When she came back into the room, he could see the spell of the moment was gone. But what puzzled him was why she had panicked when she answered the phone. She must have guessed his thoughts. Her lips tightened, her gaze lowered. “I thought it might be about my mother,” she said. “She’s dying.”
It was a terse confession, perhaps in return for his own rambling tale. They were sharing deaths, he thought with bitter humor.
“Listen,” she said, “I think you should leave. I don’t know when my father will be home. I couldn’t explain you. It will be hard enough to explain this.” She pointed at the table.
“You dropped something on it?” he suggested. “Good grief, what? A bomb?”
Still, he wouldn’t let her push him out so fast. “You’ll let me come again?”
“Why?” Her hand went to her throat.
It made him feel ashamed. He stooped to pick up his T-shirt. “To talk,” he muttered. “Just to talk.”
“What have we to talk about?” It sounded like a denial.
He took a stab in the dark. “Death,” he said.
Her eyes grew large and stricken, but she nodded. “Yes.”
He couldn’t stop the grin. He covered it by pulling on his shirt. “I’ll come again—soon. Zoë, I didn’t know I needed this so much.” He grabbed her and gave her a quick, fierce kiss.
But it awoke bitterness once more. He was a failure at even this mockery he’d become. He’d spent years thinking of them as mindless, stupid creatures unfit to live, to make it easier to use them; now he had let one become real to him. What am I going to do? He thought. I won’t be able to hunt again. He’d shrivel and twist but never die—and always the awful hunger. The idea of himself wasted and quite mad, crawling through some back alley somewhere, made him shudder.
She touched his face, her unbearably human eyes showing more concern than he’d ever deserved.’ ‘What’s wrong?”
“I’ll never get my revenge,” he said. “Christopher is too clever for me. I might as well run away while I can and hide from him. Make some kind of a worthless life for myself elsewhere. I’ve always been a fool. A failure. He’ll keep on killing and keep on evading me. He’ll win.”
“No. He can’t.” He was surprised by the quick spark of fire in her.
He tucked the portrait back under his arm and flung his jacket over his shoulder. She walked him to the door. “He will win, you know, because even if I kill him, I’ll go on living endlessly, futilely, hating every unnatural second.”
“Don’t talk that way,” she said. “You deserve more.”
“No, I don’t.”
She let out a small cry of protest, of pain.
“Sorry. Till later, then.”
She closed the door slowly, as if afraid to trust him to his own despair; then he was out in the dark again.
He slipped through the streets to his den, trying to sort out what he felt. The scruffy youth who began to follow him near the park was a minor problem. He lost the boy fast through the dark backyards.
At the light of dawn he curled in a dusty corner, and abandoned thought for the musky sleep that tasted of blood.
11
Zoë
Zoë sat in the moonlight that slid molten through her window. It lay pooled on the pillow where her head had been minutes before. The silver light had pierced her eyelids as if they were transparent, keeping her from sleep.
They say people who sleep in moonlight become lunatics, she thought, and smiled. But it’s too late, she added. I already am.
She curled her legs up to hug them with her arms, feeling the window-seat cover bunch beneath her, cotton daisies from a long-ago spring. The lawn outside sparkled with frost, and the whole night was diamond and fairy.
She thought of Simon. He’d held her so carefully, and his kisses had been so sweet that she’d wanted more. He had laced her neck with shivers. She barely noticed it when his fangs pierced her throat; except then it felt like silver bubbles started to rise from her breast and burst within her head like champagne, and her body responded, surprising her into quickened breath. She blushed to think of how she had pulled him close. What was I saying to him? she wondered. It was like I was drunk.
I should be disgusted, she thought. But no, it wasn’t disgusting now that she thought of it, but it was frightening. You could rush into your death unknowing, inviting, enjoying the ecstasy of it, burned up in bright light like a moth. She hadn’t wanted him to stop.
Was it something Simon did on purpose, she wondered, or was it part of the disease, a compensation for the victim like the numbing poison of a spider’s bite? Yet Christopher liked to feel his victim’s fear. My God, she thought. If Simon can control the senses like that, what does Christopher do to them? The air of the room grew icy, and she pulled her robe closer around her.
What Simon had done was hard to believe at first, but there was the blood she had wiped from her throat, and the puncture wounds on her neck that had healed so fast. They had sealed in a matter of hours to leave just a bruise. She was still groggy and weak but strangely stimulated.
He had grown hotter and hotter as he drank from her warmth, and he had trembled. That trembling had aroused her as much as anything. She’d caused it. And he had stopped, hadn’t he? She could trust him. Despite her doubts it was his loneliness that convinced her of that finally. He just needs someone to talk to, she thought, that’s all, like me.
A dark shape in the yard below caught her eye, and her heart thumped. But it was just a cat, passing through. What was I afraid of? she thought. A small boy, perhaps, creeping up on my house?
But why was Simon afraid of Christopher? What could Christopher do to Simon that Simon couldn’t do to him? Why was Simon giving up? Stop being a wimp, she wanted to shout at him as anger flashed through her. You can do something about your problem.
She eased her clenched fists. God, it was so dumb getting mad at someone who wasn’t even there. But then, she’d been angry a lot lately. “Uh-oh,” she breathed softly. She’d forgotten to call Lorraine back. I’ll have to do it tomorrow, she thought, then sighed. She’d be wiped out tomorrow if she didn’t get some rest. She rubbed her eyes and tried to feel sleepy. I better go back to bed, she decided.
She pulled the curtains against the disturbing light.
A steady gray rain beat down on the taut skin of Zoë’s umbrella as she splashed her way to the bus stop. Each puddle caused the damp to creep farther up the legs of her corduroys, stiffening them against her calves. Cars hushed by, their drivers oblivious to the spray of water they sent splattering the sidewalk, their rear lights leaving streamers of red in the slick black street. Over the sidewalk the streetlamps misted the air with fractured light.
Her mother mustn’t have known it was raining this hard. She never would have called if she knew Zoë would have to rush outside on a night like this, but the phone call had come, the one Zoë longed for but seldom received nowadays. “Come visit me,” the husky voice had said. “Your dad’s working tonight. I’ll be lonely.” Zoë had flung on her mother’s London Fog raincoat, grabbed the red umbrella from the hall stand, and ran out into the night, barely taking time to check if she had bus fare in her pants pocket. Who cares about rain, she thought, grinning. She felt like a different person, miles from the girl who had been too tired to go to school today.
Then a spatter of footsteps from behind echoed someone running. They drew closer, fast. She stopped before she could help it, more curious than fearful. She turned just as the runner reached her.
“Zoë,” Simon said, pulling up short, and he held out his hand.
A detached part of her wondered at his not being out of breath, while she took his hand automatically, as if she had been doing it for years. They continued walking, and she shifted the umbrella to cover him, too, but he didn’t seem to notice.
“Where are you going?” He flipped his sopping-wet hair back from his eyes, scattering drops down her cheek.
“The hospital.”
br />
His eyes registered surprise, concern perhaps. “You are ill?”
“No, my mother’s there.”
“Oh.”
They stepped off the curb to cross the street. She saw him wince as he hopped across the stream in the gutter. “You all right?”
“Flowing water,” he explained. “It’s a problem to me.
“What do you mean?”
“Water rejects the dead. A corpse floats to the surface, no matter how long it takes.”
I can’t believe I’m having this conversation, she thought. It’s creepy.
“I am at odds with nature,” he continued. “And the whole natural world tries to remind me of this. The sun burns me; and when I cross running water, I can feel it trying to heave me off the face of the earth. It makes me sick to my stomach.”
No wonder he was sick on that voyage from England, she thought. If it’s true. She squeezed his hand, and that made him smile.
They reached the bus stop, and he took in the red-and-white transit sign. “Can I come?” He dropped her hand to search his pockets but seemed to find nothing that satisfied him.
“I have enough for you too,” she said. Let him come. It felt right.
His hands stopped searching and relaxed into the side pockets of his jacket. “You don’t mind sharing the time with her?”
“No.” She was touched by his insight. “It’ll be good for her. She doesn’t get out much nowadays. She likes unusual people. She’ll have a wonderful time trying to figure you out.”
“You love her very much.” It wasn’t a question. “It’s a difficult time for you.”
“Understatement.” Her lips twisted wryly.
“I haven’t seen much of natural death. What is it your mother is dying of?”
Zoë bristled. How could he sound so cold? “She has cancer. I wouldn’t call that natural.”
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to sound callous, but next to the death I’ve seen dealt, it seems much more natural. I mean, within the laws of nature at least.”
The bus came. Zoë climbed the steps, folding her umbrella, and slammed enough change for both of them in the slot. He talked as if her mother were a specimen. She didn’t bother to check if he followed her. She sat halfway down the almost empty bus, opposite the rear door, and laid the wet umbrella on the floor. When she sat up, she saw him grab the back of the seat in front and swing in gracefully beside her. He looked worried.
“I didn’t mean to trivialize your mother’s death. I know it matters. Every death matters.”
They were silent for a while, as the bus lurched through the night.
“At first,” he finally said, “you think—no, hope—it might be a dream. That you’ll wake up, and it will have been just a nightmare.”
Zoë turned sharply to look at him. Was he mocking her? But his gaze was far away, not even on her.
“You think she’ll be there,” he continued, “pulling the curtains to let in the sun, wishing you good morning.
“Yes, how did you know?”
His eyes snapped into focus, catching the light like broken glass. “What kind of a son would I be, not to know?”
She blushed stupidly and couldn’t seem to find a natural position for her hands to settle in. He’d lost his mother too. “Yes, of course.”
“You forgot,” he said in a gentler voice.
She nodded, embarrassed. “But I felt that way, too, or like maybe it was a cruel joke, and everyone would confess to it real soon.”
“And then the anger,” he said, as if it were inevitable. “Anger at her for going away.”
“For ruining our lives,” she joined in.
“At God, “he said.
“At everyone around, for not understanding, for not having it happen to them.”
Simon nodded. “At myself, too, for not having been old enough at the time to understand, or perhaps to save her.”
“I thought sometimes, I’m being punished,” Zoë said, “but I didn’t know what for. I started looking for things to do to atone.”
A woman near the front of the bus turned to look at them, and Zoë realized the conversation had gotten louder. She lowered her voice. “Now I think, there’s no payoff, no matter how good you are. No one’s going to reward you. It’s not like getting good grades in school—there’s no logic, no prizes.”
He sighed. “It pains me to hear you speak like that. So young, and so bitter.”
She was surprised. “But what about you? After all this time, after all you’ve been through?”
“Yes, I suppose, but I’ve had much longer to become that way, and even then, isn’t the point to do what’s right for its own sake, even if there is no reward?” He gave a short snort of laughter. “But what am I talking about? What do I know of right and wrong? I’ve had to rationalize the wrong for so long, I’m not sure I could know the difference. It appears self-preservation is the strongest motivator of all—for everyone.”
Zoë noticed that they were passing the hospital. “Damn!” She leapt for the bell cord. The bus ground to a halt at the stop by the farthest entrance, and they scrambled to get off. At least the rain had stopped; a piece of luck, since she’d forgotten the umbrella.
On the way up the long driveway he put his arm around her. He should be dead, she thought, three hundred years ago, and yet he’s here comforting me. It doesn’t make sense.
“Zoë,” he said when they were halfway there, “don’t let the anger make you push people away. Don’t take it out on the people who love you. I cut myself off from my father, and look what happened to me. It tortures me to think of how it could have been. I should have recognized the form his grief took and comforted him. We could have stood against Christopher together. We could have won. I was a fool.”
Zoë hugged him closer to her. “We don’t ever have the benefit of hindsight in our decisions, let alone three hundred years’ worth.” Secretly she thought, Am I pushing them away? No, it’s them. But his words nagged at her; she still hadn’t phoned Lorraine.
As they neared the building, Simon slowed down. He tipped his head to examine its height like Jack facing the giant. She hesitated at the large glass doors. Would anyone really want to sit at the deathbed of someone he didn’t even know? “Are you sure you want to come in?” she asked.
“Yes,” he said, but he looked frightened, unsteady.
“You could wait outside.”
“No.”
It didn’t look as if he was going to move, however, so she went in ahead of him. He followed her and kept close like a child at the dentist. His eyes flicked rapidly here and there. She was sure a sudden noise would give him a heart attack—if that was possible. He almost flinched when someone passed him in the corridor. They drew a few curious stares, but this was a hospital. They probably think I’m taking him to the psych ward, she decided.
“I’m not used to the light,” he said by way of excuse.
When the elevator doors closed, she wished for his sake they had taken the stairs. She could feel his panic like vibrations in the air. Thank goodness they were in there alone, because she didn’t think he could have taken a crowd.
“The problem is,” he said—and she could hear the click of his tongue in his dry mouth—“in my line of work you like to have an escape route.” He cut short a nervous giggle by biting his lip.
Zoë smiled politely at the plump nurse at the fifth-floor station. The nurse smiled back. “Which room?”
“Five twelve.”
“Oh, yes, Mrs. Sutcliff. She said she was expecting her daughter.”
“That’s me.”
“Well, go ahead, dear. I expect you know the way.” She looked doubtfully at Simon but held her tongue. He stared back at her, a defiant young punk, his defense mechanisms at work again.
Zoë tugged at his sleeve. “Come on.” What was he up to? Was he going to make a scene?
He broke eye contact with practiced indifference. Quite an actor, she thought, remembering his distres
s only moments before. She could hear the nurses in the staff room now—“It’s the stress,” they’d say. “It brings out the devil in them. She’s hanging out with hoods to get attention.” It made her smile. If only they knew.
The smile faded when she came to her mother’s door and got no response to her gentle knock.
The lights were low, and her mother just a huddled lump in the bed. A surge of terror made her rush to the bedside, but the steady movement of breathing quelled her fears. She lowered herself to a chair. Her mother’s slippers lay half under the bed, looking flat and empty. I guess there won’t be any conversation tonight, she thought.
Simon, liquid with ease in the muted light, pulled a chair up beside her. He looked at her mother with interest, all the nervousness smoothed from his face. “Hence your beauty,” he said.
“But she’s not like she was.”
“I can still tell.”
She wasn’t sure how to answer, so didn’t.
I could shake her, she thought. I could wake her up. She almost reached out, but her mother looked so peaceful. Zoë crushed beneath her thigh the hand that wanted to touch. Let her sleep, she argued. She needs it. She has to grab what she can. But Zoë’s lips were tight with disappointment. Why did she call if she was tired? I thought she wanted me here.
Simon gazed steadily at her mother’s face. It was impossible to guess his thoughts. They made a strange pair: the dying and the undead. Is he wishing he could die too? she wondered. Is life forced on him as much as death is forced on her?
A thought suddenly struck her. Could he change her? Could he give her his blood like Christopher had given his? Surely they could find a way to get her the blood she would need without killing anyone. She would have time for her art, time for her family, all the time in the world. But would he do it?
“Simon,” she whispered, “if a sick person became a vampire, would he heal?”