28
I had flashbacks to the events of that time in the cellar for weeks afterwards, but thankfully the images remained in my mind and I didn't find any more vampires in my kitchen. Nor did I see Uncle Kurt hovering around the shops or my house watching me.
My head pounded from the rush of images, smells and sounds that were battling to find space in my brain. It was easy to order the pictures of my mother; I had first-hand experience of her and existing memories to work with. It was almost comforting to visualise my mother and what she was like as a young woman, to see her pregnant with me and in her own way happy. It was wonderful to see images of my grandparents, taken from me too soon. I accepted those implanted memories with delight.
The other images were horrible. Thoughts of Ferrers, Rachel and Richard, filled my mind. But it wasn't just them. There were vampires I'd never met, perhaps connected in some way, I couldn’t be sure. But blood, murder and sex filled my mind like a sordid snuff film endlessly playing on repeat.
I saw people talking about a manuscript, about me. A prophesy about a half-human, half-vampire girl that would somehow reveal vampires' true nature. I didn’t know if it was about me, but I knew about vampires anyway. Plenty of humans did by all accounts - bloody collaborators. Then again, I recognised them when it was obvious, when they were trying to kill me. Had the injection of Ferrers’ venom tipped something in me over the edge? Would it be enough for me to somehow sense vampires, something akin to the sire bond they mentioned? Or was it all just folklore and forgery? Nothing was clear. Nothing was certain.
Mum said I looked terrible and wanted to take me to hospital, certain that I had contracted some sort of awful virus. But I didn’t dare risk seeking medical assistance. Ferrers’ venom had awakened something in me, and although the psychic overload that connected me to my family, and to just about every vampire on the face of the earth, had subsided, I knew something had changed in me forever. I felt it. It was like a low-level murmur resonating in the background, beneath my skin, my muscles, and my nerves, deeper than bone even. What if I was becoming a vampire? What if the doctor found something? No, I thought, I need to get my head around this first, prepare myself, ensure I'm psychologically strong enough to deal with whatever is about to come my way.
All I knew for certain, was that while I hadn't died in that cellar, I felt bloody terrible. I took codeine to deal with the headaches and herbal remedies to help me sleep. The latter didn't work, so I tried wine and codeine. The cocktail seemed to work.
The events in the cellar didn't just take a physical toll on me. Finding out that I had a whole vampire family holed up in the city up the road from me wasn’t an easy thing to process. On the one hand, Kasper and Ferrers had both saved my life from Rachel. On the other hand, they were ultimately the ones who had put my life in danger to start with.
I worried that Ferrers would change his mind about killing me and come and claim me as his. I worried he would kill Mum to obliterate any ties my father and I had to the human world. I worried I'd wake up one morning a vampire, that the part of me which held that DNA would triumph over the other. I didn't know what that would mean, or indeed if it were even possible. I wasn't sure if you could even prove that I was part vampire. I looked normal. I felt physically normal, or as normal as a person can feel when their brain is overloaded with other people's memories.
Mickey gave up calling me which was a relief. Neither of us were in a position to start a relationship. We both had issues around vampires and our family; I wasn't going to add any more baggage to our relationship. Guilt was eating a huge hole through me. Not only had Sean died because vampires were looking for me, it was at the hands of my own father. How could I possibly tell Mickey that? And how could I hide it from him? I had to let him go. I couldn't bear the thought of him hating me. The prospect of deceiving him and not telling him was even worse.
I certainly had enough deception to deal with as it was. Even if I didn't want to say "Hey, Mum, guess what? My father didn't leave you, he was forced to be a vampire against his own will and stayed away to protect you,” there was the whole issue of his brother being on the scene. Even if Kasper made Kurt stay away, there was no guarantee that he wouldn't take it upon himself to start stalking Mum again, lurking outside her house whenever he had a bad day. And what about Kasper staying on in the area? I had no idea what his intentions were, be they vampire or family business. Mum could easily have bumped into him sometime. How the hell would I explain that?
As I lay in bed, nauseous from the codeine but pleased that my skull was no longer splitting in two, I determined that there was no way around it. The most practical thing I could do would be to accept the situation as it was, accept the lunacy of my father being a vampire and move forward. I'd just have to suck it up, stop feeling sorry for myself and take control. There was no point fighting it. I accepted what I was, half human, half vampire, and decided to get on with life; and, as if by magic, all my headaches disappeared, and the memories taking a holiday in my head began to fade. The few that lingered were those concerning my immediate vampire family and the peculiar events that had led to my discovery of them.
After a few days of lethargy, resting properly and managing to eat proper meals again, and with my mother's reluctant approval, I got up, washed and went back to work.
Perhaps it was my decision to get on with the business of living life that enabled me to become open to the possibility of forgiving my paternal family. The events in the cellar had changed me that I knew. If it had forged a connection to my vampiric kin, permanent or otherwise, that had to mean something.
As the trauma began to subside, I had questions to ask. Why was my father looking for me now? Was I going to become a vampire? What did the future hold? Was there any truth to the prophecy? Did I have any special vampire detecting talents?
It was then that I started to see Kurt around and about. It was from a distance at first and weeks after the whole cellar affair. Perhaps Valentine's Day had made him reflective, I wondered. Or perhaps Kasper had decided to move on and he now felt alone.
Kurt's appearances were never intrusive. They were always from afar. I suppose it was verging on stalking, but for some reason, I found it strangely difficult to be angry with him. Okay, it was a bit creepy but I understood he had issues. Thanks to our brief conversation weeks before, and the glorious Technicolor flashbacks I had had following Ferrers’ healing of me, I knew how traumatic the loss of his brother had been. It had left a mark on everyone. Perhaps more importantly, I had felt how much he loved my Mum. I didn't want him pursuing her romantically of course, but I got his intentions. I wasn't sure if I could forgive Kurt, but I decided I wasn't going to hate him anymore. I didn't have the energy.
It took a couple of weeks for me to build up the courage to walk up to Kurt in the coffee shop I frequented around the corner from my office space. He had done what I asked when I left him and Kasper in the cellar. He hadn't approached me. He hadn't phoned me. Yes, he had recently taken to hovering around my place of business, which wasn't exactly what I had meant when I told him to leave me alone, but I appreciated that for him this forced distance was a significant step. Maybe he just needs someone to talk to, I caught myself thinking. Hell, I could do with someone to talk to.
"Hey," I said.
"Hej.” He smiled. "You know it almost sounded like you were speaking Danish then. The language isn't that different."
"Can I sit down?" I asked between bites of my lip. He nodded. I pulled out the dark wooden chair and put my latte down on the small table. "This doesn't mean we're friends, you know."
"I know, but I would like us to be." He seemed smaller than I remembered. He had new spectacles on and had cut his hair. There were no signs of injury. The wounds caused by Ferrers had healed; the physical ones anyway. Like me, I suspected that his scars were all on the inside.
I sipped my coffee nervously. "How is he? Do you see him?"
"Sometimes. He stayed with me for a whi
le, but now he has an apartment in the Bay. It's more his thing than mine. Ferrers pays for it. Kasper is like his minion, waiting for orders." I didn't comment. "But his intentions are good, Sophie, I have learned that."
"Who, Ferrers? I very much doubt that!"
"No," Kurt shook his head. "Your father."
"He's not my father."
Kurt studied his coffee. "This isn't what I wanted for him, for you or your mother, either. But as long as Kasper is here, then other vampires will not be. You will be safe, he will make sure of that."
"As long as he's Ferrers’ lapdog you mean, getting pimped out to solve vampire disputes and rid South Wales of trouble makers, is that what you mean? Troublemakers who might want to kill me in case I turn out to be some messiah or something or other? A mystical vampire detector, blah, blah, blah. "
I was being sarcastic, but truth be told, it was a notion that filled me with dread. I had felt something change in me when Ferrers had healed me. As yet, I didn't know what it was or what it meant, but recognising it somehow made it easier to accept. Part of me, albeit a small part, had vampire DNA or something like it, in it.
"Ferrers said that the manuscript was a fake," Kurt said, his eyes hopeful, trying to believe his reassuring words,
"And people say that vampires don't exist."
Kurt reached across the table for my hand, but I withdrew it, occupying it by toying with the wooden stirrer poking out from the wax cup's lid.
"I've got to go," I said, standing up. He stood up, knocking the table in the process.
"Yes, of course. You are very busy." Me too, of course. I have papers to mark. I teach, you know; at the university?"
"Yes, I know." Of course, I knew everything. "Goodbye Kurt. Perhaps we'll talk again." I didn't look back as I left the coffee shop, although something at the back of mind told me he was smiling.
I did see Kurt again. Over the course of the week that followed, I spotted him several times at the coffee shop. I'm not sure if he was there every day, I hope not if he had a job to go to. But he always seemed to be there on the days that I called in to the newsagents to pick up paperwork or collect post.
Kurt kept a respectable distance and never approached me. He seemed to prefer to ensure that he was simply in the coffee shop at the same time each day, just in case I decided I was ready to talk to him. There was no pressure on his part; he just sat in a corner doing the newspaper crossword, having his regular twelve o'clock coffee and snack. I later learned that he had developed an unhealthy addiction to welsh cakes as a result.
I didn't acknowledge him for the first few days; I didn't know how I felt or what I wanted to say. The whole thing was unsettling and I hadn't processed the events of the past month fully. I needed to be certain that Kasper wouldn't poke his head around the corner if I approached Kurt. I needed to make sure that Kurt hadn't become a vampire either. He had been hapless and friendly enough at our short meeting earlier in the week, but I didn't want to jump in both feet first.
By the fourth time I'd seen him, I was starting to feel rude by ignoring him. I had to admire his preference and his self-restraint. I rewarded him by sitting at his table and we made small talk.
Throughout our stilted conversations, we both tried to keep the subject matter light, avoiding the obvious questions of where the hell my father was. We were like a couple that was starting to date, dancing around topics that wouldn't present the best image of ourselves or which might cause friction. We were both aware of the great elephant in the room, the gaping hole in my history which my father should have filled.
I learned that Kurt was a Professor in Sociology, specialising in the study of religion and its impact on society. He was an expert in the social and political importance of alleged spiritual possession in women in developing countries. The occult and vampirism was a particular interest, his passion in fact, but recent events would mean he'd need to rethink any public papers or further research in that area. The manuscript, which he'd recalled purchasing, was to be his big discovery, but Ferrers had taken that. Kurt didn't even remember Ferrers, or the torture he had suffered at his hands, but his brother had filled in the gaps for him, finally giving in to Kurt's pleas for information. The manuscript was stolen property, best kept safe in the hands of its owners. Destroying it would have been better, but its disappearance would have brought the attention of vampires far older and more lethal than Ferrers.
Kurt asked polite, general questions about my mother, limited to those around my experiences of growing up. It felt like I was cheating on Mum by talking to him. He often enquired about my mother and how she was. I was cautious in my replies. I provided him with an abridged history of her life in recent years - nursing my grandparents, running the businesses, her work in the community and local church. Whenever I felt his questions touched on her too closely, I quickly changed the subject. We never spoke of my father.
The more time I spent with Kurt, the more my reservations about him melted away and I was starting to find his company comforting. He was pleasant to be around and I found myself looking forward to our meetings at the coffee shop. Although we'd met half a dozen times or so, I wasn't ready to invite him to my home or to anywhere which resembled my 'real life'. There was always a risk that my Mum would call round or a neighbour would ask who he was. Amidst the nightmare of the past few months, this stranger in my life was presenting a welcome respite - a sort of dysfunctional, distant relative to bolster my tiny family and a person with whom I could share my experiences of the supernatural.
Eventually, the diplomatic dance around our relationship ended. I gave him my telephone number and said he was welcome to call it, in case of an emergency or anything. I was relieved that when he did call, the emergency was the opportunity to have a private viewing of the Iron Age man that the university had discovered. I had mentioned it at one of our coffee break talks and he thought it might interest me. I didn't have the heart to tell him that I was responsible for killing it.
In time, other changes started to happen too. The flashbacks and whatever remaining visions that were implanted as part of the vampire venom, and whatever psychic link it had triggered, began to fade. My brain no longer battled to order and find space for them.
I scribbled what I could of many of them down in notebooks in case they should be of use in the future. I wanted to remember the atrocities that the vampires in my life had committed. I needed to recall the faces of the vampires that Ferrers had created. I wanted to remember that, despite what had happened since, I was conceived in love.
Although I detested Kasper, I needed to remember that he had stayed away from us for good reasons. He was once just a boy, in love with my mother, a victim trying to make an impossible choice. He hadn’t known that my mum was pregnant. He had thought he was saving her life by staying away. That's the image of a father that I wanted to keep safe. The creature in the cellar who had come looking for me, was something different altogether. He had been responsible for Sean's death. I had to remember that too.
Getting everything down on paper and accepting the reality of my parent's relationship seemed to expedite the process of my psychic healing. The blinding headaches I felt whenever I thought about Kasper or Ferrers, and the insomnia that accompanied the onslaught of images and memories were unbearable. I was glad to see them dissipate.
29
As February came to a close, I felt something like my old self. The special gift or prophetic purpose, which I feared might come to light, and which had been debated by all the vampire men in my life, did not appear. I was just ordinary me. Ordinary Sophie, with a nice ordinary family of one, my mum. Okay, perhaps two if I included my fledgling relationship to my Danish uncle. It was still difficult to think of him as family though, his having only recently appeared on the scene. And okay, there was Kasper too but I wasn't yet ready to include him in my life, nor was I ever sure that I would be. But, on the whole, things were as normal for me as they were likely to be. Although the period of
stability was so far brief, it was definitely a step in the right direction.
There was some bad news though. Amidst all the headaches, family stress and all the rest of the trauma of the proceeding weeks, the worst thing that did happen, was the news about Darren Thomas. Admittedly, it wasn't as horrible as hearing about Sean's death, and he was pretty much a stranger more than he was a friend, but it was still a terrible business.
It was Darren's mother who delivered the news.
"Hello, may I speak to Sophie Morgan please," a quiet voice said.
"Yes, this is she," I said, idly doodling on my notepad. I'd taken a break from all proactive work activities during my short ‘neurological’ problem, only doing the bare minimum. Now I was on the mend, I had started to feel a little bored. I had come into the newsagents for some company, and to meet Kurt for what was becoming a customary Wednesday coffee.
"Mrs. Morgan."
"Miss."
"Sorry. Miss Morgan. You don't know me; I'm Darren Thomas’ mum."
"Oh." I put down my pen and sat upright. This is weird, I thought. "How can I help?"
"I am very sorry to tell you that my Darren has passed away."
The leaden words hung in the air. My stomach retreated into my ribs.
"Oh dear god, I'm so sorry,” I said. "I didn't know him well, but he seemed like a very nice man. I am so terribly sorry for your loss”. My stomach sank back into its usual position. I suddenly felt very empty. A thought scratched at the back of my mind, but I couldn't hear it. Something familiar. "Anyway,” Mrs Thomas continued, “I was sorting through some of Darren's things and I found a box in his flat, along with your name and address. I think he intended you to have it."
"Really? I'm not sure what that could be." I paused for thought. I'm sure Mrs Thomas has better things to think about than what's in the damn box, Sophie. My eyebrows knitted together in thought. Think, Sophie. "Oh, he was doing some designs for me. Perhaps they’re them."
Sophie Morgan (Book 2): Death in the Family Page 24