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She walked through the dark, hoping that Emile would be presenting himself soon with the message she had been waiting on.
To know that he was okay, and living well, was her one desire in life. She couldn’t be what he needed, but she could make sure that he was happy. Holding her child close would never be an option for her, but having the ability to make changes and help with his care, got her through the pain of living without her son.
Though Veronica felt no cold, she still wrapped her black trench coat more tightly around her body. A Baltimore dock at 3am was hardly the place for anyone, let alone a short, dumpy woman in her mid 30s. Veronica was attractive enough, but would definitely never be mistaken for a prostitute. She just didn’t want to kill anyone tonight.
The rendezvous was always somewhere different; the time always the same. She would say Emile had a flare for the dramatic, but it was more likely that he just didn’t want to be identified.
Just as those thoughts entered her mind, she heard soft footfalls behind her and come to a stop.
“Miss Gein?”
“You’re getting better Emile, but I heard your sharp breath about five minutes ago.”
“As always, I can never get the best of you.”
“Not forever I’m sure. How is he?”
“Very good, he had a cold last week, but he’s back to playing soccer and training his new dog. He really loves that mutt, better than any other gift he got for his birthday. It was the perfect choice you made.”
Veronica smiled, “I didn’t get him a dog Emile. You did.” She felt a large envelope slip into her hand from behind.
“Maybe this will change your mind. He may be 12 now, but he still asks about the woman with the red hair from his dreams.”
She nearly turned around. The urge to strangle the life from Emile was almost addictive. She could go home and get her son, learn his name, and spend a lifetime with him. He could also be introduced to the monster that is his mother, and become like her. She couldn’t allow that to happen. For Emile to dangle the proverbial carrot in front of her, the allure of being known to the boy, was an error she couldn’t let him make twice.
Under clenched teeth she contained her anger, “Swear to me he knows nothing.”
“He doesn’t…”
“Swear it!” Her voice almost inhumanly harsh.
Emile’s voice sounded sad, “I swear it, querida. He has no clue. It’s just old memories beloved, they will fade.”
“Good. Make sure it stays that way.”
She heard him move away and started down the walk towards her car. An unassuming little Ford Focus in silver waited at the end of the parking lot. In her single-minded focus to get to the car, she failed to notice the large man who ran up.
“You hold’n bitch.”
Veronica stopped and looked at the man. She was 20 feet from her car and he was in the way. Dressed in dirty clothes, layered on top of one another, he was just another junkie, but he was still a human life. He could still have a chance, he was young, though the drugs had made his skin ashen and he smelled of chemicals.
He grabbed her wrist hard and jerked her to attention, causing the envelope to fall to the ground, “C’mon, I know you ‘soccer’ mom’s always got Vic or something.”
Her head down in submission, she spoke with her voice low, quiet and eerie clear in cold, “Are you sure you want to do this?”
“Yeah.” He produced a crude shiv from his pocket, “I’m real sure.”
“Then I am sorry.”
“For wha…uch!” The vagrant was unable to produce sound as blood bubbles gurgled out of what was left of his throat, his eyes wide in shock as he watched in death’s fascination. Veronica’s hand dripped with blood as she chewed on the piece of his larynx.
Her mouth full as she started to speak, “You know, I really wasn’t that hungry, but you just had to push it.”
The body fell to the ground as she spit out the bone and gore from her mouth, “Plus you taste like rotten eggs and cough syrup, ugh! Now I’m gonna have pick up a burger to get the taste out of my mouth.” She kicked the corpse, “I’m on a diet you know!”
Heaving a sigh, Veronica picked up the envelope and walked to the car. On the drive home she wiped her hand and face with one of the many hand towels she kept handy. She thought to herself that she couldn’t have too many more mistakes like this one. That would mean she would have to move to another town and she hated packing.
A lot of people thought vampires were creatures of the night that drank blood, had fangs and required 2000 sun block or risk becoming Bar-B-Que. Except for teenage girls and middle-aged single women, who thought being a vampire meant having gold eyes and standing in the sun like a walking disco ball.
Truth of the matter was Veronica didn’t like staying up late anymore than the next 35 year old Divorcee who worked 40 hours a week. She got up at 6 am every morning, went to the gym, showered and stuffed her ample bottom into a business suit. By 9 am, she walked in to the bank branch she worked at and was playing World of Warcraft at her desk, waiting for the next schmo to come in and ask for a loan they would never be approved for.
It might have seemed like a dismal existence, if it hadn’t been her 14th job in 200 years. The only thing the folk tales and movies got right was the longevity. There were no fangs, burning skin, or turning into a bat, just reinforced teeth, nails, muscles, and the forever of looking at the same face for an eternity.
Thanks to a bunch of nutty alchemists in the eleventh century who were afraid to die, Veronica and a few thousand others were sentenced to several lifetimes with a small addiction to blood with adrenal fluid every night. Better yet, she should be thanking her ex-husband who had an affair with a hemophiliac vampire in a brothel and then gave her the same disease. A rarity due to the fact that most vampires find pleasure with each other, it’s not like a human would understand that life, plus the dangers of over-population. Ever since the condom was invented, it was less of an issue now.
That’s right; vampirism is a nasty STD. Cut yourself and you heal without a scar, break a leg and you are a wearing fake cast for six weeks so people don’t freak, get pregnant and your baby is miscarried. You miscarry over and over again until you are crying every time your husband touches you because you can’t handle the heartbreak of killing another baby with your own body. Then you cry at the injustice of it all, until he walks away guilty and disgusted because you never considered immortality a ‘gift’.
“Well, fuck him.” Veronica said under breath as she pulled into her drive way. She might not live in ancient decadence like the rest of those assholes, but she did live.
Walking into her kitchen, she pulled out a ready-made syringe from her fridge and, unceremoniously, jabbed it into her arm. She felt the burn as the blood/adrenal gland cocktail slowly merged with her blood and pumped into her system. Veronica normally took her ‘medicine’ in the morning, it was like its own little energy drink on steroids, but it was Saturday morning and dawn was 3 hours away, so it didn’t matter.
She ambled to the living room and sat down with her take-out. Veronica pulled out the envelope and opened it. Inside was a glossy photo of a sandy haired boy with his new boxer puppy. His blue eyes so beautiful and smile was so bright, she could barely look at it, and tears she thought that she was done shedding were rolling down her face. Hurriedly she took a lighter from her purse and set the picture on fire. Before it could burn her hand, she dropped it into the glass ashtray on the coffee table. Taking a long drink of her chocolate malt, she watched her little boy fade into ashes.
The only child she would ever have, who would never know she existed.
Veronica huffed and puffed heavily on the treadmill in the gym. She still could not understand why any sane person did this for more than 30 minutes. It was all she was planning to do that was for sure. She knew that if any of her kind saw her, they would think she was insane for even spending 3 minutes on the thing. They couldn’t lose or gain weight; they were perfectly preserved like walking Tupperware from the 60s.
Honestly, it just gave her something to do. When she first contracted her little ‘gift’, she spent the first 30 years just pissed off and trying to waste away. When she realized that wouldn’t work, she started to learn how to do all the things she wasn’t allowed to do. Thankfully, Wallace had left by then, because he would have been mortified to know that she took up an apprenticeship as a seamstress. In learning skills, Veronica learned how to deal with an eternity. There was always something new to learn, something exciting being invented or created to figure out. When you are given the ability to use all of your brain, why sit around drinking blood all day and acquiring things you care nothing about that become priceless antiques you don’t want people to touch.
Her family had brought her up on the rich side of Charleston, South Carolina, she was a blue-blooded debutante. Her kind did not work. Veronica snorted as she plodded along, that was total bullshit. Anna Nicole married a man old enough to be a mummy and still had to work. If the ‘Everlife’, wanted to mire themselves in the lives they were accustomed to, they shouldn’t have chosen to spend an eternity in a world where the only thing you could count on was change.
Veronica looked down and noticed she as drifted 30 minutes, no wonder she was sweating and her back hurt. She didn’t bother with a cool down; she just abruptly stopped the treadmill. Almost instantly, the muscles in her back warmed and ceased the aches. Any energy she expended would immediately come back in a matter of moments. It depressed her that no matter what she did, she could not change herself. She had hair halfway down her back for 200 years. Sometimes, she really just wanted a haircut.
Lost in space she nearly ran into a muscled wall, and looked up. Sven smiled down at her with his giant, toothy smile and long blond hair. A really sweet guy, but he was always asking the same question…
“How vas your valk?”
“Good. Good. How was your class?”
Sven rolled his eyes, “Same sing, skinny barben dollz with no energy. They need to eat, not exvercise.”
“They sure do like your class though?”
“Yesv, but I vant to hep people vith real problems.
Here it comes, she thought…
“You have to let me be you trainer. You could look so much better vith abs.”
“What’s the matter, don’t you like my curves?” she asked cattily. It was the only way to get Sven off his favorite subject. The only thing the seven foot Austrian liked more than ‘hepping people’, was girls who were packing.
Eyes hungrily glued to her attributes, “Yesv, you are pervect, bu…”
“Then there is nothing to discuss.” Veronica patted him on the shoulder and made her way around him and out the door. She could hear him heave a sigh of frustration. Poor Sven, she was pretty sure she would look hot with abs too, but she wasn’t going to get the opportunity to even get those, much less a hard body. She smiled to herself, who was she kidding? If nature had taken its course, she probably would have ended up with holster hips and a double-chin.