by Slay (epub)
Slay
Stories of the Vampire Noire
Edited by
Nicole Givens Kurtz
Copyright Notice
The story contained therein are works of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the authors’ imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
ISBN: 978-1-7352195-4-7 Paperback
ISBN: 978-1-7352195-5-4 Hardcover
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Copyright© 2020 Steven Van Patten
Copyright© 2020 Milton Davis
Copyright© 2020 Sheree Renee Thomas
Copyright© 2020 Alicia McCalla
Copyright© 2020 Michele Tracy Berger
Copyright© 2020 Craig L. Gidney
Copyright© 2020 Jessica Cage
Copyright© 2020 Jeff Carroll
Copyright© 2020 Lynette S. Hoag
Copyright© 2020 Oghenechovwe Donald Ekpeki
Copyright© 2020 Kai Leakes
Copyright© 2020 Valjeanne Jeffers
Copyright© 2020 Alledria Hurt
Copyright© 2020 Dicey Grenor
Copyright© 2020 L. Marie Wood
Copyright© 2020 LH Moore
Copyright© 2020 Delizhia D. Jenkins
Copyright© 2020 Colin Cloud Dance
Copyright© 2020 Steve Van Samson
Copyright© 2020 Balogun Ojetade
Copyright© 2020 KR.S. McEntire
Copyright© 2020 Samantha Bryant
Copyright© 2020 Vonnie Winslow Crist
Copyright© 2020 Miranda J. Riley
Copyright© 2020 Sumiko Saulson
Copyright© 2020 Penelope Flynn
Copyright© 2020 V.G. Harrison
Copyright© 2020 John Linwood Grant
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Cover Art and Title concept by Taria Reed
All Obituary Illustrations by Ben Mirabelli
Editor: Nicole Givens Kurtz
Proofreader: A.C. Thompson
Publisher: Mocha Memoirs Press
* * *
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced electronically or in print without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in reviews. Due to copyright laws you cannot trade, sell or give any e-books away.
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments
Indiegogo Folks Who had our Back!
United States & Britain
Desiccant
Craig Laurance Gidney
Love Hangover
Sheree Renée Thomas
The Retiree
Steven Van Patten
The Dance
L. Marie Wood
A Clink of Crystal Glasses Heard
LH Moore
Mrs. Allison Alexandra Cox-Charleswoth Obituary
Diary of a Mad Black Vampire
Dicey Grenor
The Return of the OV
Jeff Carroll
The Last Vampire Huntress
Alicia McCalla
Gritty Corners
Jessica Cage
Shadow of Violence
Balogun Ojetade
‘Til Death
Lynette S. Hoag
Encounters
K. R. S. McEntire
Alexandria Fisher Winters Obituary
Unfleamed
Penelope Flynn
Beautiful Monsters
Valjeanne Jeffers
Frostbite
Delizhia D. Jenkins
Di Conjuring Nectar of di Blood
Kai Leakes
Snake Hill Blues
John Linwood Grant
Monday Gray Obituary
Africa
Ujima
Alledria Hurt
Attack on University of Lagos, Law faculty
Oghenechovwe Donald Ekpeki
His Destroyer
Samantha Bryant
Quadrille
Colin Cloud Dance
Asi’s Horror and Delight
Sumiko Saulson
In Egypt's Shadows
Vonnie Winslow Crist
Rampage
Miranda J. Riley
Harlon Harrington Obituary
No God But Hunger
Steve Van Samson
The Future
Bloodline
Milton J. Davis
Message in a Vessel
V.G. Harrison
Uzoamaka Anyiwo Obituary
Blood Saviors
Michele Tracy Berger
About the Editor
These Authors SLAY
Horror Anthologies from Mocha Memoirs Press
For L.A. Banks
Acknowledgments
An anthology is a massive undertaking akin to a conductor with an orchestra. Scores of artists with their individual skillset, talent, and voice must fit together and produce something harmonious, beautiful, and haunting. They collectively create a piece of art that lingers long after the song ends, the book closes, or the curtains close.
The result is a solitary piece of art crafted by many hands. This is true for SLAY: Stories of the Vampire Noire.
First, I’d like to give acknowledgement and my forever thanks to the legendary L.A. Banks. Without her Vampire Huntress series, SLAY, wouldn’t exist. That isn’t to say someone wouldn’t have developed an idea for an anthology of vampire stories from the African diaspora. The majority of the authors and myself were influenced by Banks’ Huntress work and her ability to turn something so pale as the European vampire trope and a slayer who hunts them into one that brimmed with life, in urban settings and reflected so much of what it meant to be an African American in a metropolis. I felt seen.
That’s the purpose of this anthology, to showcase Black vampires, slayers, and hunters’ stories to readers. We came to SLAY the popular, European trope.
Secondly, I wouldn’t have an anthology without the authors whose work is showcased within this volume. Their enthusiasm, commitment, and hard work helped shaped this work. Each story stunned me, a few made me cry, and several linger with me still. The authors are a talented group. I am excited to share their works with you.
Next, I want to thank my assistant, Maya Preisler, who listened to many late-night work sessions. She did them with one hand and never with a complaint. To Lucy Blue and Alexandra Christian who offered to help proofread this massive collection of stories, I am forever in your debt.
And finally, to my husband, Weston Smith, who supported me through over a year of vampires and slayers.
But most of all, thank you. Thank you for selecting this anthology to read, share, review, and give to others.
~Nicole Givens Kurtz,
Editor
Indiegogo Folks Who had our Back!
THANK YOU!
United States & Britain
Desiccant
Craig Laurance Gidney
The Bellona Heights Apartments were rundown. The pavement of the open semi-courtyard had cracks, concrete wounds that oozed out moss and straggling weeds. An old fountain, spattered with bird droppings, was filled with stagnant rainwater and trash. The first level beige brick had graffiti, scrawls of obscene words and nonsense shapes scrawled across it. The balconies that faced the courtyard were over-stuffed with plants, bicycles and rusting lawn furniture. The cornices were crumbling. Hiphop and Reggaeton blasted from open windows.
Tituba shuddered in revulsion. But she had no choice, did she?
You get what you pay for, she thought, and a one bedroom in Bellona Heights was what she could afford. At least she'd found a place to live on such short notice.
Her sister's new boyfriend, Vaughn, had threatened to change the locks one too many times. Tituba loved her sister Leah, but her choice in men was terrible. At least Juan, the last one, didn't misgender her. Yes, this place was below her standards, but, she reasoned, the lease was only for one year. And surely, she could find a more suitable place by then?
Inside the building, Tituba saw worn linoleum and the chipped paint on the walls. She picked up her keys at the office from a sullen clerk who couldn't pull her eyes away from a game on her phone, and rode the old gear-grinding elevator up to the fourteenth floor. Phantom odors drifted down the hallway: weed, old fried fish and of course, boiled cabbage. Boiled cabbage was the smell of despair and deferred dreams.
1412 was semi-furnished, with a futon/couch frame and dresser-drawers. It was on the other side of the building, so there was no balcony. The window faced the alley, which was full of dumpsters.
At least it was clean, for the most part. The only visible flaw was the discoloration right outside the air-conditioning vent. Carmine smears dribbled from the grate. Tituba touched it before she thought better of it. She felt a powdery dust on her fingertips, surprised to find that it was not dried paint or even worse, blood.
Fabiana was late, as she always was. Tituba had been sitting at the cafe for a good fifteen minutes. She entered the space with a dramatic flair, her face wrapped in a bright orange scarf, and wearing bejeweled sunglasses. Her hands were encased in some silvery gloves. Heads turned, whispers came up from the other tables. She always wanted to be noticed. While Tituba had her moments, for the most part she wanted to be left alone.
Fabiana air-kissed her and then ordered an Americano and a low-fat blueberry muffin. She ignored both of the items.
"How's the new place? And when's the housewarming?" Fabiana asked her as she removed her sunglasses, revealing violet-colored contact lenses.
"The place is ratchet, so there will not be a housewarming party. Leah and that scrub Vaughn practically tossed me out into the street."
"I thought Leah had your back," Fabiana said.
"She usually does," Tituba said, "when she's not dick-a-matized. Vaughn pitched a fit when one of his boys asked him for my number. He threw around the words, 'she-male,' and tranny and accused me of flirting. Leah didn't stop him. She became a whole other person. Meek and useless."
"Girl, if he had called me those names, I'd have sliced him up. I still carry my knife, in case anyone is fixing to get smart with me!"
"Trust me, it got ugly. He was all, 'What type of crazy name is Tituba?' Frankly, I was angrier at my sister than I was at him. I felt betrayed."
"I'm so sorry for you," Fabiana said. "Do you want me to do something to teach this dude a lesson? I know some people."
"No," she replied. "I guess this is part of my journey. I thought I'd lucked out and wouldn't have to go through people around me rejecting who I was."
"I don't blame you," Fabiana replied. She finally ate a bite of her muffin. A tiny bird bite. "You sleeping alright?" she asked.
"No… Why do you ask?"
"Them bags under your eyes, child. You know what will fix them? Hemorrhoid cream. It tightens the skin."
"I am not about to put ass cream under my eyes!" Tituba said. Both of them laughed loudly, causing the other café patrons to glance in their direction.
Fabiana said playfully, "Keep it classy, bitch!"
Tituba swatted at her hand. "Oh, hush. Seriously, though. Falling asleep isn't the problem. Hell, staying asleep isn't, either. I sleep, but I wake up tired, as if I had a tough work out at the gym, or gone a few rounds with a boxer. And when I wake up, there's always some weird reddish dust on me. And it's not just me. My neighbors all look…drained. One day, I saw a kid at the bus stop and his collar had stains of that red dust."
"Huh," said Fabiana. "Have you heard about Sick Building Syndrome? It's a place where all of the occupants get headaches and permanent sniffles. And fatigue. I think the Post did a series about it — one of the buildings owned by the EPA had it, and they had to close it."
"The effing Environmental Protection Agency had a 'sick building?'"
"You have to get out of there," Fabiana said, "Or, you need to get all Norma Rae on the building supervisor!"
Dust! Miles and miles, dune after dune of rust-red, as far as her eye could see. A red that was the color of old blood, slowly changing from crimson to brown.
She stood knee-deep in the middle of a valley, surrounded by mounds of the stuff. The sky above was hidden, obscured by a veil of red powder. She was sinking under, unable to get purchase on the feathery ground. The clothes she wore were reduced to blood-stained rags. It looked like she was shedding a membranous skin, like a snake. Her skin had abrasions, a network of thin cuts that were crusted over and flaking.
She must move on, before being swallowed whole by the wavering ground. If she didn't move, she would drown and die, forever preserved beneath, a beautiful mummy no-one would ever see. She must move, or else she would die.
She lifted one foot clear of the squelching redness. And the wind began to blow. Dust rose up into the air, into a corrosive mist that erased her body. Soon, she could not see anything. All was lost in the simoom.
Tituba woke up coughing. Her body shuddered with the fit. She could feel something rattling in her chest, as if her body were a percussion instrument filled with dry rice or sand. After the fit was over, she got up and switched the light on. Her tongue was heavy in her mouth, so she stumbled to the sink and drank two full glasses of water before she felt relatively normal.
She put the glass in the sink, checked the time. It was three-thirty AM, early enough for a second shift of sleep. But she was too wired to get back into her bed. And, it seemed that she wasn't the only person up at this hour. The floor above her creaked with footsteps. Bellona’s paper-thin walls revealed activity on either side of her apartment, coughing on the left, the plaintive voice of a distressed child on the right.
Tituba knew that falling back to sleep would be difficult, so she pulled her phone from her charging port. Her headphones were on the ottoman next to her futon. That's when she first noticed the red dust. It was all over her mattress and futon, a fine sifting of rust-colored powder. She touched it. It didn't feel of anything. It was not coarse or smooth. It was feathery and insubstantial, even though she expected it to have a gritty feel like sand or salt. Then, it moved. An infinitesimal slither through her fingers, a blur of micro-movement. Reflexively, Tituba shook the stuff off her fingers and headphones.
It wouldn't come off. There was a slight disturbance, but then the powder-dust settled back. It clung to the curve of the headphones, the whorl of her fingertips. Tituba rubbed at the dust, hoping to dislodge it with friction. That did not work. Her fingertips were stained.
She muttered a curse word or two under her breath. She ran water over the stubborn stain at the kitchen sink.
A piece of dried skin, embossed with a fingerprint, fell off her hand, leaving behind tender new skin. She watched as the opaque red crinkled skin settled in the sink.
The powder-dust plumped up with the water. Fat with sudden moisture, the flakes began to rise upward, as if buoyed by an unfelt breeze. Red drops of old blood hung in the air, hovered. Then, they burst open.
Tituba screamed.
The office door was locked, as it had been for the past two weeks. Tituba had stopped by the superintendent's office before and after work, on the weekend, but the door had always been locked. The emails she sent were unanswered, and the phone calls went straight to voice mail.
She didn't know if she'd even seen him during the time she'd been in Bellona Heights. Her neighbors confirmed that he was elusive and unreachable at the best of times. Everyone she'd spoken to had given her a 'why bother' attitude. When she told the residents in the mailroom or lobby about the mysterious, weird dust she'd seen, they just shrugged, as if defeated.
One time in the laundry room, she asked Phylis, an older woman who lived on t
he same floor, if she knew anything.
Phylis had been folding a child's clothes when Tituba entered the shabby basement with a week's worth of dirty clothing. Phylis had grudgingly given her a greeting when Tituba broached the subject.
"Yeah, I've seen it," Phylis had said, dripping with attitude. "Folks made a stink about it, back in the day. Nothing happened."
"But it must be unhealthy. So many people here have respiratory problems."
"And?" Phylis said, as she went to unload a dryer that had just buzzed. "Ain't nobody who owns this glorified flophouse care about our health. This ain't Northwest."
Tituba purposefully ignored the bitterness dripping from Phylis's voice. "Maybe not. But the dust isn't natural. I hear it rattling in the vent, like tiny ants. Like it's alive…."
Phylis stopped folding the laundry and threw it into the basket. "You're a fine one to talk about 'unnatural' things," she announced as she headed to the door.
Tituba said, "Excuse me?"
But Phylis was already out of the room.
Now, she stood in front of the office door for the umpteenth time. She jiggled the lock, even though she knew there was no point. Maybe Phylis was right, and she should leave well enough alone. But she couldn't. Tituba's entire existence had been full of struggle, starting from birth, and it didn't look like it was going to get easy any time soon. The dancing dust was just one more obstacle to overcome.
