They Say

Originally written Thursday, January 5, 2006

“Oh yeah? What’d they have to say? Do they have any idea who did it?”

“Who did it? You didn’t know? It’s supposed to be accidental. She OD’ed.”

This was news to me, and while macabre, it still qualified as good news, if true. Her death could not now be prevented, but I’d be more than happy to learn that neither I nor Moshe had had any involvement in it. I hadn’t, after all, checked the body for bite marks; I’d merely trusted Patrick’s insinuation. Had he reacted impulsively without determining the truth of the matter himself? Of Jeanine, I asked, “Really? That’s official?”

“Well, that’s what the people at the club expect to hear from the police. There’s been a series of ODs like that ever since the club opened. So you haven’t heard any of this yet?” she looked a little surprised but not in a patronizing way.

“No, but I’m curious. What do you mean by a series of ODs? How often do they happen?” All too often these days an initially promising-sounding turn of events only inspires skepticism moments later. One OD is a relief of a sort; a series sounds suspicious, as I’m sure Jeanine realized.

“Oh boy, I get to spread gossip!” She smiled wickedly and clapped her hands. “This is down-low gossip, though. For your ears only.” And even though we were in the privacy of her home, she leaned forward conspiratorially. “Series of ODs, once or twice a year on average, with the big holes in the neck, loss of blood. I know I watch too much TV, but I’m not the only one who thinks of vampires. I mean, with a third of the kids at the club sporting fake fangs and all, it’s almost a foregone thing.”

So at least Patrick’s assumptions were not kneejerk. “ODs that look like vampire bites. And that woman had them?”

“Yup. So this is what Joey and the others say. They say that some of the vampire enthusiasts—I mean, one clique in particular. Some just dress like it, and some of the people who work at the club swear there are real vampires there, but whatever.” She chuckled a little but may have been watching for my reaction, which was to raise my eyebrows and smirk. It could have been interpreted as either skepticism or sharing in the joke. “Anyway, this one super-secret club of junkie vampire worshipers—that’s how they take their heroin. That’s how they shoot up.”

“In their necks? That doesn’t sound too smart.”

“I know, it’s not. Which is why they OD so often. They’ve never had an OD at the club that didn’t happen that way. It’s not even just injecting it there, they use some kind of special needles to make it look like they were bitten. Or maybe they bite each other. No one at the club actually knows because they’ve never seen it happen. They just find the bodies. And the autopsies always come back positive for heroin, so they just write it off as accidental.”

“Wow. That’s what I call taking obsessive to a whole ‘nother level,” I said. And I meant it, too.

“No shit.”

The events of this day to be continued...