In a deep sleep, Martin barely moved a muscle, not even when bright sunlight began shining directly onto his face. Finally, mid-afternoon, he began to stir. He stretched, yawned, sat up and opened his eyes. For the first time in days, he felt refreshed and energized. In other words, he didn’t feel like blowing his brains out. It felt good to be alive.
Then he remembered the cemetery, Adriana, the blood, other bodily fluids, the wolf. Had any of that really happened? It couldn’t be anything more than a bad dream. He was in too good a mood now for the last two days to have been real. Vampires and werewolves! Nonsense.
There was no pain in his neck, which Martin thought was a good sign. He stood, looked in the mirror, saw no marks on his jugular. Lifting a hand to touch his neck made him feel somewhat silly, but, the simple gesture reassured him that everything was normal.
“Vampire bites heal quickly, Martin.”
He whirled around. Adriana stood near the door, smiling at him. “Whoa! How the heck did you get in here?”
“I snuck in. Vampires are very sneaky. That’s why I wore sneakers today.”
Martin looked down. “Chuck Taylor’s. Very nice. So really, how did you get in?”
“Your mother let me in. She told me to go upstairs and wake your lazy ass up, make sure you’re still alive. Then she went back to work.”
“I don’t think she said, ‘lazy ass’.”
“No, but she implied it. She was surprised you were still asleep. She’s a little worried about you, you know. Wandering around all night, coming home late, sleeping all day. She says that’s not like you.”
“Well, no, I guess that isn’t like me. Things have been a little weird the last couple of days.”
“Yeah, I’ll bet. Two suicide attempts and a hot chick turns you into a vampire.”
“And I think I met a werewolf, too.”
“You think you did? Seems like something you would be sure about.”
Martin sat down on the edge of a recliner and stared at the floor. “I don’t understand anything anymore. Reality doesn’t seem to exist.”
“Reality is just different from what you thought it was.” Looking around, Adriana sat down in the nearest chair. It was blue and shaped like a hand. She smirked and said, “A hand chair. How very stylish - if you were a teenager and this was 1975.”
He ignored the sarcasm, preferring to sit silently while looking confused.
“Listen, Martin,” Adriana continued, “I’m sorry about losing my control last night. I had never intended to turn you.”
He gave her a blank stare. “You know I think you’re nuts, don’t you?”
“Still not a believer, eh? A vampire bites your neck, you see a werewolf, and you’re still not convinced that there’re things out there that most people have no concept of. That’s okay, I don’t blame you. It’s hard to accept this stuff. But life is going to be different for you from now on. That’s just a fact.”
“What’s going to be different? I don’t want anything to be different. I want my life to be back to what it was.”
“You want your life back? Then why did you try to get rid of it?” Adriana stood and walked around his room. “You know, you’ve got it pretty nice here. Look at all this stuff. TV, mini-fridge, microwave.” She looked out the window. “I see your neighbor likes to sunbathe topless. She’s got a nice rack for an old broad.”
Martin nodded. “That she does.”
“You ever go over and visit? You ever hit that once in a while?”
“You’re being disgusting. Miriam is like a hundred years old. I help her with her gardening once in a while, go to village council meetings with her.”
“Yeah, whatever.” Adriana laughed. Martin rolled his eyes.
“How about some coffee?” she asked. “You look like you need a caffeine injection. Let’s go to Mama Maria’s. We’ll take a walk, get you some air.”
Martin pondered long enough to give Adriana an opening. Before he knew it, they were out the door, walking at a brisk pace toward downtown Arbor Woods.
“Think you can keep up with me, Marty?”
“Martin,” he corrected her. He hated being called Marty. It sounded so common, and he liked to think he was anything but. “Yes, I can keep up with you. No problem,” he said as he was having trouble keeping up with her. She glided blissfully along; he was at a near gallop, sweating and gulping for air.
She decided to show mercy on him. Her pace slowed, allowing Martin to catch up and walk alongside her comfortably.
“It’s the shoes,” he said. “I’m not wearing my running shoes.”
“You have running shoes?”
“”Yes. Good ones too. Expensive. Probably because they’re American made.”
“Do you ever run in them?”
“Well, no. But they are very comfortable. Great walking shoes.”
When they reached the bookstore, Martin was still sweating. His shirt was damp and the beads of perspiration on his expansive forehead gleamed under the lights. At the cafe counter, he ordered an iced coffee. Joanie, the barista, narrowed her eyes when she saw the condition he was in. “Are you okay, Martin? You look like you’re going to have a heart attack.”
“I’m fine. Just a little warm outside.”
Uncharacteristically, Joanie reached out, taking his hand in hers. “I hope so. I worry about you.”
“You do?”
“Oh yeah, absolutely.” She looked him up and down. “You seem different today. Are you wearing cologne or something?”
“No. Perhaps it’s my natural manly musk.” Normally the result of his attempting humor in conversation with a woman was a silent stare on her part, followed by Martin feeling stupid and self-conscious. In this case, Joanie responded by saying, “Oh Martin, you’re so funny sometimes. Well, enjoy your coffee. I put a little extra sugar in there for you. I know how you like it.”
Martin joined Adriana at a table in the back.
“What’s wrong, M? You look a little confused.”
“This is the first time Joanie has ever really spoken to me. It’s like she was coming on to me a little bit. It’s odd. I always thought she was on the other team.”
“Oh, she’s definitely on the other team. I mean, look at her! For cryin’ out loud. She’s got a tattoo on her bicep that says ‘Dad.’ That doesn’t mean she might not dig you a little bit, for reasons unknown to her. Vampires give off a sensual vibe without even trying. No one is immune. People who wouldn’t normally be attracted to you will start falling all over you, wanting to be near you and not even know why. Of course, I had that before I became a vampire. But, like I said, things are going to be different for you now.”
“Really? Why, because you’re a nut job who thinks she’s a vampire and you tried to drink my blood?”
“C’mon now, Martin, be polite. For one thing, I am not a nut job. I’m unique, I can get wild on occasion, but that does not mean I am a nut job, as you so eloquently put it. For another thing, I didn’t try to drink your blood, I really did drink it. Made me sick, as it turns out, but that doesn’t make me any less of a vampire, nor does it make you any less of one now that you’ve been turned.”
He guzzled down his coffee, the icy liquid cooling down his whole body. “Okay, I’m a vampire. I drink blood now. So, where’s my bloodlust? How come I’m not out on the prowl for a little strange plasma? Where’s my bloodlust, damn it?”
She gave him a cool stare. “There’s no need for sarcasm. You will have a taste for blood sooner or later. It will come eventually. But there’re things you need to understand first, so you don’t go transforming just any Tom, Dick or Harry. There’s some unwritten rules to follow. I’ll make it my job to help you through this period of your life. Especially since I’m the one who caused this period to happen.”
“Do you have some kind of instruction manual for me? It seems like that would be helpful.”
Adriana’s eyes lit up. “You know, you’re right, that would be helpful! I should write a vampire instruction book. You can help me write it. We can call it You’re a Vampire! Now What? Or maybe Transformed: What to Expect When You’re Expecting to be a Vampire. Or maybe one of those books for idiots, you know, like The Complete Dummy’s Guide to Being a Vampire. I think there are a lot of possibilities with this subject.”
Martin swallowed the last of his coffee. “I still think you’re nuts.”
“Fine, be a doubter. That will get you nowhere. You’ve got the potential for eternal life now, and you’re going to need my help.”
Ice was melting in his cup and Martin slurped it up through the straw. “Well, I do have many questions.”
“That’s good. I’d be happy to help you - but only if you stop that freakin’ slurping!”
Martin looked at her innocently while making an incredibly loud slurping noise.
Adriana gave him a look. “Apparently, I should have transformed someone with better table manners.”
“Apparently,” he replied. “I noticed when you were in my room that I could see your reflection in the mirror on my dresser. I thought vampires couldn’t see their reflections.”
“That’s a myth. There’re many myths about vampires. All those books and movies over the years, people see them and believe that stuff. Like we can turn into bats and fly around. I wish. That would be pretty cool if we could do that, don’t you think?”
“Absolutely. I also noticed you didn’t mind walking around in the bright sunshine. You didn’t melt or turn into a heap of vampire dust or anything. You just went on your merry way like everything was hunky-dory.”
“Where do you get these phrases from? Who says ‘hunky-dory’ anymore?”
“You didn’t answer my question.”
“Okay, smart guy. The sun doesn’t bother vampires. If it didn’t bother you in life, it’s not going to bother you in the afterlife. Or whatever you want to call this. I just call it life.”
“So you’re not dead. Or the undead.”
“Wouldn’t undead imply that I was once dead but now I’m alive? That sounds more like a zombie, and there’s no such thing as a zombie.”
“So I’ve heard. Where’s your coffin?”
“My what?”
“Your coffin. You know, the thing you sleep in.”
Adriana grew frustrated when she heard that. “I never understood why a vampire would have a coffin. Like I said, we’re not dead, so why have a coffin?”
“Don’t knock it, it might be comfortable.”
“Sweetie, I have a king size bed at home. It has one of those remote things so I can control how firm the mattress is. Now that’s comfortable.” She shook her head, laughing. “Coffins? Who the hell wants to sleep in a coffin? I get a little claustrophobic, so that would be awful.”
“I get claustrophobic too.”
She looked at him with a soft expression. “See, we’ve got so much in common. We both get claustrophobic, we’re both vampires, we, uh, huh, yeah, well, we don’t have that much in common, but still, it’s something.”
Martin slurped up the last of the melted ice. “So, we’ve established you, or should I say we, don’t sleep in coffins, unless of course we really want to, we can walk in the sun, maybe even go to the beach, and we can’t turn into bats and fly away. Have I got that right?”
“You do.”
“Anything else I need to know?”
“Plenty, but I don’t think you’re in the right frame of mind to hear it.”
He looked thoughtful for a moment. “Perhaps you’re right about that.”
“You know, the more I think about it, the more I like the book idea. We could sell it to a publisher as a spoof, or a parody, or whatever the correct literary term is, but it would really be a valuable guide to the newly transformed. It would be an underground classic.”
“Yeah, I’ll mull that over.” He glanced over his shoulder. Joanie was smiling at him. Returning the smile, his cheeks began to turn crimson, then he shyly turned away.
Adriana was grinning at him. “I told you, you’ll find that the ladies are more attracted to you, now that you’ve got that ‘vampire thang’ goin’ on.”
“Had I known all I needed to get women was a ‘vampire thang’ I would have been bitten a long time ago. If I had I been able to meet a real vampire, of course.”
“Of course.” Adriana stood. “Come on, I’ll walk you home. I know you don’t like to be out of your room for too long.”
Joanie watched them walk out together, wondering just why it was she suddenly found Martin so appealing.
The experienced vampire and her newly minted protege strolled in the direction of Martin’s home. While Adriana spoke constantly about the book idea, he tried to ignore by looking at the sky, the trees, the gardens they passed. That’s when he saw Amelia sitting in her yard again. He turned toward Adriana to tell her of how women like Amelia always seem to look through him, but found Adriana had disappeared. Dumbfounded, Martin stopped to look around for his missing companion. By this time Amelia had made her way across the lawn.
“Hello, Martin. You look like you’ve lost something.” She was a blonde now. A loose fitting plain white t-shirt blew slightly in the breeze while madras shorts offered a fine view of her legs. So simply dressed, yet Martin found her stunningly beautiful.
“Lost something? Yeah, well, no, not really.” Even though he felt like he was making a fool of himself, he noticed she was not only engaging him in conversation but making eye contact with him as well. It was a turn of events he found both pleasing and disconcerting.
“Did you get a haircut or something?” she asked. She thrust a hip to one side, ran a finger over her lips. “You’ve changed something, I just don’t know what.”
“I’m pretty sure I’m the same old me.” Okay, he thought, I really suck at making small talk. Really.
“Oh, you’re so amusing, Martin,” she said as she touched him lightly on his arm. He thought he would faint. The spell was broken when he realized he had absolutely no intelligent comments to make since there wasn’t enough blood going to his brain.
“Uh, I need to, uh, go. Home. Yes, home. I need to do you. I mean stuff, I need to do stuff. At home. Now. Go.”
She giggled, touched him on the arm again, then brushed windblown hair back from her forehead. It was the sort of thing that made his knees buckle. “Well,” she said, “stop by again. Maybe next time you can come inside.”
Martin was definitely dizzy now. “Huh?” was all he could say.
“You know, come inside the house and visit for a while. See you.” She gave him a little wave, she giggled again, then spun around and walked back to her front door. Martin watched every step Amelia took until she was inside the house. When he could no longer see her, he stared at the space she had been in.
“I told you things would be different.” Adriana was standing only a foot away from him.
Startled by her sudden appearance, he almost screamed at her, “Where did you come from?”
“I was around. Matter of fact, I was here all the time. You need to work on your social skills. You are not good at small talk. Let’s walk and talk.” As they did, she explained how vampires can use the power of their minds. “For instance, I simply focused my thoughts on your little blonde friend. I influenced her to focus on nothing but you and your sexy self. My thoughts combined with your newfound vampire groove made me seem invisible to her.”
“You were invisible to me, too.”
“That’s because you were thinking how nice it would be to see her naked. I could have sung the National Anthem at the top of my lungs, and you wouldn’t have noticed.”
“I wouldn’t say that’s exactly true,” Martin stammered.
“Bullshit.”
“You’re right.” He gave her a sidelong glance. “Will you teach me how to use that mental focus thingy? I’m not real good at thinking straight sometimes.”
“Oh, so you’re coming around to the whole vampire concept, are you? Especially now that there are chicks involved.”
“I’m not saying I think that I’m a vampire, or that you’re a vampire, I’m just saying you may have some things to teach me, that’s all.
He looked to his side. She was gone again. “Hey, I know you’re there. You haven’t really disappeared. You have to show me how to do that.”
“Are you talking to me, Martin?” It was Catherine Clover. Having parked her Lexus in her driveway, she had just taken a bag of groceries from the trunk of her car when she heard him.
“Who me? Uh, no, I was just, uh, talking on my cell phone.”
“Slick,” Adriana said in a barely audible whisper. His eyes darted from side to side, but he couldn’t see her. “You know you don’t have a cell on you.”
“It’s one of those new cells, nothing but an ear bud.”
“Good attempt, but you don’t have an ear bud, either,” Adriana whispered.
“Oh, I don’t even see it. It must be tiny,” Catherine said.
“I think she’s insulting you,” Adriana said.
I’m going to kill you, Martin thought. Can you hear that, Adriana? No reply.
“Can I help you with the groceries?” Martin asked her.
“Hey, maybe she’ll give you a little reward, if you know what I mean.”
Trying to drown out Adriana’s voice, Martin attempted to concentrate on Catherine. He set the bag of groceries down on the island in the center of the kitchen.
“Thank you, Martin.” She drew near, closer to him than she had ever been before. A whiff of her perfume wafted over, he could feel the heat her body threw off. She tilted slightly toward him, allowing him to note that there was nothing beneath her blouse but skin. It all made him physically weak again. Leaning up against the island, he tried to appear casual rather than faint.
In a low voice that was sexy without meaning to be, she asked him if he was all right. Truthfully, he didn’t have a clue. The dreams he had of the women around him were on the verge of becoming real. Pleasant, this possibility of satisfaction on the horizon, but he didn’t understand why it was happening. He was the same person he had been last week, and the week before. What was different now?
“You have the force of the living dead now.” The voice of Adriana’s was no longer even a whisper, it was something Martin only heard in his head. “But like I said before, calling us the living dead is really a misnomer.” Inwardly, Martin used his force to tell the voice to shut up.
“I’d better be going, Catherine.” He wasn’t sure why, but Martin just wanted to leave. If only his legs didn’t feel like jelly.
“What’s the rush? Nash won’t be home tonight. We could have a little dinner, share a bottle of wine.”
“I promised Mom I would help out at the store tonight, so I just need to change my clothes and get over there.”
“Need any help? You know, changing your clothes?”
“I think I can handle it, thanks.”
She put her hand on his chest. “Okay, Martin. Another time. Nash spends an awful lot of time away from home. I do get lonely, you know.”
“And only you can cure her loneliness, big boy,” Adriana said, chuckling.
When he had safely made his way out of the house, Martin looked despondent. Adriana was waiting by the front door of his house. “Why so blue, my friend? Are you finding out your dreams aren’t really what you wanted after all? That can be kind of a bummer, having to figure out what you really want out of life. At least you’re doing the right thing so far.”
Martin didn’t get angry, visibly angry, often, but now he was furious. He spoke in a low, husky tone of voice that had more impact than yelling. “Who the hell are you to tell me what the right thing is? Quite frankly, who the hell are you? You come out of nowhere, turn my life upside down with these stupid stories of vampires and the force, like you think you’re in some Star Wars movie for blood suckers. You know what?”
He was standing erect now, instead of with his normal shoulder hunch, glaring at Adriana. “I don’t believe in any mental force, or vampires, or werewolves, or any of that. I want you out of my life. I never want to see you again.”
Just then, he spied a squirrel digging in a flower patch. Martin felt as if his blood was literally boiling. His skull was going to explode if he couldn’t get some sort of release. Eyes closed, he began to pant. Feeling heavy, his lungs too now wanted to explode. The inside of his mouth was horribly painful, as if he were growing new teeth. Which he was. His lips formed a sneer, his tongue ran over the newly born razor sharp fangs.
“I have had it with these squirrels digging up my garden!” Quicker than a lightning flash he snatched up the squirrel, squeezed it tightly in a death grip. Martin Van Buren now felt a lust unique to his kind. He was about to have his first taste of another creatures blood.
Before sinking his fangs in, he froze. “Holy shit. I really am a vampire.”
Then he remembered the cemetery, Adriana, the blood, other bodily fluids, the wolf. Had any of that really happened? It couldn’t be anything more than a bad dream. He was in too good a mood now for the last two days to have been real. Vampires and werewolves! Nonsense.
There was no pain in his neck, which Martin thought was a good sign. He stood, looked in the mirror, saw no marks on his jugular. Lifting a hand to touch his neck made him feel somewhat silly, but, the simple gesture reassured him that everything was normal.
“Vampire bites heal quickly, Martin.”
He whirled around. Adriana stood near the door, smiling at him. “Whoa! How the heck did you get in here?”
“I snuck in. Vampires are very sneaky. That’s why I wore sneakers today.”
Martin looked down. “Chuck Taylor’s. Very nice. So really, how did you get in?”
“Your mother let me in. She told me to go upstairs and wake your lazy ass up, make sure you’re still alive. Then she went back to work.”
“I don’t think she said, ‘lazy ass’.”
“No, but she implied it. She was surprised you were still asleep. She’s a little worried about you, you know. Wandering around all night, coming home late, sleeping all day. She says that’s not like you.”
“Well, no, I guess that isn’t like me. Things have been a little weird the last couple of days.”
“Yeah, I’ll bet. Two suicide attempts and a hot chick turns you into a vampire.”
“And I think I met a werewolf, too.”
“You think you did? Seems like something you would be sure about.”
Martin sat down on the edge of a recliner and stared at the floor. “I don’t understand anything anymore. Reality doesn’t seem to exist.”
“Reality is just different from what you thought it was.” Looking around, Adriana sat down in the nearest chair. It was blue and shaped like a hand. She smirked and said, “A hand chair. How very stylish - if you were a teenager and this was 1975.”
He ignored the sarcasm, preferring to sit silently while looking confused.
“Listen, Martin,” Adriana continued, “I’m sorry about losing my control last night. I had never intended to turn you.”
He gave her a blank stare. “You know I think you’re nuts, don’t you?”
“Still not a believer, eh? A vampire bites your neck, you see a werewolf, and you’re still not convinced that there’re things out there that most people have no concept of. That’s okay, I don’t blame you. It’s hard to accept this stuff. But life is going to be different for you from now on. That’s just a fact.”
“What’s going to be different? I don’t want anything to be different. I want my life to be back to what it was.”
“You want your life back? Then why did you try to get rid of it?” Adriana stood and walked around his room. “You know, you’ve got it pretty nice here. Look at all this stuff. TV, mini-fridge, microwave.” She looked out the window. “I see your neighbor likes to sunbathe topless. She’s got a nice rack for an old broad.”
Martin nodded. “That she does.”
“You ever go over and visit? You ever hit that once in a while?”
“You’re being disgusting. Miriam is like a hundred years old. I help her with her gardening once in a while, go to village council meetings with her.”
“Yeah, whatever.” Adriana laughed. Martin rolled his eyes.
“How about some coffee?” she asked. “You look like you need a caffeine injection. Let’s go to Mama Maria’s. We’ll take a walk, get you some air.”
Martin pondered long enough to give Adriana an opening. Before he knew it, they were out the door, walking at a brisk pace toward downtown Arbor Woods.
“Think you can keep up with me, Marty?”
“Martin,” he corrected her. He hated being called Marty. It sounded so common, and he liked to think he was anything but. “Yes, I can keep up with you. No problem,” he said as he was having trouble keeping up with her. She glided blissfully along; he was at a near gallop, sweating and gulping for air.
She decided to show mercy on him. Her pace slowed, allowing Martin to catch up and walk alongside her comfortably.
“It’s the shoes,” he said. “I’m not wearing my running shoes.”
“You have running shoes?”
“”Yes. Good ones too. Expensive. Probably because they’re American made.”
“Do you ever run in them?”
“Well, no. But they are very comfortable. Great walking shoes.”
When they reached the bookstore, Martin was still sweating. His shirt was damp and the beads of perspiration on his expansive forehead gleamed under the lights. At the cafe counter, he ordered an iced coffee. Joanie, the barista, narrowed her eyes when she saw the condition he was in. “Are you okay, Martin? You look like you’re going to have a heart attack.”
“I’m fine. Just a little warm outside.”
Uncharacteristically, Joanie reached out, taking his hand in hers. “I hope so. I worry about you.”
“You do?”
“Oh yeah, absolutely.” She looked him up and down. “You seem different today. Are you wearing cologne or something?”
“No. Perhaps it’s my natural manly musk.” Normally the result of his attempting humor in conversation with a woman was a silent stare on her part, followed by Martin feeling stupid and self-conscious. In this case, Joanie responded by saying, “Oh Martin, you’re so funny sometimes. Well, enjoy your coffee. I put a little extra sugar in there for you. I know how you like it.”
Martin joined Adriana at a table in the back.
“What’s wrong, M? You look a little confused.”
“This is the first time Joanie has ever really spoken to me. It’s like she was coming on to me a little bit. It’s odd. I always thought she was on the other team.”
“Oh, she’s definitely on the other team. I mean, look at her! For cryin’ out loud. She’s got a tattoo on her bicep that says ‘Dad.’ That doesn’t mean she might not dig you a little bit, for reasons unknown to her. Vampires give off a sensual vibe without even trying. No one is immune. People who wouldn’t normally be attracted to you will start falling all over you, wanting to be near you and not even know why. Of course, I had that before I became a vampire. But, like I said, things are going to be different for you now.”
“Really? Why, because you’re a nut job who thinks she’s a vampire and you tried to drink my blood?”
“C’mon now, Martin, be polite. For one thing, I am not a nut job. I’m unique, I can get wild on occasion, but that does not mean I am a nut job, as you so eloquently put it. For another thing, I didn’t try to drink your blood, I really did drink it. Made me sick, as it turns out, but that doesn’t make me any less of a vampire, nor does it make you any less of one now that you’ve been turned.”
He guzzled down his coffee, the icy liquid cooling down his whole body. “Okay, I’m a vampire. I drink blood now. So, where’s my bloodlust? How come I’m not out on the prowl for a little strange plasma? Where’s my bloodlust, damn it?”
She gave him a cool stare. “There’s no need for sarcasm. You will have a taste for blood sooner or later. It will come eventually. But there’re things you need to understand first, so you don’t go transforming just any Tom, Dick or Harry. There’s some unwritten rules to follow. I’ll make it my job to help you through this period of your life. Especially since I’m the one who caused this period to happen.”
“Do you have some kind of instruction manual for me? It seems like that would be helpful.”
Adriana’s eyes lit up. “You know, you’re right, that would be helpful! I should write a vampire instruction book. You can help me write it. We can call it You’re a Vampire! Now What? Or maybe Transformed: What to Expect When You’re Expecting to be a Vampire. Or maybe one of those books for idiots, you know, like The Complete Dummy’s Guide to Being a Vampire. I think there are a lot of possibilities with this subject.”
Martin swallowed the last of his coffee. “I still think you’re nuts.”
“Fine, be a doubter. That will get you nowhere. You’ve got the potential for eternal life now, and you’re going to need my help.”
Ice was melting in his cup and Martin slurped it up through the straw. “Well, I do have many questions.”
“That’s good. I’d be happy to help you - but only if you stop that freakin’ slurping!”
Martin looked at her innocently while making an incredibly loud slurping noise.
Adriana gave him a look. “Apparently, I should have transformed someone with better table manners.”
“Apparently,” he replied. “I noticed when you were in my room that I could see your reflection in the mirror on my dresser. I thought vampires couldn’t see their reflections.”
“That’s a myth. There’re many myths about vampires. All those books and movies over the years, people see them and believe that stuff. Like we can turn into bats and fly around. I wish. That would be pretty cool if we could do that, don’t you think?”
“Absolutely. I also noticed you didn’t mind walking around in the bright sunshine. You didn’t melt or turn into a heap of vampire dust or anything. You just went on your merry way like everything was hunky-dory.”
“Where do you get these phrases from? Who says ‘hunky-dory’ anymore?”
“You didn’t answer my question.”
“Okay, smart guy. The sun doesn’t bother vampires. If it didn’t bother you in life, it’s not going to bother you in the afterlife. Or whatever you want to call this. I just call it life.”
“So you’re not dead. Or the undead.”
“Wouldn’t undead imply that I was once dead but now I’m alive? That sounds more like a zombie, and there’s no such thing as a zombie.”
“So I’ve heard. Where’s your coffin?”
“My what?”
“Your coffin. You know, the thing you sleep in.”
Adriana grew frustrated when she heard that. “I never understood why a vampire would have a coffin. Like I said, we’re not dead, so why have a coffin?”
“Don’t knock it, it might be comfortable.”
“Sweetie, I have a king size bed at home. It has one of those remote things so I can control how firm the mattress is. Now that’s comfortable.” She shook her head, laughing. “Coffins? Who the hell wants to sleep in a coffin? I get a little claustrophobic, so that would be awful.”
“I get claustrophobic too.”
She looked at him with a soft expression. “See, we’ve got so much in common. We both get claustrophobic, we’re both vampires, we, uh, huh, yeah, well, we don’t have that much in common, but still, it’s something.”
Martin slurped up the last of the melted ice. “So, we’ve established you, or should I say we, don’t sleep in coffins, unless of course we really want to, we can walk in the sun, maybe even go to the beach, and we can’t turn into bats and fly away. Have I got that right?”
“You do.”
“Anything else I need to know?”
“Plenty, but I don’t think you’re in the right frame of mind to hear it.”
He looked thoughtful for a moment. “Perhaps you’re right about that.”
“You know, the more I think about it, the more I like the book idea. We could sell it to a publisher as a spoof, or a parody, or whatever the correct literary term is, but it would really be a valuable guide to the newly transformed. It would be an underground classic.”
“Yeah, I’ll mull that over.” He glanced over his shoulder. Joanie was smiling at him. Returning the smile, his cheeks began to turn crimson, then he shyly turned away.
Adriana was grinning at him. “I told you, you’ll find that the ladies are more attracted to you, now that you’ve got that ‘vampire thang’ goin’ on.”
“Had I known all I needed to get women was a ‘vampire thang’ I would have been bitten a long time ago. If I had I been able to meet a real vampire, of course.”
“Of course.” Adriana stood. “Come on, I’ll walk you home. I know you don’t like to be out of your room for too long.”
Joanie watched them walk out together, wondering just why it was she suddenly found Martin so appealing.
The experienced vampire and her newly minted protege strolled in the direction of Martin’s home. While Adriana spoke constantly about the book idea, he tried to ignore by looking at the sky, the trees, the gardens they passed. That’s when he saw Amelia sitting in her yard again. He turned toward Adriana to tell her of how women like Amelia always seem to look through him, but found Adriana had disappeared. Dumbfounded, Martin stopped to look around for his missing companion. By this time Amelia had made her way across the lawn.
“Hello, Martin. You look like you’ve lost something.” She was a blonde now. A loose fitting plain white t-shirt blew slightly in the breeze while madras shorts offered a fine view of her legs. So simply dressed, yet Martin found her stunningly beautiful.
“Lost something? Yeah, well, no, not really.” Even though he felt like he was making a fool of himself, he noticed she was not only engaging him in conversation but making eye contact with him as well. It was a turn of events he found both pleasing and disconcerting.
“Did you get a haircut or something?” she asked. She thrust a hip to one side, ran a finger over her lips. “You’ve changed something, I just don’t know what.”
“I’m pretty sure I’m the same old me.” Okay, he thought, I really suck at making small talk. Really.
“Oh, you’re so amusing, Martin,” she said as she touched him lightly on his arm. He thought he would faint. The spell was broken when he realized he had absolutely no intelligent comments to make since there wasn’t enough blood going to his brain.
“Uh, I need to, uh, go. Home. Yes, home. I need to do you. I mean stuff, I need to do stuff. At home. Now. Go.”
She giggled, touched him on the arm again, then brushed windblown hair back from her forehead. It was the sort of thing that made his knees buckle. “Well,” she said, “stop by again. Maybe next time you can come inside.”
Martin was definitely dizzy now. “Huh?” was all he could say.
“You know, come inside the house and visit for a while. See you.” She gave him a little wave, she giggled again, then spun around and walked back to her front door. Martin watched every step Amelia took until she was inside the house. When he could no longer see her, he stared at the space she had been in.
“I told you things would be different.” Adriana was standing only a foot away from him.
Startled by her sudden appearance, he almost screamed at her, “Where did you come from?”
“I was around. Matter of fact, I was here all the time. You need to work on your social skills. You are not good at small talk. Let’s walk and talk.” As they did, she explained how vampires can use the power of their minds. “For instance, I simply focused my thoughts on your little blonde friend. I influenced her to focus on nothing but you and your sexy self. My thoughts combined with your newfound vampire groove made me seem invisible to her.”
“You were invisible to me, too.”
“That’s because you were thinking how nice it would be to see her naked. I could have sung the National Anthem at the top of my lungs, and you wouldn’t have noticed.”
“I wouldn’t say that’s exactly true,” Martin stammered.
“Bullshit.”
“You’re right.” He gave her a sidelong glance. “Will you teach me how to use that mental focus thingy? I’m not real good at thinking straight sometimes.”
“Oh, so you’re coming around to the whole vampire concept, are you? Especially now that there are chicks involved.”
“I’m not saying I think that I’m a vampire, or that you’re a vampire, I’m just saying you may have some things to teach me, that’s all.
He looked to his side. She was gone again. “Hey, I know you’re there. You haven’t really disappeared. You have to show me how to do that.”
“Are you talking to me, Martin?” It was Catherine Clover. Having parked her Lexus in her driveway, she had just taken a bag of groceries from the trunk of her car when she heard him.
“Who me? Uh, no, I was just, uh, talking on my cell phone.”
“Slick,” Adriana said in a barely audible whisper. His eyes darted from side to side, but he couldn’t see her. “You know you don’t have a cell on you.”
“It’s one of those new cells, nothing but an ear bud.”
“Good attempt, but you don’t have an ear bud, either,” Adriana whispered.
“Oh, I don’t even see it. It must be tiny,” Catherine said.
“I think she’s insulting you,” Adriana said.
I’m going to kill you, Martin thought. Can you hear that, Adriana? No reply.
“Can I help you with the groceries?” Martin asked her.
“Hey, maybe she’ll give you a little reward, if you know what I mean.”
Trying to drown out Adriana’s voice, Martin attempted to concentrate on Catherine. He set the bag of groceries down on the island in the center of the kitchen.
“Thank you, Martin.” She drew near, closer to him than she had ever been before. A whiff of her perfume wafted over, he could feel the heat her body threw off. She tilted slightly toward him, allowing him to note that there was nothing beneath her blouse but skin. It all made him physically weak again. Leaning up against the island, he tried to appear casual rather than faint.
In a low voice that was sexy without meaning to be, she asked him if he was all right. Truthfully, he didn’t have a clue. The dreams he had of the women around him were on the verge of becoming real. Pleasant, this possibility of satisfaction on the horizon, but he didn’t understand why it was happening. He was the same person he had been last week, and the week before. What was different now?
“You have the force of the living dead now.” The voice of Adriana’s was no longer even a whisper, it was something Martin only heard in his head. “But like I said before, calling us the living dead is really a misnomer.” Inwardly, Martin used his force to tell the voice to shut up.
“I’d better be going, Catherine.” He wasn’t sure why, but Martin just wanted to leave. If only his legs didn’t feel like jelly.
“What’s the rush? Nash won’t be home tonight. We could have a little dinner, share a bottle of wine.”
“I promised Mom I would help out at the store tonight, so I just need to change my clothes and get over there.”
“Need any help? You know, changing your clothes?”
“I think I can handle it, thanks.”
She put her hand on his chest. “Okay, Martin. Another time. Nash spends an awful lot of time away from home. I do get lonely, you know.”
“And only you can cure her loneliness, big boy,” Adriana said, chuckling.
When he had safely made his way out of the house, Martin looked despondent. Adriana was waiting by the front door of his house. “Why so blue, my friend? Are you finding out your dreams aren’t really what you wanted after all? That can be kind of a bummer, having to figure out what you really want out of life. At least you’re doing the right thing so far.”
Martin didn’t get angry, visibly angry, often, but now he was furious. He spoke in a low, husky tone of voice that had more impact than yelling. “Who the hell are you to tell me what the right thing is? Quite frankly, who the hell are you? You come out of nowhere, turn my life upside down with these stupid stories of vampires and the force, like you think you’re in some Star Wars movie for blood suckers. You know what?”
He was standing erect now, instead of with his normal shoulder hunch, glaring at Adriana. “I don’t believe in any mental force, or vampires, or werewolves, or any of that. I want you out of my life. I never want to see you again.”
Just then, he spied a squirrel digging in a flower patch. Martin felt as if his blood was literally boiling. His skull was going to explode if he couldn’t get some sort of release. Eyes closed, he began to pant. Feeling heavy, his lungs too now wanted to explode. The inside of his mouth was horribly painful, as if he were growing new teeth. Which he was. His lips formed a sneer, his tongue ran over the newly born razor sharp fangs.
“I have had it with these squirrels digging up my garden!” Quicker than a lightning flash he snatched up the squirrel, squeezed it tightly in a death grip. Martin Van Buren now felt a lust unique to his kind. He was about to have his first taste of another creatures blood.
Before sinking his fangs in, he froze. “Holy shit. I really am a vampire.”
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