Melabeth the Vampire (12 page)

“Yeah, you’re right. Ok let’s go.” David said with a really shaky voice. “You’re naked.”

“Yeah, I mentioned that; I will need some clothes.” I looked around. The only option was the bloody trench coat the wizard had been wearing.

David said, “Let’s try breaking into one of these buildings. Maybe we’ll be able to find something for you to wear, before someone sees us. How would we explain…?” David looked around in dismay. There were three dead men:  one of them without a heart, and one without a head, and there was blood everywhere, splattered against the walls and puddle up in the middle of the alley. “All of this?”

“Suicide” I said, as I headed for one of the doors in the alley.

With great strength, I broke the steel door open. “Follow the white rabbit, David, or the naked girl. Now that I think about it, it makes more sense than following a rabbit.”

“You have been reading my Journal,” David replied grumpily.

“Hurry, let’s go” I said. I reached over, grabbed David’s hand and pulled him through the doorway.

David was still in shock; he had this dazed look, like he wasn’t sure which way was up. We had entered a warehouse. It looked like it was full of furniture; I was hoping for clothes.

At least it didn’t seem like anyone was around. We hurried through the warehouse until we came upon some
office doors. I went into the first office, but found nothing to wear. The second door ended up being a broom closet full of cleaning supplies. It’s in the broom closet that I got lucky; there, hanging on a hook was a dark blue work suit.

I pulled it off the hook; it was dirty and smelled, but I couldn’t run down the street naked. Holding the work suit in my hand, I looked over at David. He was staring at me; no, he was staring at my body. If he was looking higher than my chest, he would have noticed I was looking back at him; if his tongue fell out of his mouth, I wouldn’t have been surprised.

“Do you like?”

David jumped as if I just caught him sneaking
cookies. “Yeah, everything is ok.” He looked away and his face turned the color of a tomato.  “Sorry, Melabeth.”

“It’s ok.” I said. “You didn’t answer my question. Do you like? Do you like what you see?”

“Yes,” he said quietly.

“Then I don’t mind you staring, but I think it’s only fair if I get to see you naked. So take off your clothes, please
,” I said teasing.

“What… Now?”  David looked really nervous all of a sudden. I liked that; it made me more comfortable to be around a man that wasn’t experienced.

“Just kidding, we need to get out of here.” I slipped on the work suit.

It took us at least five minutes to work our way to the front of the warehouse without being seen. The warehouse was open, and there were people working. We slipped out the front, and, then we walked really fast to the bus station.

About the time we were going in the bus station door, we could hear the sirens in the distance. With no time to waste, we grabbed our bags from the lockers. I rushed into the girl’s room, tossed the work outfit in the trash and put on one of my new outfits. I took out the only pair of jeans that I bought and a white top. All I had left were my knee high boots; they would have to do until I got another pair of shoes.

We ran to get on the bus; the bus driver gave us an irritated look, as we found our seats. We both let a gasp of air out as the bus started driving out of town.

I sat next to the window looking out. I could hear David’s heart beating over the noise of the bus. We were quiet for a little while.

I was not sure what David was thinking; finally he looked over at me and said, "You killed three men."

"Yep" I said. What does he mean by that?

David looked at me with a pained look on his face. Then he said, "Yep. That’s
your answer for murdering a man?"

"Murd
er? I didn’t murder them; I killed them!" I said. That hurt; how could he be thinking badly of me? "I did it to save us."

"I don’
t know everything that happened," David said. "I was knocked out; when I awoke, you were ripping a man's head off. Then, before my eyes, the other man turned into a giant. You both started fighting, and then the giant got a hold of you. I was afraid he was going to kill you. I felt the fear in me, and, at the same time, I knew I could stop him. I got his attention, I felt fear for myself. I pushed all my fear into him, and it also went into you."

"Is that what that was… fear?"

I wasn’t sure how I felt right now. Was he calling me a murderer or not? He said he was afraid for me; I will let him finish before I lose my temper.

"Yes
," David responded. Then, with a little hesitation, he went on to say. "Remember I told you I can feel what you feel?" I nodded my head yes. "Well I felt you dismiss the fear. And when you awoke, I felt your hunger. Then you killed that man in the alley. You didn’t have to; he wasn’t going to attack us again. So my question to you is, do you have to kill a person to eat?"

"No
," I felt tears building up in my eyes.

"Then that’s murder." David said bluntly.

One of my tears betrayed me and jumped down my cheek; I turned my head back toward the window, I didn’t wish for him to see my tears. How could he make me cry? I saved his life, the ingrate. "You don’t know shit David."

"When you killed those me
n, you almost felt nothing, and if you did feel something, it was excitement; I know that," David said with a soft voice. "I now know what you are, and after seeing you do what you did, should I fear you?"

Tears fell down my face as I responded to his assessment of me. "If you had something to fear, you would be dead. Those men were not out to get me; they were out to k
ill you. And yes you’re welcome,"

"Well, if I didn’t say thank you…" David started.

"And another thing, what do you believe I am anyway," I said; my pain was turning into anger.

"Please don’t get mad at me. I don’t mean to be ungrateful to you. I am sorry for hurting your feelings, because I am scared of you." David held his head down. "I am having a hard time putting it into words; I know I am not making a lot of sense. Let me try to explain this to you… please don’t get mad."

"I'll try," the way he kind of begged helped me calm down, but I still felt like crying. I didn’t move my face away from the window to look at David. I still didn’t want him to see me cry.

David started to talk. "Where do I start? I guess first I should say that I know you’re a vampire. I think I have always known."

I couldn’t help myself; I turned to look at him; the tears were still threatening to show themselves. David went on by saying, “I know you saved my life today, and I will always be thankful for that. I can feel a great darkness in you, but, at the same time, I can feel a great… love. You need to be careful, or else that darkness will swallow you up. You can’t just kill people.”

“Do you trust me?” I asked.

“Yes and no. I trust you wouldn’t hurt me. I trust you as far as I am concerned personally. I don’t trust that temper of yours.” David said. "I can feel your pain, and it’s greater than I have ever encountered."

I think he still likes me as a friend, and that made me feel better; I was still afraid he didn’t want anything to do with me. I don’t know why, but I needed him.

So I said, “David trust me when I say that killing bothers me. I think you are misreading me with your powers. In the moment, like in the alley, I always feel nothing, or sometimes I feel excited to fight and kill. You need to understand that it bothers me; I don’t want to be what I am. I have only been like this for a few days. I have no friends or family. I don’t know where to go, or where I have been. I don’t know who to trust, and, in four days time, five men have tried to kill me. I know I am a vampire, but I don’t know shit about vampires. My master left me by myself to find my own way. The weird guy I fought in the alley, his hands were claws that I have never seen before. He told me with one swipe that I would die. Why would I have died? What the hell was he? And will more come after me for killing him? I have questions, no answers. And I am alone.” Now I was crying; tears ran down my face freely, and I felt ashamed.

David quickly wrapped his arms around me and pulled me tight. I cried into his shoulder as he held me. For the first time, in a long time, I didn’t feel alone.

After I cried some more, David whispered in my ear, “sorry for not understanding. You would think, out of all people, I would understand. I don’t even know what I am… or how to control my powers; I could have killed that man myself. Hell, I could of killed you.”

I held him tight, and then said, “It’s ok. You are my only friend, and I need you. Also you are right; I murdered that man. I did it without even thinking about it. I need someone to tell me that; I don’t want to become any more of a monster than I am already.”

David pulled back from the hug, and then he looked me in the eyes and said, “You are not a monster. Trust me when I say, I have seen monsters. I can see people’s souls, or something like that. I understand their emotions; I have felt terrible things from men and women. They were monsters, monsters in human clothes.”

“Really?”

David wiped my tears from my face. “Do I look brave enough to lie to you?”

I laughed, then David smiled brightly and said, “I love the sound of your laugh, and the way you sing; makes me feel like my soul is on fire with passion. I had no idea you were new to this… life. I will help you make your way, I promise.”

“Thank you; you don’t know what you already mean to me.” As I said this, I looked at David’s hands. That’s when I noticed he had blood on them. Confused, I said, “Did you cut yourself?”

“No” David said, and then gave me a small smile, “your tears.”

“Oh, my tears.” I wiped my hand across my face. When I pulled my hand back, I noticed that my tears had blood in them. “Crap, I am making a mess.”

“Don’t worry about it.” David said, as he started to pull a shirt out of his bag.

He pulled off the shirt he was wearing, because there were bloodstains on his shoulder. Wow, he had a lot more muscles with his shirt off, nice abs with a very tight chest; it took willpower not to reach up and rub my hands all over his body.

Unfortunately, he put on his clean shirt. Then he used the dirty one to clean me and him up. Finally I have a friend; deep down I know I need him. Lucky for me he needs me too. Someone is after him, and he doesn’t know why. He has powers that he does not understand, and they
are most likely the reason those men came after him. He and I are kind of in the same boat.

We both are something more than human, yet we don’t know the rules of what we are. I have a feeling that we both need to figure out what we are, and how it all works. We need to find out as fast as possible. At least I don’t have to figure it all out on my own.

“So,” David started to say after putting away his soiled shirt. “What’s it like to be a vampire?”

I answered him by saying, “I am not sure I can explain it.”

“Well do crosses burn you? I already know the daytime thing is bullshit.” David said.

I answered him by saying, “I don’t know about crosses. I kind of hope that is bullshit; I hate to think that I am an evil creature from hell. I would like to think that I could be forgiven for my sins.” I had been too scared to try out the cross and the churches in town. “Your right, the sun does not bother me. And I can go into houses without being invited.”

“I wonder if that’s true.” David replied with a look of deep thought.

“If what’s true?” I responded; I was a little confused.

“The part of being able to go into homes without being invited.” David answered me.

Not sure where David was going with this, I said, “I have gone into two different homes. I was not invited into either of them.”

David, still looking at me, said, “I don’t know this for a fact, but I think that some homes are protected. Let me try to explain what I have witnessed.”

“Ok, go on.”

David leaned back into the bus seat as he started to explain this information to me. “Well you know I can see spirits. And I can also see other things that are hard to explain.

I can see people’s spirits or souls when they are still alive. I have also witnessed magic walls; I don’t know how I can describe what I have seen. The walls are like someone took Reynolds wrap, and wrapped it around the building, or house. Now, when people go through these walls, I notice it pushes on their spirit. Their body just drags their spirit through, and I don’t think anyone even notices the wall.

When I see spirits try to come in or out, the wall stretches, and then shoves them back, and the spirits cannot get in or out of the wall. See, I have noticed, when I look at you, it's like your spirit is on the outside of your body, animating it, whereas with people alive, the spirits are inside of them.

Not all of the buildings have this wall around them. I have noticed this wall on older houses, churches, and some new houses."

"You think someone put this wall there?" I asked.

"Yes, I do, maybe like wizards or witches or something along those lines." David said. Then he went on by saying, "I also witnessed something in my apartment complex that kind of ties this all together."