Here, In This Place

[ChrisGibson]

WELCOME TO A NEW WEEK!
Because it was his day off, they did go to lunch, and then they went around downtown looking through some of the shops, and in the back of his mind he thought how women were supposed to like this thing and men were not, except that everything was interesting with Tanitha Tzepesh, and she was that best of things, not clingy, but also never distant. When she was around, she gave everything. When it was time to go, she said so firmly, and kissed him, and went walking off into the rest of the day.

As David went home to find himself a life without this woman for the next few hours, it occurred to him that he had no idea what she did. All of the usual questions: What do you do? What’s your family like? all disappeared in her presence. Even now, he realized he should care about these things, but didn’t really. And in her presence he was never able to pretend.

David watched a little bit of television, and then surprised himself by falling asleep on the sofa, and when he got up he felt pleasant. His place felt like home. He wasn’t lonely and anxious as he had been in Lassador. He thought about his mother frying porkchops and how crispy they had been, the border of hot fat, how golden brown they were, with mashed potatoes. He longed for them so powerfully it hurt, and he was surprised when tears came to his eyes, a sharp deep cut of sorrow, and then he laughed, suddenly happy, and the sorrow was not gone, not exactly, but he was not hurt anymore.

He had been putting so much aside, putting those last days of caring for her, his secret grief and even more secret guilt away. He visited his anger at his sister, and even the anger at a woman, a mother, who had left no life insureance, no instructions, and was perfectly fine with leaving him to handle all aspects of her death. As afternoon deepened toward evening, for the first time David Lawry felt himself living with all of his feelings, and he understood, for the first time, that they were not too much to bear.

He found himself taking the long way. He was going to Rawlston, but he wanted to travel through Lassador. He wanted to travel up the state road as it turned into the South Side. He wanted to see the neighborhood he’d grown up in, cared for his mother and nearly lost his mind in. He wanted to see the spire of Saint Ursula’s in the east and had no idea that the night before a friend of his had come there looking for trouble. Downtown the old hotels, the Amtrak station in the distance, the bridge into the north side, old Saint Ignatius, Ottawa Hills. He wanted to see all this before high up north, he drove into the east, and through subdivions and half farm houses happy in their loneliness, he headed to Rawlston.

At the Blue Note a jazz band was playing, and Nehru, in an Hawaiian shirt, brought David a drink, and said, “It’s good to see you, but when you came I hoped Sunny would be with you.”

“Whaddo you mean?” David said, taking the drink and nodding his thanks.

“Sunny’s a grown man,” Nehru said. “We don’t ever want to be clingy. He texted around two or three in the morning, the usual time he comes home, and said he was fine. But we haven’t heard or seen from him sense.”

“Oh,” David said, making himself take a sip of the boilermaker.

As the peace he had been in that seemed so stable cracked in front of him, David heard himself lie and say, “I’m sure he’s fine.”

Nehru nodded and seemed as convinced of this as David was. So David said, “I am a detective. It’s my job to see what could go wrong. It’s my job to be pessimistic. Do you mind if I go up and look through his room?”

Nehru shook his head.

“I don’t even think the door is locked.”

There was a sort of disappointment David felt coming up the back stair into the set of rooms that made an apartment and a half. Last time hed been here had been his first great day and he had had been drunk and with Dan and loving life and fallen asleep in a beer stupor to wake up to sunlight in his eyes. Now, he was genuinely afraid for Sunny, and the place was empty. The light suddenly turned on in Sunny’s room seemed to harsh, and the place needed a cleaning. He rifled through Sunny’s clothes and his few bags, through the chest of drawers that had been used first by Dan and then by him and, at last, found what he was looking for, Dan Rawlinson’s journals.

When Nehru came upstairs, and asked him if he’d found anything, David said, “I might have. If you don’t mind, I’m thinking of staying here the night.”

“Sounds good,” Nehru said. “You gonna be up a while?”

“Probably.”

“I’ll put some coffee on for you.”

“That would be great.”

Nehru nodded and turned to leave.

“Nehru?”

The shopkeeper nodded.

“He’ll be alright.”

Nehru nodded, let out a breath and turned for his apartment to make coffee.

David had gotten a text from Tanitha and returned it, telling her he was in Rawlston for the night. He was halfway through a cup of coffee when he stopped reading and put the book down.

It wasn’t the first time he’d stumbled into a terrible place where he didn’t know what to do and could only stare at a wall. It had felt that way the day a doctor told him in no uncertain terms his mother would be dead in a day. Now he stopped staring at the wall and the open door to the hallway. He lifted the notebook and read again:



It was opened by a Black woman, and Dan hoped she wouldn’t say something withering like the woman he’d seen before. But any sort of hope didn’t matter because she was so beautiful, and so strange. Her eyes were blue as her skin was dark, and black hair fell down her back like, he felt stupid for thinking it, an Indian princess. She was exactly as tall as he was, and would always be that way, and he wondered if she wasn’t in a costume, for she stood in a red dress with a great dark blue shawl around her shoulders.

And she was still looking at him.

“Trick or treat!” he said.

“Who is it?” a voice came from down the hall.

The woman opened the door, turned around and called, “Trick or treaters! One,” she modified, “Trick or treater.”

There was silence, and then laughter, and then the voice said, “Well, then you have to bring him in.”

The woman nodded and did so, closing the door behind Dan.

The foyer was of paneled and polished wood, and he could see a large old timey living room off to his right, and Dan sniffed the air. “Is that coffee?”

“We’re just getting up,” the woman said. “Would you like a cup?”

“I…” Dan looked at his watch.

“You will not be late to meet your friends again,” she said, gently. “Come. I am Tanitha.”



David sat on the bed, still feeling every part of his body, feeling his breath move slowly through him, thinking if he moved at all, the whole world would shatter. He couldn’t move. He could barely breathe. Thinking was beyond him. But in the end he had to move. He had to pick up the journal and read.



“Are you witches?”

“Well, you already know we aren’t,” Tanitha said.

“Then,…” Dan felt at a loss, “what are you?”

“You are the one who came here and knocked on our door with that lame line,” Tanitha said, “knowing full well there’d be no candy here tonight. And yet you came, so the better question is who are you? And what did you come here for?”

“I…” Dan started. “I… Came to find… I dunno.”

“You do know,” Kruinh said, softly.

“Something more,” Dan said. “I came to find something more.”

Kruinh nodded.

“That is what we are,” he said. “We are that something more. Or part of it.”



If anything was unnatural, or was different than what he had experienced before, it was her. He could not even think her name. He pushed his phone away, somewhere between sickened and terrified to look at it, for the last message had come from here. He blew out his cheeks and ran his hands over his jeans then got up and went down the hall. Brad and Nehru’s apartment was the first door at the head of the stairs and it was divided between their large bedroom and living room and kitchen and then a small hall with a bathroom and a big room and back enclosed porch for the kids who had a little door that opened on the other end of the hallway. Across from it, David had seen, just down the hall from him, was another door, which was to the private bathroom for Dan and Sunny’s apartment made of bedroom and kitchen.

Without knocking, David came into Brad and Nehru’s to get another cup, and Brad was there, his grey and black hiar sticking up as he smoked a cigarette.

“Learn anything?”

“Maybe,” David shook his head.

“I know I said I’m not worried,” Brad said. “But it’s been a whole day, and I am.”

“I know,” David said. “Me too. I’m putting out a ping on his last text to see where it’s from. I’ve already put out a search for him.”

“You have any idea where he is?”

“Not yet,” David said. Then, “Well, I do because I know what he’s looking for. I just don’t know where he thinks what he’s looking for is.”

“He got agitated the other night,” Brad said. “When we were talking about the boy that got killed in Germantown.”

“Thank you!” David said. Then he said, pointing to the pack of cigarettes.

“May I?”

“Be my guest,” Brad held the Winstons out to him.

MORE SOON

 

[ChrisGibson]

That was a great portion and change certainly did come! Gabriel certainly turned out to have a big surprise for Sunny. I am enjoying this story a lot and it never fails to surprise me. Excellent writing and I look forward to more soon!

Thank you!

 

[ChrisGibson]

ON THE ROAD TO FIND SUNNY, DAVID STUMBLES ON UNCOMFORTABLE TRUTHS

At any other time he would have been deep into Dan’s journal, and he had never been a reader, but now he was looking for signs and the signs were there, the funeral home, Germantown, Sunny’s run to Germantown, but it was at the end that David’s face became tight and dry and tingling.

He banged on the door rapidly, and it was opened by a tall, brunette vampire with dark Mediterranean features and wide dark eyes, a look of both concern and suspicion on his face. Dan stood blinking at him, and he said, “Can I... help?” Then… “Who are you? I know you are not human?”
“I’m as human as you,” Dan said. “Please, I need Kruinh or Tanitha.”
The elegant vampire and shirt who looked as if he was on his way to a business meeting eyed him cautiously, but said, “Come in.”
Dan was aware of Myron outside waiting, when this austere vampire closed the door, and he wondered if Tanitha and Kruinh would even remember him and then moments later, Tanitha came down the stairs into the foyer, her shawl wrapped around her but her eyes were wide as she looked Dan up and down.
She flung out her hand and terrified Dan, pronouncing, “Tazi kŭshta da bŭde vidyana zavinagi i nikoga da ne e skrita ot teb. Zashtoto si krŭv ot moyata krŭv!”[1]
And then she said, “From now on this house is always open to you, Daniel. What has happened to you? You have been…” she came nearer, passing the other vampire, and grasping Dan’s chin, “made.
“Who did this?” she wondered. There were, after all, not that many vampires.
“Rosamunde—”
Before he finished both she and the dark haired vampire hissed, and Tanitha swore, “Kuchka ot yamata na ada!

They were all worried. Worry was an insufficient word. Troubled was a better word, irritated even better, angry, afraid, agitated . So, in the end, David left the door open and went to the apartment across the hall to keep vigil with Brad and Nehru and hope for the sunrise. Only in the sunrise could something be done.
He wanted to show them the journals. He wanted to tell them everything, but what would they think? Would they think he was foolish and Sunny was foolish and Dan was out of his mind or having them on? And where the hell was Dan?
Or was showing Brad and Nehru the journals just too much? Was it opening the ordinary world to horrors they didn’t need? Hell, David thought, he knew he didn’t need them! They didn’t make his world any better. He hoped for faith, signs of God, signs of wonder and beauty and what he got was shit like this? Vampires! Fucking blood drinkers! What the….
As the apartment filled with grey smoke three thoughts went through Davud Lawry’s head.
Why did I not have the courage to open those journals before?
If he had read them, he might have known Sunny was on his way to Germantown. Hell, in a way, he known, hadn’t he? He would have gone with him, kept him from whatever he met.
And David thought, there is an enemy, a killer with a purpose, and we never knew what that purpose was, but now we do. The enemy has a name: Rosamunde. It didn’t answer why Blake and the others had been killed. Were they signs or just food? Surely if there were such creatures in the world then they fed regularly, and they would have done it better than this?
Tanitha.
Tan… was the third thought.
Would that she were a witch, whatever a witch was.
Tanitha was a vampire.
David was so angry he wanted to slam his fist on the table because he knew two things were true.
One: Sunny Kominsky was dead by now.
Two: and only in very recent times had his mind made accommodation for such a possibility:
Sunny was now a vampire.

 

[ChrisGibson]

He screamed and screamed until he understood he was screaming, and even then he couldn’t stop. The sudden pain was all he knew, and the suddenness of everything. The air hurt his lungs and burned his skin, and a great burning hunger too, worse than heartburn twisted through his body. Immediately he was given to eat, or drink, his mouth filled, his pores, his cells taking everything in, like a time returning to him long ago when he’d traveled all day, thirsty as fuck across the desert, and was happy at the sight of water. He drank and he drank and he drank until he vomited, and the cool, cool water hurt his stomach.

Only now, as the pain abated, and his mind returned to him, he realized that he was naked, and he was in darkness, that he was strangely stronger and more alert than he had ever been. Quickly memory returned to him. He was Sunny Kominsky of Aladema California. He had come here to find his friend. He had come to Germantown in a shitty city in Ohio called Lassador. He had thought he was saving someone named Gabriel and he had gone home with Gabriel. They’d had sex and Gabriel had… killed him. And what was quenching his thirst, even as he was dislodged by hands stronger than his own, was a chest, and what he was drinking, though it had for him the same nourishing sensation, better actually, than ice cold water, was not ice cold, was not water at all, was most certainly… blood.

“There, there,” Gabriel said, his shirt still undone, the red marks on his white chest almost instantly healing. He put his hands to his knees and said, “You’ve weakened me, Sunny. I gave you too much.”

Sunny knelt, naked on a something like a great ottoman in a large, barely lit room.

“What the fuck have you done to me?” he demanded.

Gabriel was still panting.

“You know what I’ve done to you,” Gabriel said. “And if you remember those journals you told me you read, and what your friend told you, then you also know you’re stuck here for a little bit.”

Sunny put his hand to his throat.

“Your throat was crushed,” Gabriel continued. “It’s often just part of the process. The making is hard. But that’s all done. It’s strange, very strange. It happens almost automatically. For a very long time I was afraid it wouldn’t happen, but it did, and you’re here.”

Sunny ran his hand along his neck where the skin was smooth, and Gabriel said, “When it happens, if you are trying to make someone, if you really want that someone made, it is as nerve racked as we ever get, for the person is truly dead. You were a fucking corpse. I don’t mean you were in a deep sleep. You were just dead dead. And then, about an hour ago, it started to happen, the Change. The discoloration stopped, the bruises went, color came back, your throat…. It healed. And then that thing,… that extra thing. And your heart started beating, and then you were screaming. I don’t know if you woke the others.”

“The others?”

“Carter. My sister. Her crew.”

“Your sister.”

At once Sunny and Gabriel both said, “Rosamunde.”

“Yes,” Gabriel said. “We are… She is making her own clan. I made you for her.”

“Holy fuck,” Sunny shook his head.

“No, no, don’t do that,” the handsome Gabriel said. “I… listen Sunny. When you told me what you told me I should have killed you, but I didn’t because there was a fire in you. I saw that. We made love—”

Sunny turned his face away, wanting to vomit.”

“Look at me!” Gabriel said.

Slowly, Sunny Kominsky forced himself to look at Gabriel.

“When we made love you were so tender, you were so strong I knew why you were here, with me.”

Sunny said nothing.

“It was proorisménoi,” Gabriel’s voice sounded heavy and accented as it moved around the word, “Destined! That is how some of the greatest are made.”

“Fuck you!” Sunny punched Gabriel square in the jaw, and the young man fell back, rubbing his cheek.

He did not appear angry, but stood up and Sunny did as well.

“Yes! Yes, there is that fire. Hit me a thousand times if you must, but I saw it in you. You said you came here for a reason—“

“To find my friend!”

“You found him. You found exactly what happened to him and passed beyond it. He was not meant for this. You were, and you are here. This is your destiny.”

“I will walk out that door in the morning, and set myself on fire!” Sunny declared.

Gabriel’s face changed and suddenly he slapped Sunny hard.

He felt the slap, but it wasn’t painful. It was more like the observation of a slap. Something had changed in him.

“I give you life, and this is how you act with it?” Gabriel said. “Walk out into the…. Walk out into the….Well, fucking walk. Just walk! I’ll open the goddamn door for you in the morning.”

“You’re nuts!” Sunny said.

“We could make love every day and hunt every night,” Gabriel said.

“I’ll never forgive you.”

“Forgive?” Gabriel spat. “What kind of fucking Sunday school lesson do you think we’re in? You are a blood drinker now. Forgiveness means nothing. Now, I will get your clothes. You cannot be introduced to the others like this. As beautiful as you are, you cannot be introduced like this.”

Sunny realized Gabriel was admiring his body and rather than being sickened he wanted to fuck him. So Sunny was disgusted with this new self and as his penis rose he said, “One day I’ll kill you.”

Gabriel looked frankly at his erection, and then turned around to retrieve Sunny’s clothing. When he came back with them and laid them on the Ottoman, as Sunny spoke, Gabriel said, “You would kill me?

“Do you think that threatens me.”

“You don’t believe me?”

Sunny stepped into his briefs and reached for his jeans.

“You don’t understand me at all,” Gabriel said.

“When I saw you I thought, look at this mortal boy, this frail thing who lasts as long as a blade of grass? And there is so much fire in him, so much strength. What if I could make him into what I am? What if he could survive it as few mortals can? He would be… he would be stronger than me. Don’t you see…?” Gabriel looked on him adoringly as Sunny lowered his tee shirt, “don’t you understand? To make something beautiful, something immortal, that was stronger than me, that had the power to kill me…. When the day comes that you take your revenge, I will fall at your feet! I would be honored to die at your hands.”

Sunny froze, staring at Gabriel in wonder.

“We may all eventually die at your hands,” Gabriel said. “But that day is not today. Come. Meet my sister.”

---

[1] “This house be forever seen and never hidden from thee. For thou art blood of my blood.”

MORE IN A FEW DAYS

 

[CharmedFan28]

Those were both excellent portions! Sunny’s friends have a right to be worried. Something big has happened and hopefully he can make contact soon. So much going on but I am enjoying this story! Great writing and I look forward to more in a few days!

 

[ChrisGibson]

Those were both excellent portions! Sunny’s friends have a right to be worried. Something big has happened and hopefully he can make contact soon. So much going on but I am enjoying this story! Great writing and I look forward to more in a few days!

I am so glad you're enjoying the story. It's great to hear from you and know how involved you are.

 

[ChrisGibson]

WELL, NOW THE WEEKEND IS UPON US

Later on, Sunny would say that, more than anything, this place had the feel of a theatre stage that had been transformed into a mock palace. It was a great hall, but Sunny could tell it had been a warehouse. Why these people, these vampires, were in a warehouse in Ohio was a question he’d have to ask when he was better established in his new reality. Everything seemed mad. He couldn’t trust the world right now.

“He is beautiful,” the first woman said.

She was beautiful, strange like something he had never seen before or really only seen in paintings, those odd paintings of knights and fainting women, but here she was, pale skinned with thick, long red hair, a real Ophelia. Beside her, ice white, most un Ophelia like was a woman with long blond hair, and she nodded as well. None of them did so in lust, but more as if looking at a piece of art, and Rosamunde said to Gabriel, “I’m glad he turned out, I worried that you couldn’t do it.”

Gabriel had said much the same thing. Was it that difficult to make another vampire? And if it was so difficult, how had these been made? Except there was something in Dan’s journal that implied that maybe not all of them were made. After all, Tanitha had a father. He shook his head, so many questions to ask, so many questions.

“I am Evangeline,” the blond woman said. “Do you understand what I’m saying?”

“If you speak English I can understand it,” Sunny said.

“I detect sarcasm,” she said, and Sunny, listening to her posh BBC voice said, “I detect a fake accent.”

At this he heard snickers from around the room, and he continued, “I would have thought vampires were above faking it. Guess not.”

“Hold your tongue.”

“You hold your tongue,” Sunny returned, his face not changing. “From what I get of the way this show runs, there’s a boss here, and you’re not it.”

Evangeline’s face was even paler, and he saw that she had lifted her long white hand. She was about to slap him, and he would have slapped her back. He suddenly didn’t care about things anymore. He never had, but now he cared to much less.

“That’s enough,” the beautiful read headed woman said. She was actually in a great soft gown like something from one of those Queen Elizabeth movies, and the light in her hair made it shine like gold.

“There is an order,” she said, “you are right. And it demands respect, and I am at the head of that order and for now I beg you, leave off mocking my lieutenant.”

“And you are Rosamunde,” Sunny said.

“My fame proceeds me,” she looked to her brother.

“Not him. Dan Rawlinson.”

At this her eyes flew open and she lost composure, but only for a moment, and Sunny was reminded that there were other vampires out here, others who could help him. If only he could get out of here.

“What are your plans for me?” he said. “How do I get back to my friends. To my family? Or is that forbidden?”

“It wouldn’t even be possible,” Evangeline said to him.

“You’re new. You cannot walk in the day and you cannot not feed.”

“Feed?”

“But you know what you are,” she continued, though Rosamunde had opened her mouth and now turned to see what Evangeline would say.

“You know what Rosamunde made you, and what you are is something that must feed on women and on men, and that you cannot live without drinking.blood. Welcome to what you are.”

The only resistance Sunny could offer was to feebly say, “Gabriel made me.”

“He made you for me,” Rosamunde said, “swearing fealty to me. So it is as if I made you.”

Fealty, swearing fealty. How old were these creatures? What kind of a world did they come from? Never mind. Sunny shook his head.

“So, I’m stuck here,” Sunny said, and he hated saying that because the words were totally unnecessary. Though Rosamunde only nodded solemnly, the smile on Evangeline’s face made him want to stab her. Stabbing would have done nothing.

A dark haired man, older than Gabriel, less kind looking, stepped forward. He was dressed in modern clothes, slacks, a turtleneck. He had been standing with a group of other guys, and they looked like guys, just guys. Now he held out Sunny’s phone to him.

“Call your friends,” he said.

Sunny took the phone and opened it.

“They keep calling,” the man said.

“This is Carter,” Gabriel said.

“Call them and let them know you are alive,” Carter said. “Let them even know you will be back with them—sometimes—in a few days.”

Sunny saw there had been calls from Nehru, calls from Brad, calls from Dave. Two from his mother.

“You might want to sit down and call them all or… text.” Carter said the word with distaste.

“Obviously it wouldn’t do to tell them too much. You will be staying with us. When strength returns you may even go back to something like the life you were living, but you will always return here.”

“And what if I choose not to.”

“Then Ricardo is already in California waiting to slash Avery Kominsky’s throat,” Rosamunde said without passion. “And after her, your friend Jack.”

“And after Jack… the others,” Gabriel said, but he said it morosely.

“It’s just how we are,” Rosamunde said, not smiling. “We cover all things. So, please, make your calls, and let your friends know you are alive. Tell your boss you are coming back to work.”

“My job is gone by now.”

“I assure you it is not,” Rosamunde said. “Trust me, I have my ways.”

 

[ChrisGibson]

When he slept he dreamed of the sun and the sandy white shore. He dreamed of waves like liquid glass that yellow sun shone through, turning them blue and green and white as they curled and rippled over him like the spirits of stain glass. He was not a poet, he had a hard time stating how he felt when he was on a surfboard or when he was simply on the beach, when he was running with the wind through his hair. This business was never supposed to happen to him. He was never supposed to be sleeping in a casket and getting up to kill people at night.

That was what he hated. That he had not come gently into that long night of death. After the first feeding from Gabriel, he was expected to go out into the streets to kill and come back home.

The first time, he hadn’t killed. He had resisted his urge the whole night, feeling a hand that clawed him from the inside, ripping at his guts, making his veins bulge. He’d gone back into his coffin, twitching and screaming, and as it had been locked on him in the approaching day, he had been rocking and battering against its walls and lid, and Rosamunde’s voice said, “Don’t worry, he will figure it out soon.”

Again, that laughter from Evangeline, again his desire to kill her.

He had figured it out, or rather, it had been figured out for him. It was what Sunny hated them for the most. He had nearly leapt out of the coffin that second night, his face red and white, veins bulging and teeth gnashing.

“We have a thing for you,” Rosamunde had announced.

Carter had unveiled her.

Sunny could still see her now. How beautiful she had been, She was a work of art, the most beautiful girl he’d seen till then, like Venus, her skin utterly white, her breasts round and high, her hair deep red, her face terrified. Her body trembled. If he could say anything now to the girl bound to the stake he would say, “Do not worry, no one will harm you.”

But when they had released him, and he opened his mouth, what he did was launch himself upon her and sink his jaws into her throat. As he growled with consummation, she was gone in a shower of blood and gnawing, and his pain began to dampen as his jaws clamped down on her broken windpipe, and she died in his arms. The madness cleared from him and as she died, the pain in him died, the hunger was assuaged and, at last, the madness, and when he was done he lay there with the dead girl in his arms, understanding what he had done.

In the sudden silence after the slavering sounds of him mangling the girl’s throat, Carter spoke.

“Now you’ve eaten,” Carter said over him. “Now you are back to yourself. Now you understand how necessary it is to always feed.”

Above his head, dispassionate, not happy or sad, Rosamunde had said, “You are too young to not eat. Do not try that again.”

Sunny was one of five. Rosamunde and Carter had made them all, all of them new, all of them sleeping in coffins by day and doing what they were told in the night. One called Mitch said, “You just have to learn to do what they say. Then it’s better.”

“I learned,” the one called Tom said, “that no one’s really that great, and if you just pick someone to… you realize everyone’s done something wrong and nobody’s totally innocent.”

Up until the moment he had launched himself upon that girl, he had felt powerful, more powerful than he ever had before. He did not like to admit this, but he treasured his new sight and his new senses. These others did not seem to. There seemed nothing terrible powerful or happy about Mitch or about Tom. Even their names spoke of despair. Why had Rosamunde made them? But then, maybe Rosamundes reasons were different than Gabriel’s.

Gabriel came to him when the sun was about to rise.

“Stay with me,” he said.

“No.”

“Don’t you understand,” he said, reaching for Sunny’s hand while Sunny pulled away.

“Things will be different. This is only the beginning. We will be a great house, and you will be at the start of it, cunning, wise, beautiful. Only do not starve yourself. Do not do that again.”

“I don’t want to kill people.”

Gabriel opened his shirt.

“Drink,” he said.

“What?”

“You haven’t hunted, and you don’t want to kill,” Gabriel said. “Drink.”

“I want no part of you.”

“What option do you have? If you had gone to bed with me, I would have had you drink from me as we made love, the old fashioned way, the most intimate way between Maker and Made, but you won’t have that. Even if you want it.”

While he spoke, Sunny felt his penis stiffening, but his anger would not allow him to go to Gabriel in that way. Instead, he gathered the other man to him and sank his teeth into his breast. He drank, and drank and drank, and the taste of blood was the sweetest, most wonderful thing he had ever known. When he wasn’t doing it, he was disgusted by himself, but when he was doing it he was in ecstasy, and as he finished and Gabriel swooned in his arms, Sunny suddenly realized that Gabriel, weakened, would probably just go out and do the killing that he himself could not. In a sudden despair, his body hot with new blood, his emotions fallen to a new low, but his erection higher and stiffer, Sunny said, “Come on.”

“Come on?”

“Fuck coffins,” he said. “Take me to your bed.”

HAVE A GOOD WEEKEND

 

[CharmedFan28]

That was a great portion! Sunny is getting acquainted with this new part of his life and I think it is going to take a lot of adjustment. Hopefully he can contact his friends soon so they at least know that he is still around. Excellent writing and I look forward to more in a few day! I hope you have a good weekend too!

 

[ChrisGibson]

Yes, to say the very least, some adjustment will definitely be required. Let's hope he can rise to the occasion.

 

[ChrisGibson]

When he had read Dan’s frank journal, and when he had blushed knowing that Dan gave it to him knowing what he would read, the part where Dan kept fucking Rosamunde had semi confused Sunny, but it did so no longer. Gabriel had said there was a bond between Maker and Made, and like Dan and Rosamunde, this bond had been made in bed. So, in what he now understood as hatred mixed with sexual frustration, he sated himself in Gabriel’s bed. Gabriel had a terrible strength which he had not used that first night they were together, but now Sunny was strong as well, and there was a deep fury in both of them. One could fuck and hate at the same time, and the fucking was so much better. What was more, the shy part, the part that cared, the part that at Brad and Nehru’s apartment had worried about waking up their kids, was gone. Well into the morning Sunny bent Gabriel over, sweat dripping down his brow, to his nose, onto Gabriel while he plowed him. Well past the usual time for sleep, the bed creaked and shouts and screams came from his room, They held onto each other, and the thoughts that rose in Sunny’s mind, that he had never been so close to someone, that he had never hated someone and been in a passion for someone so much at the same time, that this was the best sex he’d ever had, he pressed away. When Gabriel bit his chest or his shoulder and fed on him, he cried out because the pain felt like an orgasm, when he drank from Gabriel while plowing his ass, Gabriel howled, for it felt like climax. Apparently whatever went on in feeding, two vampires could drink from each other for a long time without needing to find fresh human blood. And when Sunny finally did orgasm it was a violent sunrise, one without dawn or gentlenss, a white and yellow explosion as, on the balls of his feet, he half fell from the bed while, he continued slamming into a Gabriel who was on hands and knees, his round buttock’s holding Sunny’s cock an exploding prisoner while the younger man nearly lost consciousness and swooned to his side.


In the dark that was surely day, lying beside Gabriel, Sunny spoke.

“What you did to Blake?”
“Blake?”
Sunny had momentarily forgotten that Blake was why he had come, and Gabriel had, in the last few days, forgotten their initial conversation.
“Oh, your friend.”
` “Yes,” Sunny said, and he said it insistently, largely to cover up the fact that he had managed to forget Blake, “my friend.”
“Oh, he was never meant to be a Drinker.”
Sunny blinked at the casualness with which Gabriel spoke.
“He, and the others who were found, they were practice, practice for Mitch and John and the others to learn how to kill.”
The sensation left Sunny’s face. There was no point in look surprised or angry. These things were beyond Gabriel.
“They were people who looked like they people our new drinkers were used to being with, a test to see if they really could kill just anyone. And… they could. Also,” Gabriel went on, “they were a warning.”
“A warning?”
“To the others. To our enemies.”
“The other vampires?”
Gabriel raised an irritated eyebrow at that word.
“To leave a body lying around is not what we do. It upsets the balance, raises questions so…”
“You killed them and left them to upset your enemies,” Sunny said, “who are doing things the… traditional way.”
“Yes.”
So, of course, Gabriel was responsible for, if unsympathetic about, Blake’s death, but one of these dull drinkers sleeping in their coffins had done it. And if Gabriel who lived a very different life from common people had no understanding of what this meant, then Mitch did, Connor did, Tom did. They knew that a twenty-two year old kid with his life ahead of him had been taken in the night and killed just to be a hunting lesson. This was the answer to Sunny’s question, the end of his journey, and there was no meaning in it, no meaning at all.


Brad cooked a huge breakfast that morning. It was about four a m when they’d gotten the call from Sunny.

“I’ll be back in a few days,” he had said, and they all breathed sighs of relief.

“You can go to work tomorrow in peace,” Nehru had told David.

“If half asleep,” Brad added.

David said, “I already told them I’m coming in late.”

They were so relieved to hear from Sunny, it took a while for them to go to bed, and once they had, they were still up a while. It was almost a relief for morning to get here, and then coffee was on and milk and orange juice were out and Brad was frying eggs and Neru was doing bacon and toast, and they all sat down to eat in a way which was unusual because none of them was usually a breakfast person which is what David said, stuffing his mouth with toast.

The kids got up a little later, and Brad said he was going to run them around town and maybe head to some music stores in the north part of Lassador. It was then that Nehru took out his cigarettes and David surprised himself by taking one too, and finally, Nehru spoke.

“Here’s the thing,” he said, “When we got that call from Sunny, this is how I felt. I felt like I was much more afraid than I wanted to admit, and then I was a lot more relieved, but not completely relieved.”

“Yes,” said David. “Lik something’s going on.”

“Yes,” Nehru said. “Like when a kidnapper tells someone to call and not panic.”

“That was in the back of my mind,” David said.

“Can you ping the call?”

“Possibly. But here’s the thing, It wasn’t a ransom call. It was a call that said he would be back in a few days.”

Nehru waited for David to go on.

“I really think that whoever he’s with….I feel like this is beyond the police.”

Nehru looked surprised to hear a police officer say that.

“You mean like, in the way that terrorist are beyond the police?”

“No,” David said, shaking his head. “No… Not exactly. I… I don’t know how to say it. The world… the world is full of all sorts of things.”

“I’m going to see my uncle,” Nehru stood up.

“What?”

“He says shit like that. He is into… weird things. And you seem to be saying that Sunny is in a weird thing.”

“Can I go with you?”

“Don’t you have work?”

“This is part of an investigation. I’ll call and tell them I am at work.”

 

[ChrisGibson]

After Nehru stopped at the townhouse where his uncle lived, he slapped himself in the head and they kept driving until they were on the campus of Wilmington College.

“This is a hell of a nice place,” David said. “It’s like once you get out of Lassador, the air changes.

“To be fair, as long as you stay largely north in Lassador, it’s all pretty nice.”

They found a man who looked only a little older than Nehru, and not very different from him, in rumpled sweater and cocked fedora, working away in a junky old office that looked very much like what David Lawry would tink of as an old college professor’s office. Books were everywhere, groaning from sagging shelves, and half of them had titles far beyond David while the others were comic books and story books, childrens’ novels along with pulp fiction. David was startled by a copy of Interview With the Vampire.

“Nephew,” the man who was not old, but felt old said, pushing up his glasses, “And… nephew’s friend.”

Nehru embraced his uncle, clapping him on the back, and David shook his hand, introducing himself.

“David.”

“Uriah Dunne,” the professor said.

“My uncle is a professor of the paranormal.”

“I am a professor of classical romanticism gone philosophy that somehow got associated with the paranormal.”

“Like ghost?” David said.

“And witches and vampires and—” the man threw his head back and howled, making David jump, “werewolves. All of it.

“So what can I do you for?”

“I’d love to say we were just here to visit.”

“If you were just here to visit, you and Brad would bring the kids to my house in the evening, and you can, and you should.”

“Remembered and remembered,” Nehru said.

“We have a friend,” Nehru said. “We have a friend, and he disappeared. He… actually came here because one of his friends was one of the guys who was killed a year ago in the Vampire Murders.”

“Right,” Uriah suddenly looked serious.

“The other night, after a long time of silence, there was another murder just like it.”

“And another like it the next night,” Uriah said.

“What?”

“A block east of Saint Ursula’s,” Uriah said, “in an alley. A young man was found dead.”

David wondered how he hadn’t known this, but he had been obsessed with Sunny. If he hadn’t heard from Sunny, he’d be convinced that it was him.

“Also, off of the pattern, but in the north end of Germantown was found a girl, naked throat mangled. The only thing they have in common, but it would be hard for people to tell if they weren’t looking, was that the boy, the young man, was bloodless and had throat bites, and this girl had lost a lot of blood too. Throat crushed as well.”

“Wait!” David sat up. “How do you know all thar?”

“You mean, Detective, because I’m not in the police?”

“How do you know I’m—”

“You walk like police,” Uriah said. “And the truth is, I know lots of things. People tell me many things. People whose secrets are too heavy for them to hold alone. Maybe you know a Tanya Sommers.”

“She was my partner,” David said, feeling the world shrink.

“Well, she was my student. She—and a lot of people—know I’m in this sort of line or work. Always have been.”

“So they come to you,” David said, “because you have an open mind.”

“I don’t know if my mind is open,” Uriah said, “I’ve seen things is all.”

“Uriah’s family is strange,” Nehru said. “I mean, not on his mother’s side. She was my grandmother, and we’re odd, but we’re not… uncanny. Uriah’s family is uncanny.”

“Well, they’re witches,” Uriah said, dismissively.

David didn’t even blink.

“What do you think of those killings?” David asked.

“The Vampire Killings?”

“Yes.”

“I think that you, Detective Lawry, are testing me. Because I think that you know the answer is they were done by vampires. Why they were done so obviously, I have no idea, for a vampire would have a great stake—no pun intended—in keeping his world secret. But I also think I’m telling you nothing new. I think you already know all this and the only one of us who doesn’t is my dear nephew.”

He turned to Nehru, “Am I right?”



MORE IN A COUPLE OF DAYS

 

[CharmedFan28]

That was an excellent portion! I think Sunny’s friends are right to be concerned and I hope he sees them soon. It was sad to learn that Blake’s death was pretty much meaningless for the vampires that killed him. Poor Sunny and his poor family. Great writing and I look forward to more in a few days!

 

[ChrisGibson]

Sunny's in a very rough spot with some very rough people and seems far from freedom or from help right now. I can't really think of anything I can say right now without spoiling what comes next! As usual, I'm glad you're reading.

 

[ChrisGibson]

TONIGHT WE RETURN TO OUR FRIENDS



“You haven’t said anything,” David Lawry said.
“Because there isn’t anything to say,” said Nehru, putting down the last of the journals.
“But do you believe me. Believe them?”
“You do believe them?” Nehru said.
“I’d kind of be an ass not to. I mean, I know there are people who deny everything no matter what’s in their face, but you have to remember, the whole reason I came here is because I saw Dan dead, dead on a table in a morgue. Then your uncle’s friend sent me a DVD and there Dan was, alive and well, and here he is, in these journals—”
“Being a fucking vampire.”
“Yes.”
“Dan is a vampire.”
“A vampire on tour with his band.”
At this they both burst out laughing, and they kept laughing until Nehru said, “And you think they have Sunny?”
David nodded.
“They want to do with him what they failed to do with Dan,” Nehru said.
“Then you believe?”
“Not that that’s the most important thing,” Nehru waved it off, “but yes. You’re right. It’s only an ass that disbelieves in the face of evidence. The real important thing is how do we help him?”
“I think we just have to wait till he comes back.”
“You believe he’s coming back?”
“He said was, Nehru.”
“You believe he’s coming back a vampire.”
“That’s the only way I think they would let him come back.”
“Then here’s the deal,” Nehru turned to him. “What are you going to do about that Tanitha woman?”
David looked away from Nehru and Nehru said, “Not just for the sake of your love life. But… if she is who you say, if she is the one in the journal—and I don’t see how she couldn’t be—then she would know how to help our friend.”

David drove into the sun for half of his journey, not allowing himself to think. As he whizzed down the expressway that hung over the east of Lassador and cut through the south, he could not allow himself to think about his next move. The expressway let off onto a strip of restaurants and Walmarts that had become part of Glencastle, and not far from here he arrived at a jarringly old street, and rolled up and down Brummel with its old Victorians. He came up the 4400 block, the 4500 and at last arrived at the 4800’s, a dense conglomeration of purple and deep red, pink and blue and brick old houses surrounded by little gardens, a regular witch’s village as the summer ended and fall began to touch the first trees.
He parked his car, and walked up and down, remembering what Dan had done, and he saw, old and stately, and very solid, 4844, old brick, 4846, a blue house with white trim, 4850, a pink turreted home with a wrap around porch. A great oak rose up in between the sidewalk and the street, causing the concrete to buckle, and David, looking both ways even on a quiet street, went to the other side and counted house, 4845, 4847, the usual but unexplained jump in numbers that made 4853 the next one. It was not unusual to think the very same thing had happened to 4848, but David stood across the street looking at 4846 Brummel, and then at 4850. He was half hidden by a great tree, and he took out a bit of paper and read, carefully:
“Tazi kŭshta shte bŭde zavinagi vidyana i nikoga skrita ot men. Zashtoto az sŭm krŭv ot tvoyata krŭv.”
It had been a good try, but not one he’d known would turn out. He had taken Dan’s journal and read the phrase Tanitha had recited to let Dan see the house, but of course Dan would not have known to write precisely whatever that language was, and David would not have known how to pronounce it. He copied it into his computer and it said the language was Bulgarian which David thought, ironically, was vampiric enough, but this yielded no English translation. So he copied the English words Dan had written.
“This house be forever seen and never hidden from thee. For thou art blood of my blood,” and then he changed those words to “hidden from me” and “I am” instead of “thou art” and so the phrase he had just murmured revealed itself.
There was no reason it should work, a guessed spell from someone who was not a vampire, a witch or a wizard and did not believe in magic or practice sorcery, who did not, for that matter speak any other language. But this time, with more serious intent than desperation, David pronounced those words again.
“Tazi kŭshta shte bŭde zavinagi vidyana i nikoga skrita ot men. Zashtoto az sŭm krŭv ot tvoyata krŭv.”
Just like a jump on a film projector, or like something seen from the corner of the eye, but right in front of him, suddenly, the space between the two houses snapped and there sat a great purple Victorian with wrap around porch and high tower, and then, it was gone. It snapped back to the regular view and David could not hold onto it. It was the same way as when he tried to stay awake and could not manage it. With more seriousness, he said the words again, and this time, for a flicker the same thing happened, and then the house was gone.
“Fuck me,” David muttered.
“Fuck…. Me.”


In the afternoon, David found out that Sunny’s call had indeed been from Germantown.
He got a call late in the afternoon from an unlisted number, and was afraid to answer, but reminded himself he was an officer of the law and he was actually on duty.
“Is this David Lawry,” a woman’s voice sounded uncertain.
“Yes, ma’am, how can I help you?”
“My name is Avery Kominsky,” she began,
“Sunny’s mom.”
“Yes!”
She was obviously relieved, and David kept the relief out of his voice.
“He called me early this morning. Around seven—”
That was four hours later than he had called them.
“He had sent me a text and then he said he just wanted me to hear his voice, and that I should call you. Mr. Lawry, is anything wrong?”
“Please, call me David.”
“Sunny said you were a detective.”
“I am. That’s how we met. But Sunny’s my friend.”
“Oh,” her voice changed.
David frowned.
“Oh?”
“Maybe he called me to reassure you. David, listen,” her voice was suddenly gentle. “He’s going to be home soon, and everything you guys have started is going to grow just like it’s supposed to. I can’t wait to meet you.”
“Meet me…? Grow? Oh!”
David laughed.
“No, I really am just Sunny’s friend. I mean, he’s very attractive, but, I’m… already entangled in my own thing.”
“Oh,” Avery laughed over the phone. It was good to laugh, but now she said, “He’s not alright. Is he? I mean, he’s not himself?”
“No, Avery,” David said. “He’s not. And I’m doing everything I can.”
“I understand the police can only do so much, but—”
“Mrs.—Avery,” David said, “listen to me. I, as myself, am doing everything I can to get my friend back and safe. Alright?”
There was quiet on the other end of the phone and then a shudder and Sunny’s mother burst into sobs.
“I promise,” David said.
She nodded, and then realized he couldn’t see her, and said, weakly, “Thank you,” as she continued to cry. A few minutes later they ended the call and David looked at his phone. There had been three more calls from Tanitha which he could not answer. But for the sake of whatever the two of them had begun, which he wouldn’t allow himself to think about, he had to call her back, and moreover, for the Sunny’s sake he needed to reach this woman. In this new world, where his friend was probably a vampire, and his almost girlfriend seemed to be one too, where there was a coven or pack or whatever the fuck they were of vampires turning people into lunch, dinner or other vampires, and where David knew absolutely nothing about them, staying in his apartment quickly becoming no option. Even as night drew on, earlier now as summer became autumn, this new place felt like the old place, only worse, and he thought of getting in his car, driving straight for Rawlston and drinking and the apartment over the restaurant and across the hall from Nehru and Brad’s, whose two previous occupants were both now, not only nowhere to be found, but no longer human.
But all of this was bullshit. He had told a mother he would do everything to get her son back, and so he reached for his phone at the same time there was a knock at the door that nearly made him scream.
“Stop being a bitch,” David whispered to himself.
The knock came again, insistent.
He hoped that no one saw him the way he saw himself, that what they met was a confident tall, capable detective. Which is what he was about to be as he cleared his throat and opened the door.
He wasn’t surprised to see Tanitha standing there.
The old caution about inviting vampires in crossed his mind as she stood before him, strange in overalls, a cardigan, a red bandanna in her long hair.
“Come in,” he said.
The vampire stepped through.
“David Lawry,” she said, fixing him deep blues eyes that were grave and slightly reproachful:
“We need to talk.”




TOMORROW: THE WEEKEND PORTION

 

[CharmedFan28]

That was a great portion! I am glad Sunny has people who care about him so much and are trying to find him. We all need that. Excellent writing and I look forward to the weekend portion tomorrow!

 

[ChrisGibson]

“First,” Gabriel said as Sunny dressed, “you are not a vampire.”
He pronounced the word with disgust.
“You are Aluka, Empusa, These words we have taken to ourselves, or they have been applied though, like all words, they are lacking. I prefer, we prefer, aimopótis, sanguinarius, Il bevitore di sangue, the krŭvopiets.”
“Blood drinker,” Sunny said.
“Yes.” Gabriel said, “Blood drinker.”
“Yes,” Sunny said, pulling on his shirt, “But what is the point of all of this? Why are we here? And with all of those names, what are we? I’ve seen Dan. He walks in daylight.”
“As do I. As will you. Soon. It takes time to grow strong enough for that. In time you will be invulnerable to nearly all things. We are here because others are here.”
“I read about them. Tanitha and—” Gabriel made a noise that made Sunny stop.
“Do not say their names.”
Sunny blinked.
“Do not speak their names. They came here first.”
“To make other vam—blood drinkers?”
“No,” Gabriel said. “For that is not a thing they do. They actually think it is very bad form. They came here for other reasons. I assume they came to establish a presence in the New World, though why they chose Ohio of all places is beyond me. Much of what they have done is beyond me. And hopefully we are beyond them.”
“They’re enemies.”
“They are very much enemies.”
If only Sunny could find a way to get to 4848 Brummel Street, the place he remembered, but the place that he also remembered was hidden, If he tried to reach it, he was taking a great chance on them actually helping and actually being able to stop these assholes from harming his friends here, his friends back home like Jack, his mother.
“All Aluka belong to houses,” Gabriel “Families, clans. And the clans all have rules. Many of the rules concern how to kill, who is allowed to be killed, who is off limits. Without them, it is said, there would be no humans left, and then we would all be gone, for human is ultimately what we are.”
“We’re parasites.”
“Everything on this earth is a parasite.”
“Well,” Sunny was thinking of this Kruinh, this Tanitha, a father and daughter, of Gabriel talking about his sister Rosamunde.
“How… did you become a Drinker? If you made me, who made you? And your sister? And do you and your sister—“
But Gabriel was already shaking his head.
“No,” he said.
“What?”
“No one made me,” Gabriel said. “Or Rosamunde. We… umrya v utrobata. Died in the womb. We were roden mŭrtŭv…. Born Dead.”
Sunny stared at the beautiful dark haired boy in horror.
“That is the way for most of us,” Gabriel said. “The clans are actual families. Now and again the head of the clan allows mortals to be joined to us. New blood is good. They are as much blood drinker as we are. Of old we were all humans, and all of us begin human. If a blood drinker takes a mortal bride, then their child will be mortal. Maybe possess certain gifts, but be mortal. However, if a woman among us becomes pregnant, by a drinker or by a mortal man, then the blood in her, and the ichor—that thing which the blood becomes, which gives us our strength, but which again must be replenished by blood, that enters the growing child, killing it, as I killed you, and quickening it so that all of our women bear children who are already blood drinkers.”
Vampire families, vampire babies. Sunny would have laughed, half picture little babies with pointy teeth making a terrible mess of breastfeeding, but he was disgusted, and disgusted with himself. He had spent the day fucking and drinking from Gabriel and in his mind that was better than going out and killing another human being. Tonight he was on his way to work fo the first time, and eager as he was to go back into the world, he was afraid of what he might be, or do. He felt ashamed, tainted.
“Rosamunde is…. We are,” Gabriel said, “starting our own clan.”
“Starting,” Sunny began. And then he said, “But what clan do you belong to?”
“We belong to this one!” Gabriel nearly screamed flying up, his hair bouncing comically about his naked face, his naked body mottling red.
Taking a deep breath he said, again, “We belong to this one.”
“Now,” he appeared disturbed and upset in a way that revolted Sunny, that made him made mad at himself for having sex with this weirdo, “you should go to work.”
“Gladly,” said Sunny.

“So then you know everything,” Tanitha said, fixing her blue eyes placidly on David while she sat on the arm of the easy chair one leg crossed over the other.

David was infuriated by Tanitha’s lack of…. Humanity really. Her refusal to be apologetic or embarrassed or any of the things that the more he thought about it, it was impossible for her to be.

Finally he said, “You didn’t tell me.”

“It seems like I didn’t have to.”

“People sleeping together tell each other things.”

“I didn’t tell you I was a vampire, and you didn’t tell me you knew one. Seems like we’re even,”

David opened his mouth.

“Look, David, you’ve told me everything about that journal, and I’ve told you far more than I tell most people, so you know that I am not quite a modern girl. I’m not exactly sure how a modern girl is supposed to act, but it seems to me that far more important than whatever you may be feeling is your friend, Alexander.”

“Dan.”

“Yes?” Tanitha wrinkled her brow.

“Is he a plot?”

“What?”

“Is the reason he’s gone some type of plot?”

Tanitha looked at David like he was a fool.

“The reason he’s gone is because he’s a musician and he’s always gone with his band this time of year.”

“And Sunny.”

“Will have to wait a few nights. Christopher and Lawrence, two of our own, have already found the place where Rosamunde is staying, in two nights’ time—mornings’ time, actually, they are going to rout them. It is already planned, and we will save your friend then.”

“If only we could go tonight.”

“Mortals are hasty,” Tanitha said. “I imagine that is part of being mortal. When you have had time to see things fold, unfold, see what jumping in prematurely can do, you won’t be in such a hurry.

“Well,” Tanitha said brusquely, almost, David thought, like a man, “it seems we’ve covered everything. If I were you, I’d call Sunny tomorrow, and say you expect a return call. If they have his phone, they’ll make him speak. It will set you at ease.”

“I don’t think I’ll ever be at ease again,” David said.

“I think you will be,” Tanitha said. “For now, I’m going to bed.”

“Oh?” David said, looking at her, surprised, as she stood up.

He thought she was going to the door, but instead, Tanitha Tzepesh unhooked her overalls, and then neatly pulled them down and stepped out of them. In swift, fluid movements, Venus like, she removed shirt and all things and swept her hand through her hair, standing mahogany and naked, an wonder of rounded hips, black triangular sex, breasts like ripe furits, and then she turned around and walked toward David’s room, her full behind mesmerizing him despite his previous frustration. When she turned around, despite everything, what David saw was the fall of black hair, the flash of blue eyes in dark skin, and her lips smiling, wickedly.

“Are you coming, or are you sleeping on the couch?”

She disappeared into the bedroom, and mouth dry, thought after thought ran through David Lawry’s head, but he was already unbuckling his belt, already unbuttoning his shirt, and already hard, he followed.

 

[ChrisGibson]

Legs folded under her, she sat nude on the bed, combing her hair, and said, “It has been a long time since I’ve met a man like you, David Lawry.”

“Really?” he said. “How long a time?”

She stopped in the middle of brushing her long hair and said, “Are you asking me how old I am?”

“In a polite way,” David said, and he pushed his hair from his face as he turned over and reached for the pack of cigarettes that was the first one he’d bought in years.

“It’s never polite to ask a woman her age,” she surveyed the length of his body, the play of muscle in his legs to this buttocks as he lit the cigarette and turned around to face her.

“And I am usually oh so polite.”

“Usually quite the gentleman,” she said, switching sides with the brush and taking the cigarette from him with a long, joyous inhale, like a movie star, her blue cat eyes closing to slits while she exhaled from her nostrils and returned the cigarette.

“But you don’t fuck like a gentleman,” she said.

And he had never heard that word from her mouth, so he nearly coughed, and then shaking his head, he ashed and said, “No man, no I do not. But you take all the gentleman out of me.”

Their very first time, when he was not sure how to court her, when he thoughtTanitha so fey and exalted he would always let her make the first move, they had been at a movie he wasn’t very in love with, and suddenly her hand had slipped into his trousers. At first he was surprised at what was happening, then he was like a teenager. There were few people in the theatre and as the movie had loudly played over them, he had undone his pants and gone down lower in his seat, his hand had made its way up her classy dress and they had pleasured each other, laughing, groaning, looking at each other through slit eyes while the film had played.

They had left that theatre in a hurry and gone back to David’s apartment, where Tan had guided him not to the bedroom, but to the door. He’d had her there, against the wall, and come, laughing with surprise, and then burying his head in her shoulders.

“I’m so good, so responsible most of the time. Such a goddamn worry wart,” He had said, still not releasing her, still holding her legs around his waist, still buried inside of her, feeling hands in his hair, her stroking his neck.

“I get tired of being so good.”

“Detective Lawry, I’d say you were very good just now,” she had laughed low in her throat.

Right now, David sat beside her on the bed and finished the cigarette, stubbing it out. She had ceased combing her hair and now ran her fingers through his.

“Five hundred,” she said. “Give or take.”

David murmured, “Five hundred what?”

Then his eyes flew open.

“What the fuck? Five hundred years old!”

“Give or take,” Tanitha repeated, reaching over him for his Marlboros.

“Jesus!”

“Not as old as him,” she said. “And by the way, if you didn’t want to know, I’m not sure why you asked.”

She took one out for her and one for him.

“I just… like… That’s like you were before America.”

“You should make me a tee shirt and put that on it for my birthday.”

David half laughed.

He took her by the chin and kissed her,

“If I’m out of line for saying this, forgive me. But I’m in love you.”

She kissed him back, lightly.

“I was getting that.”

“And amazed by you.”

“Because I’m older than America.”

“But it’s like you were just born yesterday.”

“I certainly wasn’t. You’re just surprised because you’re thinking in a mortal way. But if the ocean can be wet after millions of years, why are you surprised that I can be after five hundred?”


HAVE A GREAT WEEKEND

 

[CharmedFan28]

That was a well done portion. It seems there is still a lot for me and others to learn about the world of this story and I am enjoying that. Im very interested to see where this is all going and look forward to more in a few days. I hope you have a great weekend too!

 

[ChrisGibson]

There was just something different that night about being on the motorcycle, speeding over the streets of Lassador and toward the expressway and then riding on the curve all the way to Rawlston. He felt freer than he’d ever felt before with the wind in his hair. It never occurred to him to put on a helmet. Was he already feeling the effects of immortality? Sight had changed. Before this he could never have seen stars in the light polluted Lassador sky. Now they blazed in the black sky, and now Sunny thought of coming back to his friends, friends he had worried for.

In the back of his mind the worry blossomed. He was, in fact, not completely free, just released for the first time. And he would have to find a way to kill someone if he didn’t want to go mad again and start killing with no thought. What was more, he would have to return to Lassador, to that large warehouse where Rosamunde was trying to start her new tribe, and he would have to remain with them for a time. When he had left, he could feel the effects of the sun. It had been dark red in the sky as it was setting. He would have to be back by six, six-thirty at the latest. He knew they weren’t lying about the effects of the sun because Dan’s journal had confirmed it, and he’d have one hell of a time explaining to Brad or Nehru why he could not leave his apartment till nightfall. What was more, he fully believed that Rosamunde and Carter would make good on their promise, that they would kill his mother and his friends if he did not return.

So…. Feeling free is not the same as being free, he figured as the motorcycle growled while he rolled down the off ramp into Rawlston.

He had expected his employers at the Wiggle Biggle to say something about his absense, but they said nothing at all as he checked in, put on his apron and went for his schedule. They were not a restaurant with a large staff—another reason Sunny was surprised they hadn’t missed him—and a server was expected to till a register and wash a dish. Tonight he was serving on the roof top and enjoying the strung up party lights. He was in the same jeans and tee shirt he’d been in when he’d been taken, and he realized he’d have to stop at Brad and Nehru’s for clothes before he went back to Lassador.

He was working nights at the bar he’d come to, and his employers could tell no real difference in his life. After all, he was from out of town, and no one was paid to care for a server. He was glad to be making money, though he wondered how much that was going to mean from now on. Surely being what he now was didn’t mean work and money weren’t necessary and yet… they weren’t as necessary.

He was surprised by how much he saw and how much he sensed. On TV shows vampire always had such small regard for human life, but this whole night he had been so very fascinated by it. He had longed to be right back in the midst of it. He was still human, wasn’t he? Only changed? And he wanted the touch of human skin, the scent of human flesh, human laughter. Human life. Right now, to overhear conversations, to smell perfume, to see the pleasure taken in eating was his purpose for being here.

Things changed when HE arrived, because Sunny could not stop looking at the Black man who wasn’t short, wasn’t tall, wasn’t fat and wasn’t exactly thin, who was, in a way that Sunny did not have time to analyze, while he went from table to table, arresting, and this is why he was glad to take the tip from the last table of departing guest and make it to this man’s table before anyone else did.

“I’m Alex, I’ll be your server,” Sunny said. “You probably need time to decide? Let me start you out on water.”

Sunny was drawn to the twinkle in his eye, the regal way he nodded, the was his face seemed carved and polished, a work of art from mahogany. Sunny poured more water and said, “Is there anything else I can get you?”

“Why don’t you get your best wine.”

Sunny smirked. “Our best wine is about eight bucks.”

“Well, then,” the man smiled and held open his hands, “Why don’t we make that happen? I can certainly spare eight dollars.”

“And do you prefer—?”

“A red.”

Something happened in that moment. It was a difference in the quality of the man he was standing before contrasted to everyone around him. Things he would never have noticed were clear now. His scent was different. His speech was different, His breathing was different. Different from everyone else around him, but… not different from people he’d been around for a few days now, not different from himself.

Once he’d heard two people having a discussion and one said, “I always knew she was Black.”

“How could you tell?” the white girl asked her friend.

“How could you not?” her Black friend had said.

He’d almost thought that was nonsense, but going into the military he realized he could tell another soldier. And now, when Sunny pulled away from this beautiful man, with eyes like alligators, he knew two things, “He s like me. He is a vampire.” And also, “He knows that I am as well.”



“You don’t look like you’re from around here,” Sunny said, pouring the wine.

“I look as much like I am from around here as do you.”

Sunny smiled and said, “Fair. I came looking for one thing. I found something else entirely.”

“That’s often how it is,” he said.

“And you?” said Sunny.

“I’m looking to settle. My family has an old property around here, and I’m getting moved in.”

His name was Crane, and they talked through the night. As the crowd lessened, Sunny had more time, and Crane seemed in no hurry to leave. Since he was what he was, Sunny assumed the man was waiting to talk with him. It did not occur to Sunny to ask for help in escaping Rosamunde. He was only glad that there were others in this world, possibly many more others. Despite not having worked in two days, he hardly worked at all tonight. He was was drawn to the elegant man, and finally Crane said. “You look hungry. You have the look of someone who comes to a city and doesn’t know the good places to eat.”

Everything in Sunny sharpened. He sat upright, but said nothing.

Crane said, “When you learn to listen, you know all the great places, but you are young so right now I’ll simply tell you, if you go over to Victor Terrace you will find all the great cuisine you’re looking for. Especially this time of night.”

Crane nodded, as if tipping his hat, then placed an actual tip on the table, and stood to leave.

In that moment, Sunny tried to place him, all the little things he had seen and been obsessed by. The wide brimmed hat tipped over his head, the dark trousers and white shirt over a strong body, a bottom Sunny didn’t mind looking at either. He thought saying ass was too crude from someone like this. He watched his shoulders, the lion way in which he walked. He called:

“Crane?”

Slowly the man with the rich brown skin turned around, raising one eyebrow.

Sunny approached him.

“I get off work in about forty-five minutes. If it wouldn’t be too much, would you… Would you like to take me there? Victor Terrace?”

“Alex—” Crane touched his hand.

“My friends call me Sunny.”

“I think,” Crane said, and his hand still rested on Sunny’s, “I will call you Alexander.”

And delicate touch Crane’s sent a shiver through Sunny.

“I promise you this: I will be back in for you in forty-five minutes.”



Crane said, “Leave your bike here and we’ll be back for it by morning.”