Bets, Threats, Marionettes

Originally written Sunday, December 18, 2005

“You tell me, cuz apparently I don’t know. You’re the one who keeps dibs on me.” He wasn’t quite as intimidated by me as I’d hoped he’d be. Maybe I’d pushed him to the edge of patience with my unrelenting cross-examinations, and he no longer felt he had to play along.

“Last time I saw you, you were leaving the dance floor with Trudy and two Crypt kids. At least one of them was one of Trudy’s regulars.”

He said nothing. He just stared at me, his forehead creasing between the eyebrows almost imperceptibly. Finally: “That’s the last thing I remember, too.” I rolled my eyes. Like I didn’t see that coming. For a few minutes, at least, he had been under my control. Since none of us, apparently, had seen him before then, there was no way to know if he were telling the truth or not. He continued, “How long ago was that?” After I estimated—loosely, since the passage of time had escaped me somewhat, too—that it had been an hour, he asked, very quietly, “What did I do?”

The gravity of the moment was weighing on him, and I was communicating at least as much through my silence as I could have through direct answers. Joey continued to spin records several doors away, while a police radio crackled every few minutes and (although I couldn’t hear it, Moshe probably could) Craig was sobbing on Trudy’s shoulder. Moshe is perhaps the most gullible immortal I’ve met, but he isn’t an idiot. He knew something was deeply wrong. I saw an ambulance pass by, reflected in the window behind him. Its lights were on, but its sirens were not. Moshe’s eyes followed it, and he looked worried, panicked even. He started to bolt, but I was standing at just the right angle to lift my arm and whip my elbow into direct and probably painful contact with his chin. He stumbled backward into the glass door, and before he could get his bearings, I flattened him against it with one hand at his breastbone, while I held the stake directly over his heart with the other.

“She’s dead, Moe.” I wasn’t sure what made me call him that; the goth getup may have prevented me from being able to apply the Hebrew appellation without a sense of irony. “And you’re the last one anyone’s seen her with. Now, I want you here because I have a mystery to solve. And you want you here because if you get yourself arrested, you’ll either burn to death or starve your way into a weak and helpless mass before anyone can prove you innocent.”

He looked down at the carved piece of wood aimed at his chest. “So that part of the legend is true, huh?” He was very nervous, only now seeming to realize the gravity of the situation.

“Curious enough to test it… the ‘legend’? You wouldn’t last long enough to remember.” It is for real. Wooden stakes kill vampires. Of course, it takes a lot more than the one-two punch some versions would have us believe. It requires a tremendous amount of muscle to penetrate the ribcage, and it will often take more than one blow to get the job done. It’s messy, it’s exhausting… and it takes either extenuating circumstances or an unwarranted perception of your own cosmic authority to believe you have the right to carry out second-death sentences, even on those who are no longer connected to the universe. It’s really no wonder that I’ve had occasion to execute only around five or so vampires in as many centuries’ time.

As for the stake, the point must be as sharp as a knife’s (if knives were conical), and the shaft should be as thin as you can make it without losing rigidity. Some kinds of wood are better than others, stiffer. I’m really not trying to make this sound phallic on purpose; if you think otherwise, then I challenge you to try to describe wooden stakes without the clichéd imagery dominating your explanation. I’d like to suggest, alternatively, that it is specifically because the procedure is so easily translated into sexual metaphor that it has become so mythic and, it seems, almost universally understood, even while other elements of vampire lore vary from one region, story, and/or storyteller to the next. And that’s not my fault. I’m just telling it the way it is.

He clearly wasn’t going to take the risk. “And so… you said prove I’m innocent? Does that mean you think I didn’t do it?”

“Oh, I have a hunch right now that you’re guilty as charged. Give me a reason to believe otherwise and I’ll be happy to.”

“Um, how? I don’t even remember any of it.”

“I’m gonna let go of you, and you’re not gonna run.” He nodded. I lowered both of my arms from his body. I felt the skin of his face with the back of my fingers. The touch made him start.

“Your hand’s cold.” He knew it wasn’t supposed to feel that way to him.

“Your face is very warm. You definitely just drank from someone living. And, uh, no animal smaller than a St. Bernard would’ve made you this warm.” I tilted his head back and forth and then held his wrists away from his body, exposing the soft side of his forearms. “No open wounds I can see. So at least you didn’t turn her.”

“But… wouldn’t that be better than dead?”

“Yeah. Sure. Cuz you’re having a ball and a half, right?”

“I’m adapting.”

“You’re coping. Reluctant vampire foundling getting the kindergarten for immortals crash course from his only favorable acquaintance while playing marionette to some as yet unknown voodoo puppeteer. Great way to start off a productive afterlife.”

“Voodoo puppeteer? Is that what’s been happening to me? How do you know this?”

“Like I said before, I think you’re the one whose bite marks are on that woman over there. Your actions have been so shady ever since we met that you’ve given me very little reason to think that anything you say is true. But there’s something bigger going on than anything you let on knowing about, and if it weren’t for one solitary factor in all of this, I’d be using you like a bulletin board right now.” I get talkative when I intimidate. I guess when I have a captive audience, I take advantage of it.

I began to reach back into the bag hanging at my side to draw out the charm. I decided it was time to show him what had had him in its thrall all these weeks. Perhaps he’d recognize it and know who had possession of one or both of its complements. Perhaps being faced with the source of the magic would interrupt or diminish the spell’s hold on him. But when I clutched the charm, I found it once again vibrating in the bottom of the bag. And instead of being placated by a firmer grasp as it had been before, this time it seemed to be increasing in rapidity from moment to moment. While pondering the meaning of the charm’s odd signals, Moshe’s eyes fixated on something behind me, and with a bewildered look on his face, he said very quietly, “Kay?”

The events of this day to be continued...