by Tim Forder
“She’s out shopping. Left to get the bus about an hour ago.”
“OK, get the baby and get out. Go next door and call the fire department. NOW.”
“Jack, Isabella?”
“Do as I said. I’ll see to Isabella.” Diana started moving, and I turned and rushed to Isabella’s door, I started banging and yelling, “Isabella, the house is on fire. Isabella the house is on fire. Nothing. But then again, I was standing almost right under the smoke detector, so how could I possibly hear past her door. But how could Isabella not hear the alarm going off right outside her room. Sleeping like the dead is one thing, but this is ridiculous.
Whoop, whoop, whoop.
Getting no response, I was beginning to wonder if Diana could be wrong about Isabella being home. Could I be risking my life for someone who may not even be home? It would explain no response to the overpowering alarm.
Whoop, whoop, whoop.
Trying the door knob, I found the door locked. The smoke was starting to get to the hallway; the smoke was starting to get to me.
Whoop, whoop, whoop.
Remembering that it’s not the flames, but the smoke that gets to you first, I was starting to get scared for my life. I could not leave not knowing if Isabella might be sleeping to her fiery death beyond the locked door. I could not leave without getting this door open to see what was or was not behind it.
I backed up a step and kicked the door, but it held. Coughing from the smoke in the hallway, I kicked again out of desperation, and I smashed in the door.
Whoop, whoop, whoop.
I rushed into the room and there on the bed looking very peaceful in sleep was the angelic Isabella. The bed was covered in dark satin sheets with Isabella resting on top of the sheets. In contrast to the sheets was her long, flowing blonde hair on matching dark satin pillow and her angelic pale skin face that looked too pale. Could she have already succumbed to the smoke? Worried for her life, I rushed to her side and discovered her breathing very lightly. She looked so beautiful in her satiny red gown that left her lightly curved shoulders bare, as well as her creamy white arms. She had such a light feminine figure with pleasant little perky breasts.
Whoop, whoop, whoop.
My eyes were starting to water from the smoke that was now following me into the room. It was getting tougher to breath from this smoke invasion into the room.
And she continued to sleep on. The room was starting to get thick with smoke and smoke detector was blaring loud enough to wake the dead and Isabella just kept sleeping on.
Whoop, whoop, whoop.
It seemed too late to even try to wake her, especially if all that racket from the smoke detector had not already awakened her.
Whoop, whoop, whoop.
So I just grabbed her up and threw her light feminine body over my shoulder using the “fireman’s carry,” just as I was taught in Boy Scouts. When I turned to leave the room, I discovered the smoke had gotten blindingly thick.
Whoop, whoop, whoop.
I blindly felt my way out of the bedroom and into the hallway. That placed me right under that godforsaken smoke detector again.
Whoop, whoop, whoop.
Getting that damn smoke detector behind me, I moved momentarily into the dining room.
Through the smoke it was easy to see that the kitchen was fully in flame. Both through the doorway and through the serving square, I could see the fire angrily eating everything that used to be our kitchen. It would most likely be only seconds before the hunger of the fire would break out into the living room and dining room. It would be a real good idea if I was not here when that happened.
Whoop, whoop, whoop.
With the smoke detector blaring to beat the band, I turned and felt my way past the living room wall, past the stairway up to the bedrooms, and continued out through the front door and into the clean, fresh air.
It was so bright outside that I was momentarily white blind from the sunny day. [White blind: Opposite of night blindness; one’s eyesight is overwhelmed by brightness of light. One might experience it in the form of snow blindness.] Putting Isabella down onto her bare feet, I was shocked as she finally woke up, screaming in horrific pain as she suddenly and totally ignited in flame.
I heard a fireman yell, “We have a human torch here. Get that hose on her.” Looking past her, I could see the firemen already had hoses attached to the fire hydrant in front of the next door neighbor’s place. I saw the fireman turn the hose from the house onto Isabella.
The spray was so hard that it forcibly shoved her right into me, while the spray was putting her flame out.
Isabella burned until she became a black skull face, wearing the burned rags of her once beautiful satiny gown. She croaked, “You did this to me! You brought me out into the sunlight to burn. You did this to me!”
Totally stunned into motionlessness, I just stood there as a burned, blackened, monsteress Isabella croaked out, “You die.” Her white teeth stood out in contrast to the blackened skull that made up her face and head. Those whitened teeth were now growing out fangs, a long, sharp pair of life sucking fangs.
All I could do was watch, frozen in place, frozen in fear as those pure white dealers in death, those fanged teeth moved in toward me. I could not move, as those fangs got so close as to disappear, until I felt two sharp intrusions into my neck. I could see Di playing with baby Elaine, not caring that her husband was about to die, that her husband was about to be drained of his life fluids.
I was watching Diana playing with baby Elaine as if she didn’t have a care in the world. I could feel my life draining from me. I could feel ... a stiffness in my neck from falling asleep in my lounge chair with the news on. While the TV droned, “And the death toll continues to rise as three more men were found dead in North East, D.C. all within a three-block radius. ...”
My mind reeled with the memories of seeing perfectly within the dream, then my mind literally screamed the thought...VAMPIRE. Could Isabella be a Vampire? Can our boarder be some sort of vampire?
I need to talk with Eric. Who knows more about vampires than me? My old buddy Eric.
Chapter Nine
A Vampire Hunter is Born
“Eric, Jack’s here to see you. We’re leaving now. Don’t you boys destroy this house while we’re away.” Why Eric’s wife always feels she has to guide me into Eric’s home office, I will never understand. By now I know how to get to Eric’s home office like I know my way to my own bedroom. For that matter, we have never damaged the house when she was away ... well, not much anyway.
“Hey, Jack, come on in.” Actually I already was walking in and finding my usual seat. I’d been in Eric’s home office so often visiting with my best bud, that I needed no assistance finding my seat. I was as comfortable in Eric’s office as I would be in my own home,
“Leaving?” I asked, casually pointing in the direction of the departing wife.
“They’re”—referring to his wife and son—“visiting her mother. You know how her mother just loves me.” Eric had once told me that his mother-in-law was a real bitch to him. He was the man who took her only loving daughter away from her (in marriage) and left her to be all alone (as her husband had run off with his under competent/oversexed secretary). Now, anytime his wife went to visit her mother, Eric stayed home out of the war zone.
Interrupting my musings, Eric asked, “Jack, you look like you have something heavy on her mind. What’s up?”
“Let’s play ‘what if’.”
“OK, shoot,” Eric answered. I could tell from his tone that he was getting serious as a reaction to my seriousness in this visit. This was not going to be one of our famous Laurel and Hardy visits.
“Say I know a person who only goes out at night. When this person walks into the room, the temperature drops noticeably, but goes back to what it was when this person leaves the room...
“Sounds like a member of the walking dead. Someone very allergic to sunlight. Someone who is so deathly cold that the
living can feel the room temperature change in their presence,” Eric interrupted.
“There’s more. This person has a voice that is painful to listen to even though everyone else raves at how beautiful her voice is. Everyone sighted, that is. When we met, she freaked at the realization that I was blind. Since then, with the help of someone else, she has been successful in evading me. I honestly don’t think that this someone has any idea of the help she is rendering to ... this deadly cold creature.”
At first, it sounded like you were describing a vampire, from a blind man’s view, but then your description changed to that of a siren.”
“And what, pray tell, is a siren?” I asked.
“I know you read Odyssey. Remember that Ulysses was warned about the ‘song of the sirens’ so he had all his men put beeswax in their ears so they could not be driven crazy by the songs of the sirens. In Greek lore, a siren is a bird woman whose song is so beautiful that it drives men to crash their ships and kill themselves. Other cultures have sirens as mermaids that again drive men crazy with their songs and their beauty. Some tales have these mermaid sirens coming up to ships and pulling men deep into the sea, to be consumed as food.”
“So have you ever heard of a bloodsucking siren?” I asked.
After a thoughtful pause, Eric replied, “Nooo. Possibly a vampire with some magical ability to enthrall all those around her to see her as extremely beautiful, to have everyone bend to her will. OK, Jack, Give. Are we talking about someone ... for real?”
“Would you believe our boarder, Isabella Báthory?” I answered as seriously as possible.
Eric laughed as if I had told him the funniest joke he had ever heard.
“Eric,” I called over his joviality, “Eric. I am serious.”
Eric got himself under control and after a moment’s introspection, he continued, “Jack, you are serious. You really believe that sweet beautiful Isabella Báthory could be a ... Vampire or a siren?”
“Eric, Di took her in while I was away at the NFB convention, right?”
“Right.”
Every time I called home all I heard about was how beautiful the new boarder was and how lovely her voice was. When I got home, I met our new boarder. When she walked into the room, it got colder and when she said “hello” it almost made my ears bleed. I’m telling you, to me, her voice sounded like fingernails on a chalkboard. Di keeps going on about how she’d love to get Isabella in church, singing in our church choir. Oh yes, Eric, Di never mentioned to our new boarder that she had a blind husband. When we met, my blindness was a total shocking discovery to her.”
“Shocking, you say?” Eric interrupted.
“Yeah, sounded to me like she totally freaked when she discovered I was totally blind. Di assumes that she just had never met a blind man before and did not know how to act around one. Eric, I haven’t seen our boarder Isabella Báthory since. She comes and goes without my seeing her at all, ever, and I swear she’s done it with Di’s help. I really believe that Di does not even realize that she’s helping our boarder.”
“It’s a shame you can’t see if she has a reflection in a mirror,” Eric interjected.
“Interesting you should say that. I just happen to have an extra watch here.” As I spoke, I handed out my old low vision watch that I used to wear on a wide leather band. The band had two shiny gold colored shields on either side of the band that acted like mirrors. “Eric, put this on, and the next time you see Isabella Báthory, sneak a peek at the shields, and see if she appears in the shield’s reflection.
Eric took the watch from me said, “You do realize that if she is a vampire using some magic to enthrall people around her, that maybe that magic takes care of the invisibility to mirrors as well?”
“I would really doubt that. Enthralling people is one thing, but enthralling inanimate objects is another.”
“You have a point ... wait a minute, come on, Jack. Now you have me talking like you have a real live vampire in your home. Vampires are fictitious. They don’t exist.” Eric announced with strong feeling.
“So everything I have told you is my imagination. The room temperature changing as she enters and exits a room, her horrid voice which only I can hear, and her ability to control my wife to avoid seeing me again is all my imagination, right?” I demanded.
“OK, OK. I just got an idea. Isabella should be leaving for work soon. I’ll just happen to be outside ‘getting some fresh air’ and just being neighborly I’ll greet her, and as she walks away I’ll see if she appears within your watch shields. OK?”
“Sounds like a plan to me. I’ll just cool my jets here and wait until you return.” For emphasis I made a point of sitting back, enjoying the nice, cushy seat.
“Fine, see you in a bit.” With that Jack rushed out past me. The room got very quiet. A minute later, I heard the front door open and close. The quiet became entombing and then became seemingly endless. Worse, the doubt gremlins came into my mind with statements not to be ignored like, “Really. A real live Vampire? And in your home? Why not Trolls or little fairies? Vampires are creatures of fiction and you believe you have one in your house? Come on, man are you cracking up or something? Maybe Johns Hopkins failed to mention “delusions” and “going crazy” on the list of side effects of RP. I was starting to think maybe I should grab up my white cane and just slink out of there and forget I even mentioned anything to Eric, especially about Vampires.
Then I heard the front door open and close again. There was still more silence. The doubt gremlins changed their tone. Eric did what you suckered him into, and now he is too embarrassed to even come back in his own office to tell you what a fool he feels like.” ... “Watch your friend walk in here and order you out for making him feel so stupid.
The doubt gremlins were interrupted by the sound of footsteps against the wooden hallway flooring, coming nearer then walking into the room. The sound of steps continued back to Eric’s office executive chair without a word spoken. Here it comes. Your bud Eric is just trying to figure out a way to tell you what a damn fool you just made of him. He’s about to verbally rip your ass a new one, and you really deserve what you’re about it get.
The doubt gremlins dialogue was broken with the almost inaudible, “She has no reflection.”
Jack was not sure what he had heard or possibly was not ready to believe what he had heard compared with what was preparing to hear, so he asked, “Eric, what did you say?”
“I’m still trying to believe it myself, Jack. There was no reflection of her in your damn shields.” After he said that, Jack heard a rustle of movement, followed by his hand being grabbed, “Here take this damn watch back.” Eric was forcing the watch back into my hand.
“Eric, please tell me what happened. Is everything alright?” I asked, concerned for my friend, and our friendship, from his tone.
After an endless silence, that was most likely only a minute or two, Eric spoke, “Only minutes after I walked out onto the front porch, Isabella came out of your place and walked out onto the sidewalk. As she passed I called out, “Hi, neighbor.”
She stopped, looked my way and said, “Hi ... Eric, right?”
“That’s right, Eric,” I answered getting up and walking out to her. “I’m just out getting some fresh air.”
“So where are your wife and son tonight?” Isabella asked me.
“They’re out ... visiting with my wife’s mother ...”
“You are not with them? Why? May I ask?” She asked me in such a very sexy way. Not to mention looking hot in that white, low top and short, red skirt. I was really happy my wife was not around at that moment, and all I was doing was talking with her.
“My mother-in-law and I don’t agree on one thing,” I told her.
Sounding very coquettish, she continued, “And what possibly could your mother-in-law and you not agree on?”
“Marrying her daughter,” I answered playfully.
“Well, I can’t imagine a big, handsome man like you having
a disagreement with any woman.” Grabbing my hand she added, “I’d love to spend my time with you, but I must go and catch the underground ... oh, you Americans call it the subway, to work.” Rushing off, she called back, “Bye, neighbor, we’ll have to talk again when your wife and child are away.”
As she walked away, I almost forgot why I was there, as I watched her wiggle that red, short skirt down the sidewalk. But I did remember, and I did look into the watch shields you gave me and ... in the shield the sidewalk was empty. She was not to be seen. I looked again, and she was still walking down the sidewalk, but when I looked again into the shields; SHE WAS NOT THERE.” Eric was getting unnervingly excited near the end of his recital.
“Eric, please settle down....,” I said in a calming voice.
“Jack, don’t you understand what I’m saying? She had no reflection in the mirror of the shields. Man, Jack, that bitch is a real vampire. ... I just don’t believe it, but you have a real vampire living in your home.”
What followed was some thoughtful silence which I did not want to break, as Eric needed the time to calm down. “OH SHIT. OF COURSE ...”
“ERIC. Please calm down,” I tried again.
“Isabella Báthory. Of course. Jack, not Isabella, Elizabeth Báthory the Blood Countess. You may have the one and only Elizabeth Báthory living with you.”
“Eric please, calm down and tell me, who is this Elizabeth Báthory you’re going on about.”
“Jack, Elizabeth Báthory, the Blood Countess, was historically a young lady who married young and then as she was getting older lost her husband in some war. Getting older, she started being obsessed with her looks and age. Well, one day while in a bad mood, she struck one of her female servants and discovered that the blood that spilled on her made her skin look more youthful, so the legend says. Well, she went crazy killing her servants left and right. Then she went about getting even more servants to kill so she could bath in their blood to keep herself looking young and beautiful.”
“These blood baths really worked?” I interrupted.
