Sucking in San Francisco (7 page)

I drive us back to the manse, Sebastian is still home. We make our way inside, and I flop down on the couch for a minute. I squirm around, unable to settle.

“Well, I’m going to get a smoothie and do some errands before work tonight. If no one needs anything while I’m out, I’ll see you later,” I say.

“Maybe someone should go with you. I would escort you but I need to stop by the club and see to some things. If you can wait for an hour or two, I can go with you,” Sebastian says.

“I’ll be okay, Sebastian. Goddess, I’m almost ninety-eight. I can take care of myself. Besides, I’m just going over to Union Street and then to work to pick up my check. I’ll be in broad daylight the whole time and with lots of people milling around.”

“I guess you’re right,” Bast says, reading my degree of snark and backing off. I’m still on edge from Helena’s reference to his feelings for me. “Maybe I should rearrange my schedule. I’m just doing the books and waiting for deliveries. I can have someone else meet the trucks and do the books later. I’ll call and make the arrangements.”

“Thanks anyways, Bast, I’ll be careful,” I say a bit more nicely.

“Are you sure?”

“Yes. I’m going to get a manicure and pedicure. You’ll be bored to death.” His concerned look turns to relief. Shopping he can handle and often enjoys, spas are another thing.

I grab my keys and my purse. First on my list is Union Street. I find a parking space just as someone pulls out. I have to flip a quick u-turn but am able to squeeze my car in, excellent! I really need a manicure and pedicure. My nails don’t grow actually, they stay the same no matter what I do but I like to pretend and get a mani and pedi once in awhile. It feels great and who doesn’t like having their feet massaged? Though I love the pampering, I don’t do it that often. My budget only stretches so far. All the unusual things going on makes me feel the need to indulge myself. It’s the same with my hair. It’s why I have perpetually short hair. Who knew when I cut it, I was making a statement that would have eternal repercussions? It was quite the scandal, at the time. I’d long wavy strawberry blonde hair. I still remember the shock on everyone’s faces when I cut it.

I was young when my parents passed away from influenza. Young and a pain in the ass. No one to tell me what to do and I figured with the money they left me I could enjoy my independence. San Francisco was still a wild town in 1933. Women were exploring their rights and lack of them. I drank a lot, prohibition be damned, flirted a lot and all but ruined my reputation. Until that one party, where I met an elegant, handsome, mysterious man. Too handsome. Dangerous. So of course I went with him into the garden. I’ll never forget his face. He looked Middle Eastern, which was still exotic in California at that time. Dark hair and lashes with brown eyes and an aquiline nose. He had a heavy accent and I have always been attracted to accents. I was a silly girl and dreamed of seeing the world. I thought he was the next best thing. With the knowledge I have now, I know he was a young vampire and didn’t care whether he drained me or not. Many of our kind are like that, regardless of age. He left me for dead, but I wasn’t, not quite. That’s how you make a vampire. You almost drain them. The virus in our venom infects what blood is left in us. A quick bite doesn’t inject enough virus to turn a human. Prolonged feeding infects the blood that’s left and changes the body. It takes a couple of days for the change to happen. The vampire used me like fast food and left me lying in the garden. When they found me they thought I’d had too much to drink. My servants put me to bed. It took me two days to transform. It’s not a pleasant experience.

My body felt like it was on fire, boiling from the inside. Things shifted and strained, as my body reformed on the inside. As my organs atrophied or plain disappeared, I kept throwing up the excess. I sweated through gown after gown and I remember my maid sponging me off. They kept mumbling around me and I thought I heard words like mumps, influenza and measles. I was quarantined from anyone who hadn’t been sick with the mumps or measles, they’d ruled out influenza. I couldn’t eat or drink. I retched up everything they gave me. Good times. I give myself a shake to clear away the memories.

I stroll into the nail boutique. A perky attendant guides me to a chair and they start my feet soaking. The balmy water feels luxurious, lifting my spirits immediately. My feet are always cold and I love taking hot showers and baths. The tension peels away from me as they start my chair vibrating. As the technician works on my nails while my feet soak, she mentions the four people who’ve been killed.

“This is freaky. They killed them by driving a stake through their heart. Like some Dracula flick. Totally freaky,” she says.

I choose an eggplant color for my polish as it always goes great with red hair and is striking against my pale skin.

“Hmm,” I say, going for disinterested. “Probably some cult. I’ve heard of people getting obsessed with vampire fantasies. I wouldn’t worry about it too much. The ones that were staked were probably in some role-playing game or something. Just don’t go anywhere by yourself at night for awhile.”

“I hear ya, honey. My boyfriend is already freakin out about me working late here and now he wants me to work days only.”

Forty-five minutes later I walk out of the shop, buffed and shined and feeling like a diva. Life was good so to speak, except for the little detail of someone trying to kill us. I guess that would be trying to kill us again. Three doors down, I find a coffee shop that makes smoothies and I get a triple berry, thinking and slurping all the way to my car.

Just as I pull out of my spot I feel a whoosh of warm air. Startled, I look over to find Aidan sitting next to me. I scream. Nice.

“Hello, Lilith, that’s not much of a welcome.”

“Y-you surprised me.”

“I specialize in surprise. Is that triple berry? I wish I could taste that, I’ve always imagined it would be excellent.”

“It is,” I say, gathering some of my cool back. “Can’t you taste it?”

“No, I don’t eat,” he says dressed in jeans and a tee shirt. Looking very ordinary in an sexy way. Yummy. I shake myself mentally. I have to be careful around him.

“How have you been, Aidan?”

“Curious. I thought I would pop in and find out more about a vampire who would rush into the night to rescue one of her callers.”

“I’m honored.”

“You should be. I’ve never hung out with a blood sipper before. What are you doing, lining up your next meal?”

“What, no bridge jumping today? Can you even die? Or if you’re bored you could redecorate your bottle,” I suggest.

“That’s a little cold hearted, Lilith, don’t you think? Not your usual professional manner, I hope. No bridge jumping for me today. It’s seems you have figured out what I am then?”

“Yes. How long have you been in San Francisco? I mean do you live here or just visiting? Did you pop in to catch a Giant’s game, or the opera?”

“Master of my own fate, at the moment. I’m at my leisure. I intend to stay that way, unless the boredom drives me to the bridge again.” he says lightly, but the temperature of his eyes drops twenty degrees and I’m happy he isn’t looking at me when he says it. “I thought I’d look for a change of scenery, I’m always looking for new ways to amuse myself. By the way, where are we going?”

“I’m going to pick up my pay check and then I’m going home,” I say.

“I think I will tag along with you to work. Maybe I can see some lifesaving in action, it might give me some creative ideas, since nothing I’ve tried has worked so far,” he says.

I just exhale, loudly, twice, and count to ten. The deep breaths are habit that’s hard to get rid of. How am I going to explain this? I can’t exactly tell him he can’t go because he can and will do anything he wants and he knows I know that. His smile just gets bigger the more frustrated I get. I know under that smile lies a capricious intelligence. The range of which I have yet to discover. I need to remember that.

“You better pay attention to your driving,” he says as a car door suddenly opens into my lane.

He laughs softly like it’s an inside joke.

“You did that on purpose didn’t you?”

“So many things happening all the time, how could you blame something like that on me, Lilith?”

He winks, sending a thrill through me.

“Tell me how you feel knowing you take the life force out of human beings to survive?”

“It’s not like I had a choice to become a vampire, Aidan. I struggle everyday with the fact that I have to live off humans. It’s a horrible way to survive.”

Remembering my first feeding still gives me chills. When I woke up from my ‘flu,’ I knew something life altering had happened. The world was brighter. I could smell everything from the crisp sheets to the cook’s menu in the kitchen two stories below and hear everything going on in the entire house. I tried to take a drink of water and broke the glass because I wasn’t used to my new strength. Scared, I crawled back into bed thinking I was hallucinating. Then one of the maids came in with some chicken and noodles to see if I could eat something. The sight of solid food repulsed me, but she smelled so good. She smelled warm and delicious. Then I noticed I couldn’t close my mouth all the way because my fangsters had popped out. I ran from the room screaming. The maid thought I was hysterical, running from the house in my night gown. It was night, heavy with fog. A man was walking his dog down the street and asked if he could help. I stopped and let him get close to me. He smelled so good and the desire to bite him overwhelmed me. I stood very still as he leaned in to speak to me. When he asked again what was wrong I moved like lightening and took him by the neck and bit down. I didn’t know any better. Instinct took over. It was the sweetest taste that I’d ever experienced. I didn’t know enough to stop and I drained him completely, gorging myself. I killed him, viciously, in ignorance. The poor man just stopped to help me. When I realized what I had done, I was revolted. I had drunk blood, blood I got from biting into another person’s neck. I suddenly felt dirty inside and out. I wasn’t even sure I knew what I was. The creature I had become was awakening in me and I had the potential to become a violent, lustful monster. The thrill of blood can be intense if it is not tempered with the memory of our humanity. Many vampires lose the connection. Most vampires don’t get mentors like Helena or Julian.

“How many vamps are in your nest, Lilith?” he asks, waking me from my woolgathering.

Suspicion set my nerves on alert. Why did he need to know this? I would have to maneuver carefully. I didn’t want him hunting my friends down.

“I live alone, Aidan, but I have three very close friends that live together. They are my family.”

Family. My family came to me after that momentous first feeding. After I finished eating, I stumbled back to my home. Not being a neat eater yet, I had blood all down the front of my white night gown, but no one could find any marks on me. My staff was terrified and wanted to call the police. I had enough control over them to keep them from doing that. They helped me clean up. As I lay soaking in a hot bath, the steam coming off the water, I was reminded of the steam coming off the blood of the man I had just killed. I felt out of control and dirty, sinful. I needed to get the blood off me. My fear of dirt was born that night. I began to think of all the things in the dirt on other people and in the blood all over me and now in me. I scrubbed savagely ‘til I was raw. Although my aversion to blood has gone away because I need to eat, the germ warrior in me has survived and grown stronger.

I stayed in bed for the next two days. I was beginning to get thirsty again but fought the impulse to eat my maid. I wasn’t sure what I was going to do. My maid had started to gossip about me to her best friend who happened to work for Helena. My maid told her friend about me. Everyone knew about the death of the man so close to my home. Helena came over right away.

I refused to see her at first but she persisted. I finally dressed in a robe and went out to meet her, explaining that I wasn’t feeling well. I was surprised because I didn’t feel the need to ‘eat’ Helena like I did my maid. I was immediately suspicious of her. Helena took one look at me and knew what had happened. We get very pale and have almost no heartbeat. We have no rich blood scent. We don’t need to breathe. Still not knowing my own strength, I broke my teacup while we were talking. She told me I had become a vampire and she was one herself. I started crying, or at least an approximation of that, since I couldn’t shed tears anymore. Then, I was very angry, but I soon realized it wasn’t her fault. I told her I was so hungry and I didn’t know what to do. Helena supervised me in feeding so I wouldn’t do any damage to my next meal. She also mesmerized them so they wouldn’t remember. She taught me that there were a lot of perks to this life. I would always be the same size. No more grocery bills. I had super powers. I would have incredible hearing and sense of smell. I would be able to move like the wind. I wouldn’t have to breathe unless I wanted to. I could bend steel bars and would never grow old. Helena and I developed a close friendship and have been friends ever since.

I lived on my own, with a lot of help coping with my condition, from Helena, Julian and Sebastian. Of course I had the advantage of a huge house and servants. I still spent all my time at Helena’s learning how to be a vampire. I was lonely in my big house. They took me in. It was 1933 and I was twenty-one. I haven’t regretted my life but I have regretted using humans to live off of. That regret runs deep in me. I might be a little lonely at times but I was more alone when I was human. At least I have true, close friends now. We traveled for quite a few years and I sold my huge house and added those funds to my nest egg. There are days I think I should just take up Helena’s offer and move in with them. After nearly a century, I’m still discovering what I want my life to mean. The difference between who I was at twenty-one and who I am becoming is the difference between a pampered and self indulgent child and a contributing not quite human being. Emphasis on being. I’ve made it this long. I’m satisfied but sometimes I am very lonely.