“Watch how I do it, Damien,” Lucifer said, pointing his trident at a small flower that bloomed from the cloud. With a flick of his finger, power coursed through the scepter and the flower was dust. A passing angel made a face and shot into a building to avoid Lucifer’s wrath. Damien looked at the pile of ash, and then sighed.

“If I’m going to become Overlord of All Demons, why do I have to go to this boring angel school?”

Lucifer gave his son a harsh look. “This is your last chance to prove to Angelo that I’m not raising scum.”

“What do you care what Angelo thinks?”

“He’s second in command to you-know-who, and I want him to think that I’m fathering a proper son, so we can get everyone in Heaven’s guard down for the…you know.”

Damien rolled his eyes,

“And maybe you would learn not to mess around with those devil girls. They’re flighty, air headed…”

“And hot as Hell,” Damien said, licking his lips.

“Haha, pun acknowledged, now shut up, we’re at the school,” Lucifer snapped, jerking his son up by the arm and leading him up the stairs to the marble building. Damien sulked. He hated angels. They were such goody-two wings. He preferred the demons at his old schools. They always got into trouble and the teachers didn’t mind. If an angel did something wrong, they practically severed their own wings and jumped off a cliff.

Damien flexed his own wings, black and red bat wings that would scare the living daylights out of any angel. He and his father were planning to take over Heaven with their army of the undead, and in order to lure the angels into a false sense of security, Damien was going to attend school to become an angel. He snorted to himself. When he was King of the Underworld, he’d make each angel kill another. It would give him extreme pleasure.

Lucifer signed Damien in, told the boy curtly that his luggage would be there by the evening, and left Damien in a school of perpetual perfection. Fun.


Damien was exhausted. Who knew there were so many classes in an angel school, and that the teachers were so strict that you couldn’t cut class? He held his books loosely in one arm and trudged to his dorm. He would be sharing with some saintly angel who probably ironed his socks and had never tortured a single living thing. Damien rolled his eyes and sighed. As he did so, he didn’t notice an angel girl walking back to her dorm. They collided in a painful clash of gothic black and red and saintly white and gold. The girl’s books and papers flew, as did Damien’s.

“Ooh,” Damien said, rubbing his head where the girl’s history book had whacked him. He looked up to see the girl gathering papers calmly.

“Watch where you’re going, idiot,” Damien snapped, scrambling to grab his papers before they blew away.

“Oh, I’m sorry, I was. You’re the one who should pay attention,” quipped the girl.

Damien put his booted foot on her history book as she reached for it. “Do you know who I am?” he snarled in her face.

“Yes, you’re standing on my book, and you clearly are in need of a hairdresser and some toothpaste,” the girl smiled innocently.

Damien ran a hand through his spiky black hair as he dug into his bottomless well of insults. He came up dry.

“Just stay out of my way, angel,” he spat as he turned away.

The girl stood up. “Oh, so you know my name.”

Damien spun. “Your name is Angel? What kind of a stupid name is that? It’s like being named Demon where I come from.”

“Well, don’t tease my name, because yours is demon. Damien means demon, right?”

Damien narrowed his eyes. “How do you know my name?”

Angel pushed a lock of hair behind her ear and met his glare with a steady gaze. “You’re the son of Lucifer who’s been sent here to go to school and help Lucifer hatch some hair-brained scheme to rule Heaven,” she said, calmly spitting out the plan. “Pardon me for saying, but your father is extremely stupid. You’d think after nine billion years he’d finally concoct something that would work. But he didn’t. I pity you, I really do. Imagine having to carry so much baggage.” She mock-sighed, then started to walk away.

Damien’s blood boiled. He raised his hand in preparation to turn her into dust, but before he could make a move, she stopped, neatly deposited her books on the stoop of her building, turned, and punched him right in the jaw. Hard.

“Ow!” Damian squealed before he could stop himself. ‘What was that for?”

“You don’t honestly think I’m going to let an amateur demon-thing hurt me? Good luck, Damien, you’re going to need it.” With that, she turned, and grabbed her books. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a murder to commit.”

“WHAT?!?” Damien said. “You’re going…to…with some type of…kill someone?”

She turned again. “You’re as slow-witted as your father. I’m a Whisperer, I’m finishing up a story and I’m going to whisper it to my writer, William Shakespeare. Now kindly let me leave in peace.” She turned to go.

“Wait, Angel!”

“What?” the angel snapped.

Damien’s curiosity got the better of him. “What’s the story about?”

Angel allowed herself a smile. “It’s break hour, and I’m sure you have nothing to do. Come into my dorm and I’ll show you.”

As Damien gathered the last of his books and followed her, a tiny corner of his stony heart thawed a little, and his father, who shared a similar heart, howled somewhere down in Hell.


“Eww, Angel, who’s the freak?” an angel squealed as Damien entered the room. The demon felt his face heat and he headed for the door.

“Angie, this is Damien, and you’re scaring him off. He’s new and his father’s Lucifer. He’s from Hell.”

Angie eyed Damien. “What’s he doing here?”

“I’m going to show him my story.”

“Gawd, you’re like a dog with a bone on that story! Hey, what’s with the loser?”

Damien was biting his lip hard as fiery letters traced their way down his arm. Gawd, they spelled. Angel touched his shoulder. “What is that? Angie, you ought to leave.”

Angie snorted, but left the dorm, clutching her fan magazine. Angel led Damien to the couch.

“She’s an air-head, but she means well. What is that on your arm?”

Damien gritted his teeth. “It happens…whenever someone says…”

“God?” Angel said.

Another red-hot surge swept down Damien’s arm. Angel put a hand over her mouth. “Oh, crap, so sorry about that.”

Damien rubbed his arm. “It’s okay; it’ll only hurt for a couple of hours. When I got really mad at myself once, I just kept saying it over and over.”

“Woah, this takes self-mutilation to a whole new level,” Angel breathed. “I think I have a first aid kit around here somewhere.”

“No, no, just show me your story, quickly; I don’t want anyone to see me here.”

Angel rolled her eyes, but pulled a thick journal out from under her pillow.

“It’s called Romeo and Juliet,” she said. “I can read it to you, if you want.”

Damien, his arm still throbbing, nodded.

Angel began reading, her voice washing over everything. Damien leaned back and closed his eyes, letting the strange, beautiful words seep into his brain.

An hour later, Angel stopped. “That’s it.”

Damien opened his eyes, disappointed. “That was…um…really good,” he stammered.

Angel laughed, a light, airy sound that sang like music. “Thank you. Now you’d better get to your dorm. It’s late.”

As Damien walked away, his mind buzzed with Angel’s voice. And slowly, with every step he took towards his dorm, he fell in love with Angel.

Weeks went by, and slowly, Damien began to like the angel school a lot more. He made new friends, including with Norm, his roommate, who in fact did iron his socks and enjoyed painting.

The classes became more bearable, too, now that Damien understood the subject matter and had Angel to talk with in between classes. They sometimes talked about Angel’s story and sometimes about homework. But today, right after math, Angel said something that Damien had been dying to say for weeks.

“Um, Damien, I kinda…like you,” she stuttered.

“Uh, me too,” he stammered back, staring at his feet.

“Okay, glad to get that out of the way. Now I can do this,” Angel said, kissing him on the cheek. “See you later.” And she flounced off.

Damien touched his cheek where she had kissed him. “Oh…my…God,” he said, and then had to sit through history with a throbbing arm.

The next day, Lucifer came bursting into Damien’s science class, along with Angelo. Damien and Angel were trying to create a cloud in a test tube, but it kept exploding. Damien’s hair was soaked, as was Angel’s and they kept cracking up whenever the tube sent shatters of glass into the walls. However, when Damien saw his father, his laughter died in his throat. Angel’s did the same.

“Damien!” Lucifer roared. “A moment!”

“You too, Angel!” Angelo, her father, snapped. Damien and Angel slunk out. Damien took Angel’s hand and she gripped it tightly.

Both fathers started yelling at once.

“I can’t believe you two!”

“How could you even think that you could ever be together?”

“You’re from different worlds!”

Lucifer stared at Angel. “Scrawny-looking goody-goody. Son, she’s an angel. You’re a demon. Get over it.”

“What about your son?” Angelo screamed. “He’s a gothic nightmare!”

Both fathers started arguing, until Lucifer raised his trident. “I’ll erase this little pest!” he snarled. He flicked his finger and a beam of power shot straight at Angel. She braced herself to take wing, but the beam hit her square in the chest, knocking her down. She didn’t get up.

“Angel!” Damien screamed, his legs going weak. He turned to his father, who smirked.

“Kill me,” Damien said, voice shaking.

“Not on your life, you little pest. I’m taking you back to Hell and dishing out a punishment worse than death.”

“No. I’m not going back,” Damien said. “I’ll die first.”

Then, he closed his eyes and said “God” over and over under his breath. The words cut into his skin, his black blood dripping down his body. Finally, he lay on the ground, barely conscious. Suddenly, Angel came to and saw the destruction that neither Angelo nor Lucifer had tried to stop. She ran to Damien and cried bitter tears.

“Angel?” Damien croaked, opening his eyes,

“Hang on, Damien, don’t say the word,” she said, tears coursing down her face.

“I’m sorry, Angel,” Damien said, crying as well. Then, the final strength left him and he was gone.

Angel, distraught, ran to her dorm sobbing. When Angelo went in to check on her, he found that she had stabbed herself with a sword-shaped letter opener. She and her beloved’s ends were the same as Romeo and Juliet’s. The irony was not lost on anyone. And to this day, one the campus of Heaven Boarding School, you can hear the two unfortunate lovers laughing as they ran across the grounds, their shadowy feet scarcely touching the ground.