The Vampire Tapestry

by Suzy McKee Charnas

  “Ah—what about female vampires?” she said, trying not to sound arch.

  “I know of none.”

  Of course: the neatest out in the book. “They’re not needed for reproduction, I suppose, because people who die of vampire bites become vampires themselves.”

  He said testily, “Nonsense. I am not a communicable disease.”

  So he had left an enormous hole in his construct. She headed straight for it: “Then how does your kind reproduce?”

  “I have no kind, so far as I am aware,” he said, “and I do not reproduce. Why should I, when I may live for centuries still, perhaps indefinitely? My sexual equipment is clearly only detailed biological mimicry, a form of protective coloration.” How beautiful, how simple a solution, she thought, full of admiration in spite of herself. “Do I occasionally detect a note of prurient interest in your questions, Dr. Landauer? Something akin to stopping at the cage to watch the tigers mate at the zoo?”

  “Probably,” she said, feeling her face heat. He had a great backhand return shot there. “How do you feel about that?”

  He shrugged.

  “To return to the point,” she said. “Do I hear you saying that you have no urge whatever to engage in sexual intercourse with anyone?”

  “Would you mate with your livestock?”

  His matter-of-fact arrogance took her breath away. She said weakly, “Men have reportedly done so.”

  “Driven men. I am not driven in that way. My sex urge is of low frequency and is easily dealt with unaided—although I occasionally engage in copulation out of the necessity to keep up appearances. I am capable, but not—like humans—obsessed.”

  Was he sinking into lunacy before her eyes? “I think I hear you saying,” she said, striving to keep her voice neutral, “that you’re not just a man with a unique way of life. I think I hear you saying that you’re not human at all.”

  “I thought that this was already clear.”

  “And that there are no others like you.”

  “None that I know of.”

  “Then—you see yourself as what? Some sort of mutation?”

  “Perhaps. Or perhaps your kind are the mutation.”

  She saw disdain in the curl of his lip. “How does your mouth feel now?”

  “The corners are drawn down. The feeling is contempt.”

  “Can you let the contempt speak?”

  He got up and went to stand at the window, positioning himself slightly to one side as if to stay hidden from the street below.

  “Edward,” she said.

  He looked back at her. “Humans are my food. I draw the life out of their veins. Sometimes I kill them. I am greater than they are. Yet I must spend my time thinking about their habits and their drives, scheming to avoid the dangers they pose—I hate them.”

  She felt the hatred like a dry heat radiating from him. God, he really lived all this! She had tapped into a furnace of feeling. And now? The sensation of triumph wavered, and she grabbed at a next move: hit him with reality now, while he’s burning.

  “What about blood banks?” she said. “Your food is commercially available, so why all the complication and danger of the hunt?”

  “You mean I might turn my efforts to piling up a fortune and buying blood by the case? That would certainly make for an easier, less risky life in the short run. I could fit quite comfortably into modern society if I became just another consumer.

  “However, I prefer to keep the mechanics of my survival firmly in my own hands. After all, I can’t afford to lose my hunting skills. In two hundred years there may be no blood banks, but I will still need my food.”

  Jesus, you set him a hurdle and he just flies over it. Are there no weaknesses in all this, has he no blind spots? Look at his tension—go back to that. Floria said, “What do you feel now in your body?”

  “Tightness.” He pressed his spread fingers to his abdomen.

  “What are you doing with your hands?”

  “I put my hands to my stomach.”

  “Can you speak for your stomach?”

  “ ‘Feed me or die,’ ” he snarled.

  Elated again, she closed in: “And for yourself, in answer?”

  “ ‘Will you never be satisfied?’ ” He glared at her. “You shouldn’t seduce me into quarreling with the terms of my own existence!”

  “Your stomach is your existence,” she paraphrased.

  “The gut determines,” he said harshly. “That first, everything else after.”

  “Say, ‘I resent . . . ’ ”

  He held to a tense silence.

  “ ‘I resent the power of my gut over my life,’ ” she said for him.

  He stood with an abrupt motion and glanced at his watch, an elegant flash of slim silver on his wrist. “Enough,” he said.

  * * *

  That night at home she began a set of notes that would never enter his file at the office, notes toward the proposed book.

  Couldn’t do it, couldn’t get properly into the sex thing with him. Everything shoots off in all directions. His vampire concept so thoroughly worked out, find myself half believing sometimes—my own childish fantasy-response to his powerful death-avoidance, contact-avoidance fantasy. Lose professional distance every time—is that what scares me about him? Don’t really want to shatter his delusion (my life a mess, what right to tear down others’ patterns?)—so see it as real? Wonder how much of “vampirism” he acts out, how far, how often. Something attractive in his purely selfish, predatory stance—the lure of the great outlaw.

  *

  Told me today quite coolly about a man he killed recently—inadvertently—by drinking too much from him. Is it fantasy? Of course—the victim, he thinks, was a college student. Breathes there a professor who hasn’t dreamed of murdering some representative youth, retaliation for years of classroom frustration? Speaks of teaching with acerbic humor—amuses him to work at cultivating the minds of those he regards strictly as bodies, containers of his sustenance. He shows the alienness of full-blown psychopathology, poor bastard, plus clean-cut logic. Suggested he find another job (assuming his delusion at least in part related to pressures at Cayslin); his fantasy-persona, the vampire, more realistic than I about job-switching:

  “For a man of my apparent age it’s not so easy to make such a change in these tight times. I might have to take a position lower on the ladder of ‘success’ as you people assess it.” Status is important to him? “Certainly. An eccentric professor is one thing; an eccentric pipe-fitter, another. And I like good cars, which are expensive to own and run.” Then, thoughtful addition, “Although there are advantages to a simpler, less visible life.” He refuses to discuss other “jobs” from former “lives.” We are deep into the fantasy—where the hell going? Damn right I don’t control the “games”—preplanned therapeutic strategies get whirled away as soon as we begin. Nerve-wracking.

  *

  Tried again to have him take the part of his enemy-victim, peasant with torch. Asked if he felt himself rejecting that point of view? Frosty reply: “Naturally. The peasant’s point of view is in no way my own. I’ve been reading in your field, Dr. Landauer. You work from the Gestalt orientation—” Originally yes, I corrected; eclectic now. “But you do proceed from the theory that I am projecting some aspect of my own feelings outward onto others, whom I then treat as my victims. Your purpose then must be to maneuver me into accepting as my own the projected ‘victim’ aspect of myself. This integration is supposed to effect the freeing of energy previously locked into maintaining the projection. All this is an interesting insight into the nature of ordinary human confusion, but I am not an ordinary human, and I am not confused. I cannot afford confusion.” Felt sympathy for him—telling me he’s afraid of having own internal confusions exposed in therapy, too threatening. Keep chipping away at delusion, though with what prospect? It’s so complex, deep-seated.

  *

  Returned to his phrase “my apparent age.” He asserts he has lived many hum
an lifetimes, all details forgotten, however, during periods of suspended animation between lives. Perhaps sensing my skepticism at such handy amnesia, grew cool and distant, claimed to know little about the hibernation process itself: “The essence of this state is that I sleep through it—hardly an ideal condition for making scientific observations.”

  Edward thinks his body synthesizes vitamins, minerals (as all our bodies synthesize vitamin D), even proteins. Describes unique design he deduces in himself: special intestinal microfauna plus superefficient body chemistry extracts enough energy to live on from blood. Damn good mileage per calorie, too. (Recall observable tension, first interview, at question about drinking—my note on possible alcohol problem!)

  Speak for blood: “ ‘Lacking me, you have no life. I flow to the heart’s soft drumbeat through lightless prisons of flesh. I am rich, I am nourishing, I am difficult to attain.’ ” Stunned to find him positively lyrical on subject of his “food.” Drew attention to whispering voice of blood. “ ‘Yes. I am secret, hidden beneath the surface, patient, silent, steady. I work unnoticed, an unseen thread of vitality running from age to age—beautiful, efficient, self-renewing, self-cleansing, warm, filling—’ ” Could see him getting worked up. Finally he stood: “My appetite is pressing. I must leave you.” And he did.

  Sat and trembled for five minutes after.

  New development (or new perception?): he sometimes comes across very unsophisticated about own feelings—lets me pursue subjects of extreme intensity and delicacy to him.

  *

  Asked him to daydream—a hunt. (Hands—mine—shaking now as I write. God. What a session.) He told of picking up a woman at poetry reading, 92nd Street Y—has N.Y.C. all worked out, circulates to avoid too much notice any one spot. Spoke easily, eyes shut without observable strain: chooses from audience a redhead in glasses, dress with drooping neckline (ease of access), no perfume (strong smells bother him). Approaches during intermission, encouraged to see her fanning away smoke of others’ cigarettes—meaning she doesn’t smoke, health sign. Agreed in not enjoying the reading, they adjourn together to coffee shop.

  “She asks whether I’m a teacher,” he says, eyes shut, mouth amused. “My clothes, glasses, manner all suggest this, and I emphasize the impression—it reassures. She’s a copy editor for a publishing house. We talk about books. The waiter brings her a gummy-looking pastry. As a non-eater, I pay little attention to the quality of restaurants, so I must apologize to her. She waves this away—is engrossed, or pretending to be engrossed, in talk.” A longish dialog between interested woman and Edward doing shy-lonesome-scholar act—dead wife, competitive young colleagues who don’t understand him, quarrels in professional journals with big shots in his field—a version of what he first told me. She’s attracted (of course—lanky, rough-cut elegance plus hints of vulnerability all very alluring, as intended). He offers to take her home.

  Tension in his body at this point in narrative—spine clear of chair back, hands braced on thighs. “She settles beside me in the back of the cab, talking about problems of her own career—illegible manuscripts of Biblical length, mulish editors, suicidal authors—and I make comforting comments; I lean nearer and put my arm along the back of the seat, behind her shoulders. Traffic is heavy, we move slowly. There is time to make my meal here in the taxi and avoid a tedious extension of the situation into her apartment—if I move soon.”

  How do you feel?

  “Eager,” he says, voice husky. “My hunger is so roused I can scarcely restrain myself. A powerful hunger, not like yours—mine compels. I embrace her shoulders lightly, make kindly-uncle remarks, treading that fine line between the game of seduction she perceives and the game of friendly interest I pretend to affect. My real purpose underlies all: what I say, how I look, every gesture is part of the stalk. There is an added excitement, and fear, because I’m doing my hunting in the presence of a third person—behind the cabby’s head.”

  Could scarcely breathe. Studied him—intent face, masklike with closed eyes, nostrils slightly flared; legs tensed, hands clenched on knees. Whispering: “I press the place on her neck. She starts, sighs faintly, silently drops against me. In the stale stench of the cab’s interior, with the ticking of the meter in my ears and the mutter of the radio—I take hold here, at the tenderest part of her throat. Sound subsides into the background—I feel the sweet blood beating under her skin, I taste salt at the moment before I—strike. My saliva thins her blood so that it flows out, I draw the blood into my mouth swiftly, swiftly, before she can wake, before we can arrive . . .”

  Trailed off, sat back loosely in chair—saw him swallow. “Ah. I feed.” Heard him sigh. Managed to ask about physical sensation. His low murmur, “Warm. Heavy, here—” touches his belly “—in a pleasant way. The good taste of blood, tart and rich, in my mouth . . .”

  And then? A flicker of movement beneath his closed eyelids: “In time I am aware that the cabby has glanced back once and has taken our—‘embrace’ for just that. I can feel the cab slowing, hear him move to turn off the meter. I withdraw, I quickly wipe my mouth on my handkerchief. I take her by the shoulders and shake her gently; does she often have these attacks, I inquire, the soul of concern. She comes around, bewildered, weak, thinks she has fainted. I give the driver extra money and ask him to wait. He looks intrigued—‘What was that all about,’ I can see the question in his face—but as a true New Yorker he won’t expose his own ignorance by asking.

  “I escort the woman to her front door, supporting her as she staggers. Any suspicion of me that she may entertain, however formless and hazy, is allayed by my stern charging of the doorman to see that she reaches her apartment safely. She grows embarrassed, thinks perhaps that if not put off by her ‘illness’ I would spend the night with her, which moves her to press upon me, unasked, her telephone number. I bid her a solicitous good night and take the cab back to my hotel, where I sleep.”

  No sex? No sex.

  How did he feel about the victim as a person? “She was food.”

  This was his “hunting” of last night, he admits afterward, not a made-up dream. No boasting in it, just telling. Telling me! Think: I can go talk to Lucille, Mort, Doug, others about most of what matters to me. Edward has only me to talk to and that for a fee—what isolation! No wonder the stone, monumental face—only those long, strong lips (his point of contact, verbal and physical-in-fantasy, with world and with “food”) are truly expressive. An exciting narration; uncomfortable to find I felt not only empathy but enjoyment. Suppose he picked up and victimized—even in fantasy—Deb or Hilda, how would I feel then?

  Later: Truth—I also found this recital sexually stirring. Keep visualizing how he looked finishing this “dream”—he sat very still, head up, look of thoughtful pleasure on his face. Like handsome intellectual listening to music.

  * * *

  Kenny showed up unexpectedly at Floria’s office on Monday, bursting with malevolent energy. She happened to be free, so she took him—something was definitely up. He sat on the edge of his chair.

  “I know why you’re trying to unload me,” he accused. “It’s that new one, the tall guy with the snooty look—what is he, an old actor or something? Anybody could see he’s got you itching for him.”

  “Kenny, when was it that I first spoke to you about terminating our work together?” she said patiently.

  “Don’t change the subject. Let me tell you, in case you don’t know it: that guy isn’t really interested, Doctor, because he’s a fruit. A faggot. You want to know how I know?”

  Oh Lord, she thought wearily, he’s regressed to age ten. She could see that she was going to hear the rest whether she wanted to or not. What in God’s name was the world like for Kenny, if he clung so fanatically to her despite her failure to help him?

  “Listen, I knew right away there was something flaky about him, so I followed him from here to that hotel where he lives. I followed him the other afternoon too. He walked around like he does a lot, and th
en he went into one of those ritzy movie houses on Third that opens early and shows risqué foreign movies—you know, Japs cutting each other’s things off and glop like that. This one was French, though.

  “Well, there was a guy came in, a Madison Avenue type carrying his attaché case, taking a work break or something. Your man moved over and sat down behind him and reached out and sort of stroked the guy’s neck, and the guy leaned back, and your man leaned forward and started nuzzling at him, you know—kissing him.

  “I saw it. They had their heads together and they stayed like that a while. It was disgusting: complete strangers, without even ‘hello.’ The Madison Avenue guy just sat there with his head back looking zonked, you know, just swept away, and what he was doing with his hands under his raincoat in his lap I couldn’t see, but I bet you can guess.

  “And then your fruity friend got up and walked out. I did, too, and I hung around a little outside. After a while the Madison Avenue guy came out looking all sleepy and loose, like after you-know-what, and he wandered off on his own someplace.

  “What do you think now?” he ended, on a high, triumphant note.

  Her impulse was to slap his face the way she would have slapped Deb-as-a-child for tattling. But this was a client, not a kid. God give me strength, she thought.

  “Kenny, you’re fired.”

  “You can’t!” he squealed. “You can’t! What will I—who can I—”

  She stood up, feeling weak but hardening her voice. “I’m sorry. I absolutely cannot have a client who makes it his business to spy on other clients. You already have a list of replacement therapists from me.”