by Carlos Colon
On his next turn when he was again in deep concentration aiming for another strike, all of us feasted on Dominic’s sandwich, leaving him with maybe three inches of the former foot-long monstrosity. At the lane, Dominic threw a particularly impressive hook to get his sixth strike of the game. He strutted proudly on the way back to his seat but noticed there was still no sign of his sandwich. Our other two teammates and I couldn’t hold back any longer. I presented him with the mangled remains of his sub.
“Hey Dom, your sandwich is here.”
He lunged at me but I quickly leapt out of his reach. “Come here, I’ll kill you!”
“You see, you fat bastard? If you weren’t so overweight you could have caught me,” I said from a safe distance.
“You can’t stay away forever,” said Dominic, pointing his finger at me. “When it’s your turn to bowl, I’m gonna kick your ass.”
Dominic was a good-natured guy, though. He cooled off quickly after seeing his cop buddies double over in laughter. He couldn’t help but shake his head and join them.
Later after he reordered the same glop, I took a seat beside him and watched him gobble it down. “Pretty good sandwich, ain’t it?”
Dominic glared at me, chewing slowly before swallowing. “You’re a prick, you know that?”
#
Dominic and his esposa Patricia, met while he was on duty at a car show at the Coliseum. She was tall, attractive and blonde, just the way he liked them. Patricia Giuliana Vargas Ledesma was from Argentina. And for some reason, she would get extremely offended whenever someone would pronounce her name Patrisha. She would correct you, “se pronuncia Pa-tree-see-ah,”. It didn’t matter anyway, we called her Patti.
The first few years of their marriage went pretty well and often they would double-date with me and Stefanie. When their twin daughters, Aida and Penny, were born we did more of the family type stuff like barbecues, weekend trips and even vacations together.
But Dominic’s first love was police work, and when the NYPD began demanding more of his time, his marriage to Patti became increasingly antagonistic. The more time he spent away from her at work, the more incensed she would become. Eventually that resentment spilled over towards the rest of the family. Whenever we defended his work ethic she would say that we were taking sides against her.
Once she began to feel isolated from the rest of us, she ultimately morphed into a nasty, sour battle-ax and by the sixth year of their marriage, they could barely stand the sight each other. Somehow they managed to drag things out another eleven years before finally throwing in the towel with a quickie divorce.
Dominic let her have whatever she wanted. “Just get her the fuck out of my life!” Oddly enough, when he talks about her today, he insists on how much he misses and is still in love with her. Hey, don’t ask me.
After the divorce Dominic moved into a one-bedroom apartment in Co-op City, where he spent nights staring out the window at the passing cars on the Hutchinson River Parkway. The night after I asked Travis and Donny about Dr. Gunder, I snooped through the files in Dominic’s apartment while he gazed at the traffic outside with a can of Schlitz. By that time, I had mastered the art of quiet, unseen presence with someone else in the room. It’s unkind to make someone you care about hear things that go bump in the night. Without even rustling a sheet of paper, I looked through Dominic’s desk for anything else that could shed a light on his unsanctioned investigation. I was especially appreciative that his window was open and the cars on the parkway were noisy enough to cover any sounds coming from the desk.
Or so I thought.
A little bell from Dominic’s computer broke the silence. It was an e-mail from tg48. Soft as the bell was, he heard it and walked over to his desk. With no mercy to the tiny office chair whose wheels were about to snap off, Dominic planted his size 46 caboose and opened the message.
“We have still not resolved the critical effect that the MV-12 Detection Serum has on the human condition. Until then, I cannot accept your offer to volunteer as a test subject. I will remain the only test subject for now. The serum contains several known carcinogens and as a doctor I cannot in good conscience test it on a healthy human being.”
Healthy? Obviously this person didn’t know Dominic too well, even though it was apparent this was not their first communication.
“The serum has shown great promise, however. It has succeeded in enabling me to trace one of the infected by penetrating through his projected facade. This was confirmed in the daylight when we found the domain where he had retired into his casket. We exposed the room by opening the curtains and blinds that were covering his windows. When we pried open his casket, his torso almost immediately went into flames. If it were not for the colleague that I had working with me seeing the same thing, I might have questioned my own sanity as so many others have already. Instead, we will now be able to soon understand what happened to my son and your brother-in-law. To this day, these types of deaths are still being foolishly described as spontaneous combustion. But now, for the first time, I was able to trace and identify one of these beings—a creature that in the past had been written off as legend or superstition instead of reality—one that grows more frightening with everything I learn. This is a danger that cannot be ignored. The nature of this infected species is predatory, and humanity is their prey.
I thank you for your support and your assistance. I will continue to inform you of any further developments. Teresa Gunder”
Holy shit!
No wonder this woman shook Travis like no one else could. She is the biggest danger our kind has ever faced—a real life Von Helsing! But what was MV12? Obviously it was dangerous to humans too, so why was Dominic volunteering to put that shit in him? And how did these two become pen pals? Self-loathing vampire or not, I still have the self-preservation drive that keeps us from ever wanting to face death—again. Knowing how bad it was the first time is incentive enough—and that’s not even taking into account that my unholy existence destines me to eternal flames.
I think I’ll stay here.
When Dominic took his beer buzz to bed, it allowed me to log on to his account and read his e-mail history with tg48. It went back almost two years when she saw that Dominic had taken an interest in her son’s case. She began her correspondence anonymously before identifying herself as Ronnie’s mother five months later, eventually trusting him enough to share details about her research.
The doctor had travelled as far as Central Europe, where she listened to local stories about mysterious deaths similar to her son’s. Like here in the States, most of the stories had already been laughed off by the local authorities, who refused to give her access and permission to study these cases further.
In Romania, the doctor met an 86-year old woman whose husband’s death in the 1930’s had some parallels to Ronnie Gunder’s five decades later. The woman, who was totally devoted to her husband, was never able to accept his death and she remained a widow ever since, singing an old Romanian love ballad to his ashes at her bedside.
Ashes!
The old woman resisted at first but Dr. Gunder worked hard to convince her that giving access to just a trace of those ashes would allow her to compare them to her son’s and use what she learns to prevent similar deaths in the future. It would bring something positive from the losses that they suffered. From there, with her scientific background, medical knowledge, and whatever-the-fuck lives inside the brains of these analytical types, the doctor was able to see patterns and similarities surrounding many other unexplained deaths throughout Europe, and North and South America.
Inside Dominic’s desk I also found a VHS tape, which I took home with me. It was labeled “DR. GUNDER 8/20/90”. Once I got home, I slipped it in my VCR and sat down with a bag of Lay’s sour cream and onion chips and a can of Dos Equis (maybe I’m the most interesting undead man in the world). The tape was of some local access cable interview out of Syracuse University, where her son attended. The interview subject wa
s Dr. Gunder. She had granted time to some smug college student at the university studio.
The doctor was in her early fifties but the lines of pain on her face made her seem older. Still, she was doable, like Kenny Neglia used to like to say. I’m sure the doctor detected the skinny, bespectacled interviewer’s skepticism but she was probably used to that. She spoke patiently with the young man, understanding how difficult it was for a normal person to wrap his mind around the outrageous claims she was making. But to the interviewer’s credit, he handled the conversation with respect to the surviving mother of one of his fellow students. He gave her free reign. The doctor went on to describe how the unexplained deaths she had researched around the world were raising whispers of the supernatural.
In those days there was, what I like to call, decorum. In deference to the suffering mother, the tape was probably never shown outside of the local cable access channel—until now. Now it’s all over the Internet. Anyone who’d seen that interview back then probably took it as the ramblings of a broken woman who had lost her child. Me, I was shocked at how much she was actually able to learn.
“The reason they have these capabilities that for so many centuries were dismissed as folklore is because they are literally not from this world,” said Dr. Gunder.
“What do you mean?” asked the interviewer.
“In my visit to Central Europe, I had found fossilized organisms on a meteorite that matched some of the remains found at the scene of my son’s death.”
The student tried to word his question carefully to not come across as if he was mocking the doctor. “Are you saying that not only do vampires exist, but that they are also actually an alien life form?”
The doctor forced a miniscule smile. “The viral organisms located at the site were brought there by that meteorite. It was not an organism that came from this earth. I have even found remains of this organism in the ashes of those infected. And let me make this clear, no organisms associated humans can leave remains. You can find elemental compositions in human ashes but no organisms. The remains of this organism were not human. And yes, I have traced the source of the mysterious deaths and the symptoms described by the local town residents to that meteorite. It is a virus that kills and reanimates its host as a being that feeds on the blood of its own species. Does that sound familiar to you?” The interviewer respectfully nodded. “And even though the host is technically no longer alive, by feeding off other human blood, it is able to continue hosting the micro-organism that dwells inside of him.”
The student remained respectful, although I sensed a smirk being repressed. “Do the hosts have any recollection of who they are or what happened to them?”
“It’s very interesting that you ask that,” replied the doctor. “I have found that there were humans that had a genetic resistance towards complete transformation. There has been a small amount of cases where victims retained a consciousness of who they were when they were alive, therefore carrying the characteristics, memories, intelligence and emotions that they’ve always had. Those are the ones that suffer the real horror, the horror of losing everything and everyone that they’ve ever loved.”
“What about the others?” the student asked.
“Their consciousness stems from the organism within. They have the capability to interact with society, but they are strictly predatory with no consciousness of the life the host had before.”
Again the student wanted to carefully select his next words. “Just so we can be clear, what you’re stating is that you can scientifically prove the existence of vampires.”
“No, that is not what I am stating,” replied the doctor.
“Then what is it that you are stating?”
“I am stating that I already have.”
20
Juanita runs past me in tears.
“Juanita, que pasa?”
No answer.
There’s a lot of commotion in the ER, more than usual. It appears chaotic over there. Jimmy can use some help.
Generally, there isn’t much that happens here that would stir us outside the norm. We get everything here; shooting victims, knifing victims, domestic violence, hell, sometimes a skirmish will break out right in there in the ER (which is quite convenient for whoever comes up on the short end). But working in a hospital, one tends to get used to the pandemonium.
Unless it’s personal.
The doctors, nurses, and aides are doing their best to clear a path as onlookers crowd the area. Between me and Jimmy, normally just one of us is stationed in the ER while the other patrols the hospital, but when something like this happens, it becomes more of a two-man job. “Jimmy, what’s going on?”
“Oh shit!” Not exactly the way to welcome a helping hand. In fact, he’s breaking from the crowd to intercept me. “Stay here, my man. Stay here.”
“Stay here? What do you mean, stay here? I’m here to help.”
He looks shaken. “Nah, man, it’s okay, I got it. Just take it easy.”
“What do you mean, take it easy? What the hell is happening here?”
A blood-spattered gurney bursts through the doors. Normally, to get through I’d have no problem flinging Jimmy across the ER like a rolled up newspaper but that hardly seems necessary. From the blood all over the gurney I can tell something happened to somebody, but—
The scent! The blood!
“Jimmy, get out of the way!”
“No, man, don’t,” pleads Jimmy as I effortlessly shove past him and follow the gurney.
“Georgie, step aside!” orders Dr. Roehning as I try to get a view. I push him aside, too.
Adam, a tall, muscular orderly tries to intervene, but he is no match for someone who has seen his share of death, including his own.
The gurney stops, not because the EMT’s have stopped pushing, but because I stopped it.
The face is unrecognizable. Her once full, sensuous lips are split in four different places, exposing a row of teeth that’s been almost completely knocked out. The swelling of her blackened eyes forces them completely shut. Her face is deformed into a shape that I never imagined possible. A genetically resistant whisper seeps through my barely clinging projection. “Veronica?” Blood pours freely from a large open wound exposing her skull, but it activates no hunger, only the intensifying tone of Los Ruidos. She lays motionless, barely alive. I whisper her name again. I was there for her a couple of nights ago. I wasn’t tonight.
“Dammit Georgie get out of the way!”
Adam pushes me aside and takes the gurney. From behind, a hand takes me firmly by the shoulder. It’s Jimmy. No need to shove him aside this time. I’ve seen what I needed to see.
What in the world was I thinking? I am not alive. I do not have the right to interact with others. I do not have the right to experience friendship nor do I have the right to love. I am dead. The more I love, the more I try to be a part of the lives of humans around me, the more death I bring. Death brings more death.
In Veronica’s case, she’s still alive—barely. How she will come out of this remains to be seen. On the other hand, there is one thing that be counted on, one thing that is certain. Orquesta La Luna is going to very soon have to find themselves a new trombone player.
21
The Raiders, Scarsdale High School’s baseball team, had a pretty bad stretch in the early 1990’s. It had been quite a while since they’d enjoyed a winning season. But when scrappy second baseman Davey Negrón made the Senior Varsity in his freshman year, their record quickly turned around. His soft hands on the field and his quick bat not only delighted those who were sitting in the bleachers but it also caught the eyes of major league scouts throughout the country.
Uncle Dominic accompanied his sister Stefanie to watch Davey play whenever he could and there was no way he was going to miss the big game against the New Rochelle Huguenots. It was for a final playoff spot.
Davey’s recently deceased dad was also there, sitting in the row above Dominic and Stefanie casually
eavesdropping in on their conversation. I had gotten there in the seventh inning because I had to wait for the sun to come down. As always, it was bittersweet sitting together with the family and of course I had to resist the urge to stand up and cheer Davey on. As far as Dominic and Stefanie were concerned, the space behind them was unoccupied.
At the top of the seventh, Davey smoothly fielded a routine grounder to end the inning for the Huguenots. It would now be the bottom of the seventh with the Raiders’ last chance to come from behind. The score was 7-4. If they strung a couple of hits together, Davey would have a chance to be the hero of the game. He was scheduled to bat fifth.
As the teams changed sides, Dominic took the opportunity to quiz Stefanie about her personal life. “So you really like this guy, huh?”
“He’s very nice,” answered my widow.
“So, what’s his name again, Bill?” He observed her like he was questioning a perp. Stefanie just nodded without turning away from the field. Big brother persisted. “Nice guy, huh?” I couldn’t see from behind, but I’m sure Stefanie was rolling her eyes at her overprotective brother. “So, he’s a teacher?”
“He’s a college professor.”
“Yeah, so, like, what does this guy profess?”
“Calculus.” Stefanie shook her head, smiling, though I’m not sure she was amused.
“Calculus, huh?”
“Will you stop?”
“What? What? I can’t ask my sister a couple of questions about some guy she’s seeing?”
“Just watch the game. This is their last chance,” she said, redirecting his attention.
