he was enjoying my defeat, tasting my apparent fear, savoring this unique moment, obviously knowing that the longer he waited, the sweeter my blood would be.
Twin droplets of icy saliva struck my neck. A whimper passed my lips. I shut my eyes. From somewhere far away, he laughed.
Shards dulled to splinters as fangs pressed against my throat. I took a deep breath, imagined myself standing straight and erect -
- and rematerialized standing above the shopkeeper who lay on his stomach kissing the floor. I kicked him square in the face, reached down, lifted him by the shoulders and flung him at the sales desk.
I watched the man crash, then lunged at him, grabbed his collar, lifted him to his feet and smashed his face against the counter-top. The thick glass cracked internally, spider-web fractures spreading instantly across the pane.
My fangs sank into the man's throat. Almost immediately, I felt revitalized. I drank deeply of his hot, angry blood, stopping just before another gulp would completely drain him. I lifted him upward, then tossed him to the floor, smiling, savoring the rare taste of vampire blood; it provided extra sustenance for me, but the shopkeeper would be helpless without an immediate infusion of our special nectar. He lay motionless, staring up at me, glassy eyes full of fear.
I pointed toward the front windows. "Eastern exposure? The sunrise must be stunning through these windows."
Sluggish eyes snapped wide open. I walked around to the back of the sales desk and shoved it until it toppled over him. Shards of broken glass spread across the floor. I raised the window shades, flipped the open/closed sign to closed, locked the front door and flicked off the lights.
"You know," I said, "as vampires get older, they are better able to tolerate sunlight. But the dawn's first light is always the most dangerous."
The shopkeeper stared up at me, hopelessly pinned, too weak to even reply with word or thought. I walked back toward the rear of the store, then turned as if I had forgotten something.
"They say," I added, almost as an afterthought, "that a vampire who survives the first two hundred years will probably live forever."
****
The parade of spring flowers eventually ended. A canopy of emerald enveloped the city only to be replaced by crimson and umber as trees drooped from the weight of all their fruit, which finally fell to the ground, summoned by the gravity of eventuality.
The gravity of eventuality. I attempted to comfort myself with this notion ofwhat will be, what will transpire . The humans have this queer notion of "normal," but what is normal for me is certainly far from normal for humans. With great consideration, it seemed that perhaps the gravity of eventuality is a law of nature, meaning that normal events will happen to those who are normal, and abnormal events will thus happen to those who are not normal in the sense that normal people are normal. One must understand and accept this in order to find the inner peace necessary to be able to adapt and adjust to an ever-changing world.
Utterly simplistic, you say? Yes, but what else was there to do but seek solace in philosophy? To adapt and adjust may sound simple, but to do so is actually quite a difficult task.
And how did I adapt and adjust? Perhaps I did neither. Perhaps the greatest solace came as the Cab Gods looked out for me, providing enough bounty even during the summer to allow me to save at least $500 per month.
Shortly, the strange case of the Madison Mangler was closed. That last victim did indeed survive. Apparently, the tale she told the authorities of her abduction and rescue satisfied them enough for them to believe that the Madison Mangler would take no more victims, though the mystery as to who had come to her aid and killed her tormentors would remain. A week later, they found the body of Dawn Stevens, mutilated, drained of blood and dead for several weeks. After that, no more bodies were found, nor were there any more reports of missing persons that would cause them to reopen the case.
Days later, the Sigma Chi house was burned to the ground.
My first anniversary at Co-op Cab approached. The leaves had once again been ripped from the trees by the angry November winds, puffed up in pride over their victory in the annual battle of climatic supremacy against summer. All life began that process of curling up and dying. Still, comfort and