Back in Hell, Alexa, Megan, and Tiffany had all achieved their revenge on everyone who had hurt them badly enough to deserve getting the grief that they had all given.

The three girl-ghosts hit their enemies far harder than they had been hit themselves. They were beyond satisfied in that regard.

Yet, their own pain hadn’t subsided.

It had only grown worse…much worse.

The melting and decay of their ghostly apparitions was now at such an advanced stage that the three no longer had humanoid forms. There wasn’t even a distinction between any of the three of them anymore.

They were hill-like blobs of melted flesh that oozed into and mixed with each other.

The ghosts of all their victims–still with human apparitions–were there, too, facing them with expressions that were a mixture of hatred, gloating (over the three girls’ ugliness), and revulsion.

Furioso appeared between both groups.

So, he said. Everybody is here at last.

This pain is unbearable, Alexa said in a raspy voice.

I don’t regret having my revenge, Megan said in a similar voice, but I feel worse now than I did before.

Is there no way to stop this pain? Tiffany asked, also in that voice.

No, Furioso said. There is no way that is easy. No way that will give you comfort. There is only pain for you all, from now on, forever and ever.

Then why did you goad us into getting revenge on all of them over there? Megan asked, pointing to the mass of victims behind Furioso. You said we’d get relief through our revenge. We feel no such relief at all.

I never said your revenge would ease your pain, he said. Only that you’d feel satisfaction, a brief pleasure, in making those poor souls on the other side share your pain. And you got it.

But now, with them all looking at us with so much malice in their eyes, Alexa said. It feels like they’re all going to resume their former bullying on us.

Yes, Tiffany said. They all hunger for revenge on us.

We can see it in the eyes of their apparitions, Megan said.

How could you lure us into a situation with even more suffering than the kind we’d started out with? Alexa asked. How could you take advantage of us like that, as vulnerable as we were?

Well, I am a devil, Furioso said, shrugging. Did you really expect anything better than this? You’re in Hell. Here, hope is to be abandoned forever.

What benefit do you get by deceiving us with thoughts of revenge? Megan asked. Damning all their souls with ours?

The same benefit that you get, he said. By bringing down here more and more souls, by passing the pain off to others, I feel a relief…if only a temporary one. People on Earth do it all the time. They, your bullies, did that to you, for that very same reason.

But our pain feels so much greater now, Tiffany said.

Yes, it always feels worse and worse, Furioso said with a sigh and a frown.

Then what good is that temporary relief through passing pain on to others? Alexa asked.

Because the pain worsens regardless of whether you pass it on to others, or not, he said. Temporary relief, by causing others’ grief, is the closest thing to happiness that the damned can ever hope to have in Hell. Is there anyone else on Earth you’d like to afflict, for a brief taste of satisfaction?

NO!!! all three girl-ghosts shouted together.

Then I’m afraid that there’s nothing that can be done for you, he said with a shrug. You’ll just have to stay here and suffer, without any kind of relief, even temporary relief.

Wait! Megan shouted. You said before that there’s no way to stop this pain…no way that is easy. No way…that will give us comfort.

That’s right! Tiffany shouted. So, there is a way.

A hard way, but a way, at least, Alexa said.

Well, yes, but you won’t like it at all, he insisted.

We don’t like our situation here at all! Alexa said.

Yeah, what difference will it make? Tiffany said.

Tell us what this hard way is, Megan said.

If it will get us out of Hell, we’ll do it, Alexa said.

You’re talking about enduring a pain far more acute than you are experiencing now, Furioso said.

But the pain will all end, right? Megan asked.

It will end because you, as individuals, will end, he said.

That’s fine with me, Tiffany said. We originally wanted to end our lives, anyway. We hated life because all we did was suffer in it. Existence is only suffering for us, on Earth, or here in Hell. So wiping out our existence means ending our pain. It’s nirvana, basically.

That’s true, Furioso said, but prepare for an ordeal you could never even imagine.

We’re in Hell, Alexa said. Where there’s no hope of ever feeling happiness again. This is the ultimate ordeal. How much worse can anything else get?

You’ll find out, he warned.

Tell us, Furioso! Megan said. What do we have to lose?

What do we have to do to get out of this? Alexa asked.

You really won’t like it, girls, he said, shaking his head.

TELL US, DAMN YOU! all three melting ghosts shouted.

He let out a sigh. Look at all those ghosts behind me, he said, gesturing to the girls’ victims. All those damned souls that you hate so much, and who now hate you. You must let go of your hate. Let go of your pride, and love them. Feel compassion for them, and for the suffering you’ve caused them.

WHAT?!!! all three girl-ghosts shouted together in disbelief.

Yes, he insisted. That’s the only way out of here. To end your suffering, you must endure far greater suffering. That’s the paradox of salvation.

The three ghosts were speechless. They mulled the matter over in a collective sulk.

What will be even harder, he said, is that you must allow yourselves to feel the very pain you caused them. You must suffer with them, for that is what compassion means.

The three melting spirits continued contemplating this solution to their problem in miserable silence.

It is your decision, he said. Either go through this ordeal, or be trapped here forever, continually melting until you’re an unconsolable puddle.

Could this be a trick? Tiffany wondered. He tricked us before with the revenge idea.

It sounds like too shitty a solution to be a trick, Megan said. If it were a trick, he’d make it sound more enticing.

As I said, it’s your decision, he said.

If we have to pity those bitches and bastards over there, Alexa said, why not have all of them experience this with us? Have them pity us, too.

Yeah! Tiffany said. It’s only fair. Then they can escape Hell, too.

They’ll ultimately benefit, too, Megan said. Since we’re supposed to be sympathizing with them, we’d want to help them, too. Also, they’ll know the pain they caused us, and they’ll understand why we wanted our revenge. And their hate will change to pity and remorse. I think that could be really satisfying for everyone.

Very well, Furioso said, then he turned to face all of those ghosts on whom the three girls had avenged themselves. All of you, who have had your lives ruined by these three! You don’t wish to remain in this infernal prison forever, do you?

No, they said in a weary sigh.

You heard me explain the only way out of this suffering? he asked.

Yes, they all moaned together.

Then swallow your pride as the girls must do, let go of your hate for them, as they must let go of their hate for you, and join them in this collective outpouring of compassion, he said.

With the most lethargic of reluctance, the mass of ghosts nodded.

George Kelly’s 72-year-old mother was in bad shape. Just a few days before, she took a nasty fall down the stairs from the second floor to the ground floor of her apartment. She was already quite brittle, so one particularly hard knock on her upper right arm fractured it on the corner where the tread and riser of a stair meet.

Fortunately, George–who still lived with her–was there when the accident happened, having heard her scream from her apartment, which was right by the stairs. She’d meant to go to the grocery store just down the street to buy something, and she’d assured him that he didn’t need to accompany her; he could just relax in the living room and watch TV, for she’d be right back.

If only he’d accompanied her.

Instead of going to the grocery store, she of course went in his car to the hospital where he worked. He was a nurse, and he insisted on taking care of her personally.

She lay in her recovery room on a bed the upper half of which was raised up at about a forty-five degree angle. Her right arm was in a cast, going straight out from the side of the bed to the elbow, then going straight up from there.

George virtually never left the room. The rest of the staff liked and respected him enough to let him focus all of his care on her during his nursing shifts, and when his shifts were finished, he was allowed to stay with her even when she was sleeping and therefore not to be disturbed, which he of course would never do. He slept in a bed on the other side of the room, had a change of clothes handy, and food was sent to him as well as to her.

Why did he insist on being with her as much as possible? His love for her went far beyond the usual love of the most dutiful of sons. George, in his late thirties, never married. He was straight, but no woman could ever replace his sweet mother.

Though as a high school student, he’d bullied Tiffany along with Faye and all the others, George was far more of a ‘weakling’ (in the form of a ‘mama’s boy’) than Tiffany could ever have been. By calling her a “wimp,” he was really just engaging in projection.

His father died when he was six, so his mother’s burden of raising their one child was enormous. She’d been a timid, reclusive sort, with virtually no friends in the neighbourhood, so he became her best friend…in the Norman Bates sense, though without the psychopathy.

She was his entire world, and vice versa. Terrified of abandonment, she couldn’t bear the idea of him meeting a girl and marrying her, then moving away to some far-off city, his mother never seeing him again except for the ever-so-occasional visit.

So, in anticipation of such a scary prospect, his mother subtly manipulated her boy into such a state of emotional dependency on her that the idea of marrying and moving away would have been unthinkable to him. She even influenced his decision to become a nurse, so she’d have someone to take care of her in her old age…and now he would do just that for her.

On the third night of her hospitalization, he sat by her bed, his eyes tearing up. He knew in his intellect that with proper care, which she of course was getting, she would be fine and well again; but her fear of abandonment was something she’d managed to project onto him, so his emotions overruled his intellect, and any significant injury she’d sustain would put him in terror of her approach to death being at all pushed forward.

She lay there asleep. The medical equipment indicated, at a glance, that her heart rate and other vital signs were fine. He could see the rising and falling of her chest to indicate breathing; but the fear remained in his heart that that rising and falling would stop, even though he knew, in his medical expertise, that there was no reason for such a stopping to occur all of a sudden.

“Wake up,” he whispered in a barely audible voice. “Mom, please wake up.” He wanted her to wake up, but he didn’t want to be the cause of her waking up.

Her eyes opened. She looked at him and smiled.

“George,” she said in the frailest of voices.

“Oh, Mom,” he said, with a smile and a tear running down his right cheek. “I didn’t wake you, did I?”

“No, dear,” she said. “I just had a really good, long nap. I actually feel quite good, especially with you here. It’s comforting knowing my son, the best nurse in the world, is so dedicated to my recovery.”

“I am, Mom,” he sobbed. “Yet I’m so mad at myself for not insisting on going with you to the grocery store. When you slipped, I could have grabbed your arm and stopped you from falling.”

“We didn’t know this would happen. Don’t blame yourself.”

“You’ll be OK, Mom. Don’t worry. I’ll be sure of that.”

“I’m sure you will, son. But if you’re so sure, why are you crying?”

“I just hate to see you get hurt, Mom. There’s always that fear, in the back of my mind, of something…anything…going wrong.”

“What could possibly go wrong, honey?”

“Well, we assumed you’d be OK going to the store by yourself, and look what happened.”

“Oh, just because one thing went wrong doesn’t mean all manner of other things will go wrong, too. George, tell me: what’s worrying you so much? You always seem so afraid for me, and that’s sweet and all, but you’re making yourself needlessly unhappy, and that will affect your own health. What’s wrong?”

“Oh, nothing, I guess,” he said, looking down at his hands, which drooped between his knees. “I guess I’m just thinking silly thoughts.”

“Well, stop thinking silly thoughts,” she said, giving him a firm look. “Oh, I’ve gotten sleepy again. Back to sleep for me.” She closed her eyes.

“Good, Mom. Get some more rest.”

Actually, his thoughts weren’t all that silly. He just couldn’t tell her about the voice he’d hear, from time to time, a voice that he’d been hearing over the past year.

A voice that said, You’re going to murder her one day.

…and the speaker of that voice, invisible, was at that very moment hovering right beside him.