yle and the Anti-Vampire League
Alexandria Dunn
Copyright Alexandria Dunn 2012
Ellie Doyle and the Anti-Vampire League
I didn’t choose the Anti-Vampire League because I’m ethically opposed to vampires. Providing they aren’t ushering in an apocalypse or snacking on me, I have no objection to them sharing my oxygen—so to speak. I went because of my best friend, and because I am so damn tired of them.
Back in the golden days of literature (whenever those were), being a vampire meant something. It meant having gravitas, inspiring fear and respect. Having gypsies warn naïve travelers about you. A proper folklore steeped in mystery and intrigue. But now? Pop on a leather jacket, hair product, a soulful gaze, and a British accent, and suddenly you’re a bloodsucking heartthrob.
But even with my disdain for the new breed of vampire lore, the whole reason I joined was because of Katie. Everybody has a Katie: an Activist, whose existence is solely to capitalize that word. My Katie fills the role of roommate and best friend, and given that she’s never missed a rent payment and knows when to bring home ice cream, she’s excellent at both. But Katie also saw me as a cause, grouped in with sea turtles, refugees, orphans, and whatever down sad story being championed this week.
“C’mon, El,” she’d say, her voice rising on my name like always. “You have to get involved.”
I’d point out that I was involved in a lot. I’d bought a gym membership and I actually used it (her claim was that didn’t count as I joined to ogle hot men). I had a full time job (but not in a field I love). I met my coworkers and Katie for drinks (not enriching enough), I read magazines (but not books), I even went to the movies (but only to see “popcorn flicks”).
“And, I’ll have you know, I date regularly.” It was a point of some pride. Back in high school, all signs pointed to an ugly duckling that would never see swanhood.
It hadn’t been enough. So we made a deal, and to spite her, I picked the lamest thing I could: the Anti-Vampire League. They met every other Tuesday in the basement of a local church, a room that smelled unpleasantly of damp. I expected a cadre of military wannabes or has-beens sharpening stakes and prepping for the Final Battle, or a group of the devout that would spend the session in prayer for the souls of the damned. Maybe even a peppy committee of moms arranging bake sales to spread awareness of that bloodsucking pest control problem.
It was none of the above. We sat in metal chairs arranged in a circle while we told the stories of how vampires had ruined our lives. Or we tried to. Nobody in the League had been affected directly, as it turned out. It was story after story of third cousins and great-uncles that had been Changed, stories passed through emails from parents and best friends. Others told of encounters, all of which took place in the dead of night, in the woods, alone. Nobody could actually claim a face-to-face meeting with the Undead, but there had certainly been a lot of “flashes of ghostly white” and “I definitely heard a twig snap.”
First off, who goes out into the woods at night? Alone? We’re talking post-Change. There are worse things out there than your average picnic-basket thieving bears. Our comic book nightmares are now reality. Secondly, vampires step on a lot of those pesky twigs, don’t they?
When my turn came, I made up the tale of a friend devoured by a particularly bloodthirsty bloodsucker. Katie, who knew that Meredith Catfield was working as a stenographer in Poughkeepsie, gave me the stink-eye. The rest of the group ate it up. Even Stan, who was a lawyer. It seemed strange—weren’t lawyers supposed to have goggles designed to see through bullshit?
“You don’t have to mock everything,” Katie said during snacks later.
I helped myself to one of the stale donuts. Katie, as was her habit, took nothing.
On Halloween, one of the guys in the group minced up to us. Mickey’s story had been one of the narrowly-avoided-death-in-a-dark-alley variety, but he seemed like a normal guy. He wore cardigans. “Some of us are going out for drinks, you know, to celebrate All Hallow’s Eve. Liam has a bar, so we like to go over there as a group after meetings. You should come, Katie. And, um,” he stole a glance at me, “your friend, too.”
That was the general opinion of the League. They adored Katie, but I had been relegated to “Your friend, too.”
So we went out with the League. The others clustered about Katie, vying for the attention of the golden girl. I found myself beside Gavin. He was narrow, stretched like taffy, his Adam’s apple in perpetual motion. He kept his chin tucked into a frayed coat the color of boring, and he never spoke. When we reached the bar, he took my jacket and hung it on the coat rack for me.
“Come here often?” Cindy, gung-ho soccer mom, joked as we sat. Because it was the Anti-Vampire League, conversation quickly devolved to my least favorite subject, our fanged friends. Alphonso, the requisite slayer wannabe, led the conversation. He was a big guy, thickly built. Like a Marine who ate another Marine, almost. We watched as he set his stake (an actual stake, not a euphemism) into its spring-loaded wrist holster.
“But how do you get the stakes sharp enough?” Cindy asked Alphonso.
“Practice.”
“How do you avoid stabbing yourself?” I asked, loading sugar into my tone. Pinprick puncture scars roamed over his meaty hands and exposed wrists.
Alphonso’s manic eyes met mine. “Stabbing myself would just be stupid, Miss Doyle.”
“Then how do you explain—”
Somebody kicked me. I glared at Katie. Next to me, Gavin buried himself in his drink.
Alphonso, proverbial bullet (or stake) dodged, went back to tales of his “hunting days.” I listened to the others debate urban legends. Had Sasquatch come out of the Void? Did dragons roam the coast of New Hampshire? Dragons, I wanted to ask? Seriously?
Instead, I excused myself and spent ten minutes checking Twitter, perched on the bathroom sink.
When the scream pierced the air, I said, “Shit, not again,” and scrambled for the door, expecting pure chaos.
Instead, it was eerily calm. Every member of the Anti-Vampire League was either sitting or standing, staring at me. I looked back at them, trying to figure out what had happened, when finally Mickey pointed and I realized something was behind me.
It was a kid, and he wasn’t really that scary, if you asked me.
And then the kid turned and I got a good look at his face. Morticians call that particularly pasty shade pallor mortis. His skin was white and bruised, large blurred spots beneath his red-rimmed eyes and around his too-pink lips. In life, he’d probably been a cute, All-American kid, with one of those bowl-cuts so popular in the nineties and among current-day stoners. In death, he looked like…well, death warmed over, really.
A vampire walks into a bar. It should have been the start to a lame joke. But instead, fear ran rampant over my co-members’ faces. Naked fear, abject fear, terror. Cindy, soccer mom warrior, was clutching the table top in front of her, her knuckles striped red and white like a candy cane.
I probably should have been afraid too. Instead, I said, “Shouldn’t you be in bed?”
The vampire kid scowled like a real teenager. “I’m twenty-seven.”
It’s always strange to think of how the Undead never age. “Yeah, they’re probably going to need to see some ID if you want a beer. You may be twenty-seven, but you look, um, twelve.”
The kid rolled his eyes. “Beer is gross.”
“Then what are you doing? In a bar?”
The League had moved from staring in terror to gaping at me. Except Katie, who gave me a look that clearly said, “Stop pissing off the kid with the pointy teeth!”
“This is the Anti-Vampire League
, right?” Vampire Kid demanded, his voice breaking again. I nearly winced on his behalf. To be forever trapped, mid-puberty. There really is a hell.
Nobody in the group seemed brave enough to step forward and declare that, yes, the matching pins on our shirt meant we were a semi-organized support group that opposed vampires. That is, until Gavin took a step forward. The Adam’s apple, never still, was going a mile a minute, but he square those thin shoulders. “What of it, vampire?”
I was surprised at the venom in his voice.
“My name’s Rolf, not vampire. And I’m here to deliver a message on behalf of my boss,” the kid said, moving his head so that his gaze swept over everybody. Most of the League, even Gavin, flinched. “Disband the League.”
“Or what?” Gavin asked.
“Or else.” Rolf tried to sound threatening, but it was hard to pull off with a cracking voice.
This straw seemed to break the camel’s back for Alphonso, who had been cowering in the back. He swung his arm up, the spring-loaded holster twanging. There was a thwip of noise; something streaked right past Rolf. By the time I’d ducked, the stake had already thudded into the wall behind me with a hollow echo. And Alphonso was already mid-charge.
Rolf’s stance never changed. He batted away the full-grown man, who weighed four times as much as him, like somebody brushing away a gnat. Alphonso soared. His body seemed