Vampire "Untitled" (Vampire "Untitled" Trilogy Book 1) (4 page)

“No. No blood.”

He lifted himself up, using the banister for support
and pulling with his arms as though his legs were too exhausted to stand. He
felt sick.

“Do you want... should we call the police?” Paul
asked. He wanted to. Rather, he wanted her to call and do it and speak and take
control.

“Police do nothing for this.” she replied.

“They do nothing?”

“There are no police in Noua, only in Brasov. If they come it is in one hour. If they come.”

The turn of phrase reverberated in Paul’s mind, ‘If
they come.’ There was something ominous about this. He was in a location where,
in the event of an emergency or crime or trouble, the police would turn up in
an hour, if they turned up at all. It made him feel exposed and unprotected.

He looked up the centre of the stairwell, a long and
slim spiral of rectangles all the way to the top. What floor was the apartment?
Was it six? He began climbing the stairs and looked back to Ildico standing at
the bottom. He wanted to invite her up; in different circumstances he would
have loved to talk with her some more. She was pretty when she wasn’t crying.
When she was crying she looked vulnerable, in need of support, fragile.

“Who is the man outside? Is he your boyfriend?
Ex-boyfriend?”

“No. He is Nealla. I hate him.”

“He likes you.”

“No, he hates me,” She replied.

“Why does he hate you?”

“Because I won’t be his girlfriend.”

Paul stared at her. She was cold and wet, ashamed and
miserable; her mascara had run as two blackened rivers from her eyes and her
face was reddened on one side, perhaps from a slap he hadn’t seen. He wanted to
be a good strong man and tell her not to worry, but he couldn’t; he couldn’t
convince himself not to worry. He wanted to invite her upstairs but had no
appetite to face any repercussions. He had no intention of ever going near this
crazy Nealla person ever again. The whole focus of Nealla’s rage had seemed to
be saying that this girl was his property.

Then again… he couldn’t expect her to go back outside
and he couldn’t leave her standing in the entranceway. “Would you like to come
up and wait whilst they leave?”

Ildico nodded and started up the stairs towards him.
It would have been nice if she’d shown some polite hesitation, perhaps asking,
‘are you sure it’s OK?’ and giving him a chance to reaffirm the offer, but she
didn’t. She accepted immediately and began climbing the stairs. Paul realised
it was a really bad idea. He’d just been warned and threatened with physical
violence against consorting with this girl. This was a stupid thing to do. But
what else could he do. Should he tell her to go? Should he heed the warning and
have nothing to do with her?

She reached the top of the stairs and said, “Thank
you.” It sounded so sincere and heartfelt.

“You’re welcome.” Paul replied.

----- X -----

Try
to be cool. Try to say something witty or entertaining. Tell her a joke.

Ildico was sitting at the end of the beige sofa as
Paul busied himself rearranging the nested tables around the beige armchair as
a way to fill the silence. The walls were cream, the carpet was light brown and
the conversation was just as colourful as the decor.

“I want to make a workspace for writing,” he said.
Ildico smiled and nodded like this was part of an interesting conversation, but
he sensed she was as disappointed as he was. Perhaps that wasn’t true.
Something about her seemed innocent. Whenever he spoke she was like a tail
wagging puppy, determined to show enthusiasm even though she didn’t understand
what he was talking about.

He wanted to say something cool, he wanted to
entertain her. He had an empty home and nothing to show. No drink to offer, no
story to tell. He was still shaken up by Nealla. How could he talk to a girl
moments after being attacked? He could and should because he wanted to. He
wasn’t because he wasn’t very good at it and his inner monologue was making
excuses.

Paul opened the laptop bag and set the computer down
ahead of the chair and surrounded it with stationery.

“You will do your writing here?” Ildico asked.

“Yes.” He replied wishing he had more to say than a
single word.

“Are you writing about vampires?”

“Yes, I am. How did you know that?”

“It is what we are famous for. Tourist come in Transylvania for vampires.”

Paul smiled at her.

She was pretty. He’d noticed.

He hadn’t had any sort of liaison with a girl in three
months. The last time he had sex was... Nisha... Nisha. He had a flash vision
of himself between her legs, her dress hitched up, still wearing white
knee-length socks with her knickers hanging from an ankle. For a few moments he
tuned-out to relive a dreadful sexual encounter; something best forgotten. But
the moment he thought of it, it became the only thing he could think of.

Nisha... still haunting him.

“Do you want to visit Bran?” Ildico asked.

“Huh?” Her voice snapped him back to reality.

“Do you want to visit Bran?” she asked again.

“Castle Bran, do you mean? Dracula’s Castle?”

“Yes. The tourists make it Dracula Castle, but I don’t think it has anything to do with Dracula. It is nice to visit because they
have many things for tourists. They have a village for tourist that is very
old, they make all house and farm like it is from many hundred years ago. I can
take you if you like.”

“That would be helpful.” It was more than helpful, It
would be nice, great, wonderful. A day trip with a pretty girl would be
fabulous if it weren’t for a psychopath who’d threatened to slice off his balls
if he ever spoke to her.

“How old are you, if you don’t mind me asking?”

“I’m nineteen,” Ildico replied. Then as an
afterthought and with much enthusiasm, “but I’ll be twenty in September.”

Paul rocked his head back and laughed, then caught
himself and put a hand over his mouth. “I’m sorry,” he said trying to hide his
grin.

“Why do you laughing?”

Paul smiled as he answered. “It’s January.”

Silence.

“It’s January,” he said again. “It just seems a long
time to... you know. If you say I’m nineteen but twenty next month.”

“Ah, you mean I am not close to twenty!”

“Yes.”

Ildico put her hands to her mouth and lifted her knees
up to her chest. “I say something stupid, I always say stupid.”

“No, it’s fine, it’s not stupid.”

Ildico laughed with a bit of embarrassment. Paul just
smiled, trying and failing to keep a straight face. He needed this respite to
break through the dark clouds of the past hour. Having something shared, a
moment, an emotion, laughing at something, her embarrassed and him desperate
for her not to feel embarrassed was the connection. The common point on which
to bond. He looked at her the same way he had outside, looking into her eyes
for just a little bit too long and her returning the gaze, extending it. There
wasn’t pressure or discomfort to naturally break eye-contact. He could look at
her and he was comfortable.

“You know, I haven’t actually had a good look at the
apartment yet,” Paul said. “Do you mind if I look around?” He stood up and
looked at the painting of Jesus. “When I arrived today, the only thing the
landlady spoke about was this picture. She spoke a lot about it.”

Ildico twisted on the sofa to try and see, then stood
up beside him for a better look. She stood close. So close that for a moment
Paul noticed her elbow brushed against his slightly.

“What did she say?” Ildico asked.

“I don’t know. She said it all in Romanian.”

The painting was large and rather beautiful; styled in
that gaudy, over-coloured and over-detailed garishness that signified Eastern
Orthodox Christianity. Jesus was among the clouds with rays of sunlight
radiating from behind his head. He was wearing red and white robes and was
pointing to a human heart that hovered ahead of him. The heart had a cartoonish
style which wouldn’t be amiss as a tattoo with a dagger through it, except in
this image there was a small cross in the top rather than a dagger. The
painting was rich in reds, blues and golden paints and shone like a beacon in a
room that otherwise would be entirely soulless.

Paul moved towards the door, Ildico tagged along.

“I never asked,” Paul said, “but what do you do?
What’s your work, your job?”

“Not many things now. I used to work at Roman. You
know Roman? Man Trucks?”

“I know the American company, Man Trucks.”

“Yes,” Ildico replied. “They made some here in Romania. But they close factory and I lose my job.”

Paul smiled. “I never imagined you building trucks.”

She smiled. “I work in kitchen as cleaner.” She went
quiet for a moment then added, “Now I don’t have real job, but I work as baby
sitter and sometimes as cleaner in peoples home.”

The carbon copies of some of the contracts he’d signed
were still on the kitchen table. He touched them lightly feeling a sting of
worry. A pin that pressed against his newly formed bubble of cheerfulness. How
badly had the lip glossed money-whore screwed him over on this place? Time
would tell. He could ask Ildico to look at them but that felt miserable; it
would break the spell. He didn’t want her to explain how he’d overpaid and
point out what a fool he was for signing them.

The kitchen was equipped with a few pots and pans as
well as a refrigerator and gas cooker. It was small but somehow cosy with a
little banquette wrapped around the dining table. Room enough for two. He
suspected that it might be better to work in here than the main room. The
kitchen had a huge window with a view into the immense courtyard. Like a snow
covered car park, it was at least one hundred yards wide and possibly two
hundred in length. The snow looked dirty and the tower blocks bordering it
looked grey and oppressive. Other than a few parked cars and walled enclosures
for the wheelie bins it was empty. Above the towers on the far side, the snow
covered mountains could be seen.

His eyes drifted back to the contract copies. “I’m
scared I’ve paid too much money today.” He pointed to the paperwork deciding it
was better to know now than continue to stress and worry over it. “I had to
sign these and pay cash and I have no idea what I’ve signed.”

Ildico picked up the papers and sifted through them.
“This is normal, you pay for water and electric and rent and gas. You also
pay... how do you say, you pay first before you use it?”

“Pay in advance?”

“Yes. I can see here they make you pay much in
advance, so when you leave you pay what is left or they give you back money.”

“Oh, that’s good.” It was good, sincerely. He felt a
cloud lifting. “I thought I’d been robbed,” he said.

Ildico walked back to the living room momentarily and
returned with a slip of paper torn from his note pad. “I write my telephone
number here so if you have problem like signing papers you can call me and I
will help.”

Paul pressed his lips together as he tried to hide the
surge of emotion. It was such a small and simple gesture, a tiny offer of help,
but right now it meant the world to him. He took the slip of paper from her
fingers carefully. He spoke softly. “Thank you.”

Continuing the exploration of the apartment he moved
through to the bedroom. It was dark and murky with only a tiny window above the
single bed. He clicked on the light, a bare bulb cast a cold bluish light.
Worryingly, the room smelled musty as though it hadn’t been heated in a long
time and he worried there could be mould or fungus growing somewhere. There was
a wardrobe made of dark wood with a full length mirror on one of the doors. He
pressed down on the bed and found it to be softer than he expected.

The nice surprise was the second smaller room with no
furniture; when the landlady had shown him around he spent less than ten
seconds in this room, but what she’d failed to show him was underneath the net
curtain that draped the entire far wall were French doors that opened to a
balcony.

“Oh wow, I’ve got a balcony!” He pushed aside the net
curtain and pulled at the door suddenly eager and excited by this surprise
discovery. It was stiff, the wooden frame having swollen and warped over the
years. “I’ve got a balcony.” He said to Ildico directly.

“I think everybody has a balcony?”

Paul smiled as he stepped outside. “I’ve never had
one.” The view was gorgeous. Mountain forests covered in snow. “And I don’t
know anyone who ever had one with a view like this!”

On this side of the building there were no blocks to
obscure the panorama, only small huts or sheds, single story bungalows and
plots of earth that seemed to be small-holdings. The whole side of a forested
mountain was directly in view and it was stunning. Bare trees were stripped of
their leaves and stood clustered and frozen, their branches iced and dusted in
snow. There was a small church with a gold cross at the foot of the mountain
and high up the sun had become a soft orange ember, lowering towards the crest
of the hill. It was staggeringly beautiful and somehow it made things better.