The Fertile Vampire

by Ranney, Karen

  Two or three mariachi bands strolled through the crowd, taking requests, singing about birds, love, and cockroaches.

  Added to the noise was the cacophony of voices: waitresses shouting in Spanish to the kitchen, exuberant people crushed into booths and long tables, all excitedly talking. When their food came, large heaped platters of barbacoa, carne de res, or menudo, the noise level would drop appreciably for a few minutes while they acquired the knack of eating and gesticulating with their food laden fingers.

  Cumin, chili powder, and onions hung in the air, so strong my eyes watered. I instantly wanted an order of Carnitas de Puerco with guacamole, an empanada, and a margarita or a dozen.

  Instead of being seated in the main part of the restaurant, however, Kenisha led us to the back and into a private room I’d never seen before. We sat at a round table as the busboy placed a basket of chips and salsa in front of us.

  I grabbed a chip, dipped it into the salsa and brought it to my lips, suddenly aware four pairs of eyes were staring at me.

  Oops.

  “You don’t have to pretend,” Felipe said. “Not for us.”

  I understood. According to the Green Book, we were not supposed to broadcast we’re vampires because it upset the general populace. Instead, we were supposed to maintain the illusion we were like everyone else, which meant we pretended to eat in public.

  In other words we got food, moved it around on our plates, paid for it and tipped well. Not a bad deal, especially since the food didn't even have to taste good. Unfortunately, I knew for a fact it was delicious at The Smiling Senorita.

  I carefully placed the chip on my butter plate, hoping the noise filtering in from the main dining area would be enough to hide my growling stomach.

  I would simply forget the sight of hot, soft flour tortillas waiting to be spread with butter. Or tender chicken enchiladas, drowning in a spicy tomato sauce and sprinkled with acres of extra sharp cheddar.

  The mariachis saved me. They entered the private room, grinning and playing loud enough to drown out thoughts, let alone the growls from my stomach.

  When they left, I turned to Ophelia. "How long have you been a vampire?”

  Four pairs of narrowed eyes and stone faces turned in my direction. The silence was hollow, the minutes ticking by so slowly I might be watching stalactites form.

  “That’s not a question you’re supposed to ask,” Kenisha said. “Don’t you know anything?”

  Evidently I didn't, but it wasn't a confession I was about to make to her.

  “Ease up," Felipe said, coming to my defense. He didn't look happy about it, however and I'm sure he would have preferred to ride to Ophelia's rescue.

  Why had I agreed to come here with the four of them?

  "Sorry," I finally said, staring down at my placemat menu.

  “Three days,” the beautiful redhead said.

  She smiled, a gesture dazzling both Ming and Felipe. She seemed oddly impervious to her effect on the male species, which included the waiter who darted to our table with mosquito like speed.

  She didn’t need any vampire training. She already had conquests.

  Doug would have loved her and probably had.

  Opie was simply beautiful. I can only imagine that alive – and I cringed at the word – she would've been spectacular.

  But hey, I wasn't chopped liver. My eyes were a clear blue; my hair was black and thick. I had a good complexion only occasionally marred by a pimple or two. My lips were full and my smile nice. Okay, I liked it.

  “Five days," Meng said softly beside me.

  He stared at his sweet tea, wrapping his hand around it so tight I thought he was going to shatter the glass. “I’ve been a vampire for five days.” He wiped his hand on the tablecloth, pressing the tips of his fingers against the table, the nails turning white.

  “I got a position someone else wanted. He hired someone to change me.”

  He lifted sad eyes to me. “That’s how long it’s been for me. Five days.”

  Opie smiled at him, the expression curiously haunting. She might have been the Lady of Shalot, hair waving in the water’s current, eyes open and staring at infinity. She didn’t explain how she’d come to be a vampire and I found myself intrusively curious.

  I had to come up with another name. Vampire didn't sound attractive. Still, it beat some of the names I learned tonight: nocturnal nibblers, necrofanciers, jugular junkies.

  “A week for me as well,” Felipe said. “But I knew it was coming.” He stared at the far wall, then back at me. “I asked for it.” He took a deep breath, looked surprised he’d done so and smiled. “I had leukemia, you see. I had to get prior approval from the Council.”

  “You can do that?” I asked, surprised.

  “Not easily,” Opie interjected. “Vampires are the worst kind of hypochondriacs. They’re all afraid they’ll get a virus.” She glanced at Felipe. “It was someone you knew, right?”

  He nodded. “My uncle.”

  “What about you, white girl?” Kenisha said.

  I wasn’t thrilled about telling them about Doug, but I’d started the whole thing by asking so I did.

  “Two weeks,” I said.

  When they all looked at me expectantly, I added, “A boyfriend,” I said, meeting Opie’s eyes. “He got a little carried away.”

  “I’m sorry,” Opie said. “It’s hard to lose someone like that.”

  I didn’t understand. When I said as much, Opie frowned.

  “Wasn’t he killed?”

  I shook my head.

  “You’re lying,” Kenisha said.

  I wasn't prepared for the venom of her glance. Or the fact I was suddenly very, very nervous.

  “No, I’m not. He was forgiven.”

  Kenisha abruptly stood and walked out of the room.

  When no one spoke I stood up, grabbed my sweater and made my way to the door. To hell with this. I might as well be home staring at the ceiling. At least the ceiling didn’t stare back.

  CHAPTER TEN

  A vampire bites the dust

  As I made my way through the crowded restaurant the mariachi band was singing about poets, lost opportunities, and unrequited love. Laughter seemed to follow me, ridiculing my flight. Everyone else was being convivial. What was wrong with me?

  I reached the foyer, stood and stared out at the parking lot, trying to convince myself it was better to simply go home.

  The wind keened against the window, wanting in like a child frightened of the night.

  "She didn't mean anything," Opie said from behind me. I turned, looking down at her.

  “She annoys me," I confessed. "I didn't expect to be annoyed by people.”

  She frowned, but even that expression didn’t mar the perfection of her face.

  I tried to explain. “It isn't that I thought I’d be this wonderful person once I became a vampire. But I didn't expect to have the very same problems I had before, with the added complication of being…” My voice ground to a halt.

  “You became a vampire, Marcie," she said with a pitying smile. "Not an angel. You aren’t perfect. Neither is she. But Kenisha’s had a hard time of it," she said. "Her son brought her over."

  Now that was a shock. "Her son?"

  She nodded. "He'd been made a vampire a few years earlier. He lived with Kenisha and she supported him. Evidently, she said something to him that made him mad."

  I couldn't imagine a world in which a pissed off son made his mother a vampire. The world I’d known, had been part of, hadn’t been perfect. I had a chaotic dating life. I never understood my mother and money always seemed to be an issue. But this world, this was a foreign place I wasn't sure I could navigate.

  Something must've shown on my face, because she reached over and pressed her fingers against the back of my hand, her touch as cold as death.

  How long had it been since anyone touched me? Two weeks, almost to the day.

  "He was killed because of it," she said, "so Kenisha not on
ly has to deal with the grief of losing her son but the stress of becoming a vampire. That’s why she was upset.”

  “What about the guy who turned Meng?”

  She nodded. “Him, too. The Council is merciless when it comes to turning an unwilling human,” Opie added. “They allow no disobedience. Your boyfriend is the only one I know of who survived."

  Yay Doug. I thought it probably had more to do with Il Duce then Doug's charm or ability to weasel out of a tight situation.

  "How did you get turned?" I asked. An example of my tenacity. If someone doesn't answer me the first time, I keep asking.

  “I’m like Felipe,” she said. “I requested it.”

  She didn’t look sick, but neither had Felipe.

  Something in my perusal, tactful as I tried to be, must have given my thoughts away.

  “I’m not sick. I want to live forever," she said. “I don't want to get old and lose my looks.”

  Maybe being beautiful was a curse, because I couldn’t imagine wanting to remain beautiful enough to willingly become a vampire.

  "Do you regret it?"

  She shook her head slowly. "No," she said. "I don't. But I knew what I was getting into. I researched it for a long time.”

  I decided to take advantage of her expertise.

  "Does everybody gets sick when they try to eat?"

  She smiled. “You really don’t know very much, do you?”

  “I guess I don’t.”

  “Yes, at first. Some people are able to tolerate beverages in a few years, but not more than a few mouthfuls at a time. Your intestines, bladder, and kidneys don’t work the way they used to.”

  “Don’t tell me, you’re a doctor."

  Goody, she was smart, too. I bet when she was alive – another cringe – she didn't sweat in the summer.

  She shook her head. "A vet."

  She loved animals. She probably donated half her income to the poor and washed the feet of the sick on weekends. Look how she championed Kenisha, who wasn't exactly sweetness and light.

  Opie was a hard act to follow, one who made me even more aware of how petty I’d been.

  She tucked her hands under her arms, rocking back and forth a little on the balls of her feet. At first I thought she was moving to the rhythm of the mariachi band, but then I realized she was cold.

  I thrust my sweater at her, determined to be a better person than I had been so far tonight.

  "Here," I said. "Take it."

  “I couldn't. Aren’t you cold?”

  “I’m naturally hot-blooded," I said and it wasn’t far from the truth. I wasn’t feeling the temperature change as much as she was.

  I allowed Opie to convince me to return to the table where I shamefacedly took my seat again, deciding I would charm the heck out of Kenisha.

  I could be charming when I tried. Really, I could.

  “What’s the best thing about being a vet?” I asked Opie once we were seated.

  Kenisha had returned to the table, but was studiously avoiding looking at me.

  She smiled. “Helping people as well as pets. I know every time I help an animal, I’m also helping the owner. We had a ninety year old woman with a sick cat. She couldn’t afford to pay us, but we treated her cat anyway. When the cat got well you could see the change in her owner, too. That cat was all she had left in the world.”

  “What’s the worst part?” Meng asked.

  “People carrying their cats in instead of them being in crates. People who insist on answering their cell phones while I’m talking to them. People who don’t want to pay for tests then cop an attitude when I don’t know what’s wrong with Fido. People with aggressive dogs who don’t seem to know it. They call the dog ‘spirited’. That one always gets me.”

  Who knew? Ophelia, the saint, had human tendencies, after all. I was beginning to like the woman more and more.

  I asked Meng about his prospects for work, only to be informed that a great many vampires chose to go on Disability. The ADA had been revised to include those with illnesses of a blood sucking kind.

  “But I’m writing apps,” he said. “On the side. My brother sells them for me.”

  I’d seen enough white collar crime that my antennae started vibrating. Habits die hard.

  Opie was continuing with her veterinary practice. “It’s thriving, actually. Most of my pet parents are very grateful I’m open all night. They don’t have to take off work to bring their pets in.”

  How many of her pet parents knew she was a card carrying vampire?

  Felipe was on extended sick leave. Everyone at his accounting firm thought he was on a death watch. How was he going to explain when he looked hale and hearty in a few months?

  We weren’t accepting as a society. We said we were. We said we embraced our cultural differences, but it was conditional. As long as vampires weren’t our neighbors, we could accept them. As long as we didn’t do business with a vampire, they were fine. Live and let live, in a manner of speaking.

  The only place vampires had a fighting chance at equality was in the dating scene. The men were absolutely mesmerizing and that might be taken literally. Or maybe it was only certain men, because Meng and Felipe were nice guys, but they weren’t hunks, hotties, or a fangy - a term indicating any guy, vampire or not, was worth getting bit.

  Doug had been great in bed, but he wasn’t worth getting bit.

  The image of Il Duce popped into my brain unannounced. I ushered it to the door with severe instructions not to visit again.

  I didn’t ask Kenisha about her plans for the future, but Meng did. Her eyes flashed fire. I almost flinched but stopped myself. Still, she was one woman I wouldn’t want to meet in a dark alley.

  “Why do you want to know?” she asked, pushing her plate away with one finger.

  Conversation, sharing, communication - all those things I’d missed for two weeks. I was wise enough, however, to keep my mouth shut.

  “I was wondering if you were going back to being a cop.”

  What? My eyes flew to her. Kenisha whatever-her-last-name-was was a cop?

  “Are there vampire cops?”

  She turned her laser gaze on me.

  “Why wouldn’t there be?”

  I managed to shrug. “No reason.”

  “I can work the graveyard shift.”

  No pun intended, I wanted to say, but I wasn’t opening my mouth.

  Was she a uniform? A detective? Did she work in Homicide? Drugs? The gang unit? A dozen questions popped into my mind and I wouldn’t have hesitated asking anyone else at the table. Kenisha, however, kept me silent with a look.

  “Does everyone have to go to Orientation?” I asked, desperate for a topic of conversation that didn’t have Kenisha glaring at me. “My mentor says it’s mandatory for me.”

  “Your mentor?”

  I nodded then noticed that I was the object of several stares. “Niccolo Maddock.”

  Opie leaned forward. “Niccolo Maddock is your mentor?”

  I nodded.

  “He’s a Master.”

  “No one else has a mentor,” Meng said.

  Opie nodded. “We were told where to go by one of the Council interns.”

  “What’s a Master?”

  “A member of the Council,” Felipe said. “In Maddock’s case, the highest ranking member.”

  I knew, from the Green Book, that Councils ruled the vampire world. Twelve members comprised each Council. Since there were only twelve Councils in the entire world, their geographic boundaries were large.

  The San Antonio Council was responsible for the western half of the United States, with the Mississippi River being the dividing line. The Trenton Council handled everything east of that.

  If Niccolo Maddock was a Master, he evidently possessed a lot of power.

  “Why are you so special you have a mentor?” Kenisha asked. “And a Master at that?”

  I shook my head. One more question to add to the pile I’d already accumulated.

>   Kenisha didn’t look satisfied. Mentally, she was probably pulling out her notebook and listing me as a suspect for something.

  When the dinner was over, Opie handed me my sweater. “Thank you,” she said. “I appreciate your lending it to me.”

  “Keep it,” I said. “Wear it home. You can give it back to me tomorrow night in class.”

  “Are you sure?”

  I nodded. She was trembling so hard her teeth were clenched.

  She put it back on, zipped the front and tucked her glorious red hair beneath the hood.

  At the door, I excused myself, mumbling something about feeding a neighbor and went to the bakery section. I ordered some pralines, a few empanadas, and a bag of marranitos - spicy little gingerbread pigs. Just to tide me over until morning, you understand. I’d given up dinner, but there was no way I was going to sacrifice Mexican pastries from The Smiling Senorita.

  At the door, I shivered, regretting my generosity for a second, then told myself I was a big girl. I could make it to my car without freezing.

  Felipe and Meng were ahead of me, but I didn’t see any sign of Kenisha.

  Twenty steps away from the restaurant, the blaring mariachis finally silenced, I heard a shriek of tires on pavement. Someone had a few too many beers and Kenisha would probably arrest them.

  Out of the corner of my eye I saw a large black pickup speeding through the parking lot, its headlights glowing like a predator’s eyes. It rocked over something, braked, then backed up and did it again.

  Someone screamed.

  The two men started to run. I threw my bag of pastries into my purse and raced after them, wishing I’d worn my jeans and sneakers instead of opting for the corporate look. I couldn’t run well in pumps, even if they were only two inches high.

  The truck barreled out of the parking lot as I came to the end of a row of cars.

  Becoming a vampire might be classified as traumatic, but it didn’t come close to the sight of Ophelia stretched out face down on the parking lot. Felipe knelt beside her. Meng turned, stared at me, white-faced, then ran behind a car. I heard the sound of retching and after glancing at Opie again, I couldn’t blame him.