The Beast

by Shantea Gauthier

  I shook my head. He tapped on the window again.

  This isn’t real.

  Tap, tap, tap.

  I shook my head again.

  He raised and dropped his shoulders and rolled his eyes in a big pantomime sigh. Like I was being an inconvenience to him.

  This isn't really happening, so he can't hurt me, I told myself.

  My legs shook and threatened to buckle under me. I knew that it wasn't true. This was really happening.

  I reached for the window and slid it open a crack.

  The man's legs dangled in the air. He was either floating or holding himself up by the side of the window frame with so much strength in his fingertips that he appeared to be relaxed, exerting no effort at all. I didn’t know which was more unlikely, or which was more frightening.

  "Well," he said softly, "aren't you going to invite me in?"

  My entire body vibrated with paralyzing fear, betraying me completely. I managed to give my head a jerky shake. I tried to step back but the blanket caught my foot and if I moved any further I knew that I would fall. My leg didn't have the strength to shake it off so I was rooted to the spot.

  "I didn't think you'd be so beautiful," he said.

  Serge would be proud.

  "Thanks,” I whispered.

  "That wasn't a compliment, just an observation."

  "What do you want?" My vocal chords started to unfreeze. I couldn't wish the situation away. I could only deal with it.

  "I want you to join us."

  "Who's us?"

  He sighed loudly. "Are you sure you won't invite me in?"

  I shook my head. "What do you want with me?"

  "There's a war out there and you’re making friends with the wrong side."

  "What are you talking about?"

  He smiled then, pale pink lips parting to reveal long pointed fangs. I backed away, forgot about the blanket binding my foot and fell backward, painfully onto my butt.

  "Don't worry," he said in a false comforting voice that didn't seem like it was actually meant to soothe me at all. "I won't hurt you. Unless of course you ask me to. And if you did ask, well, I wouldn’t deny a pretty girl like you."

  I shook my head, eyes wide as an owl’s and kicked my foot to free it. "No. Whatever you want. No. Leave me alone."

  "I think we started off on the wrong foot." He looked down to explain his joke.

  Jokes told by men floating outside of your window at night are probably never funny. This one wasn’t. I didn't laugh.

  He continued, "My name is Harold. I am not here to hurt you. I am here to educate you, and if you really like what I have to say, I'd like to recruit you. I trust you got our little gift?"

  Eat me, drink me. I nodded.

  "In that vial is a very personal gift," he said. “It is from me to you and it is very valuable. If you drink it, it will make you stronger and faster. It will protect you from creatures like Simon. If you drink it, you can call me and I will answer."

  "What about creatures like you?" I asked. Without the difficult task of staying on my feet, I felt bolder. At least I didn’t have to prevent myself from falling down.

  "You can try silver and garlic, I'm sure. But I'm no monster. I want to help you."

  "Why?" I demanded. "Help me what?"

  "Help you stay alive," he said calmly. "Because if they want you, we want you first."

  "Who?"

  "Who do you think? Don't make me say it out here, it's not safe to talk of such things.” He leaned closer and spoke in a whisper as if we were coconspirators. “If someone overheard me, they'd think I was crazy."

  If someone saw a man floating three stories up talking about werewolves, they would be more likely to think they were the crazy one.

  "What’s in the vial? You told me what it will do, what's it made of?"

  He rested his forehead on the screen. His voice came through as a whisper carried on the wind. "My blood."

  "And the cake?"

  "My God," he said, sounding offended. "That is a cookie. It is a French macaron, none of this cloying coconut goo your people call macaroons, but a real macaron. If you eat that you will feel love and sunshine and warmth and happiness. When the crispy shell of the cookies gives way and the crème filling melts in your mouth you will know true ecstasy."

  “What’s it made of?”

  He shrugged with the shoulder of his free hand. "Sugar and eggs, some kind of flour. Lavender. It's delicious, not magical."

  "But your b-. The vial is magical?"

  His eyes locked onto mine, filling me with a sense of peace. "All blood is magical. Mine just has some benefits that you need. It will heal your wounds and make you stronger. Invite me in and I'll let you have a drink right from the source."

  The night air was warm, and it was so rude not to invite him in. He had come all this way in the middle of the night to help me, and I was making him stand outside like I didn't trust him.

  I shook my head to clear it. Those thoughts weren’t mine. If I didn't invite him, he couldn't come in. That's why he kept asking me. Emboldened by the knowledge, I stood.

  "No, thank you. Now please go away."

  "Remember," he said, staring intently at me. "Drink it. It will heal your wounds, and if you are ever in need, just call me and I’ll have to come to the rescue."

  When I approached the window to close it, a breeze carried his scent in. He smelled like melons and honeysuckle, sunshine and summer picnics. He smelled like a lie. A beautiful, intoxicating lie.

  "What are you?" I asked.

  He smiled. The fangs were gone. "I'm a vampire."

  He said it in way someone might say "I'm a Science Major." The matter-of-fact way was not what I expected to hear the information that a vampire was hovering outside of my window, asking to be let in, asking me to drink his blood.

  I nodded and slid the window shut.

  He put a palm against the window and pressed. The glass cracked while he continued to apply steady pressure.

  The window exploded around his hand, glittering shards rained to the floor. I screamed and backed away, tripped over the blanket. I hit the ground with a thud and looked up, expecting him to be reaching for me or climbing in through the broken window. He just stood there, or floated there, and poked at some of the points of broken glass until they broke off and fell into my bedroom.

  "Just a little something to remember me by in case you try to decide that this never happened." He let go of the window frame and was gone.

  I couldn’t go back to sleep. My tired brain replayed the incident. I compared Harold with the first vampire I’d met. Harold scared me, but he didn’t seem to want to hurt me.

  I held the box, examined the cookie and the vial and turned them over and over in my hand. The first vampire, the blonde, reeked of death and hate. The black haired Harold smelled of love and happiness. I couldn’t connect the two, but they were both vampires. They were both after me.

  My brain wore itself out running in circles until it was time to leave for work.

  Work felt like a strange dream. Everything was confused fuzz when I saw that they had started to make good on their promise to remove the cubicles. Mine was still intact and through blurry eyes I watched Bob sulkily take down his signs. He must have been next.

  Thankful for the walls, I sat in my chair, comforted by Shannon's presence. It felt so normal.

  I pulled out a stack of folders and started to type.

  My fingers worked on autopilot until my head swam and spun and I felt like I was half floating and half sinking. I tried to stay above water for as long as I could before I went under.

  Shannon woke me up with a gentle push.

  "Hey, Jade, it's lunchtime."

  I practically crawled out of the cubical. I ate a candy bar someone gave me. I hoped the sugar would give me enough of a jolt to make it through the day. It didn't work.

  After lunch, Shaun complimented me on the fantastic job I was doing and said I should keep it up. I
knew it would be unwise to tell him that I literally slept through the morning, so I went back to my desk. I didn’t sleep again, but I didn’t work either. Had to keep up my work flow.

  When I got home, Sandra was standing in my hallway with a gift bag and a long envelope. There was a piece of paper taped to the door, scrawled with thick black handwriting.

  Sandra wasn't smiling. As she turned to look at me, her eyes grew wide. I whirled around, almost panicked at her expression until she practically shouted, “Holy shit! You cut your hair!”

  “Yeah, do you like it?”

  “It’s um…” I could practically hear her thinking, If you can’t think of anything nice to say…

  “So,” I said a little uncomfortably. “Are you going to let me in?”

  Sandra dropped her eyes to the letter in her hand and raised it up to me. "Babe, do you need to talk about this?"

  "I don't know what this is," I said, trying to keep panic and annoyance out of my voice. I looked at the bag, the envelope, the note on the door. Another little gift? I wasn't sure I could handle any more.

  "Let's go inside," Sandra said.

  I scanned the note on the door as I unlocked it. It was a lengthy letter telling me how inconsiderate it is of me to be jumping around all night when there are other people in the building with children who need to sleep. I tore it off on my way in and threw it on the floor.

  Sandra shut the door and opened the envelope. Inside was piece of paper declaring "3-Day Notice to Pay or Quit." Behind that was a bill for the broken window.

  "Why didn't you tell me that things were this bad?" she asked, leading me to the couch.

  "I didn't-."

  "Bullshit," she said. "Things don't get this bad without you knowing. You don't break a window without knowing it. What's going on with you?"

  We sat down and I dissolved into tears.

  "It's not even that late," I whined about the notice. "And- and the window, that wasn't even me!"

  "Come here," Sandra wrapped me in her arms. "I didn't mean to sound all scoldy. I know you, Jade. You'll fight through it, you always figure things out, you'll be fine. Here, your nose is running, is this washcloth thing clean?"

  I nodded, clutched the washcloth, and kept crying while Sandra muttered soothing things.

  This is all because of Simon, I thought, sniffling and snorting loudly. He let all of this into my life. He knows more than he lets on. He saw the whole attack. Maybe one of the monsters burned his car. This is all his fault. Maybe-.

  I woke up. My head hurt and my eyes were painfully dry.

  "Come on," Sandra said. "Let's go. You're coming home with me. Jack has a truck, you're moving in with me. Screw this place anyway. Do you know how many underage drunkards I tripped over on my way in?"

  I opened my dry mouth to protest, but nothing came out. She patted my shoulder to let me know that it was time to go.

  The gift bag crumpled as we stood.

  "Oh yeah!" Sandra picked it up and held it toward me. "This is for you."

  I shrank back. "Who is it from?"

  "It's from me, dingbat! Open it."

  Under her suspicious gaze, I opened the bag. Inside was a box. A brightly decorated box with words all over it and a big picture of a smart phone.

  "I got sick of not being able to text you," Sandra said with a huge smile.

  "Oh my gosh, you shouldn't have," I said, attempting to smile back at her.

  "I had to," she said. "You know Cole owns an electronics store. He hooked it up. It was like five bucks. Besides, you needed an upgrade even before you threw your old phone through the window."

  "I didn't-." I laughed. "I did not throw my phone through the window, and it wasn’t old."

  Sandra threw her hands up in mock defense. "Okay, okay, all I'm saying is that I see a broken window and a broken phone in the same week, things are a little sketchy."

  I smiled genuinely.

  "Go wash your face and let's go," Sandra commanded.

  As the cool water washed away the crust of tears and soothed the hot puffy mess around my eyes I thought of how silly I'd been to be afraid of the gift. Harold’s surprise had scared me away from everything in a bag or a bow.

  The delicate cookie remained in the white box in my car. The vial, however, I had wrapped up in the red paper and tucked carefully into my jeans some obscene good luck charm. I wasn't exactly sure why. Harold had said that it would make me stronger and heal my wounds. Maybe I was holding onto it in case I ever wanted to call him. He had promised that he would come if I called.

  And then he broke my window.

  "Come on, Jade. You can wash all day and it still won't make you as gorgeous as me. Do the best with what you have."

  I smiled and shut the water off.

  I called out sick from work the next day. Jack and his brother helped me move the larger things I owned under Sandra's supervision.

  My bed, couch, desk, and table went into the shed in Sandra’s yard. My dresser went into one of the guest rooms and all that was left were a computer, a few boxes and my clothes and linens.

  I'd been on my own for almost ten years and everything I owned fit into a truck bed and two cars. Even my kitchen was bare, except for the beans, pasta and sauce. The garlic bread was stale and was thrown in the trash along with some old clothes and towels that had been long forgotten. Everything was moved in just a few pickup truck loads. It was a little sad to think about. I’d always thought that having few possessions would make it easier to travel, but the occasional visit to Tijuana wasn’t exactly what I had in mind as “travel”.

  Sandra paid the men in beer and flirtation, which we all shared, and after what felt like too little time she announced that she had to work in the morning and it was time to go to bed. I went up to the guest room that was now mine.

  On the unfamiliar comforter, I turned the little vial over and over, studying it. I opened the stopper and smelled the contents. It didn’t smell like anything. I’m not sure what I was expecting, but the man had smelled so good, I had expected that his magical blood would have carried some of it.

  Hesitantly, I put a finger in place of the stopper and tipped it upside down. When I flipped it back over and removed my finger, there was a bright red bead of blood.

  I smelled it again. Still nothing.

  I rubbed my finger and thumb together, spreading the droplet thin across my fingerprints.

  It didn’t seem magical at all.

  Absently, I wiped my fingers down my bare stomach, a bad habit I’d learned from Sandra. I felt a strange sensation that wasn’t the pain I should have expected. When I looked down, it was as though I had just erased part of the scratches across my midsection.

  I let another drop out and did it again. I felt it speed through the healing process. It went from angry and hot to tingly and itchy to nothing. Excited, I was ready to do it again and again, drop by drop until I was completely healed. I was sure that I’d have to live with scars, but the blood left nothing behind.

  Harold’s promise came back to me. Drink it and it will heal your wounds.

  In an exalted rush to be freed of my ugly cuts, I raised the open vial to my lips.

  I let it down again without drinking. I was the girl who would watch the bartender open my beer and then never let it leave my sight. I read the packaging on everything before I ate it, even though I didn’t always stick to what was good for me afterward. I couldn’t bring myself to drink it. The fear that it might not have been blood was replaced by the horror that blood was the best case scenario here. It might heal the physical wounds, but what else would happen?

  I put the stopper back in the opening and slipped it under my pillow. I would keep it close. For emergencies.

  And then, I slept

  chapter 6

  I arrived at work to find that, as promised, my cubicle was gone. Bob refused to let the change get him down and had signs taped to his computer monitor since he didn’t have walls.

  The whole b
uilding buzzed with the latest news of the serial killer.

  “They’re calling him the Beast of Hollywood,” Bob whispered loudly to his new desk mate, Lars.

  Lars didn’t seem to care at all that Bob was making a show of trying to be quiet. Lars kept typing and replied loudly in his thickly accented voice, “Why?”

  Shannon took the ear buds out of her ears and apparently pressed pause. She sighed and turned to face us.

  “It’s a reference to the Beast of Gevaudan,” she said.

  We all stared at her.

  She sighed again. “In Gevaudan, in France, in the 1700s there was an animal that ran around killing people and eating them. It was like more than a hundred of them. They all thought it was a wolf, which is ridiculous. People kept shooting it and it wouldn’t die. Some guy shot a big wolf and stuffed it to make it look bigger. The murders stopped for a little while and then they started up again.”

  She looked like she was going to put her headphones back in her ears.

  “Wait-.” I started.

  “What was it?” Bob finished.

  Shannon shrugged. “Eventually some rich guy shot it and it was stuffed and taken to some place but it got lost or destroyed or whatever so we have no idea. Some people think it was a wolf and some think it was like a lion wearing boar skin, some think that it was half mastiff and half wolf. I think it was a hyena.”

  “A hyena?” Apparently, Lars was paying attention.

  “Yeah, the Beast ate through bones. Wolves just eat around them. Hyenas are pretty much the only thing that can eat through bones. Plus, it looked like a hyena.” She shrugged. “Or it could be a throwback to the Beast of Bray Road from like the eighties and nineties, which was a werewolf Big Foot thing, but out here people are dying, and Bray Road was just some weird sightings.”

  “How do you know all this?” I asked, stunned with the realization that I did not know this person at all. I’d seen Shannon every week day for over a year and I knew nothing about her except that she wore headphones and could type.

  “Well,” she said. “When I was in kindergarten and first grade, I learned how to read.”