âYour living is determined not so much by what life brings to you as by the attitude you bring to life; not so much by what happens to you as by the way your mind looks at what happens.â
Chapter 1: The First Awakening
I could feel the dreams fading and dissipating as the synapses of consciousness started firing. The world of the mind being replaced by the world of the senses. Even as my body was totally relaxed, still sleeping, the dialogue of the brain began identifying the input, like a fog dispelling to reveal the landscape:
Bang! Crackle. Fireworks being set off right outside the window.
High pitched screams and screeches. Children laughing and playing with the fireworks.
Rumbling and whizzing. Cars. A busy road a block or two down.
As my senses continued to report back to my awake mind, I realized that I was sleeping not on a bed as I might have expected or even on a couch, which is not an unheard of state, but on a carpeted floor. Rolling onto my back, I inhaled deeply:
Sulfur smell of fireworks, cut grass trimmed a few hours ago, pine, something unidentifiable and delicious.
What happened last night? I asked myself. I mentally checked myself over. Not bruised or battered, other than what one might expect sleeping on a thinly carpeted floor. I was not nauseous, no headache, no hangover. Just thirsty.
I delved into my mind for what happened last night: Nothing. A total blank. I knew who I am, I knew my name and social security and first pet. I just didnât remember last night.
What is the last thing I remember? I asked myself, remaining calm. Yesterday afternoon?
Yes, home. I remembered being at home in my apartment in SoDo, Seattle. I remembered the phone ringing and the memories spilled through me a gushing torrent, rolling unstoppable through my mind:
RING ring, RING ring. At home, getting ready to go out. On the street then with my friend, walking. A bar. A shadowy man, a shadowy smile. Street after unknown street. Darkness.
I tried to rewind, to recall and hold an image so I could study it, looking at a puzzle piece, but I couldnât. It just rolled through my head as a single thing, ungraspable.
The sensation broke me out of my focus to remember and a shock of fear ran through me. I had never blacked out before. Never lost time drinking, never even passed out. It was terrifying. I realized with a jolt that wherever I was, I was not at home. I did not have carpets like this and there were no children playing on the street where I lived. I kept my eyes closed, as though if I did not open them I would be transported home. As though if my vision did not report, this might all be a dream. But the other senses can not be denied and curiosity is a force as inescapable as gravity; my eyes popped open and swerved around.
It was an empty room. Completely empty: No people, no furniture. Four walls with one open door leading to a hallway, an open glass door to a small balcony, and another open door to an empty closet, with nary even a wire hanger. I sat up, hugging my knees to me. Listening past the ambient noise for sounds of life in the building.
I couldnât hear anyone in the apartment I was in, nor above, nor below. I crept silently to my feet and explored hesitantly, quietly.
The bedroom and the bathroom off the hall were just as the one I had woken up in, completely empty and clean. In the kitchen, I turned on the tap and drank, holding my head under the spout and my long copper hair away from the spray. My mouth had that alien feeling of first waking. After spitting out the ugly morning taste with the first wetness, I drank like a desert creature, in long mouth-filling swallows until I was full. I was still Thirsty.
I had no idea where I was or how I had gotten here.
The sun was behind the hills, throwing brilliant reds and oranges onto the blanket of clouds as I stole quietly out the front door, down the stairs and down the driveway and onto the street.
He might well be a monument: The man in the shadows stands so still. He watches the children setting up fireworks in the middle of the dead end road dispassionately. With no supervision, the kids conspire to cut fuses, merge different fireworks, and make dares that should lead to some tragedy, but never does. It is as if their very innocence shields them.
The shadow manâs attention is diverted as the ginger girl walks quickly and quietly down the driveway onto the street. Her sweatshirt hood is pulled up and her hair is a spill of red in front of her face obscuring her features, like looking at someone through a fire. She is hugging her arms around her lithe frame. She is a self-contained unit, shielded.
She walks down the sidewalk, deftly giving a few feet berth to the parents coming out of apartments and houses to call in their children for the evening. Denying the Thirst that such proximity exacerbates through sheer will. His mind races behind an unmoving visage.
âStrong.â He says to the shadows, as he recalls his own first waking and the beast within that demanded blood, any blood, all blood. If he hadnât had someone there, someone to guide himâŚ.He shudders at the thought as she glides past where he hides in plain sight. He wishes he could help her and shifts slightly, almost deciding to come out into the glow of twilight and street light, but he stills and stays within the shadow until she turns the corner out of sight.
âIt must be done this way. It must.â His voice is quiet, deep, and intense. Nodding to his own assessment, he disappears into the darkness.
In the suburban areas of Washington State, it is the habit to build a big commercial road with main residential streets shooting off of it. From that main street, short dead end or looping roads spike off in either direction. The convention gives that cozy neighborhood feel, with a mega grocery department store and full plaza of boutiques just a few blocks away. The sum result of this habit of building is to make it completely impossible to find any suburban house without a GPS, while making it childâs play to find the stores from any neighborhood.
That was good, because the tasty undercurrent of smell was completely overwhelming from the second I stepped out onto the street. All around me copper, sweet, salty tang on the back of my tongue.
It drove the thirst. The thirst filled me, enveloped my mind. It made it hard to reason, to plan, to think. It was like nothing I had ever felt before and I did not know what it was or why it was. I just knew I had to keep moving. I followed the sound of traffic until I could see the Fred Meyer sign ahead, kitty corner from where the street dumped out on the commercial strip. Perfect.
The fluorescent lights high up in the near empty parking lot were too bright to me, so inside the store was like staring into a spot light. I stayed behind my hair, my refuge, my secret clubhouse for one. The smells were intoxicating. The tasty, coppery smell was here too jumbled up with breads and fruits and pastries and meats. I walked around the fruit and veggie stands, hoping one would jump out, unveil itself as the object of my craving, the fulfillment of this thirst. The bakery didnât catch my attention, nor the surf section. The meats drew me. I could smell the taste of chicken, of pork, of beef. They werenât exactly what I wanted, but close, so close. Like Sprite when you are jonesing for Mountain Dew.
âKnow what you need?â Asked the nondescript guy behind the counter.
âCan you getâŚumâŚpigâs blood by the quart?â I asked, trying to make it sound like a reasonable request when it sounded like a bizarre question in my mind.
âNot pigâs, no.â Replied the guy, as though it were ordinary, âbut beef, yeah. If thatâll work.â
âSure.â My mouth bypassed my brain.
I wondered vaguely how they get the blood here at the store. It is not as though they are butchering the animal in the back, after all. An image of the guy wringing out a raw cut steak, as one rings out a dish towel, came to me. The blood thick rubies fell in slow motion in my mind-eye.
âThat it for ya?â Nondescript guy pulled me back from my strange fantasy.
âThanks.â I replied, taking the styrofoam container from him quickly and heading for the front of the store. I slapped my right butt pocket out of habit, feeling the wallet, suddenly relieved that it was, in fact, there. In the strangeness of waking and the thirst, the thought that I might have been robbed and dumped in that empty apartment hadnât even occurred.
At the register, I found that my money and debit card were present and accounted for, but my student ID for Washington University and my drivers license were both MIA.
Who takes IDâs but leaves the cash? I wondered. Another strangeness to add to the list.
I could smell the woman on the other side of the scanning machine. Copper, salt, stale, tired, mellow, a bit sour. Words rolled through my mind that I have never associated with scent before.
I forced my attention to my hair, my barrier between me and her. Shampoo, crisp, sun. The thirst showed me the red and blue pulses in her wrist as she waited by habit, hand ready for receipt to print. I closed my eyes. Focused on my hair. I heard her rip the little slip of paper and snatched the receipt she held out, grabbed my prize and headed for the bathroom, silent to her rote politenesses.
The Ladies was, blessedly, empty. The sanitizing, disinfecting, deodorizing smells were overpowering and normal and wonderful. I locked myself in the handicapped stall and sat on the floor. back to the wall releasing the iron grip I had held myself and the thirst in. It raced through me, the thirst, as I tore off the bag and the lid. It washing away disgust and fear and normal. It demanded and it transformed to sweet exhilaration as the the blood hit my mouth. Like wine, like fruit juice, like real maple syrup thick and flowing, but with just the slightest jar to it. Milk that has gone a bit sour, grape juice when you expected apple. It is not what the Thirst exactly wanted, but it accepted it. It basked in it.
The banging of the Ladies Room door brought me back to myself, licking the bottom of the container, the sides torn off, scattered and clean of blood.
I donât remember destroying the styrofoam.
The Thirst was not gone, not satisfied or sated, but it was abated. It wasnât the demanding focal point of my existence anymore, but an internal nudge, a craving.
I sat still in the relief and peace, panic and confusion as heels clicked static on the tiles, door shut, lock turned in that echoing way of public bathrooms. Quietly I stood and stepped out to face the mirror, brushing the hair and the hood back.
I was pale. I had always had the fair skin that goes with my hair, and sunless Seattle always kept me that way. But now I was beyond pale: I was ghostly, chalky, porcelain.
To this point, I had been subtly repressing the sum conclusion of all the evidence that had been mounting since I woke. Repressing my mouth reporting that my canine teeth felt longer, repressing the keenness of the smells, the intensity of the sensory input, the Thirst. Seeing myself in the mirror after gratefully downing a quart of beef blood forced an acknowledgment. My teeth looked even longer and sharper than my tongue had told me, my eyes shone out at me like faceted emeralds. This was not the girl I remembered from any mirror I had ever seen.
I did not know any vampires. I had never even met one, that I knew of.
Until last night, evidently. I thought, wryly.
They are the proven urban legend, vampires. That they exist is known and accepted and always has been, but that is about all science has managed to prove, because vampires have almost completely avoided scientific study. I learned in school that we know so little about them because their bodies turn to ash when they die. It isnât even known concretely if they are a subspecies or their own unique beings. The locker-side chat after that particular class had been that vampires actually donât die, they are immortal and that is why they have never been able to study a corpse. As I stood examining the face in the mirror, I remembered the fireside stories from camp that told how vampires are born as vampires and live human life-spans, like a parallel world. At girlhood sleepovers the consensus had been that every vampire chooses a human mate, who becomes a vampire through some vague processâââa conversation that left us giggling, I recalled. I didnât feel like giggling right now, but couldnât fail to notice the droll touch of a smile on my vampire face in the mirror.
My mind listed off the endless and contradictory theories I had heard: Vampires turn to ash in the light of day, sunlight has no effect on vampires, or is it that the sun makes them sparkle? They kill their victims, all their victims become vampires, vampires seduce willing donors and just need a little taste. My mother believes that vampires have no reflection and my father swears they can travel in shadows. My own pet legend was that they could morph into a bat and a wolf.
I closed my eyes and concentrated on the idea of a wolf, of my body becoming a wolf.
No change, no change at all.
The vampire in the mirror is laughing at me. The thought burst me out of denial and landed me squarely in anger. How could this have happened to me? I wondered, imagining evil creatures stalking through the night, looking for an innocent victim. But I didnât go places alone or take silly risks. I knew a little bit of self-defense. I even carried garlic and pepper maceâââgood for anything that attacks except bigfoot!- it claimed. I was careful and I didnât take chances that could lead to this.
And yet here I was. I let out a long breath. I couldnât change it. I could not wish it away. I had no idea how this had happened, or why, or even where and maybe I never would. That was the simple truth.
I need to go home. I thought, a primal instinct to return to safety.
The flushing from the high-heeled lady in the stall brought that thought to action: I was going home. I quickly brushed my hair back in front of my face, breathing in the scent of it to ground myself. I raised the hood of my sweatshirt. The mirror showed me a caricature of grunge/emo, nothing that would draw attention in Seattle.
Seattle, I thought as I scurried out of the bathroom. I need to get home to Seattle, but where am I? Conveniently, the sign over the exit doors said, Thank You for Visiting Your Kent Fred Meyers.
Kent? I wondered. What a strange place to be, for human or vampire. The little town was about half an hour south of Seattle and boasted little except being equidistant from Seattle and Tacoma. I didnât even know anyone who lived in Kent.
How did I get here? I wondered as I made my way to the bus stop across the road. I didnât just mean Kent.
Go read the whole book AWAKE: A Vampire Tale
free on most ebook sites and in the authors preferred edition at Gumroad.com/AmarAjk
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