by P. J. Day
“Were you dating her?”
“No... I mean... yes. Look, it doesn’t matter; I don’t like her like that.”
Holly displayed a look of disappointment. I had lost her. She didn’t take one step closer to me that entire night. For the first time since knowing her, there was a distance between us. The carefree attraction between the two of us was now as dry as a stale saltine.
I tried approaching her but she quickly backed away. Her mascara-smeared eyes stared at me with emptiness. Holly had made up her mind. I was no longer the good-looking, confident and debonair jet-setter she had initially fallen for, but a liar. I was a liar who was barely surviving in a parallel world fit for freaks. I was one who, due to extraneous circumstances, was destined to never be trusted.
“I’m sorry, Jack,” Holly said. “I tried, I really tried.”
“Tried what? Can’t you see why I lied?”
“It’s not the lies. Please, just help me leave this place.”
I rolled my eyes. The anxiety of loneliness began creeping back into my head. I sat down and began shaking my head.
“Is there anything I can do to change your mind?”
Holly responded morosely, “I don’t know. I need to go back home.”
Holly was desperate to leave. If I helped get her out of China, I was afraid I would never see her again. Maybe she could stay a few days more and I could convince her to like me again. However, the longer she was kept in Guilin, the more stressed she’d become—the poor girl needed a clear mind.
“Just stay a little more... we’ll head to Singapore after this; I have some accounts down there,” I begged.
I realized that I was as good as dead to the company and my clients. I was unemployed, destitute, and most likely, homeless.
“Jack, just let me go home.”
As hurtful as it would be to lose her, I had to let go. My eyes began to water but I held strong, and with a rigid change in tone, I implored, “Holly, no one can know of us.”
She continued to stare at me without saying a word.
“They will hunt me down and will capture or kill us. Do you understand?”
I walked closer to her, and this time, she stood still.
“I will get you out of here. Tomorrow at sunrise, I’ll convince Milton to arrange for you to be led to safety.”
Holly began to sob uncontrollably, and I embraced her in my arms. It was difficult to keep my eyes dry as I knew that this was going to be our last embrace. One of the most beautiful things I had ever laid my eyes on was too soon become a distant memory.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
Holly didn’t respond and just nodded her head on my shoulder. I absorbed her warmth, which was probably the last piece of herself that Holly would ever give to me.
Chapter Seven
“Wake up.”
I opened my eyes and sat upright. Milton—who had on his hood and mask—threw me a gray pullover and an ugly pair of pants whose fabric felt like sandpaper.
“Is this a dream, again?” I asked, glassy-eyed and groggy.
Milton pinched me on my arm.
“Ow! What the—”
“See? You’re awake.”
“Where’s Holly?” I asked.
“She’s awake and anxious to leave,” he said, his voice muzzled behind his mask.
“Can you take that ridiculous thing off your face... you’re freaking me out,” I said, pushing aside my shirt, as I took a careful look at my wound. Milton stared at my scar with a confused look.
“What happened to you?” he asked.
“It’s a long story,” I said.
“You healed?”
“Yeah, I’m all right.”
“What do you want to do with Holly? She told me you had agreed to let her leave.”
“We need to get her to the nearest embassy or get her to someone that could get her back to the U.S. safely.”
“Well, there is a pretty good immigration lawyer down in Guilin City,” he said. “He’s helped me get some associates to the United States before.”
“What time is it?” I asked.
“It’s 5 a.m.”
I held up the pair of brown pants that looked as if they were made of the cheapest burlap material. “I know I am in no position to be picky, but this outfit is going to make me itch like crazy—got anything else?”
“Nope,” he said, with a shrug. “I mean, if you still want to look like a bloody mess, it’s your choice.”
I didn’t answer and I began putting on the pants. Milton waited with his arms crossed and his back against the wall. Milton’s overtures always seemed as if there was an ulterior motive behind them. There was a constant and nagging feeling that in return for my safety, shelter, and information, he wanted something valuable from me. Problem was, I was running out of valuable things to offer.
“Can I ask a favor?”
“Depends,” he said.
“Can you arrange a meeting with this attorney in Guilin, today?”
“Okay,” Milton curtly responded.
“Is that a yes?”
“Of course,” he said. “Jenny will take her to the attorney, but she’ll probably have to stay down there for a couple of days. It takes a while to process these types of arrangements, if you know what I mean.”
“I don’t think Holly will mind. Hey, let me ask you, is it okay if Ted goes down there with them? He can keep her at ease. This whole thing has been so traumatizing for her.”
“Sure,” Milton said.
“That’s it? Hey man, you’re an all right guy,” I said.
“We had a deal and all I ask of you is to remain steadfast in your part of the deal.”
“No problem,” I said.
“Let’s get them ready. We’re running out of moonlight, so you need to say your proper goodbyes,” he said, with a calm sense of urgency.
The pants Milton gave me were very loose. I felt like a three-year-old who was trying on his teenage brother’s pair of jeans, the baggy ones. I looked at Milton with a blush of embarrassment.
“Got a belt?”
Milton dipped his hand into his pocket and pulled out an old, dirty rope.
“Here use this...”
As I tightened the rope around my waist, I asked, “Is this lawyer a trustworthy guy?”
“I haven’t had any problems with him. Like I said, he has helped get some kids into a university in California.”
“Wait a minute. You’ve sponsored college kids? Why?” I asked suspiciously.
“If we didn’t steal all the nice things around you, how do you think we got them?” he laughed. “Our students major in international business, horticulture, and chemistry, and I’ll leave it at that.”
The Jiang-Shi were partly funded by the drug trade, probably opiates like heroin. It made sense why Milton was so interested in Zeo. He was probably looking to expand his clientele beyond humans.
I followed Milton out of the barracks and into the dining hall. Ted, Holly, and Jenny were sitting at one of the tables. They were eating a simple breakfast of eggs and a toasted roll. Holly sat still as a statue and just stared at her plate. Ted had pieces of egg in his beard, and Jenny just nibbled on her roll.
“Good morning,” Milton said. “Jack has an announcement to make.”
“Well, umm... this is mostly for you, Holly,” I said, clearing my throat. “Ted, if you want to leave, too, you are more than welcome to.”
Ted put his fork down and sat completely silent.
“Milton has a lawyer who can get you both back to California,” I said. I took a quick glance at Milton, for reassurance. “It’s gonna take a couple of days, from what he tells me, but he promises it’s safe.”
Holly looked up at me with a hardened set of eyes.
“Where am I going to stay, while this lawyer arranges my return?”
I looked at Milton for an answer.
“Jenny will take you down to Guilin City and she’ll arrange a hotel for you,” he said.
“How can I trust you this time?” she asked, her eyes slowly drifting from Milton to me.
“Ted?” I asked, his hands tightly gripped his mug, staring at it in deep thought. “You want to head back, too?”
“No, I’m gonna stick around. I’ll watch your back a little while longer,” he said, lifting his mug.
“I have business to attend to with the Jiang-Shi. Can you make sure Holly gets on a plane or boat safely?”
“Sure,” he said. He looked at Holly. “Is that okay with you?”
Holly nodded and began to tear up. I felt horrible. I felt that maybe Holly wanted me to go instead of Ted. But I felt it was best to begin the process of detachment. I had to wean myself off her. She had already made her feelings known that I was too different, or that my state of existence was too much of a shock to her conformed upbringing. I looked away from her eyes as they were filled with doubt, and doubt was all I needed to see to want to try again. I had to remain strong.
“Let’s go,” said Milton. “Jenny, take the Stryker... Ted, take my Ducati—you know how to ride that thing, right?”
“Pffft, of course, man,” Ted said with confidence.
We walked out of the compound in the early morning, stopping underneath the trees whose bushed arterial branching shaded the small stony house. Jenny put on her sparkly, pink motorcycle helmet and handed a spare green one to Holly. Holly turned to me, her face flushed pink, and her eyes still moist. She walked up to me and reached out and caressed my hand, the same hand I had used to impale myself. She leaned in closer and gave me a kiss on my cold cheek. My eyes drew down and I kept my hand limp. I held back tears as she began to sniffle and then carefully put on her helmet. Her moistened eyes were highlighted and magnified through the helmet’s visor. She slowly backed away from me, eventually turning her back as she climbed on to Jenny’s Stryker. Jenny and Ted simultaneously started their engines. Holly grabbed onto Jenny’s waist as soon Jenny put her hand on the accelerator, turning the motorbike down into the road’s initial mud-streaked slope. Ted gave me a nod as he followed close behind. Holly turned her head toward me one last time, and left a permanent imprint of her sharp, piercing green eyes in my memory... forever.
Chapter Eight
I drew Holly in my journal.
My amateurish talents didn’t do her pristine features justice. She looked quite sad in my drawing. This was the last memory I had of her face. The last few days had devastated her. I had always felt that if I were able to tell her that I was a vampire on her terms, she would have eventually come around. She was that cool, that open-minded, that intelligent. But now, I had doubts I’d see her again. I had her email address. When things blew over and we settled into another routine, maybe communication wasn’t out of the question.
I skimmed through the old, crispy pages of my journal. I found there were a few pages missing. Five in all were torn out. I didn’t remember tearing out pages from my journal. Maybe Rald took them, or someone at the archives in Bogota. The page before the first tear was me writing about some farm in Colorado. I had talked about an old barn I was staying in and how the family that let me stay in their barn were Quakers. I wrote how the family reminded me of my family but that was where it ended. Strange, because I didn’t recall my origins at all. As I continued to decipher my own journal with the utmost scrutiny, Milton walked into the room.
“What you got there?” he asked.
“Nothing, really. Just my diary.”
“Can I see it? You’ve got some nice pictures in there.”
“It’s kind of private.”
“Come on, Jack, what’ve you got hiding in there?”
“There is nothing of value for you in here, I assure you,” I said, closing the journal and putting it down at my side.
Milton raised his eyebrow with suspicion, but didn’t feel it was worth pressing the matter forward.
“You ready for a hunt?”
“A hunt? What are we hunting?” I asked, hoping he didn’t say humans.
“We’re gonna get some boar.”
“Why boars?” I asked.
“Because it’s the closest thing crawling in the forest that tastes like human flesh,” he said. “Also, a boar’s disappearance won’t show up in the newspaper.”
I stood up and put on the gray pullover sweater Milton had found for me, probably from some dank, musty corner of the cave. I scanned the room of the floor, looking for a pair of shoes, boots, or even a crappy pair of sandals. Even though I’d been barefoot since I left Guangzhou, and walking around the floor of the cave was quite uncomfortable, I couldn’t imagine the pain awaiting for me on the forest floor.
“You got a pair of shoes I can borrow?” I asked.
“Under the cot,” he said, pointing to a ragged pair of red running shoes. Luckily, they still had laces—I put them on.
I followed Milton out of the cave. We walked up the stony incline. Patchy clouds obscured the pale moonlight as the stars revealed constellations I had never knew existed in the opaque, rural sky.
“So, who else is coming along?” I asked.
“The usual hunting clan: Kai, Ming, and Ru.”
Milton exited the cave first. He stood over the opening and looked at me like a caped ninja as I emerged from the large hole in the ground. Kai and the hunting group were conversing and leaning on their bikes as we made our way from behind the old stone house. Ming and Ru looked rugged and both had long hair that went all the way down to the middle of their backs. They stood confidently and, most worrisome of all, they looked battle-tested.
“These guys look like they mean business,” I said, giving them a nervous smile.
“They’re our best hunters,” Milton added. “Ready?” he asked the group.
All five of us walked in the dark toward the large wooden bridge outside the compound. The closer we got to the bridge, the louder the rush of the river became as it began to drown out the chirps and chatter of crickets and the hoots and the nightly warble of the nocturnal birds in the trees.
Pebbles crunched underfoot as we walked down to the edge of the river. Milton faced me and continued to walk backward and said, “The boars like to dig in the soil for grubs downriver.” He grabbed something from his thick belt he had around his waist.
“Here,” he said, tossing me a dagger. Its sharp blade missed my wrist by half an inch as I deftly caught it by the handle. “Slit their throats quickly,” he said.
He effortlessly turned around and continued walking down the river toward a dark silhouette of dense trees, just a few meters ahead.
The compact, thick forest grew in a small ravine between two mountains. The overgrown forest was lush with deep green banyan trees covered in vines. There was a narrow red clay trail hidden in the tall grass, which led straight into the heart of the forest. Its mineral deposits resembled miniature crystals in the moonlight.
“Enter one at a time,” said Milton. “The boars have good ears; we must walk silently and alone.”
“What do I do once I capture one?” I asked.
“You must hunt two and bring your kill out here to the clearing.” Milton grabbed his dagger and swung it compactly in a curved motion. “You must tear into its neck like this. The boar will collapse immediately.”
I scanned the faces of the group. Each one of the men’s eyes fastened on the patch of green in front of them. All ears were focused on the sounds made by the jungle floor. They didn’t flinch or look at me or each other. I’d never hunted wild game before. I was ready to do it and show Milton that I was not just Tonghua, as Jon had called me back at the compound. They had brought me along as a kind of initiation. I was prepared for the task at hand.
We all crouched and slowly walked in the tall grass leading into the forest, our shoulders and heads barely visible in the moonlight. We diverged once we reached the sweeping darkness of the forest canopy that towered over the clay forest floor. I looked to my left and to my right. The Jiang-Shi disappeared into the brush l
ike ghostly apparitions. Their footsteps were drowned out by the cold wind that stirred up the crackle of dry leaves.
I ventured into the darkness. Adrenaline heightened my senses. The smell of decaying bark, wet grass, and rotting fruit tinged the inside of my nostrils. My eyes translated the slight movements of the leaves on the floor as the locomotion of a snake’s scurry. My ears picked up the sound of every twig’s snap, the grinding of branches rubbing in the wind, but still no snort of a boar’s snout or the dull intermittent taps of small hooves.
Thirty minutes passed as I sat on a rock covered with moss underneath a large mango tree. The other Jiang-Shi were nowhere to be found and I did not hear the death throes of a pig which was marked for death. I got up and began collecting ripe and spoiled mangoes from the floor and placed them in a pile in the middle of a small clearing surrounded by trees, hoping that a centralized grouping of the sweet-smelling and pungent fruit would attract the boars. I sat, waiting, against the trunk of one of the larger trees in the area. There was a feeling of tranquility as I waited patiently for the animals to reveal themselves.
As I placed the last fruit on my pile of spoiled fruit salad, I began to hear the murmur of helicopters in the distance. I stood up and slowly turned in a circle, trying to gauge the direction of the rapid dull beats of the chopper’s blades. It was difficult to see the sky through the covering of trees. Suddenly, the sound of helicopters stopped, but the sounds did not trail off; they just ended abruptly. I was not overly concerned since the helicopters sounded as if they were a few miles away. I began to hear the dry brush move behind me. I quickly turned around and crouched. I took out my dagger and stared at my mound of fruit. As the movement in the brush intensified, I heard footsteps above my head in the canopy. I looked up and just saw large branches swaying up and down. I turned my attention to the brush behind me and the noise had stopped.
“Milton?” I cried out. “Is that you?”
I stood in the middle of the forest, slowly turning 360 degrees, analyzing each shadow, and carefully listening to every sound. I had enough of the area I was in as it produced no boar and only hauntingly inconspicuous sounds. I decided to get back onto the trail and deeper into the forest.
