by A. P. Fuchs
Marcus set his mug down. “Time to check inventory.”
Shelly nodded, finished her coffee, and the two headed down the stairs, past the family room and to the basement door. Shelly pulled a key from the coiled band around her wrist and stuck it in the lock of the knob. Once open, they went down the flight of stairs and hit the power switch at the bottom. The room lit up, revealing an arsenal of weaponry for their occupation.
Crossbows lined the wall across from them, and below those was a long rack loaded with silver stakes. Silver-bladed swords and machetes lined the wall adjacent, and beneath those, a bin of garlic-laced steam grenades.
There was a door against another wall, locked and chained. If anything, it was their trophy room, a place to store any vampires that didn’t disintegrate upon receiving a stake to the heart.
That was the problem with turning: it could be unpredictable and not everyone transformed the same.
In the middle of the room were bullet- and slash-proof his-and-her body armor, worker jumpsuits both light and dark, as well as a rack with hanging utility belts.
Good thing we invested wisely, Marcus thought. Most of the stuff in the room was reasonably affordable. It was all the silver they had to buy that kept the cost up. Usually either him or Shelly would make trips to goldsmiths and jewelry stores and buy the purest silver items they could find. They’d take them back to the secret house and, at the tool station further back in the basement, use their own homemade smelting operation to create the weapons as required. Most of the stuff was reusable, as when a vampire disintegrated on impact, the silver stake would remain behind. However, there were the occasional run-ins that forced them to leave their weapons behind, or if a vampire was stabbed in the leg or arm, the creature would sometimes take off with the weapon. The kicker was, though ordinary wooden stakes would do, the vampire still had a chance to heal if the stake was removed quickly enough. A silver one, however, would poison the bloodstream and the bloodsucker would die regardless, whether right away or a couple hours later.
Shelly was already busy taking her pick of a sword and knife off the wall, while Marcus got her armor ready and began loading the pouches on the utility belt with garlic steam grenades, small knives, cell phone—just for their secret operations—and a few other things.
Though he knew Shelly could handle herself and had demonstrated such many times in the past, he still didn’t like the idea of her going out alone.
He prayed nothing would happen to her. Not tonight, not ever.
6
“Zach, twilight is upon us,” his mother said. She shook him gently on the shoulder.
Zach opened his eyes. He lay in his coffin, its plush lining a cradle to his body. Its heavy stone lid was no longer on top of it, and the wooden ones were open.
“Are you rested?” she asked.
He merely nodded, then sat up. His mother stood upon the stone lid, which was on the floor.
His mother.
Though it was embarrassing to admit, she was beautiful, with perfect pale skin, bright red lips and silky-smooth black hair. Her black dress didn’t have a wrinkle on it. Oddly, too, referring to her as his mother seemed natural.
After meeting her this morning, she urged him to get some rest and saw to it he was comfortable in his coffin before mysteriously—and telekinetically—lifting its heavy lid, closing the wooden ones, the stone one sliding into place on top of the stone box. He had asked her why even put the lids on if it was just them inside the tomb.
“For our protection,” she had said, “in case a stranger came along during the day. Not only would the daylight streaming in harm us, but in our weakened and exposed state, we might not be able to defend ourselves against them.”
Before she had closed the lid, however, she leaned in and gently kissed his mouth. At first, all he wanted to do was scream and get this woman off him, but just as quickly as the impulse came, so did it vanish and the brief peck she gave him was a welcome one. The love, adoration and care that oozed from her kiss was enough to let Zach know in his heart of hearts that everything was going to be okay. She closed the lid and he dreamed.
It began as a nightmare, one where this same woman, who moments ago carefully tucked him in, was tightly gripping his body, her face shoved deep into the crook of his neck. He could barely see what was going on with all her black hair in his eyes. It was all feeling: the entrapment, the strong sense of helplessness, the pain. He remembered two sharp prongs digging deep into his neck, then a moment later the gush of warm blood that leaked out along his shoulder and down his back. The sound of gulping—her gulping. The fiery pain in his neck built and built until green stars and black inky whirlpools filled his vision. His body went numb, every muscle locking, the spasms rich and agonizing. He wanted to scream, but he could scarcely open his lips without receiving a mouthful of hair.
The pain took him, spreading from his neck all through his back and shoulders and finally throughout his entire body. He shook, jerked and twisted. Then, finally, release. The pain stopped instantaneously and a rush of darkness swooped into his sight and enveloped him completely.
Moments later, he was back in the coffin, his mother shaking his shoulder.
“I had . . .” he started.
“You remembered,” she said.
“It was real?”
“It’s always real. Your first dream as one of us. Though you slumbered in your bed, you finished being reborn into our world. The first step is always the dream, the recollection of your change.”
He replayed the dream over in his mind’s eye, wincing. “I don’t remember, um, changing.”
“The darkness,” she said. “That was when it happened. Though it seemed to you to last only an instant, in fact you were lying among us for several months.”
“Several months!” Zach bolted out of the coffin and ran to the center of the crypt.
“Calm down, my son.”
“Stop calling me that!”
“But I am your mother.” Her voice was innocent, as if she truly believed it.
I believe it, too, he thought. More so, he knew it. Yet this lady in front of him was not the woman he identified as “mother.” That person was someone else. He just couldn’t remember a face or a name.
“What’s with all the shouting?” came a gruff voice behind Zach.
He turned around to see a man sitting up in another coffin. The man appeared in his thirties, with black hair and brown eyes like the woman’s. He wore a fine suit, but one Zach instinctively knew was out of date, probably by a couple of decades.
“Your son has awoke, my dear,” the woman said to the man.
“Ha!” The man jumped out of the coffin, seemed to vanish into thin air for a moment, before reappearing right in front of Zach. “So it is you, my boy. When your mother said she was going to bring you to us, I told her that you might be difficult to find. I guess not. After all, you look just like her.”
“What?” Zach said.
“He suffers memory loss, dear, just like Wil had.”
The man furrowed his brow. “Oh, I see. Well, no matter” —he slapped a hand on Zach’s shoulder— “you’ll come around soon enough.”
Zach knew he should run and get away from these people as fast as he could, but his legs seemed locked and his feet glued to the floor.
“Also seems your mother’s keeping you here, huh.”
“I’m just doing what’s best. He can’t go running. He’s already been out of the tomb,” she said.
“Is that so?”
“But he came back, as if he knew this was where he belonged. If he leaves, it will have to be with one of us, or with Wil, maybe Cassie.”
“Who’s coming with me where?” came another voice.
Zach turned to see the remaining closed coffins in the room were now open. One had a girl, the other a young man. Both seemed to be in their early twenties.
“Wil, Cassandra, I’d like you to meet your brother Zach,” his mother said.
“Hush up, Sis,” the young man said as he simply strolled over from his own coffin. “The guy just got here and, judging by the look on his face, doesn’t have a clue as to what’s going on.”
“Memory loss,” Zach’s mother sang softly then looked away.
“Oh, just like me,” Wil said. “Cool. I remember what that was like. Scary, weird, yet seeming almost natural. Being here, I mean. That’s why you haven’t run yet, am I right?”
Looking at Wil was like looking in a mirror. Zach was merely just a younger version with smoother features. Run? “I can’t run.”
“No, Mommy dearest is keeping your feet stuck to the ground.” Wil leaned in close and whispered, “Don’t worry, she did the same thing to me. Cassie, on the other hand, well, she woke up ‘intact,’ so to speak, and had a complete meltdown until Mom explained everything.”
“Yeah, well, no one’s perfect,” Cassie said, pulling her black hair back in a ponytail and binding it with an elastic band.
Zach thought the plaid-skirted schoolgirl outfit she wore fit beautifully and complimented her in all the right places.
“Dude, she’s your sister,” Wil said.
“Huh?” Zach said.
Wil tapped his temple with his forefinger. “I can read your thoughts.”
“What?”
“Okay, kids, that’s enough,” the man said. “Look, Zach, I know all this is hard for you to take in. I understand, I really do. Tell you what: this thing goes both ways. We’re here for you and will do our best to let you get used to things. But we also need you to listen to what we say and believe what we tell you.”
“I don’t know what to say.”
“You don’t have to say anything,” the man said, love in his eyes.
“No, that’s not what I meant. I don’t know what to say. I’m standing here without a clue as to what’s going on other than I got people standing around me telling me they’re my family. I got some woman who can apparently give me weird dreams and keep my feet stuck to the ground. I’m in a tomb, it stinks in here and I’m really, really thirsty.” That last statement wasn’t meant to come out.
“Has he fed?” the man asked his mother.
“Not yet. Tonight he will. He’ll have to as he was entombed for so long.”
“Good, I’m hungry,” Zach said.
“Wait and see what’s on the menu,” Cassie said.
The man stuck out his hand. “I’m Rain, your father.”
Zach didn’t want to take the man’s hand, but what felt like an invisible one grabbed him by the wrist and raised his forearm and hand to meet the man’s anyway. Rain took his hand and shook it.
Rain said, “And that’s Mira, your mother.” He finally let go of Zach’s hand; Zach snapped it back to his side immediately.
“Did Mother tell you what happened to you?” Wil asked.
“No. Not really. Only that I was in a coffin and something about a ‘change’ and . . . I can’t remember the rest.”
Mira came up beside him and put her mouth to his ear. “What once was human is now no more.” She leaned in even closer. “Zach, my son, you are a vampire.”
7
It was near seven o’clock, and Rose’s parents were still not home yet.
Probably another late-night client, she thought.
She sat on her bed cross-legged, a pink shoebox in front of her. She ran the fingertips of one hand along its top, tracing the outline of the red sparkling heart on the lid. Each side also held a heart, a red one made of felt. This was Zach’s box, the one he made for her when they exchanged their feelings for one another. She had made a similar one for him. Purple, with a blue felt heart glued to its lid. She had decorated the sides of the box she gave him with tiny silver hearts and diamond stickers, writing “I love you” in different colored markers in and around them. It was in these boxes they decided to keep anything precious they gave to each other.
Heart aching, Rose opened the lid and went through its contents: notes, movie tickets, the bill from their first dinner together, a handmade bracelet, Zach’s picture, a stick-figure drawing of them he doodled during chem. class. It was the letter on the bottom she wanted. It was two pages of regular lined loose-leaf, folded in thirds.
She pulled it out, unfolded it, and let her eyes wander the words without really reading it. Right now, she just wanted to see his handwriting, know he once touched the pages.
She set the papers down. “You have to stop doing this to yourself.” He’s missing. He didn’t leave you. He just . . . vanished. “What if something happened to him? What if he’s . . .” She couldn’t say it. To do so would give in to what she feared the most.
Tears welled up at the bottom of her eyes. When she blinked, they ran down her cheeks. “I just really miss you,” she whispered.
Rose looked at the first page again, Zach’s printing bringing him to life as if he was with her now. Out of all the things in the Heart Box, it was this letter that was the most precious. It was in this letter where he poured his heart out to her.
It read:
Dearest Rose,
What can I say to a girl like you? I’ve been sitting here thinking how to even start a letter like this. Even just thinking why I’d put all this stuff in a letter to begin with. The truth is, I don’t think I could ever say these things to you. Not that I wouldn’t want to, but because I know that if I started, I’d probably break down crying like a kid. You know me: I love the mushy stuff, but am just not good at saying it. At least, not in the way I want to right now. Besides, if I write it down, then you’ll have something to read later if you want to hear it again.
So, yeah, how to start? What can I say that doesn’t come off cheesy, or even stupid?
I’ll just be honest, and who cares what comes out. Just gonna roll with my heart on this one. I hope you’re okay with that.
I love you, Rose. I really, really love you. I mean, when we first started dating, I thought I loved you. I was excited all the time, each thought of you making me smile. Couldn’t wait to see you in between classes and after school. But somewhere along the way, all that stuff faded and a new world opened up to me. You became more real, more authentic, more intimate to me.
I go crazy when you’re not around, so much so that I get scared. Especially at night when I’m alone in my bed. When I lie there thinking of you, I can’t sleep my heart aches so much. I sometimes imagine my pillow is you and I take it in my arms and hug it tight (even kiss it sometimes, as goofy as that sounds).
When I see you in the morning a sudden rush of relief washes over me and I know I have the strength to face one more day.
I’m excited, sure, but now the excitement is over where we can go with our relationship. Like I said, I get scared because I’ve fallen utterly and completely in love with you. You’re such a part of me now that the very thought of us not being together—for whatever reason—makes me feel like I’ve lost a part of myself. The incompleteness is so overwhelming that I think I’m having a heart attack. Then I remember you and that we’re together. Then I’m okay.
Everything is okay.
The touch of your skin, the way your hand fits perfectly into mine—the way you give it the occasional squeeze when we’re walking . . . it sends electricity through me. All I want is to just pick you up, hold you and kiss you and tell you that I love you.
Those three little words—those three life-changing words—are all I want to say. Even when I’m alone I think of you and out loud I keep saying I love you. I just need to tell you, you know? Need to get it off my chest and fill your ears with those special words because no matter what happens or where life takes us, I deeply want you to know that I love you and that I always will. That you can always count on me. I won’t be perfect. No one can be. But I’ll be the best guy in your life, if you
keep me around. I’ll try my hardest for that, and if I mess up, if I somehow let you down, please know that even now I’m heartbreakingly sorry and will try my best to never screw up again.
When I kiss you, Rose, your lips are delicious. Not just physically, but emotionally, too, because through our kisses I can feel everything you feel about me. There’s fire between us. Red, hot scorching fire that blows me away every time I think about what you and I have.
I could drink of your lips forever. I really could because if I did, then that’s like me telling you a zillion times over that I love you and that you mean the world to me.
I’d do anything for you, Rose. Anything. There’s nothing I wouldn’t do.
I’d die for you. Even a thousand times if it came to it. Any amount of pain or torment, if it somehow was tied to your happiness, if it could somehow express how I feel about you, yes, absolutely, I’d do it for you.
And I want to thank you for—and here’s where it might get weird—you and I abstaining from, well, you know. We’ve both said that at times it’s been hard, but I also think that, at least right now, it’s a good call. I’ve been thinking about it and what I think is happening is because we don’t do that stuff, we grow closer together despite others maybe arguing that you-know-what is the be-all and end-all of intimacy. Sure, I agree with that, in a way, but I also know that because that’s not what we do, we then have to express ourselves to each other in other ways. All those looks you give me, the hugs, handholding, notes, kisses, late night phone calls, morning phone calls, surprise letters in my mailbox, in my binder—it really deepens things.
I’ve never known anything like this before and my hope and prayer is that I never will again, meaning that what I have with you is all I want. You’re all I want. You’re all I need.
