One.: Him
I sat at one of the small, square tables inside Starbucks, sipping at a black coffee as I read the Tuesday news. Starbucks was unusually vacant today, having only five customers in the coffee shop including myself. The only noise in the shop was the buzz of employee gossip behind the registers and the soft jazz coming from the sound system.
I switched my gaze from a story about some politician's campaign, to the article about the murdered family (a man, woman, son, and their golden retriever). The amount of killings was rising, and these humans were killed like all the rest. Their blood and organs had been drained into the upstairs bathtub, and their stomachs had been sliced into the design of a rose. The killer had been extra careful (and extra calm) because no fingerprints or any trace that he'd been there had shown up--except of course for the four corpses, but it might as well have been the father or mother that killed them. The only other sign that a murderer had killed them and not the family members was the vase of white and red roses on the dining room table, found along with a note that read "And come he slow or come he fast, it is but Death who comes at last."
Taking a long gulp of coffee, I turned the page. I didn't want to read about death. It was too close to a part of my existence, and I have to deal with that every day. I am a living vampire. I have all the advantages of an undead vampire, but none of the weaknesses. Well, except for one, but it isn't really a weakness for all vampires. When I take blood or feel a strong emotion, I flame up. My body catches fire, but only the things around me burn. It's very rare, and so far I haven't met anyone with the same "condition." Lucky us, vampires are the only ones that can do that. Something in our DNA makes it super easy for mutations to occur.
I looked up from reading a cartoon strip as the bells on the door chimed. A man walked in, hunched over himself as if it were cold. His stringy dark brown hair hung over his eyes, making them invisible to me. He was wearing a red plaid flannel shirt over a white top. An old pair of scuffed and dirty blue jeans hung on his hips, making him appear beautifully grisly. The brown boots poking out from the hem of the jeans were in the same, worn state. He looked like he might have been homeless, but his clean-shaven face told me otherwise.
He went to the register and propped an arm on the counter, cocking his hip a little and tossing his hair from his eyes. He muttered something to the startled cashier and waited while she made his coffee. When she handed it to him shakily, he pulled out a few dollars and set them on the counter carelessly, walking toward the back of the coffee shop and plopping down in a chair.
He looked exhausted, as if he'd been climbing stairs for days and hadn't slept at all. But his eyes were radiant blue, glowing with a fierce determination. He looked dangerous.
As if sensing my eyes on him, he looked up from the Styrofoam cup and met my inspecting eyes with his closed and icy eyes that would crack the ice in Antarctica if he so much as glanced at it. Not that friendly, I guess, I thought, turning my gaze away from the strange man and out the large windows looking out over the docks and harbor. Ships were coming in and going out. I couldn't understand how fishermen and sailors got up at five in the morning to go out on the cold ocean (although to me it was quite nice) and work. Maybe they didn't think of it as work. Maybe they liked their work and thought of it as more of a hobby than a job.
I stole a glance at the man in the corner. He was leaning on his elbows, propped and folded on top of the table. His head was down, his rich brown hair falling over his face again. God, he was beautiful. Yes, I know. I don't know what the meaning of "beautiful" is. I think that grisly looked men exactly like the one sitting in the corner of Starbucks on an overcast Tuesday morning in March are more beautiful than any other.
I inhaled deeply through my nose, letting the scent of ashes and woodsmoke soak into me. It was his scent, and the scent of rain and asphalt lingered over it, protecting it as if it were a child.
The rusty scent of blood engulfed me, coming off him in ugly waves beneath the beauty. I sucked in and held the breath, fighting the instictive attack that would have put the whole coffee shop into shock and then fear. I sensed my eyes lightening to white as the air became choking and vile. The coffee came up in acidic bile, and I gulped it down, feeling the slime coat my throat in bitter liquid. How could I have been so dillusioned? He was a living vampire, and he'd fed recently (as my best guess since that's the only thing I could think of at the moment that would explain the blood). Unless... No. He couldn't be the murderer. A murderer wouldn't smell like rain and the street. But then again, I'd never met a murderer. I'd never smelled a murderer, either.
And then I realized the man was upon me. He was standing above me, seeming too big as he stood there, as if I were four years old again. I stared up, blinking a few times. He reached down and grabbed my shoulder, lurching me from the chair and reaching around me as if we were old friends so that my shoulder brushed his under arm. Even for my tall height of five-nine, he was still a head taller than me. Damn men and their freakish growth spurts.
He led me to the back door (the one for Employees Only). I think everyone was watching, but no one said a word. When the door closed behind us, he reached behind him with his free arm and pulled out a shiny black gun, pressing it into my side. I stiffened, letting out a breath I hadn't known was there and holding the next one. Muscles wire-tight, I let him lead me to the door that exited Starbucks through the back.
The cool breeze was calming, and I relaxed a little. The foul stench of blood drifted away from us, making my eyes darken into their natural hazel again.
The man stepped forward, not taking me with him, and spun, sending the hard gun to my face. I sank to the rain-dampened grass, clutching my neck as it throbbed from the blow of his gun. The man was yelling at me, but I couldn't hear him. The ringing in my ears hadn't died down yet. When it did, his voice boomed into me like Fourth of July fireworks.
"What do you know!" he shouted, gun pointing carelessly at my thigh. It didn't make me feel any better that he had his finger on the trigger. "What do you know!" he yelled again.
"About what?" I managed in a half-strangled voice before he smacked me again with the hard black gun, this time landing it squarely in my eye. I cried out in pain as my head lashed backward. "I don't freaking know anything!" I rasped. But he wasn't listening. He was readying himself to shoot me in my leg, probably knowing that I was a living vamp just like him.
Finding my strength, I lurched from the ground and into him, the gunshot ringing at my ear. He fell back, the gun flying out of his reach. I wrestled to get a hold on his wrists and pin them above his head, but he kept wriggling out of my grasp. Somehow, my fingers curled around muscle-tight skin, and I realized it was his neck. I squeazed hard, cutting off his air supply. His eyes flashed to white and he raked his fingernails over my shirt, tearing the thin cotton and ripping skin and flesh. I cried out, head lashing back in agony, and the man tossed my arm to the side as if it were a stick, throwing me along with it.
I dove head-first into the green grass, getting a mouthful of earth and a faceful of mud. I pushed off from the ground, rubbing my throbbing neck. He fell on me, straddling me to the ground and pinning my arms to my side with his legs. I struggled to get out from under him, but it was useless.
He leaned over me, his greasy hair brushing my cheek as he whispered a menacing, "What do you know?" his voice ragged and ugly.
I gave a final struggle, throwing all my weight into flipping him over. It worked, and when he came up, I came with him, giving a nasty blow to the back of his neck with my elbow. He fell heavily to the ground, unconscious.
Swiping a hand across my mouth, I grinned evilly. "That's what you get for holding me at gunpoint."
I went to the shining metal lying in the grass and picked it up. It felt heavy in my hands, comfortably cold from the ground, yet still warm from his body heat. I smiled at it, thinking about whether or not I should leave him here. I wasn't accustomed to strange men holding me at gunpoint and then tackling me, but I was too much of a good Samaritan to leave him lying there on the cold ground. He'd be sore when he wakes up, and he needed someone to take care of his street-stiffened body.
