Vampire "Untitled" (Vampire "Untitled" Trilogy Book 1) (19 page)

As the door moved, he saw more of the blue moonlight,
brighter than he imagined it should be, but as he looked into the room
something was amiss. Whilst the room was in moonlight, outside on the balcony
was lit with a delicate red hue. The ruby glow around the edges. He couldn’t
see it properly due to the net curtain hanging over the window obscuring the
view, but he could see the colour of the light.

There was nothing in the room to give him fright and
he walked to the window calmly and pulled the net curtain aside. He wanted to
know what it was, he wanted to see from where the red light came.

The window pane jarred as something hit it. A hand, a
human hand hit the glass with its palm. There was a man on the balcony. The
sound that had awoken him was his hand slamming against the glass. trying to
stir him, to bring him here and open the door, to invite him inside. The man
was hidden in shadow and appeared more as a silhouette, but he was there,
looking in, looking at Paul. The only thing separating them was a pane of
glass.

“It’s awful what they did to you,” Paul said.

The vampire didn’t move.

“You were right all along. That woman tormented you
and she deserved to be punished. Even just once, she needed to be taught a
painful lesson.”

The creature outside was still; rigid, like a statue.

“I understand now why you were filled with so much
rage and anger and hatred and fury. She hurt you so much and it was wrong. It
was dreadful. What she did was a sin against you. It was a sin.”

Paul reached out his own hand and rested his palm over
the vampires, making himself and the creature outside mirrored reflections of
one another.

“That’s why it happened. They killed you. But you were
so filled with rage and fury and a desire for vengeance that a part of you
didn’t die. It came out, walked free, became the strigoi and waited in the
forest for someone to come. That’s what you are. A bad spirit that infects
men.”

Slowly, Paul removed his hand.

“I will pray for you.”

He let the net curtain fall back to obscure the
window. As he turned to leave, the delicate red hue seemed to filter into the
room and Paul felt a tingling sensation running across his naked back as though
heat was being shone onto his skin. He turned back to the window and found that
the vampire was no longer outside. It was in the room; somehow it had melted
through the glass to be inside the room with its back to the window, still
obscured under the net curtains. It stepped forward a single pace making the
curtain ride up its body as the meshed fabric pulled over its head.

There was nothing to fear now.

Paul stood before the vampire, separated by mere
inches and a fine muslin shroud of net curtain. There was something else to
see, some other part to this story. What did it want him to know?

“I don’t understand?” Paul whispered to it. “Show me
what you need me to see.”

The vampire took another step forward, a tiny step,
just enough to pull the curtain a little higher.

Paul took hold of the curtain and gathered it in his
hands. It was cold, ice cold. When he had the bulk of it in his hands he lifted
the netting up to reveal the vampire as though he were a husband lifting the
wedding veil to his new bride.

He saw its face.

My God.

He saw its face.

----- X -----

Paul
somehow managed an extra hour in bed despite the cockerel. When he did finally
get up, he took his time about it. Today would be easy, relaxed, preparing
stories at a calm and steady pace; you can’t rush this stuff.

He made coffee and cut some crusty bread to eat with
jam for breakfast. He sat by the kitchen window looking out over the courtyard,
fascinated by the amount of animal tracks around the bins. A new layer of snow
had fallen during the night but there must have been dozens of dogs since. He
watched a house cat bound through the snow and examine the bins and wondered if
any exotic animals such as bears or wolves did likewise. Wolves had been hunted
almost to extinction and the bears would be hibernating, but he could imagine
that if he sat in this window long enough he would see exciting things.

First task after breakfast was laundry, a case of
boiling water in all of the pans and hand washing in a bucket in the bathtub.
The job was fairly straightforward and there wasn’t much. It was almost
enjoyable to splash around in warm water and soap suds, it certainly left his
hands feeling clean.

The plan was to hang the clothes in the kitchen and
use the heat from the oven to dry them but his denim jeans were dripping
heavily. The obvious place for them would be above the bathtub but there was no
way to hang anything in the bathroom. The balcony was the best option; it had
several rows of clotheslines at waist height along its length. He carried his
two pairs of jeans through to the small room and pulled at the balcony door. Of
course, he knew he couldn’t leave clothes out there too long because they would
freeze, but right now the sun was shining and it looked warm enough to leave
them for an hour or two.

The balcony door felt stiff and took some wrestling
before the slowly rotting wood gave way and scraped open. Paul carried the
jeans out and...

“No!”

Paul felt his blood turning to ice water. His heart
slowed in pace but doubled in strength.“No, this isn’t true.”

On the floor, outside the door...

A present.

A gift for him.

“That was a dream. I had a dream. Nobody has been
here.”

The ice water in his veins coursed through his system
paralysing each muscle it touched.

“There are no such things as vampires. Do you hear me,
Paul? There are no such things as vampires and you don’t believe in them.” The
words sounded like a bluff. It didn’t sound convincing, even to himself. If
anybody else had heard the tone of his voice they would think he was terrified.

Driven by a compulsion to convince himself he was
unfazed, he began hanging the jeans over the clotheslines. His hands trembled
as he did it. He felt sick. He watched his hands trying to thread the wet
clothing over the lines feeling as though he was having to consciously move
each muscle. His coordination was gone, his second-nature motions had vanished
and he behaved like a drunk trying to convince his boss he was sober.

He was trying to pretend he hadn’t seen it, but when
he turned back, it was still there.

On the floor of the balcony, in the same spot the
vampire had stood, was the crucifix that had hung over the entrance to the
shrine in the forest. It was the same one, with the silver cruciform of Christ.

Paul couldn’t rationally convince himself it was any
other cruciform. He’d been out here on the balcony before and hadn’t seen it.
If it had always been here, there was no way he could not have seen it. That
was impossible. The cross was right there, he had to practically trip over it.
The only rational thought he could muster was perhaps this cruciform had been
here all along, had been hung here on the balcony above the door. He examined
the doorframe. There was no nail or hook or any way this had been fastened to
the smooth concrete. This crucifix had just appeared. It had appeared in
exactly the same place he had dreamt he’d seen a vampire.

But what if it wasn’t a dream?

Could he have done it himself, placed it here and
forgotten? Sleepwalking perhaps? Could Ildico have left it here when they first
stood here together? What if he’d brought the cross and forgotten it, stolen it
from the shrine?

His imagination replayed a moment in the forest. He
was at the shrine, reaching up to touch this cross, wrapping his fingers around
it, resting his thumb on the silver body of Christ. He saw that moment again,
recalling how he felt as though his mind was taking a mental photograph through
his eyes, his arm outstretched, holding the cross. It would have taken only a
second to snatch it down and keep it.

No, that was crazy; but it was less crazy than it
being left as a vampire’s calling card.

“There are no such things as vampires,” Paul told
himself. He picked up the cross. “There are no such things as vampires.”

He went back into the apartment and into the lounge
and looked at the picture of Jesus pointing to the heart. “What are you trying
to do to me?” Paul snapped at the painting. “Are you trying to frighten me? Are
you trying to convert me?”

The picture didn’t answer.

“You see this?” He held up the cruciform. “You go
around making people decorate their homes in your image to try and twist their
thinking, but it’s not true. There are no vampires, there is no God and you
probably didn’t even exist. There are only crazy people who believe in
bullshit.” Paul’s gaze dropped for a moment and he saw the bold text beneath
the picture, ‘anti-religion’. He laughed. “That’s right. Religion is fucking
stupid, and you’re fucking stupid, so fuck you Jesus.”

Paul turned the cruciform over in his fingers. It was
the one from the shrine, the exact one. He knew it, he knew that if he went
back to the shrine right now it would be missing from the entranceway.

He laid the cross down beside his laptop and exhaled
hard to try and purge the swell of emotions and negative feelings.

“Take a break, Paul,” he said to himself. “Let’s go
out. Let’s take a break today.”

----- X -----

Finding
his way to the centre of Brasov was easier than he’d imagined. The place he was
looking for was called Piazza Sfatului and the first bus he spotted had that
marked as the destination. Ildico had been right, it was only fifteen or twenty
minutes from Noua.

Ildico. It would be nice if she were here.

Paul was alone and aimless. He walked around the
square kicking slush and snow until it seeped through his shoes and made his
socks wet. The buildings were very ornate, like one would expect to see in Vienna; cuckoo-clock buildings he called them, but there weren’t many and beyond the
square it was back to tower blocks and dilapidated old homes. There was a
fountain made from abstract concrete shapes that, being winter, was switched
off and there was a large pretty building in the centre that was possibly a
museum.

He bought a takeaway cappuccino that was sickly.
Instead of steamed milk on the top it was processed whipped cream from a
pressurised can. Adding insult to the already injured coffee, the barista had
added some kind of vanilla syrup. None of this was asked for; he’d simply said
‘cappuccino’ and ended up with a liquid cream cake. He had to throw it in the
bin before he’d even drunk a third of it.

The shops in Brasov held no interest either, other
than how weirdly boutique they were. He found one shop with a sumptuously
dressed window as though they should be selling vintage violins. It sold vacuum
cleaners and nothing else. They seemed to have five models on display in the
window and that was it. Inside the shop was a man sitting behind a desk who
looked unbelievably bored.

Across from the Piazza was a glittery looking frontage
that said Topless Bar. “Have I sunk that far already?” Paul said as he walked
to it. He would have gone in. He would have drank and ogled and tried to
distance himself in a boozy stupor, but it was only lunchtime and the place
seemed to open after ten at night.

As he read the opening hours he felt a surge of misery
hit him. Here he was in a picturesque town that was steeped in history. It was
one of the starting points of the Silk Road, a place of transit for a thousand
years. On the far side of the piazza was The Black Church, a cathedral that
he’d read was built in the 14th century and was a major tourist attraction. But
the thought of visiting a church made him feel sick; it would be an effort. The
only thing that held any interest were the two bright red cable cars he’d seen
running up and down the side of the mountains and after lunch at a small bistro
he set off to find it.

It was a windy ride up the mountainside in the cable
car. He rode the cabin alone trying to picture himself clinging to the top of
the gondola like Clint Eastwood or Richard Burton in Where Eagles Dare. He
didn’t fancy it much; it was too cold and miserable for brave heroics of the
mind. The building at the top where the cable car stopped was a restaurant that
looked down on the city. He could imagine it bustling with tourists in summer,
but right now there were only a handful of patrons. Outside of this building in
the forests he saw wooden posts painted with shapes such as a red triangle or
two yellow stripes. He’d seen a red triangle post at the bottom of the mountain
and figured it was a trail walk. Not likely. His feet were already cold and
damp and the snow up here was seriously deep.

He stayed long enough to find a viewing platform that
looked down onto the city. It was overcast, grey and little could be seen
through the clouds clinging to the mountainside. The only enjoyment to this
place was the fact that he was alone and as he leaned on the railing he
suddenly felt a whoosh of emotion that made him cry. There was no reason for
it. Homesickness perhaps. It felt like reminiscing over a dead friend; that
sadness when you realise they’ve been gone for three or four years and you
imagine what you did and what they missed out on. Sadness. Just sadness. He
looked out across rooftops covered in snow far below him and found he couldn’t
raise a single happy thought or memory.