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“What are you doing?” Sam asked as he was jostled around by the rapidly growing crowd around them. They had been trying to squeeze their way through the boardwalk, but got pulled into the chaos instead and now they couldn’t leave. Edgar had a little notepad he was scribbling in as Alan was sitting on his shoulders dictating something.
“Fire code violations,” Edgar replied without looking up. “City hall needs to know. These unauthorized concerts are breeding grounds for them.”
“I thought you guys were exclusively about vampires,” Sam said as he got bumped and almost knocked over by someone with the word “FUCK” tattooed on their chest. He looked around. The three of them were definitely the odd men out, in terms of age and also the amount of studs/fishnets/spikes/cigarette stink.
“We protect the whole town. Somebody’s gotta do it. Obstructed fire hydrant, 5 o’clock,” Alan reported from his perch. Edgar turned to 9 o’clock and scribbled it down on his pad. Alan tapped him on the top of his head and he helped him back down to the ground.
“Corruption rises like smoke,” Edgar patted Sam on the shoulder like it was the most profound thing he would ever hear. Sam looked around and didn’t see any clear exit routes out of the crowd, somehow they had been drawn into its center and were now stuck in an ant spiral made of sleazebags.
“No extraction point,” Alan was heads below everyone else in the crowd. “Might as well stay for the show.”
“Is this band good?” Sam tried to poke his head over the people in front of him, but could only see the silhouettes of instruments on stage. It was a pretty small gig, all things considered, the elevated platform looked like it was normally used for singing quartets or children's puppet shows. There weren’t even any spotlights, just the street lamps and ambient glow of neon.
“They kinda suck,” Edgar shrugged. “But it’s free.”
Sam wasn’t thrilled about tolerating the sort of music the people around him liked, but this was a new town with a new culture and he was trying to be less fussy about things. He was already being open minded about the existence of vampires, being open to the possibility of rock music being good should be easy in comparison.
The band seemed to appear from nowhere and walked the few rickety steps up to the stage. The crowd suddenly went quiet, almost like a switch had been flipped somewhere. Sam looked around for some sort of understanding that wasn’t going to come. What had inspired this level of…reverence? These guys looked like anemic Batman villains.
He looked over at the Frogs, but they were busy practicing an elaborate 15 step high five routine that they had been hashing out for a few days. He looked back to the band because they had kicked him out after he couldn’t learn past step 7.
The band was quietly setting up on stage and Sam actually felt kind of awkward. The energy had shifted entirely. Now would be the perfect time to leave since everyone else was just staring straight ahead, but curiosity got the better of him and he stayed.
Instruments finally over their shoulders and the microphone adjusted to the lead singer’s height, they all stood still for a moment. The lead singer leaned into the mic and, with all the enthusiasm of a lawyer reading a will, said: “We…are the Lost Boys.”
Just before he could process how stupid that name was, the crowd erupted and Sam felt like he had been torn out of this reality and thrown somewhere else. Suddenly everyone was moving, and he was caught in the ocean. He lost sight of the Frogs almost immediately. The stage in front of him seemed so much bigger and taller, and the band was playing with an amount of energy and theatrics that didn’t seem possible just a few seconds ago. It was loud and cacophonous and decidedly not Sam’s thing, but he found himself enthralled by some part of it.
The lead singer locked eyes with him at one point, and Sam didn’t know why he felt compelled to look away. He must have stood out like a sore thumb and he suddenly felt self conscious. Everyone here was somewhere on the Cartesian plane of cool, scary, high, or mean, and he was none of those. The band looked like all 4.
In order, Sam sorted in his mind as he looked anywhere else besides the lead singer’s creepy stare, the scariness went like this: lead singer, most scary (as previously analyzed). Then, the drummer. He was tall and his jacket was covered in bones. Third, the guitarist, who had the most insane eyes Sam had ever seen on a person but seemed theoretically nice. And lastly, the bassist. He was only scary in the way that seeing a ferret when you aren’t expecting to see one is scary. Sam’s eyes settled there.
He was tinier than the others, and nearly every inch of his exposed skin was covered in wretched little tattoos. He had modestly carved features and, even in the dim glow of the boardwalk lights, Sam could see that he had eyes so blue they were almost translucent. Some thoughts bubbled to the top of his mind but they got mixed with the lyrics and fizzled out. Everything felt warm and soft, like the air was made of down feathers, and he couldn’t smell a hundred gross bodies or skunky weed anymore.
“Earth to Emerson!” Edgar called.
“Report in, space cadet,” Alan had his hands clasped around his mouth so that it sounded crunchy.
Sam blinked and came back into his body. Suddenly it was over as abruptly as it had started. The band were pulling out a few last frantic riffs to the delight of the crowd, and then yelling their thanks before throwing off their instruments like they had some other stage made of rotting wood to run off to. Sam looked down at the Casio watch on his wrist and an hour had passed.
“What the hell just happened?”
Edgar licked the tip of his pencil and tapped it on the notepad. “Noise ordinance violation.”
“So those guys are definitely vampires, right?” Sam poked his head into the comic shop after them. Edgar laughed and once again relished the opportunity to illuminate something for their fledgling hunter.
“Too obvious. You gotta think outside the box, rookie, vamps are creatures of misdirection. We have a great lead over at VideoMax.”
“...the video store?”
“Yep,” Alan was rifling through the new releases section at warp speed. “Pete.”
“Who’s Pete?” Sam asked. That didn’t sound like a very vampire name, but he was trying to entertain the notion of misdirection.
“The vampire that works at VideoMax.”
“No, I mean—” Sam gesticulated aimlessly. “What makes you think he’s a vampire?”
“He wouldn’t let us rent Fright Night,” Edgar’s eyes narrowed to vengeful slits. “What doesn’t he want us to know?”
Sam stared. “Maybe because Fright Night is rated R?”
“That’s never stopped us before,” Alan looked up from the crate. “Max lets us rent any movie we want.”
“Yeah, Max is awesome,” Edgar nodded fondly. “It’s a shame he hired a vampire. Once you invite ‘em in you can never get rid of ‘em, they’re like termites. He’s gonna have an infestation on his hands soon.”
Sam tried to imagine anyone at a video store drinking blood and just saw a white cloud in his mind. “I still think it might be the band. Did you guys listen to their lyrics?”
The brothers exchanged glances. “No.”
Sam gawked. “‘I’m knocking on your door, let me inside’? ‘In my lungs, keep me young’? ‘Stay up all night and sleep all day’?”
The two of them exchanged more glances. “That’s like, every rock band,” Alan said. Sam ran his hands down his face.
“Besides,” Edgar began flipping through the horror section. “Vampires can’t make art. Vampires Everywhere!, #17—” he pulled out a thin sleeved comic from the crate and held it up. The front featured four scantily clad vampire women with their hands sensually draped over each other.
“Not that one,” Alan hurriedly put his hand over the cover.
“Not that one,” Edgar coughed. “That’s issue 14, my bad. Issue 17, issue 17…” Edgar pulled out another comic, this one with an ancient looking vampire despairing over a half-finished oil painting in front of him. “Vampires Everywhere!, Anguish of the Muse. They can’t make art, it dies with their souls. It’s one of the tests,” Edgar handed Sam the comic. “Ask a vamp to draw you a self portrait. They can’t do it.”
He rolled his eyes. “Alright, so if they’re not vampires, what are they? Werewolves?”
“There haven’t been wolves in California since 1924,” Alan said. “Take this seriously.” Sam groaned. This is what he deserved for trying to fit in with the locals. The revving of an engine outside signalled that Michael was here to pick him up.
“I gotta go. Good luck with city hall.” He handed the comic back to them.
“Keep it. Educate yourself,” Edgar nodded seriously and turned his head to the store owner. “Put this one on my tab.”
“Your tab is $150.”
“Mhm,” he looked back and lowered his voice. “Sam, you got this one, right?”
Sam left the store one copy of Vampires Everywhere! wealthier and 75 cents poorer. He climbed onto the back of Michael’s bike and wordlessly put his arms around his waist.
“Whatcha got here?” Michael looked down at the comic clutched in Sam’s hands. “I thought you didn’t like scary stuff.”
“I don’t,” Sam sighed. “It was peer pressure.”
“Let’s see,” Michael took it from him and flipped to a random page. “Woah. Dude.” Sam poked his head over his shoulder and saw that the vampire babes from issue 14 were in this one as well, and there was even less going on clothing wise. Michael turned to him and had the biggest shit eating grin on his face.
“I didn’t KNOW,” Sam yelped and tried to grab it back. “I haven’t even read it yet!”
“Sammy, it’s okay to like goth chicks,” Michael cackled and held it just out of his reach. “You’re figuring yourself out.”
“I don’t,” Sam finally managed to snatch the comic back. “And they’re called goth women, Mike. Learn a little respect.”
“Alright. Don’t tell mom I called them chicks and I won’t tell her what sort of filth you’re smuggling into the house. Deal?”
Sam rolled the comic up and stuck it into his waistband. He smiled and rubbed a knuckle into Michael’s side. He flinched and shoved Sam gently enough that he didn’t fall off the bike. “Deal.”
Sam laid in bed the next evening, staring up at the ceiling. Michael was gone, he was gone almost every night now, probably chasing that girl that he had caught him with. It had gotten Mike into trouble a few times back in Phoenix, and it seemed like that was where he was setting his roots down here. Normally Sam would feel a little lonely about it, but tonight he was glad he had the bedroom to himself. His brother had a gift for knowing when something about him was off, and Sam didn’t think he was capable of making up an excuse.
He couldn’t stop thinking about the band. Particularly, ¼ of the band. The thoughts that had risen to the top of his mind like cream on milk were lingering and it was impossible to ignore them anymore.
That guy was kind of cute, right? Right? Was that insane to think? Sam wished he had someone to bounce this off of and confirm he wasn’t being stupid. But that was a stupid thought too. It was never stupid to have a crush. The heart wants what it wants. And part of him wanted that squirrely bassist.
Then there was, of course, the possibility that he was a vampire. But he didn’t really look like a vampire, apart from the amount of leather and spikes. Sam had always imagined vampires as being tall, looming creatures that didn’t have extremely charming, lopsided smiles.
Sam tried to imagine him with a stake through his heart, or bursting into flames in the sun, but instead, all he could imagine in his mind was an angular jawline, and bright blue eyes, and a sea of really ugly tattoos. He imagined sitting with him and asking what every one meant, even the one of a rat doing a kickflip. Then Sam could explain how to clean a leather jacket with vodka because he probably didn’t know how.
Fuck! He rolled onto his stomach and let himself lay face down on his pillow until the fluttering in his chest was smothered. It didn’t work.
Horror comics! Instant crush killer. He reached for the copy of Vampires Everywhere! issue 17 that was sitting on his nightstand, unread and still bent up at the edges from its trip home. He flipped through it and tried to find the goriest page to make himself nauseous and not in love.
He came upon a page of the old vampire on the cover, luring muses into his lair to try and capture the essence of his long lost bride.
“You’re mine!” The vampire declared from the page, his hypnotic gaze trained on a hapless young woman. “Your love belongs only to me!”
“The vampire master draws a young beauty into his clutches…” the square box of exposition read. “...through subtle manipulation, to be ever his!”
Sam gasped.
“I think I’m being mind controlled,” Sam sat at the kitchen table, hands in his lap. He looked down at them sadly and felt like he was in trouble, but couldn’t tell what for. “By vampires.”
Edgar and Alan were immediately at attention. “That’s a serious situation, Phoenix. We’re gonna have to give you the once over, if you consent,” Edgar said, and his eyes went wide. Sam could tell this was obviously a test.
“Uh, yeah. I consent.”
First test passed. The Frogs nodded and moved to either side of his chair. “Neck check,” they declared.
“Left side: clear,” Alan reported after taking a thorough look at Sam’s throat.
“Right side: clear,” Edgar replied and started frisking him, as if becoming a vampire’s thrall would suddenly hide a gun on him somewhere. “Who do you think did it to you? Someone in the band?”
“Didn’t you say the band weren’t vampires?”
“Our lead at VideoMax dried up,” Alan was circling Sam’s chair with his hands behind his back. “We saw Pete eating a corndog.”
“That was all it took?”
“You ever seen a vampire eat a corndog?”
Sam had never seen a vampire, period. Or he had seen four. It was four or zero. “...yeah, I think it’s someone in the band.”
“Great!” Edgar put his hands on his hips. “Take us to their lair and we’ll cut their heads off.”
“No!” Sam got out of the chair and both of the brothers made crosses with their fingers at him. “I’m not…I don’t think they need to die—”
“You’re covering for them!” Edgar grabbed him by the shoulders instead. “They’ve turned you spawn, man. But don’t worry. We’ll get your soul back.”
“Or,” Alan spoke up. “We could use this to our advantage.”
“Talk to me,” Edgar let go of him and turned to his brother. Sam was a little offended. What were vampire servants supposed to be, anyway? Did they get cool powers? He felt exactly the same, maybe even slightly less cool than usual.
“If Phoenix is their thrall then we have an easy way into the coven,” Alan continued. His head was lowered and his eyes were lit up, excited to be formulating a solid plan. “This would be great for research, before we stake ‘em.”
“It’s risky,” Edgar tapped his chin. “Not sure he’s got enough humanity left. What if he goes rogue and betrays us? Sells us out to his dark masters?”
“I’m right here.”
Alan shook his head. “Sam is a Frog, through and through. He knows that if push comes to shove and it’s between us and his coterie, he’ll stake himself to save us.” He locked eyes with Sam and grinned. “Right?”
Sam stared back in horror.
“Alright, then it’s settled,” Edgar clapped him on the back. “We’re gonna Trojan horse you. Good thing we brought all our stuff.” Alan was already rifling through the khaki army supply bag they had hauled into Sam’s home. He hadn’t thought to ask why earlier.
“There’s another show tonight. All you gotta do is let them do their woo woo glamor on you so you get backstage. Then, you record ‘em. We’re gonna put a wire on you.”
“...a wire?”
Alan handed him a tape recorder nearly the size of a lunchbox.
“How am I supposed to look inconspicuous with this?” Sam floundered.
“Just put it in your backpack,” Alan suggested as Edgar shoved a squirt gun full of holy water into each of his pockets. He frowned. He didn’t want to wear his backpack to a rock concert. His backpack had Superboy on it and he didn’t want to look lame in front of the vampires.
“Fine,” he relented. He had to be strong and break through the mind control, even if it was painful.
They finished stuffing his backpack with garlic, crosses, backup squirt guns, salt, and stakes (“just in case it comes down to brass tacks”). The tape recorder barely fit in after all that.
“Lastly,” Edgar took in a long, serious breath. Alan stood at his side, solemn. They looked like they were at a funeral. “Take this, in case you find yourself cornered by a vamp. It’s silver-tipped. It will annihilate any bloodsucker in your way. Use it wisely.” He pressed a bullet into Sam’s hand, no less than 3 inches in length.
“Is this…” Sam felt the heft in his palm. “Is this a real bullet? Is this for a sniper rifle? Where did you get this?”
“Don’t ask questions you don’t want the answer to.”
“I do want the answer to that?”
“Alright, let’s roll out,” Edgar pointed his arm to the front door.
“I don’t even have a gun to use this with?!”
They pushed him outside and Sam was 100% sure he was going to die. Not from vampires, or silver-tipped bullets, but from soul-crushing humiliation. Or maybe love. They were called crushes for a reason.
The three of them walked the whole way to the boardwalk, with the Frogs doing supply checks the entire way. When they got to the borders of fans that were starting to pool around the stage, Edgar and Alan each put a hand on his shoulder and smiled.
“Go get ‘em, soldier,” Alan said as if he was going to die in battle.
“You’re not coming with me? To the show?” Sam squeaked.
“We gotta stand at our posts, make sure nothing happens to you,” Edgar gently pushed him forward. “We’ll be watching, though.”
After a moment, Sam nodded. He could do this. He had to be brave for their sake, for the sake of the whole town. Mike too, he needed to protect his brother. They all believed in him. If Santa Carla really was overrun with vampires, then he was in a unique position to help. And then he’d be free from the mind control too. Sam took a few steps forward, and then thought perhaps he had been too finicky this whole time. The Frogs weren’t so bad. He should be more grateful, perhaps.
“Guys,” he said, and then turned around. “I appreciate you—”
They were already back to practicing their handshake and weren’t looking at him. He disappeared into the crowd with a huff. It was only his second time at this show but he was already beginning to feel more at home here, at least. Fewer people bumped into him. Someone even offered him a joint, but he declined when he thought about the possibility of Michael being disappointed in him. His heavy backpack made him feel awkward and off balance but no one seemed to care much.
The show started the same as it did last time. Respectful, uncharacteristic silence from the crowd while the band futzed around onstage for a few minutes. Sam wondered if he could make a loud noise to prove that he wasn’t under the same spell as everyone else, but got embarrassed at the thought and didn’t.
The music exploded out of the atmosphere much like it had before. It still didn’t sound good. Maybe that was an optimistic sign? Surely if they were vampires and could control people, they’d make everyone think their music was actually good, right? But Edgar had been correct. They kind of sucked. That was a comfort.
Sam expected to just wait out the music, but yet again he found himself feeling light and airy on his feet. Suddenly his backpack wasn’t so heavy. The night air felt cool on his skin. The music was timing up with his heart, perhaps. He couldn’t let himself think too hard about that. He also couldn’t think about how long his eyes had been locked onto the bassist again.
He felt like a stupid lovesick puppy. Every tiny thing about him or that he was doing was somehow adorable. His fingernails were dirty—endearing! He was slightly off rhythm—captivating! He got too excited about singing the chorus and almost knocked his mic over and Sam felt his cheeks heat up. He forgot about the giant bullet in his pocket or the 20 bulbs of garlic in his backpack or how to make coherent thoughts with his brain.
And then like that: it was over again. It felt like it had been hours, but it was only one, and Sam realized he had somehow wiggled his way to the front of the crowd. The band was drawing one last burst of energy from the audience and he found that he was clutching the edge of the stage, looking up with wide eyes.
For the first time, the bassist seemed to notice him, and their eyes met. Time slowed down, maybe literally. Sam felt a flash of recognition seize his heart, something apart from attraction. He thought about what it was like to be the smallest one in a group of cool scary vampire musicians. He wondered if anyone had ever called him weird. There was no way he had an easy high school experience. But he was being himself, up there, in front of a lot of people, and he seemed unafraid.
Sam stared. The bassist stared back.
Then he smiled. Sam smiled too.
The crowd filtered out quickly after that, like a dam had broken. But Sam lingered near the edge of the stage, trying to psyche himself up. He almost forgot to turn on the tape recorder, but when he pulled it out of his backpack he realized that it didn’t even have a blank tape in it anyway. He sighed and looked back up at the band. They were taking it slower tonight, not scurrying off in a rush like last time.
“Um,” Sam tried to make his voice sound big and failed. “Excuse me.”
Somehow they heard it anyway. They all looked up at him at once, and they all looked equally bewildered. Like he wasn’t supposed to be there or something. They exchanged glances, and the lead singer flicked his head from the bassist to Sam.
“Hey, little man,” the bassist said as he approached the edge of the stage. “What’s up?”
“Hi,” Sam stammered, and then tried to pretend he was Michael. “Hi,” he said, better.
“Hi.”
“Can I have an autograph?”
The man—or boy, he could have been a wide variety of ages—looked again perplexed, like he had no idea what that was. He looked behind him, and the guitarist fished out a crumpled show flyer and a Sharpie from somewhere. He returned with them.
“What’s uh, your name?”
“Sam,” Sam smiled and hoped he recognized it from 10 minutes ago. The lead singer perked up from the shadows as if he heard something interesting.
“Okeedoke,” the bassist said as he scribbled something on the flyer. Sam wondered if vampires usually said “okeedoke”.
“And can you draw something on it?”
“...like what?”
“Anything,” Sam grinned. “Maybe a self portrait.”
The bassist laughed unsurely and waved the guitarist over so that he could lean over and use his back as a table.
“What’s your name?” Sam asked.
“Dwayne.”
That was a relief. Vampires were named things like Vlad, or Lucifer, or Blade, not “Dwayne”. Dwaynes bagged groceries at Safeway, or were dachshunds with attitude problems.
Dwayne handed the show flyer back to Sam, who took one look at it, resolved to never show it to the Frogs, and then folded it up and put it in his pocket. “Thanks.”
“Yeah, sure,” Dwayne held out a fist and Sam bumped it. Nice, a one step handshake routine. Easy. “Thanks for coming to the show.”
“You guys are good,” he lied. Dwayne chortled like he could tell. And then his face briefly fell as he looked at Sam. Something seemed to be working in his mind. He looked from Sam, to the scary lead singer still lurking in the shadows, and then back to Sam. Dwayne did a quick little jog over to the singer and Sam watched them have a hushed conversation that he wasn’t privy to. It didn’t go on too long, but Dwayne seemed to be trying to convince him of something, and he did catch the singer saying something like “you owe me” at the very end while he glowered. He picked something up out of a nearby box and the two of them walked back over.
“Hey, kid,” the singer said, and suddenly he seemed way less scary. “You got a brother, right?”
“Yeah,” Sam nodded. “Mike. Michael.”
“Hey, I know that guy,” he said glibly and tossed him the band tee he had brought over. “Here’s a t-shirt. Do me a favor and tell your brother to stay away from my girl, alright?” He somehow smiled without smiling. “Or I’ll kill him.”
Sam caught the shirt and then grinned mischievously. He couldn’t wait to tell Mike whose toes he was stepping on. He was always getting into the same sort of trouble. “Got it.”
The band wrapped up quickly after that. On their way out, the lead singer made some sort of meaningful eye contact with him. The buggy guitarist and drummer followed, but they both seemed much more normal when they were on the ground level with him. Dwayne brought up the rear, and tossed Sam his pick on their way out.
“Seeya!”
Sam tried to catch it, fumbled it, then picked it up off the ground. By the time he looked up, they were gone in the night. He tried not to think about it too hard.
“How’d it go?” The Frogs were advancing on him now that the band was gone. “Did you have to use the bullet?”
“You were watching, weren’t you?” Sam handed it back.
“Sightlines were bad,” 4’11” Alan Frog said.
“What sort of juicy info did you get?” Edgar asked as he dug through the backpack for the recorder. “I bet—where’s the tape?”
“You guys didn’t put one in.”
“You were supposed to put in the tape,” he said to Alan.
“You were on tape duty,” he argued.
“No, you were on tape duty, I was on bullet duty. I did the whole spiel.”
As they bickered, in as many steps as their handshakes, Sam pivoted away from them slightly. He put the t-shirt under his arm and fished the flyer out of his pocket to look at it again. His heart was beating in his chest. Maybe vampires weren’t real after all, and maybe it was okay to just have a summer crush. Maybe things didn’t have to be something or anything or nothing. They could just be.
He looked down at the crumpled paper in his hands and smiled. On it was written: “To our #1 fan, Sam!”
And underneath, a drawing of a bat.