by Tim Kizer
Well, it was now pointless to argue who was to blame for his impending death: his doctors or his cavalier attitude towards moles on his body. In the last months of his life, Ron had fully embraced his new passion: he’d been drinking most of the time spent away from the Cancer Institute. Just to be on the safe side, he had asked his doctor whether hard liquor could interfere with the chemotherapy. In a typical cover-your-ass fashion, the doctor had advised him to moderate his drinking even though there was no particular risk in his case. Ron had taken it as permission to go crazy with vodka and tequila, his favorites.
Alcohol allowed him to forget for a couple of hours that he was a millionaire about to die in his prime. Fifty-one is a young age to leave this planet, you know. And Josephine Shaw (who three months later would become Josephine Buckhaus) understood it very well.
“I can help you,” she had said when they had first met. “You don’t have to die so young.”
Then she had offered him a chance to beat the cancer. She had given him no details of this ‘unorthodox treatment,’ as she called it, and Ron hadn’t cared to ask: right now he was ready to try anything, no matter how illegitimate or outlandish. The next morning, he decided to take this leap of faith.
So here they were, thirteen days later, chatting in the living room of Josephine’s her house in Montclair and waiting for her friend Tony, who was supposed to give him the cure.
“If drinking makes you happy, Ron, you should keep drinking,” replied Josephine. “After Tony cures you, you’ll have many many years to do whatever you please.”
Ron intently listened to her voice, still trying to detect undertones of insincerity or madness. Yes, this woman was either a prankster or a wacko. Of course, a possibility also existed that she was telling the truth, and Ron was inclined towards it; otherwise he wouldn’t have agreed to meet the legendary Tony at her place.
“My wife says I’ve turned into an alcoholic,” said Ron. “She hates it when I drink. Even if it’s only one glass.”
“Hates it? I thought you were the one paying her bills. Why do you let her treat you like this?”
Ron nodded and said, “She knows I’ll be gone soon, and all my money will be hers.” It was the first time he had shared this deeply hidden thought with a living soul, and he didn’t feel embarrassed about it at all. He realized he could be absolutely honest with Josephine since she had been very open with him: suffice it to say she had trusted Ron enough to tell him one of her biggest secrets.
Ron fixed his eyes on the coffee table in front of the sofa they were sitting on. It crossed his mind that the table would look so much better with an open bottle of Chinaco Blanco and two shot glasses on it. “Last night she poured a whole bottle of Stolichnaya down the sink. She literally snatched the bottle from my hand. I thought she would smash it on my head.” He chuckled.
“She wasted a bottle of Stoli?” Josephine shook her head disapprovingly. “Speaking of your wife, Ron. When you get better, when you beat your melanoma, what do plan to do about Claudia? Are you going to leave her? She clearly stopped respecting you. Believe me, Ron. I’ve seen a lot of women like your wife.”
“I don’t know.” Ron shrugged his shoulders. “I’ll have a better idea when I get rid of cancer.”
“Do you still love her?”
“I think so. She didn’t marry me for money, you know. I was an average guy driving a used car when we first met.”
“I understand. Your mind will clear up once Tony cures you. I guarantee that.” Josephine smiled. “If I were your wife, I wouldn’t treat you like a child and hide vodka from you. Why the hell does she care if you drink or not? You have a lot on your plate right now, you want to relax, and what’s the easiest and quickest way to do it? Booze.”
Ron nodded thoughtfully. Josephine was making a lot of sense to him.
“I get tired, too, sometimes,” Josephine continued. “And when it happens, I have a shot of vodka. And I haven’t become a drunkard as you can see. Once Tony cures you, you’ll be able to drink as much as you want without worrying about your liver, Ron, I promise.”
She heard Tony’s steps in the hallway and turned her face to the doorway; Ron followed her example.
“Hello, Ron.” Tony entered the room and stretched his right hand out for a handshake. “I’m glad you came.”
Even though Ron had not expected to see a long-haired shaman in exotic clothes, he was somewhat surprised by Tony’s ordinary appearance; his supposed savior was just a slender man in his forties of average height and average looks. At that time Ron didn’t notice that Tony had a prosthetic left leg below the knee.
After a few minutes of small talk, Tony gave Ron a twelve-ounce cup filled with a dark brown potion that appeared a bit thicker than milkshake.
“Here is your cure,” the vampire had said with a smile. “You’ll feel much better in a couple of days.”
Then Ron woke up. Seconds later he fell asleep again and soon had another dream.
6.
“Have you been drinking again?” Claudia asked. “I can hear it in your voice, Ron. When are you going to give a shit about your liver? And your family?”
Ron cracked a wide grin and refilled his shot glass with Johnny Walker. With the glass in his right hand, he stepped to the window and said, looking at the fountains dancing on the lake in front of the hotel, “Are you using the hands-free headset? I don’t want you to get another ticket.”
“Yes, I am. Now please answer my question.”
“It's Vegas, Claudia. It would have been ridiculous not to have a drink or two. I’m just trying to calm my nerves, honey.”
“In your condition, Ron, even one drink is too much. Are you trying to kill yourself?”
“You're wrong. Alcohol doesn’t make my cancer worse. As a matter of fact, it gets my mind off my impending death.” Ron put the glass on the windowsill, covered his phone with his palm, and laughed quietly. “Besides, I control myself.”
“How do you control yourself? Alcoholics can’t control themselves.”
“Be careful, Claudia. It’s gotten really dark. Keep your eyes on the road. Are you close to home?”
“You know that I’m always careful, Ron. I’m on Franklin; I should be home in ten minutes. Did you hear what I just said?”
“About alcoholics? Yes, I did. And I think you’ve said it a hundred times before, I must add.” Ron took a small sip from the glass; he didn’t want to get drunk too soon.
“You are an idiot, Ron. I bet you’re drunk as a skunk right now. Can you imagine what your mother would have said if she were alive? She would have been pissed off.”
“Jesus, Claudia, you're exaggerating as usual. I'm not a drunkard. I only drink to calm my nerves. And I control myself better than it might seem.”
“You have no idea how quickly it can develop into a habit. You’ll turn into an alcoholic before you know it. You're not twenty anymore, Ron. You should be more careful.”
Ron grimaced. She had no clue what was coming to her.
“I’m just trying to relax. I was on my feet half a day today.” He gently the neck of the bottle. “I'm not a complete fool; I understand I’m getting old.” He took a sip of whiskey.
“You’ll turn into an alcoholic, honey. It always happens like this: first it’s glasses a day and a month later you progress to a bottle a day.”
Ron smirked and took another sip.
“Do you remember my uncle Matthew?” he asked. “That's what a real alcoholic looks like. You must remember him, Claudia.”
“I don’t care what your uncle looks like. I care about you. I'm serious, Ron. You're taking chances.”
Was Claudia sincerely concerned about his health or did she just love to bitch? After all, she had heard the doctors’ verdict and couldn’t seriously believe that drinking would kill him before the cancer did (Ron had chosen to withhold from Claudia the fact that his melanoma had recently gone into remission, all thanks to Tony’s blood).
“You should
see my uncle. If you saw him, you wouldn't call me a drunkard.”
He was itching to ask Claudia the question he had heard from Tony a week earlier: ‘If you had three wishes, what would they be?’ Tony told him that this one question gave a better glimpse into a person’s soul than a fifty-page questionnaire.
“Honey, I'm really worried. You can't go on binges at the age of fifty one.”
“What binges?”
“I'm asking you to stop drinking vodka every damn day.”
“Claudia, God didn’t create vodka so that we would stare at it. There are billions of gallons of vodka produced every year, and someone has to drink it; otherwise, the whole industry goes bankrupt and people lose their jobs.” He laughed quietly.
“This is so stupid, and you know it. Ron, you’re on a very dangerous path, I mean it.”
“I'm just teasing you, sweetheart. I’m sorry. It was only a couple of glasses, that’s all.” He poured the last remnants of whiskey into his mouth. “Are you close to home?”
“Almost there.”
“Yeah, I'm a big tease, sweetheart. I promise to cut down on alcohol. Can I still drink wine? I need something to relax me.” With delight on his face, he refilled his glass with Johnny Walker.
“Wine is okay. But don’t go overboard with it either.”
Ron looked at his watch. Claudia must be just a mile or two away from their house right now. His heart began to pound as he touched the keypad of the prepaid cell-phone Josephine had given him before he left for Las Vegas.
Three seconds later he finally heard it: someone knocked on the driver’s window of Claudia’s car—he was ninety five percent sure it was the driver’s window.
“Do you have any spare change please, ma’am?” Ron heard the muffled male voice.
“I don’t carry change, sorry,” replied Claudia.
She must have stopped at a traffic light or a stop sign on Essex Avenue, the street she usually took when driving home from the south end of the city.
“Okay, ma’am.”
Then Ron heard a loud cracking sound followed by Claudia’s scream, which only lasted a couple of seconds. Ron heaved a sigh of relief: the murder of his wife was in progress.
Josephine had presented a few scenarios to him a week ago, and judging by what he was hearing at the moment, they had decided to strike at one of the stop signs on Essex Avenue. It was Ron’s favorite option since he preferred to avoid having his wife murdered in their house: he was afraid the police might suspect him of hiring a hitman to kill Claudia. The more spontaneous and random the murder appeared, the better the chances were of him staying off the police radar.
Josephine had said they would ambush Claudia on a one lane street so they would only need one car to block her way. Once Ron heard Claudia’s scream, he immediately pictured Josephine sitting behind the wheel of the car halted in front of Claudia’s Mercedes. Who had asked his wife for change? Probably, Graham: he was the strongest one of them and could knock Claudia out with one blow. Even though Ron had provided Claudia’s photo and her car’s license plate, they had elected to obtain more assurance that they were killing the right person by checking the victim’s driver’s license. The cracking sound Ron had heard before the scream must have been the driver’s window of the Mercedes being smashed by Graham, who was making his way to Claudia’s purse.
As Ron eased into a chair, he heard a quiet clinking: it was probably Graham taking out the keys out of ignition. Holding the shot glass in mid-air, Ron visualized Graham leaning over the unconscious Claudia, reaching for the purse that usually sat on the front passenger seat, grabbing the purse—he had to be fast no matter how low the traffic was on that street; you can’t afford to take your sweet time when killing someone out in the open. Now Graham was straightening himself, rummaging for the driver’s license... The roar of the gunshot interrupted Ron’s mental movie. His wife was dead.
Half a minute later, Josephine called Ron on the prepaid cell.
“You’re free as a bird now, champ,” she said.
7.
“You’re free as a bird now, champ.”
Then Ron awoke for the last time this morning.
8.
‘It's a bat. It’s just a damn bat. Leave it there, George. Let's go.’
Josephine Buckhaus pushed the blanket down to her waist and looked at the electronic clock on the nightstand. Its digits showed 3:58 am. They were red—just like human blood—and appeared very bright since the bedroom was pitch dark: not a single glimmer of the street lamp light could get into the room due to the tight blinds and thick window drapes they had on every window in the house.
3:59 am. In case you were wondering, Josephine had gone to bed around midnight. She had been having little sleep lately because of all the stress and body aches. She hated to admit that the insufficient supply of the vampire blood had begun to take a toll on her mental condition.
As Josephine switched on the bedside lamp, Ron’s arm twitched. When she turned to look at her husband, she found that his eyes were open.
“Yes, I’m awake,” said Ron, preempting her question.
Josephine was still staring at Ron when he lazily rolled on his left side to face her.
“What is it?” asked Josephine, resting on her elbow. “Can’t sleep?”
Ron nodded.
“Did you have a dream?” Josephine rose from the bed and walked up to the window. “I had a dream, too.”
Ron tossed the blanket away and sat up, his hair tousled, his forehead glistening with sweat.
“I am beginning to get concerned.” Josephine slid her right hand behind the blinds and half-opened the window, letting in the cool fresh air. “There’s not a whole lot of Tony’s blood left. And we still have no clue where Kelly is.”
“Well, we’re not even sure if Tony actually bit her.”
“Yeah.” Josephine heaved a heavy sigh. “I wish Tony were still alive so I could kick his ass for being so irresponsible.”
“Sometimes vampires make dumb decisions. Remember Nico? Remember how he turned into a bat and got killed by Kelly’s father? That was profoundly stupid.”
Josephine nodded silently.
“What was your dream about?” asked Ron. “Was it a nightmare?”
“It was about a lot of things. And you were there, too. So I guess you can call it a nightmare.” She chuckled.
Then her cell-phone began to ring. It was Albert.
9.
“Hello.” To Albert's surprise, Josephine answered the phone right after the first ring.
“Hello,” he said. “Are you awake?”
“Yes, both of us are,” replied Josephine. “Can’t sleep?”
“Sort of.” Albert kept the cigarette smoke in his lungs longer than usual, savoring it.
“Insomnia?”
“Not really. I had a dream about drinking Tony’s blood for the first time.” Albert glanced at his watch. 4:39 am. Frank must be fast asleep right now, and you can bet he had no nightmares despite the fact that he had strangled his wife several weeks ago.
“Again? I had a dream about giving Tony’s blood to Kelly for the first time. And Ron had a dream, too. It was about his wife.”
“It must have been a nightmare then.” Albert giggled. He licked his lips, which felt dry and crusty.
“You don’t miss your old life, Al, do you? I’m talking about that dream of yours.”
“Hell no. I’m just a little giddy, that’s all.”
“Yeah, meeting Tony was a blessing for all of us. If not for his blood, Ron would have been long dead. Fascinating, isn’t it?”
“It sure is. Not many people get a second chance to live, even millionaires.”
“What are you doing now? Having a smoke?”
“As a matter of fact, I am.”
“How are you holding up?”
“It’s not as bad as I expected. But I don’t want to find out how much worse it can get.”
Honestly, it was the uncertainty of t
heir situation that bugged him the most, not the fatigue or that odd, indescribable kind of craving he had never experienced before. He would kill to know the exact date this whole ordeal was going to end.
“Ron and I are doing okay, too.”
“These dreams are starting to annoy me.” Albert flicked the cigarette butt out of the window.
“Relax, Al. They are only dreams. We are moving in the right direction, that’s the important thing. We’ll find Kelly, I promise you.” Josephine paused. “Ron wants to talk to you.”
“I'm leaving in a minute.” Albert yawned. “I want to check what Frank is up to.”
“Are you ready to have some fun with this fucker on Monday?”
“Can’t wait. I’ve got a couple of things in mind I’d like to do to him.”
“What time are you coming over today?” asked Ron.
“Maybe around noon. Okay, Ron, I'm taking off. I’ll call you later.”
“Okay, see you soon, buddy.” Ron hung up.
Albert tossed his phone on the bed and began getting dressed.
Entering the garage, he thought of Jerry Cleveland. It wouldn't be too hard to drop by that guy’s place and strangle him. Or shoot him with a lethal dose of heroin: the death of an overdosed loser would hardly be a top priority for the police.
9.
He was lying on the couch, and Chris, his clever eight-year-old son was walking on his back, playing a chiropractor to his daddy. The boy seemed incredibly light to Graham.
“Can I stand on your head, daddy?” asked Chris.
“Aren’t you afraid of breaking my neck?” Graham laughed softly. “How is your homework going?”
“I won't break it. Can I stand on you head?”
“You think so? You think daddy's got a strong neck?”
“I don't know.” Chris stepped on Graham's right shoulder-blade. “I'm going to stand on it now, dad. I’m doing it.”
