humanity. “Ash’s wife,” she said.
Cole nodded. “Tell me where he is.”
“I will tell you nothing, chula. Only the worthy may speak to us.” Abruptly she turned to me: a movement so fast I was shocked to find her face in mine.
“Ave Maria, Father,” she whispered, bringing sharp-tipped nails to brush my cheek. The air she stirred smelled of decay. Her touch felt like the wriggling of a grave worm. I gagged.
“No!” I said. Another tango was beginning, people flocking to the floor, yet they all veered away from us, sensing not to come near. A woman knocked against me, then slipped away as if I’d passed right through her.
“I’m going to kill you,” Cole said.
The vampires laughed. Oh, such passion! Were they speaking, or were their voices in my head again?
“I won’t live in a world with you in it.” Cole said. “One of us is going to die.”
We shall see.
Their scorn filled my head, driving out their laughter. A familiar black mist descended.
Maria, I thought. Maria.
The image of Cole’s red stiletto followed me into a place of darkness and fire.
Cole brought a single bag with her to Argentina. The night of our humiliation I woke on my couch to find her rummaging in the corner. From the bag, she took something I had only seen in monster movies at the Sunday matinee.
“Show me again,” she said.
She’d dragged my back to Mr. Pepe’s, demanding more lessons. She had another plan.
“No,” I said. “Damn you. It’s over.”
“I don’t accept that.”
“They won’t take us. Besides: why would you go there, knowing he’s one of them? You will die horribly or else end up the same!”
“I love him, Father,” Cole said. “I’m going to save him. Don’t you need to save her? Are you just going to give up now—thirty years later—and never find Maria?”
I was livid. “How dare you speak her name?” I said. “You know nothing of us. Nothing! I wake up in the night, sweating because she is gone. In my dreams I am consumed by the fires of hell!”
“You don’t believe in hell!” Cole screamed at me. “You don’t believe in God, or even love! You only believe in your own fear! Coward!”
I hit her. She tripped backwards in her flame-red heels, holding a hand to her cheek. For a moment, we faced each other. Then something kindled in her eyes. She came back at me, her fingernails splayed like talons.
“You’ve betrayed her!” she shrieked. “You stupid man! You’ve betrayed us all! My Ash! My husband! Maria!”
We fought, dancing back and forth across the stones. Her nails clung to my shirt, jerking me. My feeble bulk strained against her. Late August heat blew around us and it began to rain. Soon we were both wet and exhausted. She slapped at me and I fought her off, trying to ignore the tears which streamed down her face, smearing her makeup, revealing how frightened and pale she really was.
Eventually she collapsed on my chest, sobbing. The hands with which she had shaken me with clung fast to keep herself from falling.
My heart broke so suddenly I feared a stroke. But no. My heart still beat. But it ached now. A deeper ache than I had ever known.
We slipped down upon the rain-slicked stones, holding one another like children. The names of our lovers fell from our lips and we embraced fiercely, trying not to let the world take us, the storm spin us up into the sky.
Eventually the rain stopped. A muggy sun emerged, making the stones steam. I rested my old, foolish head on hers and patted her bedraggled hair.
“Do you ever think,” she said, “that the flames in your dreams aren’t really from hell? That maybe they’re simply the love you never had, burning you from the inside?”
When I failed to respond she rested her head on my shoulder.
“Please help me, Father,” she said. “I don’t want to burn.”
“All right,” I said. “All right.” On that last day, some months later, we hid in La Recoleta until the silver light bloomed over the tops of the graves. Then we ventured forth into the true City of the Dead.
Between tangos, Cole had theorized that we could simply follow the light to its source. We were only two mortals, after all. Why would they stop us?
We came to the center of the cemetery, where the monuments towered above us like great houses. Stone angels wept into fountains. A rose window glittered in the corpse-light. Here was the source: blinding. Immense. We