh and put my hands on the keys. You can do it. Just write.

With a terrific crack, lightning splits the sky and the power is cut to the café, plunging it into darkness. The only light in the place is emanating from my laptop. 

“Ah, shit!” Marv yells from somewhere behind the counter. “Where’s my damn flashlight?” In the meantime, right on cue, my laptop battery dies. I feel like an idiot for not plugging it in when I first arrived. I begin rifling through my jacket pockets for the cord, but stop when I realize it will do me no good at all without electricity. 

Duh, Hemingway.

I can hear Marv banging around and cursing as he looks for his flashlight, unsuccessfully. 

The bell tinkles and the door opens. I hold my breath as I listen to the hollow thump of heeled shoes approach. That’s not Marv. Where the hell is Marv?

“Who’s there?” I ask, fearing both an answer and no answer. 

“I hear you want to be a successful writer,” a voice in the dark says. 

Shit! It sounds like someone standing right beside…

The next sound is a finger snap. The lights come on and I’m looking up at a handsome, dark-haired man of around forty. He’s smiling and dressed in an impeccable Brooks Brothers suit. Despite the howling winds and driving rain, there’s not a hair out of place, nor a drop of water on him. How is that humanly possible?

“May I join you?” the man asks. 

I gesture to the seat opposite. “Please, sit down.”

As he slowly settles into the booth across from me, he stares at me, as if he’s looking into my soul. I squirm a bit in my seat. The air feels thick, and there’s a faint smell of something I can’t quite put my finger on.

“I can make you a successful writer. Beyond your wildest dreams.”

Nervous, I stir my already-stirred coffee. “Are you a literary agent?” I ask, clearing my throat and clicking the coffee stirrer against the lip of the mug. 

He smiles. “Not exactly.”

I look around. Where the hell’s Marv?

“How did you know I want..”

“To be a writer?” the man asks. “You’ve been coming here every night for a long time, struggling and straining against that keyboard.”

I feel the blood draining from my face. Who is this guy? “What’s your name?”

“Call me Lou.”

“Lou. Is that short for Louis?”

He shakes his head. “Short for Lucifer.”

The boundary of what is real and what is unreal blurs as my heart jackhammers in my chest. 

He extends his hand, “And have I got a deal for you.”

My mouth drops open and I stare at the extended hand, then back at Lou, or whoever the hell he is. Crazy bastard. Marv’s pulled a prank on me here. I start laughing. “Lucifer. That’s a good one, mister. Marv put you up to this?”

He retracts his hand and settles back into his seat. “You don’t believe me?”

I’m still laughing. “Well, you ARE the father of lies!”

“I assure you, everything I told you is true. Look, I’m offering you the deal of your life here. You don’t want it, fine,” he says as he stands up. The power goes out again as he walks away. 

“Wait!” I yell as he’s reaching for the doorknob. “Tell me, why on God’s green earth would anyone be crazy enough to sign a deal with the Devil?”

He stops and strolls back to my booth. “First of all, I’m not a fan of that ‘God’s green earth’ phrase. Leaves me cold. That aside, you ask why would someone sign a contract with me? Why don’t you call that four-eyed geek in Maine and ask him?”

“Stephen King? You’re telling me that Stephen King, one of the most successful authors the world’s ever known, signed a contract with you?”

“Of course. How else could you possibly explain it?” Lou says. He winks. It’s dark and yet I can feel his expression. A chill runs down my spine. 

I shake my head and scoff. “This is such bullshit,” I bluster. 

“You like music, Hemingway?” Lou snaps his fingers. Marv’s jukebox springs to life, churning out the familiar strains of the live version of REO Speedwagon’s ‘Riding the Storm Out.’

“Seems appropriate,” Lou says. He snaps his fingers again, my laptop comes to life, lighting up the booth. I look at the battery icon. 1000%. Not 100. 

“What the hell’s going on?” I ask. 

“Now that phrase, I like much better,” Lou says with a grin, He looks me over, and I feel shabby in my old hooded sweatshirt. “It’s obvious you need money. Ready to talk business?”

I look around. Where the HELL is Marv?

I shake my head. “I’ll ask again. Why on… earth… would I promise you my soul to be a successful writer?”

Lou throws back his head and laughs. “You think that’s all I can offer? Get with the times, Hemingway! I just need the USE of your soul, I don’t need to actually possess it. Are you familiar with how stock options work?”

“Stock options? No, I’m not—“

“Options allow for the control of stock shares without actually owning the shares themselves. Little invention of mine from centuries ago.” Lou says. “Anyway, I can apply this to souls as well. I control options on your soul, not possessing the soul itself. I assure you, it’s a standard deal. All the big authors have signed contracts with me,”

“They have?”

“Sure! How the hell do you think someone’s scribblings would ever get noticed otherwise?”

“So all the authors I’ve heard of have signed these options contracts?”

“You got it.”

“JK Rowling?”

“Signed.”

“James Patterson?”

“Signed!”

“Stephen King?”

“No, not an options contract,” Lou says, shaking his head. “I do in fact own his soul. But that’s for my ‘mega-superstar-for-life’ tier. You can be quite successful just signing the options deal.”

My mind is spinning. Successful authors sign deals with the Devil? I was joking earlier about selling my soul to be a paid author. 

Wasn’t I?

I couldn’t believe the question that came tumbling off my lips. “How does this options contract work?”

“I’m so glad you asked,” Lou says as he reaches into his coat pocket. He produces a scroll. An actual scroll. I have no idea how something of its size appears from the slim fit jacket. He unrolls it and spins it around, facing me. He points to some key parts of the contract with a pen. “Firstly, would you agree there’s always been, and always will be, suffering in this world?”

I nod slowly. 

“And would you agree, there’s not a thing you’ll ever be able to do about that?”

“Yes, I agree.” Where’s he going with this? I wonder. 

Lou taps a section of the contract with the pen, then begins speaking rapidly. “This says that, using your soul as collateral for options, you agree to allow the counterparty to this contract, Yours Truly, to inflict suffering in the world commiserate with the joy and compensation you receive from being a successful writer. Standard stuff, sign at the bottom.”

I pause for several moments, then I take the pen he’s offering. I hate for people to suffer, but like he just said, there will always be suffering, right? Just before I sign, I ask, “I get to keep my soul, right?”

Lou nods at me. “Of course. Hell, keep the pen too.”

I sign the yellowed scroll. Lou puts it back in his jacket and stands up, “I’ll leave you to your work,” he says as he disappears into the shadows and walks out. The lights come back on. I exhale slowly. I’m trying to process what was surely the most intense time period of my life. 

“Hey, how’d you get the jukebox working? That thing’s been broken for years,” Marv said, suddenly appearing. Eddie Rabbitt’s ‘I Love a Rainy Night’ is now playing. Lou is thematic, apparently. I look at the clock. Shaking my head in disbelief, I check my watch and the clock on my laptop. 9:30 pm. Not a single minute passed during my conversation with Lou?

“That man that was in here, Marv. It was the strangest thing.”

“The hell are you talking about, Hemingway? You’re the only one crazy enough to come out tonight in this monsoon.”

I look at the ordinary pen in my hand, and I wonder for a moment if I was dreaming it all, but quickly dismiss the thought. The rest of the evening, the story pours out of me. Marv comes frequently to refill my coffee, but I barely notice. I can’t click the keys fast enough to get the story out. At a quarter to midnight, I hit save, upload my story to the contest website, close my laptop and tell Marv I’ll see him tomorrow.

The next three weeks speed by. Winning the weekly writing contest three weeks running has put me on a high I can’t even begin to explain. Not to mention putting $750 in my bank account. 

I’m writing every waking hour, not just at Marv’s. In between writing my award-winning short stories, I finish my novel. I print the manuscript and FedEx it to Random House who immediately call me and write up a fat contract to sign.

I barely have time to read the newspaper these days. Now, I just give it a quick glance. Some unlucky man got hit by a garbage truck. Last week, a church burned to the ground, and the poor souls apparently have no money to rebuild. 

I sit up straight as it hits me. Could this be my… I shake my head. No, it would have happened anyway I tell myself. 

It’s 8:55 pm and I’m on my way to Marv’s café. I can’t wait to tell him about the publisher’s contract I’m going to sign! The bell tinkles as I walk into the café at nine. 

“Marv?” I call out in the empty restaurant. “Hey, Marv, you’ll never believe what happened today.”

“I’m afraid Marv has met with some bad luck,” Lou says as he steps out from the back. 

“Lou? Where’s Marv?”

“He’s at the hospital. Heart attack. He’s not expected to live,” Lou says with a slight smile.

I gape at the well-dressed demon. “You? You did this?”

“I merely fulfilled the contract. What, you thought the suffering of others wasn’t going to affect you? This is the price you pay for your success, Hemingway.”

I shake my head in anger as the reality of what I’ve done hits me. “No! This isn’t right! Take it back! I don’t want this!”

“You can’t be serious,” Lou says. “We have a contract!”

“I don’t care! Tear it up! I can’t have this on my conscience!”

Lou looks at me incredulously. “No one’s ever asked to get out of their contract before.”

“I want OUT!”

“All right,” Lou says, nodding. He sticks his finger in my chest. It feels like fire. “But know this. You’ll never make a dime as a writer. You’re finished. You’ll never get another contract. You won’t even be hired to give car repair advice in the Jerkwater Times!”

“I don’t care. Just let Marv alone and be on your way, please!”

Lou pulls out the scroll and with a snap of his fingers, it incinerates in his hand. “Hell of a shame, Hemingway.”

“And Marv?”

Lou nodded. “Enjoy poverty and obscurity, kid.” He walks out the door and disappears down the street. 

I run the five blocks to the hospital, praying for Marv the whole way. I ride the elevator up to the ICU. 

A nurse points me to Marv’s room. The door is open a crack and I push through, preparing myself for the worst. 

Marv is sitting on the edge of the bed, embracing his wife. Tears falling down both their faces, they were praising God for bringing Marv back to life, just a few moments ago.

“Hemingway! Get in here and meet my lovely wife, will ya? You’re not gonna believe what just happened.”

I smile and shake Marv’s wife’s hand. 

“The Lord works in mysterious ways,” she tells me.

“Yes, ma’am. I believe he does.”

“Hemingway here is gonna be a famous writer one of these days!” Marv said. “But even in the off chance he ain’t, I’m proud to always call him my best friend.”

I still write, every day, at Marv’s. He closes up at five these days. He tells me that the near-death experience taught him what’s important in life. He says he enjoys being with his wife, that they attend church on Sundays and that they’ve fallen in love all over again. Amazing to hear, from a rough old cob like Marv. And for that, I am grateful.

The two of them encourage me and tell me I’m going to be a big success any day now. 

But like Marv, I’ve also learned what’s important in life. Friends. Family. Being square with the Man upstairs. I’m even thinking of calling my ex-wife. It was my fault she left. I’m not the same man since my meeting with the Devil in Marv’s café. 

So I joyfully labor in obscurity, a labor of love, no expectations of fame and fortune to distract and seduce me. I won’t tell Marv and his wife about Lou. They’ll never believe me. And it doesn’t matter. I watch them dance cheek to cheek near the jukebox for a while. I turn to my laptop, and happily clack away on the keys, writing the next great novel that no one will ever read.