Already Dead

by Charlie Huston

  It takes over half an hour for me to hobble home clutching my ribs. By the time I crawl into bed it's almost four in the morning and I'm not even thinking about looking for that carrier anymore.

  The phone rings about an hour after I fall into a painful sleep.

  —This is Joe Pitt. Leave a message.

  —Hey, Joe, it's me. If you're in bed don't pick up.

  Evie's voice. I pick up the phone.

  —Hey.

  —You asleep?

  —Thinking about it.

  —You're asleep, aren't you?

  —Just barely. What's up?

  —Nothing, I just got off work.

  —You OK?

  —Yeah, a little lonely.

  —You want to come over, watch a movie?

  There's a brief silence.

  —No. You should sleep. You don't sleep enough.

  —I'll sleep when I'm dead. Come over.

  —No, I just wanted to hear your voice. I'll be OK now. You get some sleep.

  —Yeah, sleep.

  —You around tomorrow night?

  I think about the carrier still out there and the deadline that I've already blown.

  —Think I'm gonna be tied up.

  —Maybe you can drop by the bar and say hi.

  —I'll do that.

  —OK. Sleep tight.

  —You too.

  She hangs up and so do I.

  I met Evie about two years back. She tends bar at a place over on 9th and C. I was there looking for a deadbeat who owed a guy some money. She was behind the bar of this honky-tonk in the middle of Alphabet City. Curly red hair, freckles, twenty-two, wearing an Elvis T-shirt and a pair of Daisy Dukes.

  I come in and ask her if she knows the deadbeat. She gives me a fish eye while she digs a couple of Lone Stars out of the cooler and bangs them down in front of a lesbian couple necking at the bar. They snap out of it long enough to pay up, then go back to their alternative lifestyle.

  —Who's looking for him?

  I peer over my right shoulder, then over my left, and back at her.

  —I guess that must be me.

  —What you want him for?

  —He's a deadbeat and I'm gonna collect on some debts he owes.

  She looks me over.

  —Uh-huh. You ever seen this guy you're looking for?

  —Nope.

  She smiles a little to herself.

  —Well, you just sit quiet and have a drink and listen to the music. If this guy comes in, maybe I'll let you know. What're you having?

  I lean over the bar to look down in the ice bin at the piles of Lone Star bottles, and nothing else. —Guess I'll have a Lone Star.

  She pulls one out, pops the cap and slaps it down.

  —Man of discriminating tastes.

  —Yeah.

  She moves off to work the bar and I find a corner a little less crowded than the others. I do like she said, stay quiet, have a drink and listen to the music. And maybe sneak a look at her from

  time to time. There's a jam session going. Bunch of bluegrass sidemen pick'n and grin'n and playing up a storm. Not my usual bag, but they know what they're doing.

  An hour goes by like that before I catch her looking over at me and she waves me to the bar. I squeeze through the hicks and nod. She tilts her head to the opposite side of the bar where a thick crowd of people are stuffed together.

  —Over there.

  —Where?

  —The little guy.

  —What little guy?

  That's when I realize that a dude I had taken to be over six feet is actually a pudgy midget standing on the bar telling jokes to a group of seven people. She looks at me and gives me a twisted little smile.

  —So how you gonna handle this one, tough guy?

  I look the midget over, taking note of the large bulge in the back of his pants. I smile at her.

  —What's your name?

  —Evie.

  —Nice name.

  —Thanks.

  —You got a bouncer in here?

  —No, just me.

  —Got a policy on fights?

  —Why do you ask?

  —Well I think I'm gonna have to rough that midget up and I'm trying to figure if I should do it in here or outside.

  —Well, you do it in here and you're gonna get eighty-sixed.

  —Uh-huh. Well I guess I better take care of it outside.

  —Why's that?

  —I think I'd like to come back in here sometime so I can see you again. Here's for the beer and the help. My name's Joe by the way. See you around.

  I left a fifty on the bar and went outside to wait for the dead-beat. He came out a bit later with some of his normal-sized pals and there was a ruckus. He pulled a gun. I took it away and thumped him a few times. The normal-sized people got outraged and I thumped them. In the end I got the money, threw the gun down a storm drain and went home. The next night I went back to the bar and sat there and listened to the music. Evie did her job and barely looked at me, but when her shift was over I walked her home.

  We sat on her stoop for awhile and talked about a book she was reading and a movie I liked. Then she got up to go in and I stood and she moved to the step above mine so she could look at me without craning her neck. She told me she was going up. She told me she'd like to see me again. She told me she had HIV and doesn't have sex with anyone under any circumstances. Then she kissed me hard on the mouth and went in. I never even had a chance to explain to her that I don't have sex either.

  It's hard to explain this kind of thing to a person. That this thing called the Vyrus has taken up residence in my body. That it feeds off my blood, scours it of all impurities and weaknesses. That it wants only to survive, and to do that it needs more blood, so it gives me the instincts, strengths and senses of a predator. That if I don't feed it more blood, human blood, it will burn my body and scorch my veins and leave me a dry husk. That exposed to the UV radiation of the sun, it will rack my immune system and tumors will riot through my body in minutes. That it pumps me full of adrenaline and endorphins. That it clots in seconds and knits my flesh and that if you want to kill me you will have to blow up my heart or head or cut me in half or otherwise annihilate my body in one blow before it can heal. That I am a secret in the world and that the greatest defense I have is to remain unknown. For we are few and we are rotted by the light of the sun. That my body is as close to dead as living can get, and is kept moving only by the will and appetite of another organism. That I could walk through a ward of AIDS patients and drink their blood and the Vyrus would eat the HIV and leave me with clean healthy blood. That I could walk through the same ward and infect the patients with my blood, and it would cleanse and heal them, but leave them with a hunger and thirst for more. That I could heal her.

  One day, when I am a braver man, I will tell her these things, and then I will look her in the eye and tell her I love her and ask her to be only mine. But until that day, we're just friends.

  In the late morning the phone rings.

  —This is Joe Pitt. Leave a message.

  —Mr. Pitt, I have a call for you from Mr. Predo. Please pick up if you are in.

  Oh, shit. It's the bodybuilder from the Coalition.

  —Very well, Mr. Pitt. Please be certain to return this call at the earliest possible moment.

  I'm fighting to untangle myself from the sheets, grabbing at the phone. I snatch it off the cradle and drop it on the floor. I fumble with the phone and try to switch off the answering machine at the same time.

  —Hello. I'm here. Hello?

  The bodybuilder's voice comes over the line and I can hear his exasperation in the way he breathes.

  —Good morning, Mr. Pitt, I have a call from Mr. Predo. May I connect you?

  —Shouldn't you make sure it's really me, just in case"?

  —If I had any doubts, Mr. Pitt, you have just relieved them. I'm connecting you now.

  There's a little click and then I hear you know who. />
  —Good morning, Pitt.

  —Morning, Mr. Predo.

  —All is well, Pitt? Here it is.

  —Well sure, I guess all is well.

  —Then you have disposed of the problem and we can expect no further difficulties'?

  There are two things you do not want to do with The Coalition.

  The first is fail an assignment. The second is He to them.

  —Yes, Mr. Predo, all cleaned up. No problem.

  —Good. In that case, I think I may have some work for you. Shit.

  —Truth is I'm pretty busy right now. Not sure I can take on anything new.

  He pauses for a half moment.

  —There are two ways to look at this job, Pitt. On the one hand, it is an opportunity, an opportunity you might say yes or no to as you wished. On the other hand, the cleanup we arranged after you bungled things at the school was quite expensive. In light of that, you might look at this job as a favor you owe the Coalition in return for taking care of your mess. I think the latter of these two versions may be the more accurate interpretation. What do you think?

  Having just lied to the man I know that this is not the time to let pride have its say.

  —I imagine you're right about that.

  —That would be yes, then?

  —Right.

  —I thought that might be your choice.

  —Yeah. So what's the job?

  —A woman is going to call you today with a problem. You will offer her your assistance. Whatever it is she asks of you, you shall do it. Efficiently and, need I say it, discreetly. Yes?

  —Right.

  —The woman is of some prominence and breeding. Try to be polite.

  —My specialty.

  —Yes. Well, once again, my congratulations on taking care of the problem, and my best wishes on the swift resolution of this new endeavor.

  —Thanks.

  —Good-bye.

  —Right.

  He hangs up. I sit there on my bed and bang the back of my head against the wall over and over again. Predo thinks the carrier is dead and the fact is I don't have the slightest clue where it is. And if any new zombies start stumbling around before I find the damn thing it won't be hard to figure out where they came from. And after that it won't be long before I'm spiked to the tarmac in some New Jersey parking lot, watching the sun come up.

  Joe Pitt isn't my real name. I grew up with a different name, but I changed it when I got infected. Lots of us do. It's not a rule or anything, not like you need to pick your secret-sacred Vampyre name. It's just that most of us leave our old lives behind, and the first thing to go is the name. Anyway, I grew up with a different name.

  There are some great parents out there; parents who know a thing or two about loving and nurturing. I had the other kind of parent.

  I was born in the Bronx in 1960. By 75 I was on my own, living with a bunch of other punk squatters in the East Village. It was alright. I panhandled and robbed, wore a Mohawk; drank, shot, snorted and sucked anything I could get. I got a rep for being twice as sick as any other punk on the scene. I'd fuck or fight anything that stood still.

  In '77 I go to see the Ramones at CBGB. Great show. I get drunk, get stoned, eat speed, and in the bathroom some guy in a suit offers me twenty bucks to let him suck my dick. It was a different time. Suits would come down to slum and check out the scene, and some of them were trolls looking for rough trade. And I liked having my dick sucked; the money was icing.

  He gets my tight plaid pants unzipped and goes down on his knees with a handkerchief on the floor to protect his slacks. Through the walls I can hear Joey and the band swing into "Now I Wanna Be a Good Boy" and I come in the guy's mouth. He stands up, pulls out another twenty and offers it to me if I suck him. I say no, but that I'll give him a hand job. He gives me the twenty. My hand is in his pants and he's leaning against me, his face tucked against my neck. I'm jerking him in time to the music pounding through the walls, thinking about the booze and drugs I'm gonna buy with the forty bucks. I'm so fucked up it takes me a few seconds to realize he isn't just trying to give me a hickey. By the time I try to scream he's chewed a hole in my neck.

  He was sloppy. He left me folded up on the floor, didn't try to get rid of me or disguise the wound or even drain me and save some of the blood. A fucking slummer out for a cheap thrill. I lay there on the floor while people came in and out of the can, stepping over me to get to the pot. Some guy passed out on the bathroom floor was no big deal at CBGB, not even one that was bleeding. I don't know how long I was there before Terry Bird came in and saw me. He picked me up and carried me out through the crowd. I think he was just planning to dump me, but then he saw how much life I had left and took me home instead.

  Terry got me healthy, explained what had happened. I didn't believe him. Big scene, lots of freaking out involved. Then he fed me blood for the first time, and I didn't care about anything else.

  I was with Terry for three years. He told me about the Clans, how they run different chunks of territory in Manhattan and make sure things stay quiet, how they keep the Vampyre a secret. He told me about the Coalition.

  The Coalition used to run the whole island, except for the West Village; the West Village has always been Enclave. But things changed for the Coalition in the sixties. That's when the Hood seized everything above 110th and Terry formed the Society and took the East Side turf from 14th down to Houston. That left the island's bottom cut off from the rest of the Coalition. Now all that turf down there is run by minor Clans and Rogues. As for the Outer Boroughs: Staten Island, Brooklyn, Queens and the Bronx? From what I hear, it might as well be a jungle once you cross a river. Who knows what the savages are doing out there in the bush? And who cares? But the real turf still belongs to the Coalition. They took some lumps in the sixties, got whittled down a bit, but they still control everything river to river between 14th and 110th.

  They have the big turf because they have numbers. They find a role in their Clan for any Vampyre who wants to join, and keep all their members supplied with a ration of blood equal to their contribution to the Clan. And that's their real power, all that blood they get their hands on. Somehow. They'll keep you supplied so you don't go Rogue and feed on your own and cause any trouble, but only as long as you toe their line. And their line is invisibility. They cultivate influence in the uninfected world, but only to protect the Clan and its interests. Or, as Terry would say, the interests of the Secretariat.

  Terry gave me the history and he explained his own philosophy,

  his plans to unite all the Clans and bring the Vampyre above ground. How this could never be done until the Coalition's power was broken, and that their ultimate power lay in their control of a vast and secret supply of blood. So I fought the fight, did what I could to bring all of us under one banner so we could step into the public consciousness together; undeniable and deserving the same rights as any uninfected person. I went to the meetings, helped to organize, and to find the new guys before they got themselves killed. Spent a lot of time huddled in basements talking newly infected fish off the ceiling. Spent a lot of time in those same basements hiding out from Coalition agents. Those were rough years at the end of the seventies. The Society was still coming together. The Coalition had lost control of the turf, but that didn't mean Terry had taken control of it. Wasn't until the mid eighties that he had enough of the smaller Clans pulled together into something big enough to be a major Clan. But now that turf is Society through and through. Me, I went my way when I figured what Terry had me lined up for.

  Started with a couple jobs taking care of Rogues who were on the turf but didn't want to join the Society. Then there were some new fish that had trouble making the transition and needed to be put out of their own misery. Then there were members of different Society affiliates who maybe didn't always want to do things Terry's way, and they needed taking care of, too. So I took care of them. A lot of them.

  One day I show up at a guy's place, a guy I know and
like. I'm there to see if he wants to grab a beer, but when he sees it's me, he gets a look on his face; a look like he doesn't want to turn his back. That's when I got it that Terry was turning me into his whip, his cop. And I ain't no fucking cop.

  I went Rogue, left the Society and tried to make it on my own. But you can't make it on your own as a Vampyre. You can't because the Clans don't want you out there on your own where you might cause trouble. So I kept running errands for Terry because I wanted to keep living on Society turf.

  And when the Coalition came calling with their first little job, I did it. Because I know what's good for me. They knew about me going Rogue just like they know most things. And they knew I could move around below 14th. They figured to get an agent, a turncoat in the Society's house. They offered to pay for it, pay well. I counter-offered. So now they like to pretend they're pulling all my strings, and I like to pretend they're not. Who's to say who has the right idea?

  I do favors for the Coalition because they have the juice to get rid of me if they decide they really want to. I do favors for the Society because this is their territory and they'll run me to the Outer Boroughs if I don't. Me, I get to stay Rogue, and that's the way I like it. It's my life, I can live it any way I want. And if I ever get tired of it, all I have to do is open the door and walk outside on a nice sunny day.

  When I look in the mirror I see a face about twenty-eight. Under it I know I'm forty-five. I could stay younger. All I have to do is drink more blood. A guy like Predo, who knows how much he sucks down? But then again he has the resources of the Coalition. Sometimes the Coalition pays me off with a few pints, but mostly I scrounge my own blood, and the less I consume the less attention I draw to myself. It is our greatest vulnerability, our thirst. It identifies us and leads hunters to us. It forces us to live in highly populated areas where our foraging and aversion to the sun will draw less attention. Some run to the country and live like hermits, feeding off the occasional stray backpacker. Some move to rural communities, feeding sparingly, becoming emaciated and hiding their true nature behind a facade of eccentricity. The suburbs are hopeless, the population neither thin not dense enough to provide cover. Vampyres in the suburbs last less than a year.