My mouth froze halfway open at the sound of his voice.
“Jesus Christ, where the fuck are you? You have no idea the shit I’ve been through.”
No, not now!
There came a crash on the other end of the call, like a wrecking ball had just plowed through a wall.
“I’ve...sorta...fucked up, just a little bit. I kinda need your help...oh shit!”
More commotion exploded out of the receiver. It sounded like World War Three had broken out.
I finally found my voice. “Bill?”
But the line was already dead. What the fuck had just happened? Had I imagined it? Was it some sort of hallucination brought on by post-traumatic stress? Was maybe someone messing with me right when I’d found my peace with the world?
I looked down at the handset. At the very least, I’d definitely received a call. I dialed the number back and held it to my ear. It rang...three...five...times before switching over to a generic answering message.
For a long time after, I stood and watched the club come to life below me but didn't really see it.
It isn’t fair!
This was home now...where it had all started for me. It was a chance to right my wrongs and make sure history didn’t repeat itself for anyone else. James had entrusted it to me. He sent me here knowing I’d make the right choice. He’d believed in me.
Could I throw that all to the wayside for one lifeless fucking dork with a penchant for screwing up every single thing he fucking touched? Hell, I couldn’t even be sure it had really been him.
It had to have been a mistake...or a trick...or maybe I’d somehow developed brain damage at some point in the...
Goddamnit!
I let out a long sigh. Was there really any choice?
Actually, I mused, there was. For perhaps the first time in my life, I was in charge of my own fate.
James had said he’d trusted me to make the right decision, but I realized now he’d been very coy as to what that choice was. Perhaps it was still waiting to be made.
Maybe I was the only one who could truly decide what that was.
That crafty son of a bitch!
Looking at the glass that separated me from the club below, I momentarily caught a glimpse of my reflection. I wasn’t surprised in the least to see a big smile plastered on my face.
I turned back toward my desk. There was a lot of work to be done to keep this city...this world...from going straight to Hell. I, for one, intended to play my part, but in my own way. My days as a pawn were over. The right choice would be whatever I deemed it.
I grinned and considered my next course of action. Whatever I chose, I’d make sure as shit it counted.
Fate could be a bitch, but it had nothing on me.
THE END
Sally Sunset will return in:
Goddamned Freaky Monsters (The Tome of Bill, part 5)
Can’t wait for more Bill? Follow his ongoing misadventures on Facebook at
http://www.facebook.com/BilltheVampire
About the Author
Rick Gualtieri lives alone in central New Jersey with only his wife, three kids, and countless pets to both keep him company and constantly plot against him. When he’s not busy monkey-clicking words, he can typically be found jealously guarding his collection of vintage Transformers from all who would seek to defile them.
Defilers beware!
Rick Gualtieri is also the author of:
Bill the Vampire (The Tome of Bill, Part 1)
Scary Dead Things (The Tome of Bill, Part 2)
The Mourning Woods (The Tome of Bill, Part 3)
Holier Than Thou (The Tome of Bill, part 4)
Bigfoot Hunters
The Poptart Manifesto
To contact Rick (with either undying praise or rude comments) please visit:
Rick’s Blog:
http://www.poptartmanifesto.com
Facebook Page:
http://www.facebook.com/RickGualtieriAuthor
Twitter:
https://twitter.com/RickGualtieri
Bonus Chapter
Goddamned Freaky Monsters
ARISE FREEWILL!!
There are few things that can fuck up a good night’s sleep quite like the goddamned alarm going off.
I stretched then sat up, feeling as if I’d slept for weeks. A yawn escaped my lips and I blinked several times as my body continued booting up. Once my head was clear, I put my glasses on - snapping things into focus.
Before it could go off again, I smacked the button on the clock - giving it a good whack to drive the point home. Jeez, what a stupid alarm. Who the hell would program something like that into a clock anyway? It had to have been Tom or Ed fucking with me...again. The dickheads seemed to have a hard-on for doing so.
Oh well, it was probably time to get my ass moving. It’s not like the work day was going to start without me.
I hopped right into my morning routine, pausing only momentarily as I tried to think of what was on the docket for the day. Surely there was some fire to be put out - a project due that was no doubt giving Jim, my manager at Hopskotchgames.com, a near aneurysm. It was the same thing week after week. Sure it could get annoying, but there was a certain comfort in the routine of it all.
The only problem was I had no idea which project needed tending to. Was it Farm Fury? No, we launched that already. Maybe Birds of War? Could be Doctor Dexter’s Daring Dash - that one was coming soon...I think. Odd. Usually I was pretty spot on for my schedule, but for the life of me had no clue what I was supposed to be working on. Hell, come to think of it, I had no idea what day it even was. It could have been the freaking weekend for all I knew.
But then why did the alarm go off?
Oh well, it would probably sort itself out once I grabbed some breakfast. Trying to ignore the concern that nagged at me, I grabbed my clothes and headed toward the bathroom. Hopefully it would be unoccupied and there would still be some hot water left. Surely a shower would help clear my head.
* * *
Just as I sat on the couch, a bowl of Cap’n Crunch in hand, a sense of déjà vu hit me, as if I’d done this before. That was stupid; I mean of course I’d done this before. I lived in this place for Christ’s sake. I’d probably eaten hundreds of bowls of tooth-rotting cereal sitting right in this spot.
I shook it off as part of the general paranoia that had become a part of my existence ever since dying and rising from the proverbial grave as a vampire. The supernatural world was a fucked up place and it seemed that I couldn’t take a shit without some entity deciding that I needed to be vaporized. Such things tended to mess with one’s outlook on life after a while.
Fuck it! The denizens of the underworld could wait until after I’d had my breakfast.
I flipped on the TV, enjoying the rare moment of normalcy. Well, that wasn’t entirely true. Hell, a disturbing amount of my life remained mundane. There was my job for starters - believe me, becoming one of the undead hadn’t been an instant lottery ticket to riches. There were also my roommates...
Speaking of which, where the hell were they?
I guess it made sense that Tom had either left early for his job in Manhattan or maybe slept over at his girlfriend’s place, but Ed worked from home like me. There wasn’t anything requiring him to be in the office today, at least that I could remember, and last night was...
I paused, a spoonful of cereal halfway to my mouth. Last night was what? I had no idea on that either. Couldn’t have been too memorable. I mean heck, the apartment wasn’t even close to being trashed. Still, at the very least I should’ve had some remembrance of what show I’d watched or video game I’d played, but there was nothing.
The important stuff was all there: who I was, where I was supposed to be - that kind of shit. It was just the immediate past that eluded me for some reason.
This was starting to get odd.
Maybe we had...
Come to think of it, when was the last time I had even seen my roommat
es?
No, that was stupid. We were the best of friends. We hung out all the time...even when the forces of evil were trying to collectively ass-fuck us.
Who knows? Maybe I drank a glass of overly-skunked beer last night. That didn’t sound so farfetched. If so, my vampire metabolism would take care of it as the day progressed, hopefully allowing the fog to lift from my head.
Yeah, I’d let things sort themselves out. Probably no point in worrying.
I bit down with a satisfying crunch then began scanning through the channels hoping to find something worth watching.
Not wanting to burden my soul with Good Morning America or similar insipid shit, I quickly skipped to the cable channels - finally stopping on what looked to be some sort of action flick.
There was a cataclysmic battle taking place on a rooftop. Multi-colored lightning flashed in the background as the combatants recklessly tore into each other - gotta love low-budget sci-fi. Yeah, this had promise.
A glowing blonde angel was trashing the bad guys in the middle of it all. Damn, she was hot. Hopefully this flick had some nudity in it. Now that would be a fucking awesome way to start the day.
Another character, this one decked out in a SpongeBob backpack of all things, hopped onto the screen and began similarly kicking ass. She looked to be of roughly school girl age. Must’ve been a Japanese fetish flick. Those dudes are seriously fucked in the head when it comes to entertainment.
I was about to change the channel and see what else was playing when my hand paused on the remote. The walking Nickelodeon advertisement was tackled from the side and dragged screaming off the edge of the rooftop. It should have been hilarious. I mean seriously, I’ve never seen a Wilhelm scream that didn’t crack me up. Something about this bothered me, though.
That déjà vu feeling hit me again like a brick to the forehead.
I didn’t know why, but the whole thing felt familiar. Watching it, sadness filled me at the poor little character’s demise. As the rest of the scene unfolded, I actually had to reach up and wipe a few tears from my eyes.
I quickly glanced around, making sure neither of my roommates was present to see my pussy side coming out to play. I’d never hear the end of that. Satisfied that I was still alone, I turned back to see how things played out.
The battle seemed to be over. The angel stood there victorious. She was still wearing too much clothing for my personal edification, but nevertheless I was tempted to stand up and cheer for her. Then I noticed one of the bad guys was still alive. He was approaching from her blindside.
I actually shouted, “No!” at the screen as he pulled out a ridiculously large gun and pointed it at the blonde Xena’s head. A bullet to her face ended the showdown.
I stared transfixed, wondering how the director could allow such a downer of an ending. Asshole should’ve been fired. Things weren’t quite finished yet, though. Apparently in need of a fucked-up finale to finish things off, a bad Hulk rip-off jumped onto frame from out of nowhere and began tearing shit up.
Okay, this was getting a little too out there even for me - which was strange in of itself. Normally I enjoyed fucked-in-the-head foreign movies, but this one left a bad taste in my mouth. I had no interest in staying for the credits.
I clicked the television off and placed the bowl down - my appetite gone, too.
Standing up, I turned my thoughts toward work. Heck, after watching that shit, I was actually looking forward to it. Maybe a few hours of coding would slap me out of my funk. I still had no idea exactly what I was supposed to be programming, but maybe that didn’t matter. Hell, worst case scenario was I would wing it - maybe take a stab at creating something from scratch. It’s not like Jim would say no to some extra...
A knock at the door interrupted my train of thought.
I automatically walked over to it, assuming one of my wayward roommates had locked themself out again. In the back of my head thoughts of wizards, vampire assassins, and even Sasquatches played out, but I dismissed them all. Most of those, especially that last group, probably wouldn’t bother knocking - even ignoring for the moment that I lived in the middle of Brooklyn, not exactly prime Bigfoot country.
Chuckling at my own paranoia, I reached for the knob and pulled the door open. For a moment, I could do nothing but gape - the laughter instantly dying in my throat.
The person who stood there was quite familiar to me. I’d have known him anywhere, even with the black eyes and razor sharp fangs.
How could I not? It was me.
Yeah, my day had just gotten a wee bit stranger.
* * *
Goddamned Freaky Monsters
Coming soon!
Table of Contents
Introduction
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Epilogue
About the Author
Bonus Chapter
Sunset Strip: A Tale From The Tome Of Bill Page 20
