The Truth About Bats
by David Mitenko
part 1 of 2
When I woke I began to suspect something was wrong. My mouth was a pasty cavern, when I blinked it felt as if metal shavings were under my eyelids. But actually that was the normal part; after what I had just put my body through, dehydration was to be expected. What concerned me was what she did to relieve my thirst.
Everything had that nebulous, disjointed flow that only happens after a long night of chemical abuse. Somehow — and I was hoping she would be able to tell me how — I had ended up in bed with this dark, salacious nymph. In fact, I suspected there were two of them; some sort of mitotic miracle had happened when I wasn’t looking.
I may have passed out briefly, at this point it was hard to tell, but when I became self-aware again I had a cracked, desiccated thirst. I felt so dry I thought I might disintegrate into a gritty pile right there on her silk sheets; a crime on the same order as eating crackers in bed, but much, much worse.
When I asked for something to drink she put something against my lips. It wasn’t water, it wasn’t even a bottle, but it was good. The same sensual warmth I had felt earlier was now pushed back into me, shot through with streaks of silver this time, an icy cold that made it even more seductive. As I gulped down the thick heat, the thought came that this was some new drug, that I really didn’t know this girl at all (neither of them, if that was the case), that perhaps I was even in danger. Then I passed out.
* * *
Five months of discipline and with five days to go I couldn’t keep it together. I couldn’t just wait until afterwards to go blow off some steam. The MCAT’s, that frightening eight hours of examination required from any med school hopeful, were scheduled for the end of the week. I had dedicated every waking hour, focused every tiny little quantum of mental energy I had in preparing for that exam.
But all those little quantums were going to leap out of my skull if I didn’t do something to calm them down, so with five days to go I ended up downtown after sunset, where pockets of throbbing, velvety darkness budded off busy streets. Only for a drink, that’s what I told myself. Until I ran into some people I knew: friends of a friend of an acquaintance. They were out for the night, enjoying themselves in exactly the way that I had been denying myself for too long. We drank, we danced, and I ended up under strobe lights with this beautiful, raven-haired sylph beside me.
At one point the minx popped two pills into her mouth. She swallowed, smiled, and the remaining pill appeared between her flashing teeth. An eyebrow arched suggestively, so I leaned over and took it from her warm mouth.
And after that the night became really lovely. The darkness pulsed. When the bar closed we went to a house party and then after that I found myself in bed with the nymph and — where did she come from? — a friend of hers. We laughed and rolled in the crimson sheets. Whatever drug I was on was amazing. The pinch of her teeth on my neck filled my body with heat; a sensual incandescence focused where her lips touched my skin and sucked through as if it was the neck of an hourglass, holding back the surge of an ocean.
* * *
But the morning was as bright and unforgiving as any dawn after decadence. I wiped the grit from my sunken eyes and disentangled myself from between the two girls. Huh, so the second one hadn’t been a hallucination. I lurched out of bed as quietly as a person can lurch and got on the Case of the Missing Clothes.
The brunette purred and stretched. I wasn’t sure but I suspected her name was Krista. “Where are you going?”
“Home,” I croaked. I had enough clues now to reach the elementary deduction that my clothes where not actually in the room. For a moment I pondered the proper etiquette for a situation like this, then went to check the next room, naked.
“Oh boy, you’re not going anywhere,” she said with a low chuckle.
Hmm, a vague sense of dread, but the door wasn’t locked and sweet Jaysus it was bright outside. I squinted through the glare and made out a set of heavy, dark drapes. They looked like air-raid curtains, possibly lined with lead. They were even buttoned down around the window but the light that diffused around the edges was bright enough to burn through eyelids.
I now knew I had the mother of all hangovers.
Just as I ducked back into the room the other girl — what was her name? — started screaming for someone to shut the goddam door.
“Maybe you didn’t read all the way through the pamphlet last night, but now that you’re a vampire you should know you can’t just wander off in the daytime.” Krista rolled over and made some room on the bed. “Come on, get some sleep.”
“I’m sorry... I’m a what?”
She giggled. “You’re a vampire, Mr. Pre-med. I couldn’t pass you up. You’re too cute... and with that hot bod I figured you’d be a good addition to the coven.”
“There was a pamphlet?”
She laughed. “You are so cute!”
“But... I have to write the MCAT in four days.”
“Will you two shut the hell up? I’m trying to get some sleep.” The other girl rolled away from us with a suspiciously unnatural snarl and twisted the sheets around her.
Ah, case solved: my pants were balled up underneath a chair in the corner. I was certain there had been an excellent reason for stuffing them there last night. Krista shrugged and slipped back under the covers, so I grabbed the pants and went into the next suite.
For the next few minutes I did some unusual things, like check myself for a pulse and examine my own translucent skin. When I finally looked up into the mirror I was ready. I had steeled myself for the pale, bloodless eyes that were going to be staring back at me. But there was nothing.
Yeah. No reflection.
I sat down on the toilet seat and pulled out my cell. “Mom? It’s me, Michael. No. No. The test isn’t for another four days. Uh, mom? Mom!? Uh... I have something to tell you.”
* * *
The all-night diner wasn’t far from Krista’s nest. That’s her word, not mine. It was around midnight when I met my parents there. Like any other family we’ve shared some difficult times: my brother was a drug-addled youth for quite a few years and my older sister, well, my parents are still holding onto the hope that she’ll marry one day even though she’s been living with her ‘best friend’, female, for almost five years now. Combined, we siblings have tempered our parents into a pretty cool, understanding pair.
“Listen, son,” my dad reached across the table and took my hand. In his ruddy grip my skin looked pale, cerulean, as if there was a sea underneath and all that held it back was a thin gray layer. “No matter what happens, I want you to know your parents love you and only want you to be happy.”
“Vampire isn’t a career choice, dad,” I poked at my eggs. “At least I don’t think so. I’m not entirely sure what happened.”
“You have to watch out for those kind of girls,” my mom said with as close to a disapproving face as my mother could make. “Oh Michael, you haven’t touched a thing on your plate.”
The eggs and sausages (they had an all-day breakfast menu) had congealed in front of me, sealed into a single, glistening union. I hadn’t been hungry for them when I ordered them, I wasn’t hungry for them now. Things that I wouldn’t be able to do, squash games and dinner dates, kept popping into my head, and I was marking them off on my PDA. Then it occurred to me. I put my head in my hand and began to moan.
“Michael? Can you hear me?” My dad had a hand on my shoulder. “Is this some sort of post-metamorphic reaction? Do you want me to call an ambulance?”
“Ambulances are for the living, dad. No, it’s not a reaction. I just realized the MCAT’s are in daylight hours. What the hell am I going to do? Sorry, mom.”
“Can they give you an extension or something?” she asked, undeterred by the language.
“These are the MCAT’s, they’re written at exactly the same time all across the continent so people can’t cheat.”
“What are you going to do?”
“I don’t know,” I thumped my head against the table. I’m sure my knife and fork would have jumped and clattered if they hadn’t been held down by the power of solidified egg grease.
My PDA beeped. I checked the text. “Great. Look, I’ve gotta go. I’m meeting with some of the other vamps in a bit.”
“Michael, why don’t you come back and stay with us?”
“It’s a long drive, mom. I don’t think vampires are supposed to hang out in the suburbs anyway. There’s this coven here in town. The head guy’s name is Masceth and according to Krista they’ve got it together in terms of looking out for themselves. I think I should just stay there until I get this figured out. Here’s their number.”
“All right, son. I’ll get the bill.”
“No, dad, let me take this one... da... dad... fine, you get it.”
Copyright © 2005 by David Mitenko
