Pride

Envy first point out this problem to me. I had never thought of it before that. Well, I mean, no one likes to think of ones self becoming outdated. Envy of course had to point it out in the harshest way possible, it’s in his nature. We were seated in my apartment, I had just handed him a slice of cake but I could see him eyeing mine with jealousy. I had known him long enough to know that he was contemplating making a fuss about some imagined superiority of my slice. He didn’t say anything though, which I was thankful for. Of course I wouldn’t have given up my slice of cake anyway, even though the two were exactly the same, it’s a matter of principle.

“People don’t care about Pride anymore you know. Look at the rest of us, people still live in fear of Lust for example, and Greed is still shunned and avoided. These days’ people go so far as to ask one another if they have no pride. If you don’t watch out older brother you might even become one of the virtues. Hard to imagine that I used to be jealous of your greatness,” most of what Envy says I ignore, after all most of it is said for pure petty reasons. Still this was a direct attack on my honor so of course I had to respond.

“That isn’t what pride means in my name and you know it,” I snapped. “I am hubris and vanity, that’s still something to be feared no matter how many years pass.”

“So maybe I know it,” Envy admitted. “But do they?” he motioned with a hand to my picture window. Below was a busy city street, filled with the people my brothers and sisters and I had considered our play toys for centuries. We like cities, not because people are any more corrupt there then anywhere else but because we can be so much more efficient in our games with people all packed together. There used to be a time when we had to be constantly on the move or we would only affect a few thousand per generation. These days we hardly have to move anyway, people cram themselves together so much that they come to us, and in large numbers.

“What have you been doing that is so much better then my work,” I asked. I used to be considered the most deadly of all of the sins. To have that position challenged by some man who only sowed the seeds of jealousy was a bit much.

“I ruined a marriage on my way here, the wife happened to see her husband kissing his mistress, which was fun. I caused a murder, a man grew angry to see his neighbor get everything he had ever wanted and went over there with a gun. I think he was a bit unbalanced already though, to be honest. A good day’s work I thought. I would have done more but I thought I would visit you instead. We haven’t seen in such a long time after all.”

“I ruined a man’s career because he told a boss that he thought he could do better then his boss did. I caused a civil war because a king insulted his second in command and treated him like a dog. I had a businessman arrested for embezzlement because he had thought that he was to smart to ever get caught,” I bragged. Envy gave me a black look.

“I come to visit you after not seeing for such a long time and all you can do is brag of your own achievements,” he complained.

“Have you seen any of the others recently?” I asked.

“No, they’re all busy.”

“As am I, admit it, the only reason you came to see me was an attempt to make me jealous of the others. Well while you are here we ought to make it a reunion, I haven’t seen the others in a long time either. I am by far the most suited of all of us to play host, so I’ll call them.”

It didn’t take any verbal shout or touching objects, as humans have to call one another. All I had to do was desire the others to be standing in my living room and they were a strange group, my bothers and sisters. All of them looked at me questioningly but Envy decided to take over, jealous lest I get the spotlight.

“Hello everyone, we were just talking about how we should all get together, so we thought we would.”

“There better be something in it for me,” complained Greed. I gave him a nod; we had just worked together on the man who had gotten arrested for embezzling. It is fairly common for some of us to work together on a job, but family reunions aren’t very common. If nothing else it’s very unusual to find a human who is guilty of all of us, which is the only thing that would make such a meeting compulsory.

“And I don’t see any food,” added Gluttony. I already could tell that this was going to go poorly. Lust wasn’t even wearing clothing and I hated to think where she had been before I had called her. She was the only one that I would never ask how her work was going, or what she had done to her victims recently. I knew that she sometimes worked part time at a prestigious strip club somewhere but that didn’t account for the rest of her time.

“I hadn’t really intended to have guests at all today, so I don’t have money or food to give you at the moment,” I said, before they could start insulting my host skills. I think I am a very good host, but it helps when it’s a planed event. “I can order some take out up her, and run down to the ATM if you’d like,” I offered. I didn’t like waiting on my guests, it was below me, but it was better then them considering me poor and stingy.

I had had to use a pay phone to order the food since I usually don’t have any use for a phone so I don’t have one in my rooms. An ATM was just down the street so at least that wasn’t a long trip. When I returned to my rooms everyone had made themselves at least somewhat comfortable, though Wrath was yelling at Sloth to move out of his way and Envy was complaining that Lust had stretched herself out so she was taking up the entire couch. These were always like this when they got together.

“You’re behaving like I would expect Greed to,” Envy was complaining. “You don’t deserve an entire couch to yourself.”

“You’re just jealous because I got here before you did. Sit down on the floor like Glutton is,” Lust told him, completely unmoved. I was happy to note that at least someone had found her a sheet to wrap herself in. Though of course it meant that one of them had been going through my closet, depending on who it was I might have problems. If it was Greed some of my things would probably be missing, if it was Wrath my stuff was probably torn apart. Well if I brought up the subject everyone would get mad at me probably, so I didn’t. Because old things don’t look as nice anyway I usually get new stuff every few weeks. I can’t be seen in old clothing, I want to look amazing at all times or there is no point in living. Not that, as a sin, I really live as humans would consider it anyway.

To be continued...