Tom Bites Back

by Steven Banks

  “Can you teach me how to turn into a bat and fly?”

  “No. I cannot.”

  “Oh, come on! You gotta teach me!”

  She raised an eyebrow. “Oh, really? I do? And where exactly does it say I am to be your personal vampire instructor?”

  “It’s your fault I’m a vampire! Everybody at school keeps asking me, ‘Can you turn into a bat and fly?’ ”

  “Teaching transformation and flying takes time, which I do not have this evening. Let us get to the important matters at hand. Fetch paper and pen, so you may take notes.”

  I grabbed some notebook paper and a pen from my backpack and sat at the desk chair.

  “Choose your victims carefully,” she said, rocking back and forth. “Make sure you are alone when you feed. No public spaces. Caves are excellent; dark alleys, abandoned buildings, the woods, a secluded park—”

  “But wait, I don’t—”

  “Shush! Do not attack. Either persuade or charm the victim. The jugular vein is best. Steady the victim’s neck or skull. Pierce the skin with your fangs. They will usually faint, so be prepared to catch them. Feed quickly, but efficiently. Do not make a pig of yourself. Cease when full.”

  “Whoa, whoa, whoa! I don’t want to suck anybody’s blood!”

  She stopped rocking in the chair. “Good heavens, lad, you must feed or you will surely die.”

  “No way. It’s too gross.”

  Martha shook her head and sighed. “One of those, are you? You’re as bad as vegetarians. Where have you been getting your blood?”

  “I get it from uncooked meat.”

  She scrunched up her face. “How pathetic.”

  “And they have a synthetic blood you can buy.”

  “I tried it…once. Never again. It’s as bad as Diet Coke. How often do you feed?”

  “Every three or four days. I guess I don’t need blood as much as you do, because I’m only one-third vampire.”

  She stood up. “Then why am I wasting my time giving you this valuable, hard-won knowledge?”

  “Wait…” I didn’t want to ask her the next question, but I had to. “Um…so…do you really kill people?”

  “No,” she snapped. “I do not kill. I am what is known as a catch-and-release vampire.”

  “I’ve never heard of that,” I said doubtfully.

  “Well, I had never heard of a Vam-Wolf-Zom, but one exists, does it not? I only suck enough blood to quench my thirst. I leave the person, or animal, light-headed, weakened, with a small scar, but they recover.”

  She walked toward the desk and looked at all the homework I had to do over the weekend. I couldn’t believe how much homework we got the very first week of school. That should be illegal.

  Martha picked up my U.S. history book. On the cover it had a painting of those guys who signed the Declaration of Independence. I had to write a report called My Favorite American for History class on Monday. I hadn’t started it yet. I was trying to figure out who would be the easiest person.

  Martha looked at the picture and shook her head. “That does not resemble Dr. Franklin in the least.” She tossed the book down on the desk.

  “How’d you become a vampire?” I asked. “Did a bat bite you?”

  She sat down on the edge of the desk. “No. I was orphaned at the age of thirteen. My father died at the Battle of Concord, in 1775, my mother of the pox, a month later. A couple took me in and put me to work at the City Tavern in Philadelphia. I was a serving girl. One evening, as we were closing, I noticed that Benjamin Franklin had left his spectacles on a table. I ran outside—”

  “Did you say Benjamin Franklin?”

  “Yes.”

  “The guy who invented glasses and electricity?!”

  Martha rolled her eyes. “Dr. Franklin did not invent glasses, he invented bifocals. And he did not invent electricity. He flew a kite with a key on a string, during a thunderstorm, to demonstrate that lightning was electricity.”

  “You actually knew Benjamin Franklin?!”

  “Yes! May I finish my tale, please? Dr. Franklin was a brisk walker and quite tall, so I had to run like the devil to catch up with him. I called out, he turned around and—”

  “Ben Franklin bit you?! Ben Franklin was a vampire!”

  I couldn’t wait to tell Zeke. He would go crazy.

  “No!” said Martha.

  She gave me the same kind of dirty look that Emma gives me all the time. “Stop interrupting me! Good Lord, lad, you are trying my patience. Dr. Franklin was not a vampire.”

  Zeke would be really disappointed. I was too.

  “I returned his spectacles to him, he doffed his hat and said, ‘Many thanks, my dear Martha. I should heed my own advice: Haste does indeed make waste.’ Then he placed two pence in my hand.”

  “Two pennies? That’s all?”

  “I earned ten pence a week. Dr. Franklin was a generous tipper. I needed to make haste back to the tavern, for I knew my master and mistress would be displeased to find me gone. I took a shortcut through an alley, which would prove to be a cataclysmic mistake. From the darkness sprang a tall, pale-faced man, with black hair and beard, wearing a long, red cloak. He grabbed me roughly about the neck. I screamed for help. Dr. Franklin came running and tried to beat the man off with his walking stick, but the man was strong. He grabbed Dr. Franklin’s stick and struck him a mighty blow across the head, knocking him senseless. I tried to scream again, but the man clasped his cold, bony hand over my mouth. He dragged me through a doorway into a damp, dark room that smelled of animal hide. He bit my throat, began to drink my blood, and…turned me.”

  “Who was he?” I asked.

  She took a deep breath and then let it out.

  “His name was Lovick Zabrecky. I was part of his brood, for a brief time. There were four of us. I learned their ways, the rules of the nightwalkers, and then I departed. Most of my life has been spent on my own, which I prefer. For over two centuries I have stayed out of the sun’s lethal rays, avoided being beheaded or burnt, escaped many an angry mob, and protected my heart from wooden stakes. There have been some close calls. But it makes life interesting, yes?”

  I remembered something. “Hey! I have to do a report for my History class called My Favorite American. Can you tell me more stuff about Ben Franklin?”

  “I am not here to help you with your schoolwork, lad. What other questions do you have? Quickly now.”

  She was not exactly the most patient vampire. Were they all like this?

  “How am I ever going to learn to turn into a bat and fly if you won’t teach me?”

  “There are a few books on the subject.”

  “Can I get them on the Internet?”

  “No,” she scoffed. “They are rare, expensive, and quite difficult to obtain, though not impossible. You may also, perchance, run into another vampire who will teach you.”

  “Are there a lot of other vampires around?”

  “Very few.”

  “Are they all like you?” That didn’t come out right.

  She got offended. “Of course not! Just like people, no two vampires are alike. Different personalities, different breeds and strains. Some can stand a bit of sunlight, if protected. I, alas, cannot take a single beam. I would go up like a torch.”

  “I can go out in the sun as long as I put on sunscreen and wear sunglasses, and a hat, and clothes that cover my skin.”

  “That proves my point, Thomas Marks. Some vampires can transform into other creatures, some cannot—”

  “Wait. You mean I might not be able to turn into a bat and fly?”

  “Precisely.”

  That was the only good thing about being a vampire. If I couldn’t fly, that would really suck.

  Martha went on. “Some of us can turn into mist, fog, or smoke.”

  Zeke hadn�
��t told me that.

  “Which allows one to disappear, to escape, to observe people and go unnoticed. To slip through small spaces: under a door, through a window crack. It allows one to go almost anywhere. However, it is not easily learned and can be dangerous.”

  Knock, knock, knock.

  That wasn’t Emma’s knock.

  4.

  Questions and Answers

  Gram was knocking on the door.

  “Tommy?”

  “Yeah?”

  “It’s getting late, I think it’s time to turn off the music and hit the hay.”

  “Oh. Okay, Gram, I will. ‘Night.”

  “ ’Night, Tommy.”

  I listened to her footsteps go down the hall and heard her door close.

  “I must depart,” said Martha. “Farewell.”

  “No! Wait,” I whispered. I went over to the radio and turned it off. “Can we go down to the basement? Please? Just for like, fifteen minutes?”

  I could tell she was trying to decide whether to stay longer.

  “Very well, Thomas. I shall stay for fifteen minutes. No more.”

  Could I convince her to teach me how to fly in fifteen minutes? I had to try.

  “Maybe you’d better turn back into a bat first, before we go downstairs.”

  Just like that, a bat was hovering by the door. I put my hoodie on. Martha the Bat flew into my hand. I carefully put her in the pocket of my hoodie before opening the door and making sure nobody was in the hallway.

  As I quietly tiptoed down the hall toward the stairs, Emma’s door swung open.

  “What are you doing, Creepy?”

  “Nothing,” I said, hoping she wouldn’t notice the bulge in my hoodie pocket.

  “Where are you going?”

  “Downstairs.”

  “Why?” she said, crossing her arms and leaning against the side of the door.

  “I’m…I’m going to get more spareribs. I’m hungry.”

  “You are such a total zombie. Why were you listening to classical music?”

  “I…I like it.”

  “No, you don’t!”

  “Yes, I do!”

  “Since when?”

  “Since tonight.”

  Emma looked down. “What’s in your pocket?”

  “Nothing.” I put my hand in the pocket. I could feel Martha. I mean the bat, which, I guess, was also Martha.

  “There’s something in there,” said Emma.

  I let out a big sigh. “Okay…. It’s the vampire bat that bit me and I’m going to run away with it and join a vampire coven and suck people’s blood and terrorize the world.”

  Emma opened her mouth, but she couldn’t think of anything to say, which doesn’t happen very often. Finally she said, “Good!” and closed her door.

  Sometimes you can tell people exactly what you don’t want them to know and they think you’re joking.

  * * *

  When we got down to the basement, I took Martha the Bat out of my pocket and she turned back into Martha the Girl. Gram’s basement has a big sofa, a beanbag chair, old hippie posters on the wall, and a Ping-Pong table that Emma and I used to cover with blankets to make forts.

  Martha sat down in the beanbag chair and smiled. “I have not sat upon one of these since 1969.”

  Her fangs were super white. I wish I knew what my fangs looked like, but I can’t see my reflection.

  “How do you keep your fangs so white?” I asked.

  “I brush after every feeding and I floss. One must keep up one’s appearance.”

  She looked down at her dress and picked off a piece of lint.

  “Martha, what happens to your clothes when you turn into your bat? When you got here, you were a bat. Then, you turned into a girl, with clothes on. Do your clothes disappear or what?”

  “A vampire’s clothes are actually cloaking devices, so they are invisible, in the reflective dimension, when the vampire transforms into a bat or other form.”

  “Oh. I get it,” I said, slowly nodding my head up and down.

  I had no idea what she was talking about.

  “Do you live around here?” I asked.

  “Temporarily.”

  “Hey, do you know the werewolf that bit me?”

  “I do not associate with werewolves. But I’m acquainted with a few. Describe him.”

  “He was really big and had a gray face and white fur.”

  “Good Lord, lad, that is the description of a thousand wolves!”

  “He had a dark circle around one eye.”

  Her face got serious. “Were the eyes a vivid, intense blue?”

  “Yeah.” I remembered seeing his blue eyes when I turned around, just before he bit me.

  “That is a werewolf by the name of Darcourt. He is not to be trusted.”

  Why would I trust him? He bit me.

  “He is dangerous and powerful. If perchance you see him again, get away as fast as you can. Unless you wish to fight him to the death.”

  I didn’t plan to get in any fights to the death with werewolves if I could help it. I decided to change the subject. “So, what have you done for the past two hundred years?”

  “I am not here to tell you my life story, Thomas Marks.”

  “You didn’t have to go to school, did you?”

  “No. I didn’t. I couldn’t. However, I had no wish to be a dunderhead. I snuck into libraries at night, after they closed. I have read every great work of literature. I speak and write eight different languages and play eleven musical instruments…. Music is my true love and passion.”

  She had an expression on her face like Annie gets when she talks about a great book she read, or like my mom gets when she talks about Emma and me when we were babies, or like Zeke when he talks about banjos. Sometimes I wish I felt that way about something.

  “I was lucky enough to see Beethoven premiere his Ninth Symphony in Vienna—when he was completely deaf, mind you. I saw the great jazz musician Louis Armstrong play his trumpet and sing ‘Potato Head Blues’ on a Mississippi riverboat in New Orleans. I saw the folk singer Bob Dylan play his very first show in New York City.”

  Gram loved Bob Dylan. He was an old guy from the sixties. She plays his records all the time. His voice sounds raspy and hoarse, like he has a bad cold. In my opinion, I have a much better voice than Bob Dylan. Singing is one thing I’m okay at. That’s why Annie asked me to be in her band.

  “Martha, do you want to meet Gram? She’d love to talk to you.”

  “No!” she said sternly. “You must make a blood oath that you will tell no one about me.”

  I raised my hand. “I swear on blood; I won’t tell Gram—”

  “Anyone!” she said, pointing her finger at me.

  “I swear on blood; I won’t tell anyone about you.”

  “And mark me well, Thomas Marks: If you ever break that oath…you will instantly ignite into flames and burn.”

  I definitely didn’t want to do that.

  She stood up and opened the small window near the ceiling. “And now, I must depart.” She wrapped her arms around herself.

  “No! Wait!”

  “Now what?”

  “Can’t you please teach me how to turn into a bat and fly?”

  “How many times must I say no?”

  “Oh, c’mon! The vampire guy that turned you, that, that Shovic Labrescky guy, he taught you stuff.”

  “His name is Lovick Zabrecky.”

  “Okay, he taught you, so you gotta teach me! What about…what about The Code of the Vampires?”

  I made that up. I didn’t know if there really was a Code of the Vampires, but it sounded good. There might be.

  She sneered. “There is no such thing as The Code of the Vampires.”

  “Well,
there should be! You turned me; you should teach me!”

  She crossed her arms and looked at me for a long time.

  “Very well, Thomas Marks, I shall instruct you. But, do not expect to learn how to transform and fly properly all in one evening, ’tis not an easy skill. Firstly, cross your arms across your chest, palms down, fingers spread apart.”

  I crossed my arms like people do when they’re in a coffin.

  “Wait. Do you think because I’m only one-third vampire, I might be only one-third bat and the rest of me will still be human?”

  “There is but one way to find out. Close your eyes.”

  I did.

  “Now you say, ‘Turn to bat. Bat, I shall be.’ ”

  “And then what?”

  “And then you shall transform.”

  I opened my eyes. “Really? That’s it?”

  “Yes.”

  “That’s crazy.”

  “Then say it not! And do not become a bat and fly! And I shall waste my time no longer here!”

  She moved toward the window.

  “Wait-wait-wait! Okay, okay! I’ll say it.”

  Why did I have to get The World’s Grumpiest Vampire Teacher? Why didn’t I get a nice, patient one?

  Martha stared at me intently with her green eyes. “And take heed, Thomas, when you say it, believe it.”

  I closed my eyes, took a deep breath, and said, “Turn to bat…. Bat, I shall be.”

  5.

  The Flight of the Vam-Wolf-Zom

  I felt a little breeze. I opened my eyes. The room was ginormous.

  The sofa looked as big as a house. The Ping-Pong table was gigantic. The beanbag chair was humongous. Martha towered over me like a giant.

  “Am I a bat?” I yelled up at her.

  She crouched down and peered at me. “In a manner of speaking. Let us say you are a bat, though a somewhat wolfish-looking bat, due to your werewolf state.”

  I held up what I thought would be my arm and looked at it. It was a black-gray wing that I could see through. Inside the wing was what looked like a skinny arm, with three fingers and a thumb at the end. I looked down at my two tiny, claw-like, five-toed feet. I felt my ears, and they were huge in comparison to my head. I guess I was a bat.