by Adam Millard
“Sophie. Sophie, come join me, girl.”
Words spiraled around in my head and I felt dizzy. I turned my head and saw the elder vampire, beckoning me closer with his hand.
My body fell against the roofing, stiff as a board, and I felt the feeling of being human returning. It was pure agony. My eyes rolled back in my head, and I gagged. It felt like my spine was snapping in two, and I knew I was human when I heard a scream erupt from my throat. This was the reason we changed back to human when we were unconscious – it was virtually painless.
No one liked to shift awake, but unfortunately, I had no choice.
“Sophie…”
Even if my weakened state, my legs moved. They ached and I was sure I’d pulled a muscle, but they took me to the vampire. My right hand placed itself in his and he drew me closer to him.
“Who… who are you?”
“My name, dear Sophie, is Christoph. Master Vampire of your fair city of Lincoln.”
I felt helpless as he embraced me. I felt him brush my hair from my shoulder, catching the ear that Joseph had nipped. His breath was hot on my neck.
“Sweet angel,” he whispered.
I felt his lips touch the skin and an overwhelming rush ran along my body. Carefully, I turned my face to his and whispered back against his lips, “I’m the angel of death.”
Instinct gave me wise words and I followed them, like a good little girl. I flung both my arms around him and sunk my teeth into my neck. I drew on the remaining strength my wolf had left me with and my canines pierced his jugular.
His blood was hot, fierce as fire, in my mouth and I clamped onto the vein. My nails lengthened to claws and I pierced his body. Christoph started screaming, trying to twist his body away from me, but to no avail. Blood just continued to pour. I ran one hand over his perfect little face, scarring him along one side and covering him in his own blood. I rested over his heart, before pushing my claws deep, willing every ounce of my strength into his rotting body.
The rage burned deep inside me and I only stopped once I heard Joseph’s voice, tugging at my senses.
“Sophie, Sophie, sweetie, he’s dead. Come on, he won’t get you. Let him go, Sophie, you’ve done it.” Reluctantly, I let him go and the vampire’s body dropped to the floor.
Every inch of me was covered in blood, and I spat the remnants from my mouth onto his body. Flesh was under my nails, which were mercifully returning to normal. It would have been hard to explain that to anyone in the street.
Joseph’s arms curled around me, his body pressed into me. I was fully aware he was naked and I suddenly became aware of my own nakedness. He pressed his body against me, before nuzzling my neck. I giggled, a very human laugh. He nipped at my ear again, making me giggle again. I spun on my heel, throwing my arms around Joseph’s neck. Before I knew it I was pressed against him, kissing him, kissing him as if I didn’t want to let him go.
He laughed gently as we parted.
“Your dad is right, you know. I do love you, blue eyes. Everything about you, from your long luscious hair, to your tiny little feet. You make me smile in a way no one ever has. I’m sorry for all this shit that’s kicked off. I never meant for this. I—“
“I love you too,” I said, placing my index finger on his lips to silence the tirade that poured forth.
And I knew I did. I always had, always would, I just hadn’t realized it. I’d been scared since he had told me, and been stuck in permanent denial the whole time. It had spurned my decision to run away and look what had happened there.
He brushed a strand of hair from my face and wrinkled his nose in a delicate fashion.
“You smell like dead vampire. It’s disgusting.”
“Oh, I’m so sorry!” I pouted.
“Let’s go home.” He held out a hand for me to take. “Your father’s been worried sick”.
“You better fix my bike for me!” I poked his ribs.
“We didn’t dismantle it too badly; nothing me and the boys can’t handle.”
I picked up my discarded jacket and pulled it around me. If I managed to get down the ladder in one piece, I could find my suitcase, and I could be dressed in seconds.
I turned to face him. “Can’t handle! I can ride it better than you can. Second thoughts...“ I buttoned my jacket and tossed my hair, “...I’ll fix it, and do a damn better job.”
WHAT'S THE SCOOP?
By Chantal Boudreau
Brody would have never guessed where life was going to take him when his father’s gardening supply store went belly up, the result of a couple of franchise gardening centres setting up shop in his home town. He had worked for the family business since he was a young teen, and he had never known anything else. Brody had gone to business college, his father had seen to that, but he hadn’t been able to adapt to slaving away for someone else’s benefit. He wasn’t meant to count beans or push paper either. Brody had always been a hands-on kind of guy.
He had tried starting his own lawn care service, hoping to put his gardening knowledge from the store to good use, but competition was stiff. Brody wasn’t just trying to position himself against established professionals, he also had to jockey against low-balling adolescents trying to earn themselves an extra buck before finishing high school. There wasn’t much of a median between the two. Then he had gotten the call that had changed his life, in a not so pleasant way.
“Bed of Roses Lawn Care,” he had answered, with his usual attempt at cheeriness. It had been more difficult at that point, because of those down times.
“I need you to clean my lawn. It’s seriously messed up, after the winter’s thaw.” The man on the other end of the phone sounded rushed and impatient. He also had that nasal intonation of suggested superiority. “I’m willing to pay the going rate.”
“Clean your lawn? Is it a problem with weeds? Old, dead vegetation? I can cut and trim as needed, and I can treat any sort of pest. I can even redesign...” The man did not give Brody the chance to finish, interrupting with an irritated tone.
“Just get rid of the shit,” he said bluntly.
That had been Mister Whitney, a man with a Great Dane, who had been unwilling to chase after the animal with a plastic baggy over the winter months. He had released the beast into the back yard to heed the call of nature, where the gigantic turds had lain frozen and eventually buried in the snow. Once spring had arrived and the ice and snow had melted, the plethora of pungent deposits have reappeared and once thawed, had left the man of some means with a nasty problem.
“But...but I’m a landscaper – I tend lawns and design gardens. I don’t normally clean up animal refuse,” Brody had protested.
“Well this crap is marring my landscape and I’m willing to pay your regular hourly rate to fix it because I’d prefer not to sully my hands doing it myself. If you’re not interested I can find someone else to pay to do it...”
Brody had actually been quite quick to agree to the job after all. The truth was, he just didn’t have what it took to be competitive in standard landscaping. The students had him beat on price and the more experienced professionals offered higher quality and discriminating service. He welcomed the money and agreed to clear Mr. Whitney’s yard on a regular basis.
Word had spread and soon many of Mr. Whitney’s neighbours had joined Brody’s list of clientèle for the same lawn treatment. It wasn’t the type of business Brody had been intending, but it was earning him an honest living. He became known as the “pooper-scooper guy” and the name Bed of Roses took on a whole new meaning.
Brody had made a point of learning more about dogs since that turn of events, and the one thing he noticed was that since the snootier folks kept the critters primarily as another show of their wealth and status, they mostly kept pure-breds. The dogs tended to be very large or outrageously small. They ranged from a variety of tiny terriers and lapdog types, like teacup Chihuahuas, to massive beasts like Bichon Frises, Afghans, Great Danes and Burmese Mountain Dogs. Br
ody thought he had run into the largest scat he had ever seen when he was hired on to address the droppings of an Irish wolfhound, but it turned out that Mr. Pooper-Scooper was wrong.
Brody found that his greatest influx of new customers came in the spring, for the same reason Mr. Whitney had phoned him on that fateful day when he had stumbled into his current business venture. When Brody picked up the phone one morning with his customary “Bed of Roses – life can smell more sweet,” the voice on the other end of the line had responded with a heavy accent, Eastern European of some sort, Brody guessed.
“You are ze man who cleans up after ze dogs?” the caller inquired.
“I offer many landscaping and yard tending services, but yes, that is one of them. I charge the same hourly fee no matter what the job, that one included, and no partial hour rebates if it takes less than the full hour,” Brody replied.
“Zis ist good. I can pay. I have a big dog, und he ist very dirty. I wish to hire you to clean up ze yard after him,” the caller told him.
“So you want me to add you to my regular daily roster?” Brody asked.
“No, only for a couple of days a month. I will give you list of dates for ze year. You come on zose days.”
This was not that unusual a situation for Brody. It was not uncommon for wealthier couples to have custody disputes over their pets when they split up. Sometimes one of the owners would be the custodial “parent” with the other having only visitation rights. Brody assumed that this was one of those instances. This customer would only need service from Bed of Roses during those visits.
“Sure,” Brody acknowledged. “That can be arranged.”
The new client was very pleased and provided his name and address. He also scheduled the first yard cleaning, and said he would have the schedule ready for him when Brody arrived.
Brody wasn’t sure what nationality or ethnicity the name “Lupta” was. It certainly wasn’t something one tended to hear locally. He decided if he ever had the need to make small talk with Lupta he would make a point of asking. Customers often seemed flattered when he took an interest in those kinds of things.
The house was located in the wealthier quarter of town, but it was old and had been left vacant for long enough while the prior owners had been trying to sell it that it had gotten a little run-down. Mr Lupta had already begun to spruce it up again. There was an assortment of renovations being made, including some to the house’s façade, to restore the majestic look it had once had. Workers were even in the process of installing a very large doggy door in the back, one that even a man the size of Brody, who was quite hefty, might be able to squeeze through. He had to wonder what kind of monstrous mutt Mr. Lupta must own in order to warrant something that big. A Saint Bernard or a Newfoundlander crossed his mind as possibilities.
Despite the changes in progress, the house still reminded Brody of some haunted thing out of the movies. The place had an eerie ambiance, like some cross between the Bates’ house in Psycho or the location of the Amityville Horror, especially in contrast to the newer, well-maintained homes that surrounded it.
Brody avoided the other workers as much as he could while he did the dirty deed. The droppings were fresh, and calling them turds would have been an understatement. The piles of refuse were almost as large as cow patties, and Brody wondered as he gagged from the sight and stench of them if Mr. Lupta had lied to him and owned some type of sizeable livestock, rather than a dog. When he was done, had disposed of the evidence of his work and was properly cleaned and sanitized, he approached the side door as Mr. Lupta had directed, to collect his payment and the schedule for future visits.
The man who opened the door was a little smaller than Brody had been expecting, based on the timbre and surety of the voice on the phone. He looked a little gaunt and absolutely exhausted. Otherwise, Brody would have described him as wolfish in appearance. He had a long face adorned with heavy silver sideburns, and he had piercing, deep-set eyes.
“Mr. Lupta? I’m Brody Terrence from Bed of Roses Lawn Services. Your yard is clear, just as you requested. You said you would have a schedule prepared for me and for me to drop in to arrange payment.”
The smaller man frowned and glanced about sluggishly until his eyes settled on the printed sheet bearing the schedule that he had set aside for Brody. He also provided credit card details so Brody could charge the cost of that day’s job as well as future ones, muttering under his breath in a foreign language when they were done. Brody hoped he hadn’t somehow offended his newest customer.
“I’m sorry if I’ve disturbed you but this was the time and date agreed upon,” Brody said, folding up the schedule and thrusting it into his pocket. “It looks like I got you out of bed.”
Mr. Lupta cocked a bushy eyebrow, and then shook his head, waving Brody off.
“No – not your fault. My sleep schedule ist off...time changes und jet-lag. I’ll be fine once I adjust to zings here.”
Brody smiled and nodded, looking around. There was no sign of any dog.
“Is your dog adjusting too? I was kind of hoping to meet the fellow. He must be pretty big from the looks of things. What breed is he, might I ask?”
There was a flash of mischief in Mr. Lupta‘s eyes, and he smirked, his smile almost a sneer. It reminded Brody of an animal curling its lip in a threatening way.
“Yes, he ist adjusting also. He shies from strangers und hides when ozers are here. He doesn’t use zis door; he likes ze back one by ze yard, which is why I’m having ze dog door put in. He likes to sleep by zat door, too. His name ist Farkas. He ist not ze breed recognized in zese parts. I guess you could call him European Wulfhound.”
That reply came as a surprise to Brody, since he had never heard of such a breed either. He assumed based on the name that it must be some offshoot of the Irish Wolfhound, but had not yet gained proper acceptance from American breeders. If that was the case, Brody was puzzled as to why the animal’s excrement did not bear any resemblance to that of the true breed. He had seen that kind of animal refuse recently enough, and the two did not compare. Nevertheless, Brody wasn’t about to argue that point. He didn’t know enough about Farkas to jump to any conclusions.
He returned again after three more days and then was off for the better part of a month. The schedule ran in cycles, one stop for a light cleaning at the start of 4 days, a second stop at the end with a heavier collection and 24 days off. It seemed simple enough, although odd if it was some sort of custody arrangement. Maybe, he thought, it was based around the work schedule of Mr. Lupta or his ex-spouse.
On the second stop of his third cycle, Brody encountered something completely unexpected. He was scooping one of the larger piles from the backyard, when it slipped from the end of his tool and splattered on the ground. Aside from the fact that Brody now had a worse mess to deal with, he could see something jutting out of the scattered remains that he hadn’t noticed before, something large and solid. He approached and crouched down to get a better look, concerned that the dog may have eaten something that might have done him some internal damage.
Brody turned away as soon as he identified it. The item that had been shaken free of the excrement was undoubtedly and undeniably a human finger, albeit a ragged and mauled one. Brody backed away from it as quickly as he could scramble. Then, before finishing that day’s cleaning, he rushed around to the side door, which he banged upon with great urgency.
Mr. Lupta opened the door after a couple of minutes of pounding. He looked very tired and not the least bit happy.
“What ist it? Why are you beating on my door? We have pre-arranged payment. Zis should not be necessary.”
“A finger!” Brody exclaimed breathlessly. “I found a finger! What the hell has your dog been eating, or maybe I should say ‘who’?”
Mr. Lupta laughed out loud, the peals bursting forth in sharp little yelps. Apparently, he found Brody’s distress amusing. When he finally managed to settle himself, he stared at his lawn man with a crooked grin,
one that revealed pronounced incisors.
“Do you know what I do for a living?” he asked.
That wasn’t something they had ever discussed. Brody shook his head. Mr. Lupta’s smile broadened.
“I wast rather famous in Europe. I am master props-man. I design und create special props for movies – zat ist why I moved here. I am in ze middle of making horror film, und my current contract is for a movie called “Ze Amputator”. I have many realistic body parts around ze house at ze moment, und now und zen zey go missing. I wondered what had happened to zat finger.”
“You mean that’s not real? It sure looked it,” Brody responded.
“My work ist very good, Mr. Brody. Zat is why it looks real. But it ist not. Zat foolish dog will eat anything, including my work. I wish to try salvage zat finger. Leave zat mess und clean up ze rest.”
Try as he might, Brody could not stop glancing over at the finger. It glistened with a moist fleshy shine, and he could have sworn it crawled with the odd maggot, but he told himself that Lupta must be an expert at his trade. The realistic look of the finger was a result of that expertise. Forcing himself to deny the distraction, Brody finished the rest of the back yard and set off for his next job.
The finger still bothered him for days after its discovery. He tried to believe that Lupta’s explanation was truthful, but the more he thought about his curious business arrangement with the strange little man, the more he questioned its veracity. He had never seen Farkas, not once, or any signs that there was even a dog in Mr. Lupta’s house, other than the doggy door and the backyard evidence. Brody had even gone as far as searching “European Wolfhound” on the Internet, but his efforts just brought him to pages referencing Irish Wolfhounds and cell phone detectors.
It wasn’t until the day that Brody noticed an unusual coincidence regarding his scheduled clean-ups and the lunar cycle that his curiosity peaked. His jobs matched the time surrounding the full moon. Part of him, the little boy inside who still marvelled over horror stories and the supernatural, automatically thought “werewolf”. He considered that Farkas might be a fib to cover Mr. Lupta’s own nocturnal comings and goings. Perhaps Lupta was the “wolf” hound. If that were the case, it would certainly explain the presence of a real human finger. The whole notion frightened Brody to no end.