Chapter 13 - Back in the Saddle?

    Naked as the day he came into the world hundreds of years ago, Archie Greenway lay stretched out on a cold stainless steel table. In just a few minutes, Fredrik Husby, proprietor of the finest funeral home in Arbor Woods, was going to remove whatever vital fluids remained in the old boy, and replace them with fluids of the embalming kind. For the moment however, Husby was placing Archie’s clothes into a tote bag with the Husby Funeral Home logo on it, making note of each item on an embalming report. That finished, he would place Archie’s body in it’s final, everlasting pose.

    Husby looked the body over for any bruises, catheters, or IVs. He found none. He studied Archie’s face and noticed that it had a slight grin. Anything approaching a smile on a dead body displayed at a wake would be morbid, Husby thought, as he reached over to smooth the lips down into neutral position.

    Archie opened his eyes and said, “Hi!”

    The funeral director leaped backwards, tripped over his own feet and nearly fell. “Holy Jesus! You’re alive!”

    “Holy Jesus is right. Do you know how cold this table is? This is no way to treat the dead. Don’t you think the dead have feelings?” Archie pondered this for a moment. “No, I guess they don’t. Anyway, the thing of it is, apparently, I am not quite as dead as everybody thought I was. I felt dead for a while there, but I’m much better now, thank you.”
   
    Husby stood still and silent, simply staring at Archie. In his thirty years in the funeral business, he had never had a dead person say hello to him.

    “Do you think you could help me sit up?”

    Fred couldn’t move, but found the courage to speak. “I’m so sorry. This has never happened before. Everyone - we all thought - well, there was a concensus of opinion - that, you know, that you were deceased. I really hope that this doesn’t sour your feelings toward the Husby Funeral Home.”

    “I don’t have any feelings about your funeral home,” Archie said as he struggled to sit up. “I don’t really have any feelings at all right now. I’m numb from laying on this cold metal. I’ll tell you what, my butt is really sore.” His feet dangled over the edge of the table, and he swung his legs like a small child.

    Spying the tote bag on the floor, he asked, “Are those my clothes in there? I’d really like to get dressed and get out of here.” Then he saw his suit hanging on a rack. A look of distaste crossed his face. “My brown suit? Augusta was going to let me be buried in brown? I always told her, my favorite suit was the dark blue one, with the pale blue pinstripes. She never listened. Wait until I get ahold of her. Good thing she’s stacked, if you know what I mean.” Archie winked at the bewildered mortician.

    “Sir, Mr. Greenway, maybe you could just wait here while I contact someone.” He had no idea who to call.

    “Yes, yes, there will be time for all that later. Let me ask you, are you Italian?”

    “No, no I’m not. Swedish.” Husby was even more confused now. “I’m not sure what that has to do with anything, sir.”

    “I smell garlic. Garlic gives me heartburn. Used to be able to eat anything I wanted without a problem, but now,” Archie shrugged, “not so much. I have to be more careful, watch what I eat.”

    “I did have Italian for dinner last night. Is there something I can get you? Can I get you a glass of water?”

    Archie smiled. “Water? No, no water. I’m hungry. I need to eat if I want to keep on living.”

    “Well, I, uh...”

    “Come a little closer. What’s your name again? Husbandry?”

    “No, it’s Husby. It’s, uhm, ah, Fredrik Husby.”

    “Can I call you Fred?”

    “Well, I normally go by Fredrik.” Husby stepped slowly toward Archie.

    “Fred, I’m going to need an antacid later. Do you have any antacids?”

    “Yes, I have some in my office.” Husby suddenly felt very weary, unable to think as clearly as he had just a few minutes ago.

    “Good, I’m really glad to hear that. Listen, come a little closer, I’m an old man and I want to talk to you.” Husby did as he was told. Archie put his hands on the other fellow’s shoulders. “Listen, I think you’re a good guy. I hope some day you can find it in your heart to forgive me, and maybe we can be friends, spend time together, play a little cribbage, maybe get a bite to eat, just not Italian. Like I said, it gives me heartburn. Anyway, I’m really sorry about this, but I am famished and I don’t think I can make it out of this building without your help.”

    Fredrik Husby’s mind clouded over completely just as Archie bared his fangs.
   

Chapter 12 - Salty Chocolate, Bloody Squirrel

    “Okay, so let me get this straight, you give eternal life to someone who wants to die and you expect him to be thankful?”

    Martin paced to and fro in his room while Adriana, ensconced comfortably on a black leather recliner, tried to get the TV’s remote control to work.

    “I think a little gratitude would be nice, yes. A simple thank you for bringing some joy into your life would be sufficient.”

    “Joy?” Martin stopped dead in his tracks. “I’m not feeling any joy right now. I feel dread. Even in the best of times I don’t do joy, and I don’t think these are the best of times.”

    “Blah blah blah.” Adriana whacked the remote against her thigh a few times, then tried to turn on the TV, with no result. “Maybe you should learn to look at the bright side of life once in a while, then you wouldn’t mope around your room all day and night.” She  slapped the remote against the palm of her hand.

    “For heaven’s sake, what are you trying to do?”  

    “I’m trying to turn on the freakin’ TV! I want to watch Jeopardy.”

    “I’m pretty sure that’s not on right now.”

    “I recorded it.”

    He gave her a quizzical look. “You recorded it? On my DVR?”

    “Yeah. Mine’s not working. I gotta call the cable company and get a new one.”

    “When did you program my DVR?”

    Adriana stopped abusing the remote control long enough to roll her eyes. “I came in the other night when you were sleeping. I figured you’d be less likely to give me grief if you weren’t awak. And I was right. You didn’t say a word, although you do mumble a lot.”

    Martin was aghast now. “You watch me when I sleep?”

    “What? Eeeuuuwww, no. That would be creepy. What am I, Santa Claus? Besides, you’re not a pretty picture when you sleep. Your arms and legs are splayed all over the place like someone who took a dry dive from a ten story building...”

    “Splayed?” Martin interrupted.

    “Yes, splayed. It means...”

    “I know what it means,” he interrupted again, sounding testy, as if his intelligence had been questioned. “I just don’t hear it used very often.”

    “Anyway, you’re spread out all over the place, your mouth is open wide enough for me to see your tonsils, and you’ve got some big ones, let me tell you. Like little crab apples guarding the entrance to your throat. So, no, you are not a pretty picture.”


    “Whatever.” Martin sat on the edge of his bed. “Why on earth did you have to transform me anyway? Millions of people out there and you had to choose me.”

    “Well, there weren’t millions of people in the cemetery that night. And you seemed like a nice enough guy. I figured you weren’t going to go out and do stupid stuff with your vampire powers.”

    “Stupid stuff, like what?”

    Adriana became enthused with the idea of being a vampire mentor to someone. “Well, you know, you’re smart enough to not go around turning every Tom, Dick and Harry into a vampire, because, let’s face it, not everyone should have eternal life. There are a lot of assholes out there, and you don’t want to see them around for the next couple of centuries. So, no assholes, that’s rule number one. We in the vampire community call it the Trump Rule.”

    Martin nodded. “Makes sense. I didn’t realize there was a vampire community.”

    “It’s more of a loose association really, nothing formal. We don’t have any organizers speaking out for vampire rights or anything like that. The existence of vampires is still a well kept secret. Not even the government knows about us. At least I don’t think they do. There’d probably be a tax on blood sucking if they did.”

    Martin chuckled, then turned serious again. “Listen, is there any way out of this? I mean, nothing against you and your kind, but I really don’t want to be a vampire. I’m just not cut out for that sort of thing. All that hunting and stalking of humans, grabbing them, biting their necks. I couldn’t do that sort of thing. I don’t even like touching people, to be honest with you.”

    “A phobia about human contact? Get a grip. Or do you have a phobia about gripping things? Anyway, don’t worry about it. A lot of us, most of us, really, don’t even hunt humans. We feast on animals. We grab the occasional woodland creature, have our way with them to nourish ourselves, and then we get on with our lives.”

    “Are you talking about squirrels and things?”

    “Yeah, all of those critters that there’s way too many of.”

    Martin looked confused and worried. “So, there’s millions of vampire squirrels out there?”

    “Oh, Lord, no. Although that would be kinda cool. Vampire squirrels and racccoons and what not, I could train them to do my bidding. I could have furry little minions all over the place.” Adriana snapped out of her reverie. “ Seriously though, the unfortunate thing about feeding on animals is that they die when we drink their blood. No eternal life for them. That’s why we never dine on some critter that’s going extint or something. Just the ones that there are a ton of.” Her face brightened as she got out of her chair. “Hey! I’ll teach you how to feed on a squirrel.”

    “Right now?”

    “Yes, right now.”

    Martin paled and shook his head. “No, I don’t want to, not right now. The neighbors might see.”

    “It’s the middle of the night. No one’s out there.” She stretched out her hand to him. “Come on. You’ve got to do this sometime, and I’m here to guide you through it.”

    “No, I really...”

    “Martin!” she vehemently whispered his name, just as his mother did when she was exasperated with his reluctance to perform some simple chore. It was always effective.

    He jumped up. “Okay, okay!”

    They made their way downstairs, then stood silently in the center of the back yard. For almost a minute they neither moved nor spoke, until Martin leaned closer to Adriana and said in a quiet tone, “This is how we hunt?”

    Without looking at him Adriana replied, “Yes. Be still and they will come to you.”

    Sure enough, a squirrel zigged and zagged over the lawn until it came to rest within a foot of Adriana. In a quick, effortless motion, she bent over and snatched it up. It squirmed for a few seconds, but as she rubbed the animals stomach it became still.

    She turned to Martin. “Your mind should be quiet when you do this, then the animal will be quiet as well. You want them to be relaxed, not fighting you. Send out peaceful thoughts, give them a little massage, then ram your fangs in and have yourself a meal.”

    A look of quesy disgust came over Martin’s face. “Yeah, that’s impressive. Why don’t we let this guy go? He doesn’t look like he’s ready to meet his maker.”

    Adriana spoke in a quiet but firm way to him. “Martin, you’re going to need nourishment at some point. We’ll take it slow. I’ll pierce his neck, and you can sip a few drops of blood, just so you get an idea of what it tastes like.”

    In the dark of night, even with her heightened visual acuity, she didn’t notice Martin had gone from being pale to a sickening shade of light blue.

    “I really don’t think this is a good idea,” he said, stifling the urge to throw up.

    Adriana wasn’t paying attention to him anymore. With a razor sharp fingernail she made a small slit in the squirrel’s neck, put a droplet of it’s blood on her forefinger and offered it up to Martin.

    He glanced at the crimson spot in front of his face for less than a second, then his eyes rolled heavenward and he crumpled into a heap on the grass.

    She looked at the squirrel and said, “I’ve never seen that happen before.” Putting him down on the ground, she told the critter, “All right, off you go, I’ve got other things to deal with right now.” For a few seconds, the squirrel was motionless, then he came to life and chirped angrily at Adriana before running like the devil.

    Adriana leaned over Martin. “Hey! Hey! Wake up, buddy. Are you okay?” There was no response. She slapped him lightly. Still nothing. This calls for something a little more drastic, she thought.

    Making sure the faucet was turned all the way on, and the garden hose was on the jet setting, Adriana hit Martin in the face with a strong stream of cold water. Sputtering, he jumped to his feet, begging Adriana to knock it off.

    “What?” she shouted. “I can’t hear you!”

    “Would you stop that?”

    She released her grip on the nozzle. “What? Oh, this? Sure. You feel better now, Martin?”

    “No. I feel like shit, quite frankly, if you’ll pardon my language.”

    “Don’t sweat it.” She put the hose away while Martin attempted to shake off some water. “You fainted, big boy. What’s with that?”

    “If you must know, I have hemophobia.”

    Her face went blank. “Oh.”

    “Do you know what that means?”

    “Uhm, no.”

    “It means I have a phobia.”

    “Another phobia? What a surprise.”

     He sighed then continued, “Yes, another phobia. I have a fear of blood. I faint at the very sight of it.”

    She looked at him for a moment, then broke into laughter. “You have a fear of blood? You’re gonna need to get over that or else you are not going to make a good vampire, that’s for sure.”

    “You think this is funny?” Martin was now wet, quesy and angry. “Because I don’t think this is funny at all.” Glaring at her, he began to walk in circles around Adriana. “How am I supposed to get along as a blood sucking fiend if I can’t even stand the sight of a single drop of blood. Just thinking about blood makes me nauseous.”

    “We are not blood sucking fiends, Martin. We’re just average people who occasionally need to drink the blood of another person or animal in order to stay alive. But that does not make us fiends. We simply have alternative dietary habits.”

    He stopped circling and stood directly in front of her. “This is all one big joke for you, isn’t it? Bite the fat loser and turn him into a vampire. What a brilliant idea. You didn’t live up to your own standards with me, did you? Am I really someone you want to see walking around for eternity, a big, fat mope like me?”

    It was Adriana’s turn to be angry now. “This is all your freakin’ fault!”

    Martin was astonished at what he heard. He cocked his head slightly and his eyes narrowed. “What? What did you say? You think this is my fault, that I’m a vampire now, a vampire who can’t stand the sight of blood? This is my fault? Really, is that the way you look at this situation?”

    She was defiant. “Yes!”

    “Unbelievable.”

    “Yes, I did let my standards down when I turned you. And yes, that is your fault. And you know why? Because you smelled like chocolate, that’s why! Sweet, warm, gooey chocolate. Mix that with your sweat, and you smelled like salty chocolatey goodness. There! That’s why I turned you, because I have a weakness for salty, chocolatey things! How is a girl supposed to resist that? Especially at this time of the month.”

    Surprised, Martin asked, “Vampire women still have...that?”

    “Oh, yeah. I told you, we’re human, more or less.”

    “I’m sorry...about...you know...the monthly thing.”

    “You’re sorry. How do you think I feel?”

    Martin had calmed down. “I have some toffee upstairs. It’s covered in Belgian chocolate and topped with sea salt.”

    “I know. I found your stash. I didn’t eat it all though.”

    “I appreciate that. Let’s go inside so I can dry off.”

    “Okay. I noticed you still have some Christmas fruitcake in your mini-fridge. I love fruitcake.”

    “You spend a lot time snooping around my room, don’t you?”

    “Only when I’m hungry, or when I want to watch Jeopardy.”

    As the very moment they went inside to dine on Belgian chocolates, Colette, was attempting to nap in a park just a few blocks downwind from Martin’s house. In her werewolf form she lay under the outstretched arms of a stand of stately old Norwegian pines. The lids of her eyes were slowly coming together when she saw the squirrel run past her and out of sight. Then he returned, stopping to glare at her. He chirped foul oaths.

    Colette’s eyes sprang open. “What’s eatin’ you?” Then she saw the nick by his jugular. “Oh. One of those animal only vampies, huh? You should be happy you got away.”

    The squirrel let out another torrent of profanity laden chirps.

    “Don’t take it out on me, little fella, unless you want to be my midnight snack.”

    Indignant, the squirrel turned his back on her, then ran up a tree.

    “Now how am I going to get to sleep?” Colette murmurred to herself. “Damn squirrel’s got me all riled up.” Her eyes began to close again. “The air smells like chocolate. Salt too. That’s a good mixture,” she murmured as she drifted off.    

Chapter 11 - The Beginning of a Beautiful Relationship

    Bulldog Armstrong, a Glock 29 in his right hand, used his left hand to twist the doorknob, on the off chance the front door of Frederick Apennine’s apartment was unlocked. It was not. Standing to one side, Armstrong pounded on the door. He didn’t want to rouse the neighbors but he wanted the occupant to know he was there. In a firm voice that was not quite a shout, he called out: “Federal agent! I have a search warrant! Open the door now!” He emphasized the word “now.”

    It was true that Bulldog Armstrong, so named for his tenacity and the fact that his physical appearance vaguely resembled that of a bulldog, was a federal agent. It was also true that he wanted Apennine to open the door immediately, if not sooner. However, it was untrue that agent Armstrong had a search warrant. It was just a thing that sounded good to say if anybody happened to be listening. Agents of the secret, and secretive, Vampire Investigation Unit worked well outside the law. Officially, the unit did not even exist, so therefore a judicially authorized search warrant was quite unnecessary.  

    “I’m gonna count to three, then this door is coming down, I’m coming in, and I won’t be happy, Frederick.” Agent Armstrong paused a moment, giving the object of his quest a moment to unlock the door. There was no sound of footsteps scurrying toward him, nor even the faintest hint of locks being undone. “All right, Freddie, here we go. One...”  Never being one to bother with the rest of the count, Armstrong stood squarely in front of entrance, then raised a well muscled leg. His rubber soled size twelve shoe hit just next to the knob. The door gave way easily and Armstrong entered, led by his gun.

    Armstrong spoke again, in an even lower voice. “Freddie, you need to show yourself right this minute. We don’t want any problems. You don’t want a bullet in your heart by accident, do you?” His demand was met with silence.

    He scanned the living room for any sign of movement. There was none. Candles on a coffee table dimly lit the lifeless living room. A half drunk glass of red wine sat alongside the candles. There was a beige sofa, a sleek black leather recliner and not much else in the room. More candle light flickered from behind a semi-open door at the end of a short hallway. The apartment seemed oddly still, since the tip that led Armstrong here said Apennine might have company with him, a lady friend to be exact.   Creeping along slowly, Armstrong wondered if Apennine really was at home.

    Armstrong reached the room with the flickering lights. He nudged the door open with the toe of his shoe. It was a bedroom. Lying in bed was Frederick Apennine, a well known interior decorator, womanizer, part-time bank robber when his design business was slow, and vampire. He was naked as a jaybird except for the hunting knife standing straight up in the middle of his chest.

    “Hmmm,” was the only comment Armstrong made at the sight. Tossed on a chair in the corner were Apennine’s clothes. There was no other clothing, not a woman’s nor anyone else’s, to be seen. A small amount of blood had trickled from the wound, then dried up. There weren’t any signs of a struggle.

    Armstrong approached the body, looked down at the knife. The handle was engraved with small gold letters, “To Molly” on one side. He leaned over and read the other side, “Happy 21st.”

    “Well, Freddie,” agent Armstrong said out loud, “looks like this Molly person took a strong dislike to you. Guess I’ll have to find her and ask her about it.”

    “You won’t have to look far,” a female voice said from behind him. As Armstrong spun around to face the voice, he was confronted by Molly Kwiat. Not having had time to dress, she was as naked as the blood sucker she had just stabbed to death.

    Before Armstrong could utter a word, Molly’s fist hit him squarely on the right side of his jaw. The heavy black flashlight she had found while hiding in the closet (the closet Armstrong didn’t notice when he had entered the room) made an excellent blunt object. She used it to strike his left temple before he could react to her punch. Just as in the old cartoons, stars swirled about his head and birds chirped in a mocking fashion. Then darkness overtook him. He crumpled, unconscious, in a heap at Molly’s feet.

    With great alacrity, Molly dressed, removed her knife from Frederick’s chest, cleaned it in the bathroom sink, and then used a towel to wipe her fingerprints from anything she may have touched in the apartment. Not giving too much thought to the fact that she had almost been caught murdering a vampire, if indeed that really was a crime, she gathered up her purse, gave a quick glance to the federal agent she had just assaulted, then exited from the apartment and into the night.

Chapter 10 - One Last Time (For Old Time's Sake)

    With fangs bared and a wild look in his blood red eyes, Archie Greenway propelled himself from his favorite recliner with as much force as he could muster.

    Traveling all of two feet, he landed face down on the floor. His nose bloodied, his upper fangs driven into his lower lip, he had fallen and could not get up.

    “My God, Archie!” his caregiver, Augusta, shrieked. “Are you all right?”

    Her first instinct was to run to his aid, but the old man’s insane babbling caused her to remain motionless.

    Slowly, painfully, he separated fang from lip, then managed to shout in a dry, thin voice, “Come here, woman! Your overlord of the underworld commands it! Kneel before me! Worship me! Hey, come on, let me suck your blood! Oh, Augusta! I think I broke a hip.”

    Augusta remained standing in the kitchen doorway. “Overlord of the underworld? What are you talking about? Archie, you look like you’re bleeding.”

    “Oh, I must have bit my lip. Goddamn fangs. Five hundred years a vampire, but I just can’t get used to them.”

    “Fangs? You don’t have fangs.” Augusta came closer to Archie, leaning over to get a better look at his mouth. “Huh. Your teeth do seem to look different. The ones up front are kind of pointy, but I wouldn’t call them fangs. Too small. I think fangs are supposed to be bigger.”

    “I never had any complaints about my fang size before.” He looked up at her with tired, watery eyes.“You have great boobs. Let me touch them before I die.”

    She straightened up. “You’re not touching anything. And you’re not going to die. At least, I don’t think you are. I suppose we need to get you up off the floor.”

    “Just let me nuzzle my head in between them, then I can pass on to the next life a happy man.”

    “Oh, brother, you really are a drama queen. A horny drama queen.” She looked him up and down. “Does anything hurt? Do you honestly think your hip is broken?”

    “No, there’s nothing broken but my pride. My ancient, vampire pride.”

    She peered with pity at the bag of old bones in her charge. “Yeah, you have to wonder what Dracula would say about you taking a belly flop on the living room floor.”

    “Dracula. What a load of hooey. Never existed, at least not like that Hungarian hambone who played him in the movies.”

    “I always thought Bela Lugosi made a good Dracula.”

    “He was no better than a common junkie.” As quickly as it arrived, his temper disappeared. He asked meekly, “Could you maybe help me up?”

    Augusta pondered for a moment. “I guess. Can’t just leave you there in a heap. Well, I could, but that would be against my employer’s rules. Might be against the law, too. Then again...”

    “Would you just help me up please?”

    “Oh, all right, you big baby.” Within a minute she had Archie on his feet. Facing each other, he swayed until his body was resting against Augusta’s, his arms lightly wrapping around hers, his hands settling on the small of her back.

    “What do you think you’re doing?” she asked him.

    “I’m overpowering you,” he replied.

    “Feels more like you’re collapsing,” she said as she gave him a gentle shove. Slowly moving through the air, he plopped down on his recliner.

    “There, feels better to sit down, doesn’t it?”

    “No. I felt much better with my arms around you.” Looking and feeling weak, he slumped in his seat. “It’s hell to get old, even for an immortal. Or a semi-immortal.”

    Ignoring him, Augusta took a chair from the dining room table and sat in front of Archie. She looked him over with great curiosity. “Your teeth really did get sharper. How did you manage that?”
   
    “I told you, I’m a vampire. In the old days, in my prime, I would have swept you into my arms, thrown you down on the bed, had my way with you. Then I would have sunk my teeth into your neck and we both would have eternal life.”

    “Yeah, eternal life drinking other people’s blood.”

    “Well, you can’t drink your own blood. That’s like drinking your own urine. It’s no good for you. Make you sick.”

    “That’s not what I meant. Drinking blood sounds icky. It would be like going through life having to eat food you don’t enjoy, like liver and onions.”

    “Oh, I used to love liver and onions. Can’t find it at restaurants anymore. Some world we’re living in.”

    “Hold on. If you’re a vampire, why do you need to eat normal human food? I thought you just drank blood and that was it.”

    “No, no. More myths. We can eat anything we want. Pancakes smothered in butter, juicy burgers, goulash. Does anyone make goulash anymore?”

    Augusta was becoming intrigued. “So I could still eat things like kielbasa and enjoy it?”

    “Oh, honey, I’ve got a kielbasa for you.”

    “You’re a disgusting old man, you know that?”
   
    “I’m not sure my kielbasa works anymore, anyway,” he said resignedly. “Of course, if you handle my sausage properly, you never know what might happen.”

    “What might happen is that I’m going to throw you back down on the floor and leave you there.”

    “All right, okay, I’ll behave myself. Seriously, Augusta, the things I’ve seen. I was in Florida when Apollo 13 took off. I was driving along, people were pulled off to the side of the road, standing by their cars, looking up at the sky. There it was. It had just launched, I could see the flames, the exhaust. It was beautiful. I always thought I had brought it bad luck though. You know, they were the ones that had the problem.”

    “Yeah, I saw the movie.”

    “Uh-huh. I was in Jersey when the Hindenburg crashed. I had never seen one of those zeppelins land, so when I read in the paper it was going to land at Lakehurst, I had a friend take me over and we watched it come. Scared the crap out of us when it caught fire. Ran for our lives.”

    “Sounds to me like you’re bad luck.”

    “Hmm, does seem like it, doesn’t it? Maybe I should have stayed home more.”

    Augusta looked closely at his mouth. “Looks like your fangs have gone away.”

    “Yes, they only appear when it’s feasting time.”

    “Is that what you call it, ‘feasting time’? Nice.”

    “We have to call it something. When a vampire transforms a normal - that’s what we call you non-vampires - we refer to it as feasting. Because that’s what it is. We’re replenishing our strength, nourishing our bodies, our souls, our minds.”

    “You have a soul, Archie?”

    “Very funny. Of course I do. Every living thing has a soul. And when a vampire puts the bite on a person, we absorb some of their soul, and vice-versa. The new vampire gets a little bit of the old. Same thing with the mind. The old gets an infusion of the new vampire’s knowledge, and the new gets some of the old vampire’s intelligence. Not all of it. In some cases, such as with a centuries old creature like myself, all the accumulated knowledge would be overwhelming. The newly transformed humans head would explode, or something like that.”

    “Uh-huh. You’ve got this all pretty well figured out.”

    “Well, I have been around a while, my dear.”

    She leaned back in her chair. “So let’s say I’m a vampire and I’m living the life eternal. How do I take care of myself? I still have bills to pay. I don’t want to work as a caregiver forever.”

    He looked at her incredulously. “Have you taken a look in the mirror? You’re a hot mama. You get yourself one of those parents, a sweetened father...”

    “You mean a sugar daddy?”

    “Yeah, whatever. Get one of those things, let him take care of you, and when he kicks the bucket from old age, you find yourself another one. Vampires age at a fraction of the rate normals do. You just have to keep finding someone to feast on once in a while, to stay youthful and refreshed. It doesn’t even have to be a person. Some of us go for animals instead, leaving humans out of the equation entirely. Of course, the animals simply die after being bitten, rather than turn into vampires. I’m not sure PETA would approve, but what do they know? Damn hippies.”

    “Animals? You mean, like squirrels? I hate squirrels.”

    “So do I! God’s most useless creature, other than used car salesmen. Bought a used Chevy Impala once. After a week, I couldn’t get the car to go in reverse. Went and found that sales guy, got my money back. They never did find his body.” Archie winked at her.

    What Archie was telling her gave Augusta pause. She reflected on her life. Born in Chicago, she was raised in a tiny apartment above a dive bar on Damen Avenue. In fact, her father wanted to call her Damen. Her mother informed him that Damen was a masculine name, so they both agreed that nearby Augusta Boulevard would be her namesake. Only the influence of the priest performing the baptism kept her middle name from being Boulevard. There were no childhood beatings, nor any alcohol or drug abuse in the family, just a grinding poverty brought on by having a stay at home mom minding seven children and a nearly illiterate father slaving away as a grammar school janitor. Augusta had worked hard since dropping out of high school, helped support the family, but with dead parents and siblings scattered to the four corners of the globe, she had no one but herself to worry about now. A never ending series of lifetimes being cared for by rich men had a certain appeal for her. Augusta didn’t fully place her faith in Archie’s tales of vampires, but she didn’t entirely disbelieve him either. She was willing to take a chance.

    “All right, let’s do this,” she told him emphatically.

    “You mean sex?”

    “Not by any stretch of the imagination do I mean sex. The vampire thing. Let’s change me.”

    Archie was surprised. This was the first time in decades he had successfully persuaded a woman to do something he asked of her. “Are you sure? There’s no turning back, you know. Once you’re in the club, you’re in for life. Like being in the Mafia, but with a better retirement plan. You know, I knew Lucky Luciano. He was one of us.”

    “Yeah, okay, let’s focus on me here.”

    “Sorry.”

    “So how do we do this?”

    He looked around the house. “Well, let’s see. I’ll need to be on top of you.”

    “Oh, for heaven’s sake!”

    “It’ll be easier on both of us that way. Standing would take too much out of me. It’s a lot of stress on the body of both vampire and normal when someone gets transformed. I promise to be a total gentleman.”

    Augusta rolled her eyes. “That’ll be the day.”

    “I helped write that song.”

    “You did not! Come on, let’s get this thing over with.” Augusta grabbed the old fellow by his hands, pulled him out of his chair, and led him into the bedroom. She threw the covers onto the floor and lay down on her back. She lowered the collar of her shirt a to provide easy access to her jugular. “Do you think you can get on top of me without breaking any bones? Or hurting me for that matter?”

    “Don’t you worry, little missy, this is going to be great.”

    Slowly, with much grunting and creaking of joints, Archie managed to get into bed. Gingerly, he placed his body over Augusta’s. There was a faint smell of stale coffee about him.

    “Give me a second, I need to get in the mood, if you’ll pardon the expression,” he told her.

    “Couldn’t you have gotten in the mood before you got on top of me?”

    “Quiet!” He pictured in his mind some of the women in his life. There had been Southern belles, mistresses of their plantations with pale skin that never saw sunlight and light blue veins that ran along the sides of their necks. Of course, the mistresses had slaves, dark skin covered in sweat from daylong toils, strong of body, full of fight until the end. There were European queens and princesses and ladies in waiting, small town schoolmarms and big city whores, young girls lusting for their first thrill and old women longing for a final fling.

    Finally, Archie felt his blood begin to boil. His teeth sharpened. “It will only hurt at first, then there won’t be any pain,” he whispered to her. Like a master craftsman, he punctured her skin in exactly the right spot. “I’ve still got it,” he mumbled, as it was difficult to suck blood and speak coherently at the same time.

    “What?” she asked.

    “Nothum,” he replied.

     Her blood flowed into his mouth. He was right, she thought, the pain was brief, then the area he was biting went numb. She had the strange sensation of being under his control.

    The transformation was taking longer than she had anticipated. At some point she noticed he was no longer drinking. The punctures at her neck felt as if they were clotting. He had been breathing heavily, but it had eased, then seemed to stop altogether.

    She whispered in his ear. “Archie?” No response. She got a hand between their two bodies, placed it in the middle of his chest. There was no heartbeat.

    “Shit!” she said loudly. Archie had died on her, literally.

    She needed to get his body off of hers. First, though, she needed to remove his teeth from her neck. She placed a hand on either side of his head and decided to pry it off quickly, thinking that would be less painful, like swiftly ripping off a bandage. His teeth didn’t want to come out. She wiggled his head a little, gave it a good pull, and out they glided. Once that was done, she pushed his body off, then laid him out on the bed, making him appear as natural as possible, as if he had been taking a nap. Picking the covers from the floor, she flung them over him, then called an ambulance. She would tell them he had been napping, and that she had dialed 911 when he wouldn’t get up and was unresponsive. By the time the paramedics arrived, Augusta was wearing a fashionable scarf around her neck and a look of mourning on her face.