***
I moved out of the house that following day, not far mind you but out. It was too dangerous for Purpose in there, and I didn’t want anything to happen to him. I made a small lean-to in the yard and kept a fire going the entire winter. When the spring thaw came I buried each urn and marked them with a small headstone. I said a hollow prayer as I laid each to rest. I didn’t find comfort in it, but I hoped that, as they watched over me from above, they would.
Purpose stood next to me solemnly as I did the unenviable task. When I was done he bounded off chasing after a rabbit that had strayed into his territory. Purpose wasn’t an English Bulldog, but he was close. As man neared the brink, so did his most trusted and loyal friend, dogs that could not adapt were now gone forever. Only the medium-sized, smarter breeds like Retrievers, Huskies, and Pit Bulls survived and even thrived. Purpose looked something like an Old English Bulldog, with longer legs like an American Bulldog, a square head like a Rottweiler and a semi pushed-in nose; much like my beloved Henry. His markings were as near to Henry as I could remember, his body was fawn colored, with black rings around his eyes and his face was white.
I was standing over Gary’s spot in the ground when I heard Purpose barking a warning. I turned quickly. Somebody was coming.
“Come, Purpose,” I told him as we strode back into the house.
I heard Tommy stop by the headstones: a few moments later he called out. “Mr. T, you here?”
Purpose bristled at first and then relaxed when I assumed he recognized the voice.
“Where’s the dog?” Tomas asked from outside.
“You mean that morsel you brought me to eat last year? I do hope you upped your game this year, I’ve been very hungry.”
“Does your food always leave droppings?”
“Busted,” I said to Purpose who I let go. He immediately bounded out of the basement to greet our guest properly.
“What is he feeding you?” Tommy asked as Purpose bowled him over. After a few minutes of rough housing Tommy stood up. “It’s good to see you up and about, Mr. T.”
I didn’t answer him.
He motioned to the small, marked mounds. “I’m glad you finally put them at peace.”
My heart panged as I realized the finality of my act. “I wish I was at peace.”
Tommy had seen the hurt on my face and the pain in my words and quickly moved on. “How has Purpose been doing?” he asked.
“Who, that mangy mutt? He eats more than any dog I’ve ever known. It’s difficult to keep him satisfied.”
“You look better.”
“You didn’t bring any food?”
“Pop-Tarts have been extremely hard to come by in this new world of man. My hope is someday that someone finds the recipe and begins to replicate it. There is a baker in New Detroit that bakes an awesome blonde brownie with a caramel center, though.”
“I was thinking more along the lines of meat, but now that you mention it, sweets sound pretty good too. I’m curious, though, we’ve had this routine you and me…for over a century as a matter of fact. I sit morosely in the house and you bring food. What changed?”
“The world changed, and I need you involved in it. So, either you were going to hunt for the puppy I brought, or you were going to eat him and then we were going to have a serious problem.”
I didn’t ask for clarification. Tommy might be a boy in outward appearance but he was five hundred years my senior and significantly more powerful than me. ‘We’ had a serious problem really meant that ‘I’ had a serious problem. I was thankful that Purpose had been too small at the time to get an enjoyable meal out of.
We sat down on a small bench I had in my lean-to. Purpose was busy patrolling his domain and reveling in every moment of it.
“What now, Mr. T?”
“I don’t know, Tommy. I guess I always thought the pain of loss would diminish. But, if anything, it’s grown over the years. Maybe it’s because I will never be able to honor my last words to Tracy as she died in my arms.”
“We will be together again,” Tommy murmured, remembering back to that snowy winter day.
Tracy had been closing in on ninety, and I loved her as much then as I did when we met. Even more so, I guess, because I knew our time was coming to an end. I always thought that ‘Soul Mate’ was just a term that lovelorn teenagers gave to the fleeting loves they had in between classes. But that was Tracy – to me, we were connected on so many different levels, that I think she had felt the loss of my soul just as deeply as I had, maybe even more so. To realize there was an afterlife, and that I could not spend it with her, well that was just a pain that at times became too difficult to dwell on.
“Something is different, Tommy. I can tell by the way you’re lingering. Normally you can’t wait to pay your respects, drop off your food, and be gone. I’m not sure if part of it is from the guilt of my condition, which, by the way, you have no culpability in, I made the choice. Or it’s just my shittier-than-thou demeanor, hell; I don’t even like being around myself and why Purpose stays is beyond me.”
“He sees something there, Mr. T, something you had a long time ago. It’s still there…you just have to dig a bit deeper.”
“So what gives? Remember I grew up in Boston, I know when I’m being played. Damn, I miss the Red Sox.”
“They’ve started playing a version of baseball. Looks more like hockey with base pads, but they’re calling it baseball.”
“Full-contact baseball? I love it; maybe I’ll have to catch a game someday.”
“What if that day were a little sooner than expected?”
“Could you please just tell me what’s going on?”
“There’s a new threat to man.”
I didn’t say anything; man had been on the edge and had come through the other side – not unscathed, but they had made it. “And what concern of that is mine?” I finally asked.
“You are still half-human, I would think that would be enough.”
“It’s not.” I answered flatly and a bit too quickly.
“Purpose is a fine dog, and he seems to love you even with all your faults. Treated kindly and with love, he will most likely live fifteen years, maybe a few more. What then, Mr. Talbot? You going to go back and stink up your hovel?”
“You leave him out of this!” I shouted as I stood. Purpose was on the far end of the yard; he looked over at me, his head cocked to the side, wondering why I was so upset. “Do not lecture me, Tommy! I think I love that scraggly, gangly damn dog, and I will not listen to you talk about his eventual decline and death!” I was shaking in rage. “Why would you make me go through this again?” I asked as I sat heavily, my face in my hands as I hid the shame of my outburst.
“I gave you Purpose, to give you a purpose, Mr. T. You can still be a part of something even if you are apart from it.”
“That’s pretty philosophical.”
“I’ve had a lot of time on my hands,” he said in a placating manner.
“Please tell me zombies haven’t made a resurgence. I never knew how sweet the smell of fresh air could actually be.”
“Worse.”
That perked my interest somewhat and I think Tommy knew it.
“Fine, I’m listening…what’s worse?”
“Lycanthropes.”
“What? Listen, I know I haven’t seen a dictionary in years, much less read a book, but what the hell is a lycanthrope?”
“A werewolf…sort of.”
“Oh, come on.” I stood. Purpose, again, stopped what he was doing to look at me, the crazy part-human. “Werewolves? Really? How about a Frankenstein or two just for fun?”
“No just the werewolves or actually lycan would be the correct term.”
“If that’s true and not just some ruse of yours to get me out of this yard, then how bad could it be? Last movie I watched there was like one of them and they ate a person or two every full moon.”
“That’s myth.”
“What’s m
yth?”
“The full moon aspect,” he answered. “Lycan can change at any time, they just happen to be strongest during the full moon.”
“Stop dancing around it and get to the meat of it, please, I’m a busy person.”
Tommy looked up at me, his eyebrows upraised as if to say ‘Really?’
“I have to get dinner for Purpose and me,” I told him in haste.
“The zombies killed some Lycan, but not nearly the same sort of percentages that man suffered. It was always man’s vast numbers that kept Lycan on the periphery of existence. They didn’t dare disturb the sleeping giant. They would take only what they needed to feed. Often times relying on the homeless and destitute to satisfy themselves.”
“But…?” I prodded when he paused.
“But the balance has shifted. Lycan have numbers now that can truly end man’s reign as king of the hill.”
“This can’t be serious. This seems entirely too far-fetched, even after what I’ve been through.”
“Oh, it’s true. They’ve gotten bolder as they’ve begun to realize their superior position.”
“Wait…so you’re saying they’re not attacking yet, but they will? How could you know this?”
“Azile—” he started, but I stopped him.
“Azile, the Azile? Are you hearing yourself? This is the worst Grimm Brothers’ fairy tale I’ve ever heard. They would have laughed you out of their office if you brought them this story. Okay, let’s get all the pieces straight. We’ve got you – a vampire. And me – a half-vamp, apparently there’s werewolves…and now you’ve just informed me about a witch that lived a century and a half ago. Oh, and Purpose the wonder dog,” I added when the pooch licked my hand.
“Azile sends her regards.”
“How is she still alive? And how long have you known?”
“It was her that brought me the information regarding the Lycan. That was a little over four months ago. I was nearly as surprised as you when she showed up at my doorstep.”
“You have a house?” I don’t know why that sounded so insane. A vampire home owner; would the milkman deliver? Did he get satellite or cable? Right now, a domesticated vamp sounded like the most normal thing this weird afternoon.
“In Florida, more of a mansion, than a house - overlooks the ocean. I find peace there.”
“Florida? Plan on retiring soon?” He looked at me crossly. “How did she find you?”
“I’ll be honest, Mr. T, she’s as much a mystery to me as she is to you. She’s obviously a very powerful witch if she can cheat death of its rightful property.”
“How hard can it be? You and I do it every day.”
He gave me that cross look again, until I shut up.
“She did a locator spell to find me and warn me about the Lycans. She said she had foreseen it.”
“Prophecies…wonderful…those are always so much fun. Why can’t she see stuff like marshmallows falling from the sky? Stop looking at me that way,” I told him. “Okay werewolves, what are we, I mean you, supposed to do about it? You’re only one person.”
“We’d be three if you joined. Four including Purpose.”
“There is no way, Tommy; I will not put Purpose in harm’s way. Not another loved one, not ever.”
“Lycan hate vampires, they eventually will seek you out and destroy you. One-on-one you may have the advantage, but they hunt in packs.”
“It would be mercy from them if they were to end my existence.”
“You cannot have forgotten.”
“No, I haven’t forgotten. I die without my soul; I’ll never be able to retrieve it.”
“Do you perhaps think your soul is going to come looking for you here?” he asked, spreading his arms wide.
“It could happen,” I told him.
“Come with me, Mr. T, it will do you some good.”
“I’d love to, but I’m agoraphobic.”
“You’re afraid of leaving this thing you call a home? There’s a whole new world of man starting up. We could help see that they have a fair chance of making it. How many families are out there right now where the father is doing his best to protect his family from the monsters that go bump in the night?”
“You really do know how to hit a man below the belt. I’ll go only because I need to see what this new baseball game is all about. But if this is a true quest, don’t we need a fifth so we can be like the Lord of the Rings.”
“I have a surprise for you in that department.”
“I’m not big on surprises,” I told him.
Last time a friend of mine had thrown a surprise birthday party for me, I had punched him square in the mouth when he had jumped up to announce himself. He had spent the majority of the night making calls to dentists to see if they could fix his tooth; I subsequently got hammered. I was twenty-one, not much phased me back then. He would call me a dick after every desperate attempt to find an emergency dentist. ‘I’ll toast to that’ was my normal response.
“It’s got nothing to do with your sister right?”
A pained expression showed briefly. “No, nothing to do with Eliza. She has paid her penance and is at peace.”
“There’s jail in heaven? You’re kidding right?”
“We all must atone for our deeds while we live.”
“Well holy fuck! That doesn’t sound all that fair. I mean, those of us who live longer lives…well, we’ve done more, meaning we’ll have more to atone for. Oh, this is bad.”
“To be fair, Mr. T, you really haven’t done anything this past century to be overly concerned about.”
“That’s a true enough statement, but I did plenty before that. Shit, shit, shit,” I said as I began to pace. “Okay, so is there like a balance sheet, one bad deed gets outweighed by a good one? Maybe I could help little old women across the street while I sell them Girl Scout Cookies, that’s like a two-fer.”
“It doesn’t really work like that.”
“You a theologian?”
He shook his head.
“I’m going with my model then.”
He shrugged his shoulders.
“We should get going,” I told him. “I have a shitload of good things I need to get done.”
It took me under a minute to pack up what I was taking, and that revolved around some rope dog toys I had made for Purpose. It was, however, another hour as I said goodbye to my family. My head throbbed from my tears as Tommy led me away. One way or the other I knew I wasn’t coming back here, not ever. That thought produced such a wide and varying range of emotions; it would do me little justice trying to capture them here in my journal.
Ah, my journal, how I have missed you. Like a true friend, you have waited for me these many long years. I hadn’t written much in one in a long while, but that hadn’t stopped Tommy from bringing them to me every so often. Now that I come to think of it, where in the hell was he getting them? The pages were new and crisp, not yellowed, dry and crumbly like they should have been. The kid was one giant question mark. I would have to accept this as I did a long line of anomalies that swirled around him.