I know the Devil, and he's a good guy

Niel is not of this Earth.

Although we have little in common, although he exists in a plane of existence that none of us have experienced, although he would have gladly stolen any of my girlfriends, I love him.

I knew Niel in Highschool, but I was not drawn into his gravity-well until my first year of junior college. He is charisma incarnate. Scratch that, he is Plato's eternal form of charisma. The guy sweats likeability.

I am unable to describe that-which-is-Niel in simple human terms, so I will try to relate a couple of stories:

I remember his counter-top one night. There were 200 beer bottles neatly lined up into a beautiful snake. And what was the snake's head? A blender. And what was that smell? The motor had burned out from trying to make one too many daiquiris. He just laughed and said "Fuck it," and you knew it wasn't just the beer talking.

He had an entire wall in his bedroom painted to look like a beach-scape. He would be happy to smoke you down until the sun came up. But you dared not speak. Someone might try to say "Man, I am so wast-"
"Shut the FUCK UP! I'm trying to mellow."
We would laugh freely at this seeming incongruity, but we would not speak. Not out of fear, shame or concern. We would keep silent simply because it was somehow correct.

He would leave to spend months at a time living in Incline Village, snowboarding and tearing at life's jugular. I remember one time he met us at a bar for a brief time, then left to go home with 3 women. He had been back in town for 45 minutes.

Niel decided to join the army. While in boot camp, he mailed us a VHS tape of his squad's gas-mask training. They emerged from the sealed bunker, eyes blazing and drool flowing. Niel threw up several times, spit, then looked straight at the camera - straight at the viewer - and smiled. Then he flashed the horns.

A few weeks later he showed up at my house. He needed a place to crash. I swear to you that if he had just killed my mother I wouldn't have refused him. It only took 24 hours for the army to find my phone number - he was AWOL, and they wanted him back. The army was swayed by his powers, and he was discharged without a single mark against him. Or so he said.

And I believe him.

Niel was there when the woman that I thought I would marry left me. He was there when I would return from some failed personal quest and needed a friend. Despite his endless luck and gumption, or perhaps because of it, he was always a good friend.

The last I'd heard from him, he was installing radar and satellite equipment on US warships across the globe for obscene amounts of money. My friends and I sometimes reminisced about his exploits, and re-told stories that are too debauched even for this humble blog. Despite all that I've said, I didn't realize how much I missed him.

Until he called me two weeks ago. He is back in town.

I don't know if these old bones are ready.