by Alice Bell
I crumpled the schedule into a tight ball and threw it across the room. Then I got out my bottle of Seagram’s. I took a big swallow and shuddered. It tasted better with 7-Up. The clock on the stove read almost nine.
I picked up my lucky dice, two burnished pink cubes with tiny rhinestones. My mother had brought them back from Vegas. They were the last thing she had given me. It soothed me to rub the cubes together so they made a soft clicking noise.
I rolled an eight. Not as good as a seven or a nine. No matter the number, even snake-eyes, you couldn’t roll again for a better number. There had to be boundaries. Otherwise I could spend the rest of my life rolling dice.
Before leaving the house, I teased and ratted up my hair, so it was big and high, securing it with Aqua Net. I found a black dress with a tight lace bodice and put black nail polish over the sparkly blue that had begun to chip.
The air was fresh from the rain. Clouds drifted past the rising moon.
I always went to the same bar down by the river. It was dark and grungy and the bands that played there were dark and grungy too. It was the only way I could get through the long nights.
TWO
Devon
The tunnels beneath the city had been closed for half a century. Public safety, they said, but I was hardly part of the public. When I discovered the passage beneath my building, I gave the steel door a few good kicks and I was in.
The tunnel went from China Town to the boardwalk. Tonight when I came out, the air was balmy. On the beach two girls juggled fire. Flames shimmered on the water behind them.
Music clanged through an open door. “I.D.,” the bouncer crossed his arms to make his muscles bulge. I slipped past him when he blinked.
I felt her presence, before I saw her. Scarlett. I’d swiped a book of matches from her coffee table last night. The name of the bar was printed on the cover.
She sat alone. Her hair was teased up, which complimented her weirdness, I thought. Her neck was long and slender and breakable.
She gasped when I suddenly appeared beside her. “Hey,” I said. “Remember me?” I was struck by how pretty she was, even dressed in black and looking very Goth.
“Oh, hi-i-i,” she breathed, something people did in books that I hadn’t realized was possible.
A guitar shrieked as it was unplugged. When a bleached blonde in tight jeans brushed against me, she gave me the eye. There was plenty of time for that later, if I felt like it. I turned to Scarlett.
“I’ve never seen you here before,” she said. Normally, it would be a line but she sounded truly surprised.
“I don’t come here,” I shrugged. “Why? Is it your favorite haunt?” She did kind of haunt a place.
“I come here every night,” she said.
“Every single night?”
She lowered her gaze.
I wondered if guys hit on her or if she was too out there. “You must have heard some good lines,” I said.
“No…” she stirred her drink and gave me a shy glance. “If I was going to use a line, I would quote from a great book. And if they didn’t get it… well, then at least I would know. And I wouldn’t have to go to all the trouble.”
“What trouble?”
“You know. Of talking.”
I never had to talk to anyone. “Okay, let’s hear it,” I said. “Give me a line.”
She flushed. Her lips moved ever so slightly. She was counting under her breath, like last night. She stopped at eight. Something wrong hovered in the air. And then she went into character, putting her hand to her breast and imploring me with her incredible black ringed eyes. “Kiss me. But don’t look at me. I don’t want to see your lying face,” her lips quirked. “You miserable conniving bitch, Catherine,” she broke into giggles.
I sidled closer. “I don’t remember Heathcliff calling Catherine a bitch,” I wanted to put my hand on the back of her neck.
Her eyelashes fluttered. “Your turn,” she said.
What came to me was the opening of Tristessa, which I had committed to memory last night in her living room. I quoted word for word. The rest of the world fell away. It was just the two of us, until I came to the end of the longest run-on sentence known to man.
“I love that book,” she said. There was a question in her eyes. “How did you ever…” her voice trailed off. “It’s such an obscure book,” she said. “Like people who think they love Jack Kerouac don’t even know it exists.” Her eyes were so huge and gorgeous, I thought they could swallow me.
Suddenly, a look of panic crossed her face. She checked her watch. “I—I have to go home.”
What did she see with those big eyes that warned her against me?
I touched her neck, brushing my thumb against her pulse. Her skin was hot. When she met my gaze, I remembered. For just a second, I remembered how life felt when it was painful and fragile and fleeting.
“Goodnight,” I whispered.
Scarlett
I kept glancing in my rearview mirror, sure he would follow me. And I didn’t even know if he had a car. He hadn’t the night we met. In fact, he had a way of appearing out of nowhere.
When a pair of headlights got close, my hands turned sweaty on the wheel. The speedometer crept up past fifty and though I had a phobia of police officers and was afraid of getting pulled over, I kept going, faster and faster.
In Devon’s beautiful dark eyes I’d seen something that scared me.
Waiting for my gate to open, I counted to eight forward and backward.
Once I was safe inside, with the doors locked, I took solace in lighting the fire and candles, so the house was cast in a warm glow. After making a cup of tea, I perused my book shelves, looking for just the right book to take my mind off Devon.
I had so many books simply because I couldn’t resist them. Each one promised a new world; an escape from my own for a little while.
My gaze landed on my suitcase. I dug through it, wondering what had happened to my copy of Tristessa. I kept seeing Devon’s face, the way his lips had shaped the words as he described the cab ride in the rain, the grim beauty of the night.
I found the book on the floor where it must have fallen. I snatched it up. My eyes scanned the first page. Devon recited it almost exactly. Maybe, in fact, word for word. He’d said ‘lugubrious’ and there it was on the page, along with Citlapol, which fell from his tongue with ease. He’d even rolled the R when he said Tristessa.
Something cold sliced through me.
I sat on the edge of the sofa. My eyes kept probing the shadows. I went to the kitchen and got a drink of water. Staring through the window, I realized what I’d seen in Devon’s eyes—the same twisted longing I felt as I searched for him in the dark.
Deep down, I had wanted Devon to follow me home.
* * *
The next morning, when I rolled a seven, before rushing out the door, I thought it might be my lucky day, until I saw Georgie’s BMW parked in my space. Bitch.
I got to my classroom seven minutes before the bell, as I’d planned. But it was too much time. I did my nails, taking off the black polish. I put on a coat of pink. Still, I was left with three minutes. It felt like forever, sitting at my desk in the quiet. My mind was restless, coming up with all kinds of things to worry about.
When my class arrived, they spent the entire period doing an essay exam, so there I was again, thinking.
I had plenty of work—papers to grade, essay topics to dream up, books to assign, but Devon hovered on the edge of my consciousness; his perfect face, the dark depths of his eyes that looked at me in a way no one had ever looked at me before, like he saw me… the real me.
I forced myself to focus. When I wrote a comment in the margin of an essay, my hand trembled.
I checked my watch and waited. “Seven minutes,” I announced.
A girl at the back of the class stood abruptly, hoisting her backpack to her shoulder. She wore large red-framed glasses and her brown hair in a side ponytail. She slapped her essay
on my desk. “Can I leave? If I’m done already?”
I nodded. “As long as you’re sure you’ve done your best.”
She made a derisive sound before flouncing out.
The rest of the class used all forty-seven minutes. I had asked if Poe’s poem, Annabel Lee, was about everlasting love or obsession. There was no right or wrong answer, obviously.
But when the classroom emptied, I peeked inside a few of the essays to see which view was most popular. Everlasting love seemed to be winning and I felt gratified. I hoped to show these kids the kind of world where love conquered and souls entwined forever, even if it only happened in books.
Before my next class, I went to the bathroom and when I pushed open the door, there was Georgie, brushing her hair in front of the mirror.
“Scarlett,” she said, catching my gaze.
“Georgie,” I said, and felt the blush on my cheeks. I’d only ever called her Miss Hartly.
She turned around and dropped her brush into a shiny leather bag hanging off her arm. “Look, since we’re here, I should tell you something. Woman to woman. Henry is out of your league. Okay?” she spoke sternly, like I was one of her students.
Was she expecting me to answer?
She tossed her hair. “I saw you two kissing,” she said. “And I’m not going to lie. It was awkward.”
My pulse raced. I felt ashamed even though I knew it’s what she wanted, to shame me.
“He’s teasing you, you know,” she said. “Henry would never be with someone like you.”
* * *
My Adult Literacy class was sparsely attended. Most of the students had jobs and kids and it was a struggle for them. I felt a surge of affection for the nine people who sat under the florescent lights, going through the tasks I gave them when they could have been at home with their families.
I found myself reaching out to shake their hand or pat them on the arm, as they left. Soon Georgie would take over and I hadn’t said a word about it. I couldn’t bear to break the news.
In the parking lot, the air was fresh on my skin.
Georgie’s parting shot kept replaying in my mind: Henry would never be with someone like you.
As I counted the steps to my car, I realized there were only three cars left in the lot, one of them mine, the other a silver Volvo and there, clear on the other side, by the street—Georgie’s car. She had moved it. So she must have left and come back. Why? What was she doing here so late?
A wave of nausea came over me. Not because Georgie lurked somewhere on campus but because of the idea that came to me. My mind circled it, coming close, jumping back, as if it was a coiled snake.
Don’t.
Yes.
Do it.
No.
The sun had left a strip of pink on the horizon and all around the sky deepened to the darkest blue. Above me, lights exploded, big and white. A lone coyote howled. The sound careened off the rooftops of the city.
I loaded my suitcase into the car, freeing myself for movement, an act of premeditation. I heard my breath in my ears, a surreal soft panting and the other sound—the scrape of metal against metal, as I dragged my key across Georgie’s bumper.
Then I was running.
THREE
Zadie
Nine Years Ago
Her luck ran out, as luck tends to do. The stars no longer aligned for her. Maybe they never had.
She made her way north to meet up with Inka but received no more messages at any of the main stops, San Cristobal de las Casas, Mexico City, San Diego, L.A., San Francisco and at last Portland, the city of roses. Home.
Along the way, she saw no Vampires. At least, none she recognized.
She hung out in Portland for a while. Maybe she stayed too long.
But wouldn’t Devon come home? In the end? He should be looking for her too.
She liked to walk across the Hawthorne Bridge at night after feeding downtown, always drawn to the familiar neighborhoods. Human memories licked at her mind.
It troubled her to see her old house with strange people living in it, though she didn’t miss her family. She just felt proprietary about the house.
She checked the cemetery for people she’d known. But so many names from the past had slipped away.
She found her own tombstone. Beloved Daughter… Rest in Peace. No rest for the wicked, she thought, running her hand over the cold marble. What did they bury down there anyway?
Finally, she went east over the mountains to that desert city, a haven for Vampires according to Inka.
She took a bed in Coffeen sanitarium, and kept a calendar, marking a big X over each day. She slept with Devon’s picture under her pillow.
Time crept slowly.
She prowled the underground tunnels at night, looking for a sign from Inka.
The tunnel was nothing like Inka’s stories. It appeared to have been abandoned. There were no opium dens teeming with beautiful humans and their beautiful drugged out dreams, no ceaseless parties with underground rock stars, none of the glittering revelry she’d heard about. It was damp, dreary… dead.
The boardwalk had a string of bars to sustain her but she couldn’t help thinking Inka and the others had moved on to the next immortal scene, leaving her far behind.
She wondered if Devon was with them by now. Jealousy flared in her veins.
She wondered if Angels had captured him. Rage came like white heat.
When she was so lonely, she began to miss the realm, she headed back down south, to California and the bigger cities, leaving no trace of her existence except for a pink lunchbox with her few belongings inside… and a slew of victims in her wake.
FOUR
Devon
I lay in bed, watching a spider traverse its web. I hadn’t stopped thinking of Scarlett since I met her, which was barely three days ago and no time at all when your life might be endless. She had awakened something in me.
I thought about Tristessa too, the beautiful junkie, how she lit candles for the Madonna. (I pictured her as Scarlett.) I liked the way the last line of the book broke off mid-sentence and how the narrator said his life was a legend because it was his.
The taco stands and Mexico City slums reminded me of my trip back up to the States, traveling at night because daylight made me sick.
It felt like years ago now, though I got confused about time. I had come to on the shores of Lake Nicaragua when a woman kissed me. It was a distant memory, dark and misty. I remembered being cold. Her kiss was warm.
At first so many things made me sick. Until one night on the long road up to Tikal, I was seduced in the back of the bus. I consumed a complete stranger in the height of ecstasy. She was my first victim. Afterwards I ran through the jungle, feeling like a rock star who’d snorted lines of cocaine off the bodies of starlets.
Last night Scarlett leaked energy all over the place, a big beautiful mess. After she left the bar, I was full of strength. I walked with the moon for miles, watching it dip in and out of the clouds.
I thought of how Scarlett laughed at her own joke and how there was a bitter edge lacing her tone when she said ‘bitch,’ as if she was jealous of a character in a book. I felt how easily her emotions shifted and how powerfully they raged, like an electrical storm.
Now I stretched, still charged from Scarlett’s feast of emotions.
After dressing in a clean T-shirt and jeans, I moved silently through the streets.
An old phone booth caught my attention. It sat under a green street lamp outside the 7-Eleven. The door gaped open and a piece of paper was tacked inside. I reached in and tore it off.
LOST CAT.
I recognized that disgruntled looking cat. It was the same photo on top of Scarlett’s piano. The mean-faced creature went by Alceste. Poor bastard. There was a phone number to call, which I took as a sign. I threw the paper away. Scarlett’s number was etched in my mind. Alceste and I would likely cross paths, at some point, if he was still alive, seeing how we were both nocturnal
… and lost.
I got to the boardwalk as Scarlett was leaving the bar, wearing a short black cocktail dress and knee-high boots. Just seeing her gave me a jolt. She veered. A smoker in a dirty wife-beater broke from his group to follow her.
I made my presence known, smacking the guy upside the head. “Get lost,” I said.
He gaped at me and trotted back to his friends.
“Hey,” I called to Scarlett, catching up to her. “You’re not driving, are you?” I sounded like your average concerned citizen, as if drinking and driving was the worst sin I could imagine.
She put her hand to her throat, a protective gesture that turned me on.
With both hands I braced myself against the wall, trapping her. I ran my gaze down the length of her, taking in her short skirt. When our eyes met, her pupils were huge and black. Her lips parted and I breathed in the sweetness of whisky and torment on her breath. A new cut shimmered on the surface—humiliation.
I couldn’t resist touching her creamy thigh, fingering the tiny buckle of her stocking strap. Desire overpowered her fear. I lowered my head to graze the crook of her neck with my lips.
She stilled. She was so damaged; I could feel it, like a slow burn. She had tragic secrets.
When she opened her eyes, her pupils had gone back to normal. Reality flooded in, a rush of cigarette smoke mingling with human voices, bass thumping in the bar, the red glow of the neon sign above us.
She grasped the sleeve of my T-shirt. “Kiss me,” she said.
“What?”
“Kiss me,” she said again. Color warmed her cheeks, making her childlike. I had a sudden memory of a girl from my past, a girl with long legs and soft skin. I couldn’t remember her face. Or her name.
My last kiss had been on the beach in Nicaragua. The woman’s hair was wet, like something slimy crawling over my flesh. I didn’t kiss my victims.
“No,” I shrugged off Scarlett’s hand.
