Here, In This Place: An Origin Tale
E L E V E N
LOVE
AND HUNGER
In the afternoon, David learned that Sunny’s call had indeed been from Germantown.
He got a call late in the afternoon from an unlisted number, and was afraid to answer, but reminded himself he was an officer of the law and he actually was on duty.
“Is this David Lawry?” a woman’s voice sounded uncertain.
“Yes, ma’am, how can I help you?”
“My name is Avery Kominsky,” she began,
“Sunny’s mom.”
“Yes!”
She was obviously relieved, and David kept the relief out of his voice.
“He called me early this morning. Around seven—”
That was four hours later than he had called them.
“He had sent me a text and then he said he just wanted me to hear his voice, and that I should call you. Mr. Lawry, is anything wrong?”
“Please, call me David.”
“Sunny said you were a detective.”
“I am. That’s how we met. But Sunny’s my friend.”
“Oh,” her voice changed.
David frowned.
“Oh?”
“Maybe he called me to reassure you. David, listen,” her voice was suddenly gentle. “He’s going to be home soon, and everything you guys have started is going to grow just like it’s supposed to. I can’t wait to meet you.”
“Meet me…? Grow? Oh!”
David laughed.
“No, I really am just Sunny’s friend. I mean, he’s very attractive, but, I’m… already entangled in my own thing.”
“Oh,” Avery laughed over the phone. It was good to laugh, but now she said, “He’s not alright. Is he? I mean, he’s not himself?”
“No, Avery,” David said. “He’s not. And I’m doing everything I can.”
“I understand the police can only do so much, but—”
“Mrs.—Avery,” David said, “listen to me. I, as myself, am doing everything I can to get my friend back and safe. Alright?”
There was quiet on the other end of the phone and then a shudder and Sunny’s mother burst into sobs.
“I promise,” David said.
She nodded, and then realized he couldn’t see her, and said, weakly, “Thank you,” as she continued to cry. A few minutes later they ended the call and David looked at his phone. There had been three more calls from Tanitha which he could not answer. But for the sake of whatever the two of them had begun, which he wouldn’t allow himself to think about, he had to call her back and, moreover, for Sunny’s sake he needed to reach this woman. In this new world, where his friend was probably a vampire, and his almost girlfriend seemed to be one too, where there was a coven or pack or whatever the fuck they were of vampires turning people into lunch, dinner or other vampires, and where David knew absolutely nothing about them, staying in his apartment was quickly becoming no option. Even as night drew on, earlier now as summer became autumn, this new place felt like the old place, only worse, and he thought of getting in his car, driving straight for Rawlston and drinking and the apartment over the restaurant and across the hall from Nehru and Brad’s, whose two previous occupants were both now, not only nowhere to be found, but no longer human.
But all of this was bullshit. He had told a mother he would do everything to get her son back, and so he reached for his phone at the same time there was a knock at the door that nearly made him scream.
“Stop being a bitch,” David whispered to himself.
The knock came again, insistent.
He hoped that no one saw him the way he saw himself, that what they met was a confident tall, capable detective. Which is what he was about to be as he cleared his throat and opened the door.
He wasn’t surprised to see Tanitha standing there.
The old caution about inviting vampires in crossed his mind as she stood before him, strange in overalls, a cardigan, a red bandanna in her long hair.
“Come in,” he said.
Lowering large black shades, the vampire stepped through.
“David Lawry,” she said, fixing deep blues eyes on him that were grave and slightly reproachful:
“We need to talk.”
“Firstly,” Gabriel said as Sunny dressed, “you are not a vampire.”
He pronounced the word with disgust.
“You are Aluka, Empusa. These words we have taken to ourselves, or they have been applied though, like all words, they are lacking. I prefer, we prefer aimopótis, sanguinarius, Il bevitore di sangue, the krŭvopiets.”
“Blood drinker,” Sunny said.
“Yes.” Gabriel said, “Blood drinker.”
“Yes,” Sunny said, pulling on his shirt, “But what is the point of all of this? Why are we here? And with all of those names, what are we? I’ve seen Dan. He walks in daylight.”
“As do I. As will you. Soon. It takes time to grow strong enough for that. In time you will be invulnerable to nearly all things. We are here because others are here.”
“I read about them. Tanitha and—” Gabriel made a noise that made Sunny stop.
“Do not say their names.”
Sunny blinked.
“Do not speak their names. They came here first.”
“To make other vam—blood drinkers?”
“No,” Gabriel said. “For that is not a thing they do. They actually think it is very bad form. They came here for other reasons. I assume they came to establish a presence in the New World, though why they chose Ohio of all places is beyond me. Much of what they have done is beyond me. And hopefully we are beyond them.”
“They’re enemies?”
“They are very much enemies.”
If only Sunny could find a way to get to 4848 Brummel Street, the place he remembered, but the place that he also remembered was hidden, If he tried to reach it, he was taking a great chance on them actually helping and actually being able to stop these assholes from harming his friends here and his friends back home like Jack, his mother.
“All Aluka belong to houses,” Gabriel was saying. “Families, clans. And the clans all have rules. Many of the rules concern how to kill, who is allowed to be killed, who is off limits. Without them, it is said, there would be no humans left, and then we would all be gone, for human is ultimately what we are.”
“We’re parasites.”
“Everything on this earth is a parasite.”
“Well,” Sunny was thinking of this Kruinh, this Tanitha, a father and daughter, of Gabriel talking about his sister Rosamunde.
“How… did you become a Drinker? If you made me, who made you? And your sister? And do you and your sister—”
But Gabriel was already shaking his head.
“No,” he said.
“What?”
“No one made me,” Gabriel said. “Or Rosamunde. We… umrya v utrobata. Died in the womb. We were roden mŭrtŭv…. Born Dead.”
Sunny stared at the beautiful dark haired boy in horror.
“That is the way for most of us,” Gabriel said. “The clans are actual families. Now and again the head of the clan allows mortals to be joined to us. New blood is good. They are as much blood drinker as we are. Of old we were all humans, and all of us begin human. If a blood drinker takes a mortal bride, then their child will be mortal. Maybe possess certain gifts, but be mortal. However, if a woman among us becomes pregnant by a drinker or by a mortal man, then the blood in her, and the ichor—that thing which the blood becomes, which gives us our strength, but which again must be replenished by blood, that enters the growing child, killing it, as I killed you, and quickening it so that all of our women bear children who are already blood drinkers.”
Vampire families, vampire babies. Sunny would have laughed, half picturing little babies with pointy teeth making a terrible mess of breastfeeding, but he was disgusted, and disgusted with himself. He had spent the day fucking and drinking from Gabriel and, in his mind that was better than going out and killing another human being. Tonight he was on his way to work for the first time, and eager as he was to go back into the world, he was afraid of what he might be, or do. He felt ashamed, tainted.
“Rosamunde is…. We are,” Gabriel said, “starting our own clan.”
“Starting,” Sunny began. And then he said, “But what clan do you belong to?”
“We belong to this one!” Gabriel nearly screamed, flying up, his hair bouncing comically about his naked face, his naked body mottling red.
Taking a deep breath he said, again, “We belong to this one.”
“Now,” he appeared disturbed and upset in a way that revolted Sunny, that made him made mad at himself for having sex with this weirdo, “you should go to work.”
“Gladly,” Sunny said.
“So then you know everything,” Tanitha said, fixing her blue eyes placidly on David while she sat on the arm of the easy chair, one leg crossed over the other.
David was infuriated by Tanitha’s lack of…. Humanity really. Her refusal to be apologetic or embarrassed or any of the things that the more he thought about it, it was impossible for her to be.
Finally he said, “You didn’t tell me.”
“It seems like I didn’t have to.”
“People sleeping together tell each other things.”
“I didn’t tell you I was a vampire, and you didn’t tell me you knew one. Seems like we’re even,”
David opened his mouth.
“Look, David, you’ve told me everything about that journal, and I’ve told you far more than I tell most people, so you know that I am not quite a modern girl. I’m not exactly sure how a modern girl is supposed to act, but it seems to me that far more important than whatever you may be feeling is your friend, Alexander.”
“Dan.”
“Yes?” Tanitha wrinkled her forehead.
“Is he a plot?”
“What?”
“Is the reason he’s gone some type of plot?”
Tanitha looked at David like he was a fool.
“The reason he’s gone is because he’s a musician and he’s always gone with his band this time of year.”
“And Sunny?”
“Will have to wait a few nights. Christopher and Lawrence, two of our own, have already found the place where Rosamunde is staying. In two night’s time—mornings’ time, actually, they are going to rout them. It is already planned, and we will save your friend then.”
“If only we could go tonight.”
“Mortals are hasty,” Tanitha said. “I imagine that is part of being mortal. When you have had time to see things fold, unfold, see what jumping in prematurely can do, you will not be in such a hurry.
“Well,” Tanitha said, brusquely, almost, David thought, like a man, “it seems we’ve covered everything. If I were you, I’d call Sunny tomorrow, and say you expect a return call. If they have his phone, they’ll make him speak. It will set you at ease.”
“I don’t think I’ll ever be at ease again,” David said.
“I think you will be,” Tanitha said. “For now, I’m going to bed.”
“Oh?” David said, looking at her, surprised, as she stood up.
He thought she was going to the door, but instead, Tanitha Tzepesh unhooked her overalls, and then neatly pulled them down and stepped out of them. In swift, fluid movements, Venus like, she removed shirt and all things and swept her hand through her black hair, standing mahogany and naked, a wonder of rounded hips, black triangle of sex, breasts like ripe fruits, and then she turned around and walked toward David’s room, her full behind mesmerizing him despite his previous frustration. When she turned around, what David saw was the fall of black hair, the flash of blue eyes in dark skin, and her lips smiling, wickedly.
“Are you coming, or are you sleeping on the couch?”
She disappeared into the bedroom, and mouth dry, thought after thought ran through David Lawry’s head, but he was already unbuckling his belt, already unbuttoning his shirt, and already hard, he followed.