Stella’s hunger had been too much for Dorian. He had left her gnawing at her bloodied digits, returning as soon as he could with a street cat. He had watched her from across the room, watched raptly as her small hands held the squirming cat still as her face contorted into a foul mask that looked more like an old man’s face instead of a child’s. She had slashed at the cat’s neck with her canines, which always grew when she was ready to eat, and emptied the skin and fur of meat, viscera, and bone. She had looked up at him after that—her first kill—and smiled. Her canines had shrunk back to normal, her cat eyes had lost the sheen they had acquired during her feeding. Innocence had returned to her features, which had changed back to her infant form. She was a normal baby. She was his baby.
Dorian broke out of his reverie. Paco was trying to lull Stella to sleep. He had Stella’s lampin draped over his shoulder where her head rested, to catch any drool that might fall. They looked sweet, a father and his daughter bonding, against the late afternoon light. Only…
“No!” He yelled, dropping the paper and overturning small pieces of furniture in his attempt to get to Paco in time. He snatched Stella away from Paco, ignoring the strange look on his lover’s face. Stella gave a grunt of discontent, her fangs receding into her gums. She eyed him curiously.
“What’s wrong? What is it?” Paco asked, confused.
“I, uh, thought she was going to pee,” Dorian said lamely. “Forgive me.” He kissed Paco’s cheek and, with shaking knees and trembling fingers, went into the kitchen and sat Stella down on her high chair. He took a chair and sat in front of her so that their faces were level and they were staring eye to eye.
“That was bad,” he said. “What you did was bad.”
Stella gave him what amounted to an innocent look.
Dorian nodded. “You leave papa Paco alone, okay? Let Papa Dorian do the hunting.”
Stella stared at him, blinked.
Dorian wondered if she understood. She was certainly smart for a child her age, quick to identify letters and objects, although she could only say a few words, preferring to communicate in a strange, incomprehensible language that sounded like a cross between a kitten and a canary.
Dorian had always supposed that it was plain baby talk but Paco, who was a professor in the linguistics department of the State University, noticed a pattern in her birdlike mutterings—a lilt here, an inflection there, the use of the same word for the same thing—enough to make him think that either she was making up her own language, which was fairly common for children her age, or she was somehow remembering her birth parents’ speech.
The first reason seemed more plausible of course, but the more Paco studied her chirps and murmurs, the more he was convinced that her ‘words’ were too complex to be of a normal child’s making. She was smarter than a normal child her age, that much they knew. But just how smart was she, really? Paco had begun studying her secret language in depth, fascinated as he was by its nuances. He could even say a few words in it now, words that pertained to simple things like cloud or tree, but claimed that he could never get the inflection right. Stella would look at him strangely whenever he tried to speak in her tongue, am amused look that made Paco think she was laughing at him. And now she wanted to eat him? Dorian decided that it was impossible to keep her instincts—if that was what they were—at bay. He would have to let her hunt for herself.
And that was when the killings started.
They were barely noticeable at first—all the rats in the house disappeared. Then the alley cats and the stray dogs that roamed the streets. And finally, a child.
Dorian had read about it in the papers—a three year-old girl had gone missing not two blocks from where they lived. The body was found near a dumpster two days later, slashed and mutilated beyond recognition, almost empty of guts and organs, its skin turned inside-out. The police were on the lookout for a child killer with cannibalistic tendencies. Maybe a molester, they said.
Dorian was at a loss. Stella needed to eat, right? Besides, it was the child’s fault for wandering so far away from home. He knew he should say something—reprimand his daughter perhaps, or at least warn her of the dangers of getting caught—but didn’t. Stella would only stare at him, her feline orbs alive and inquisitive, elfin ears twitching ever so slightly in a way that said, it’s nothing I can’t handle. Can we play now? Besides, her second birthday was coming up and Paco wanted to throw her a party; it was taking all of Dorian’s strength to keep him from pushing through with it.
Dorian sat near the open window with Stella on his knee. It was nearly dusk, Stella’s feeding time. Paco wasn’t home yet; he had a faculty meeting to attend. Dorian stared out onto the street, lulled by the sound of early crickets and Stella’s soft purring. He brushed her face with the back of his hand, angling it so that he was staring straight into her eyes. That was when he noticed—her eyes, which had been mud brown, had changed color. He thought they had grown lighter before, after she had gone hunting on her own, but it was only now that the change was truly noticeable. Dirty brown had lightened to a sapphire blue in the right and opal green in the left, much like a kitten’s eyes would change color a few months after its birth.
Stella gurgled happily, aware of the deepening twilight. She raised an arm, grasping Dorian’s finger in a chubby fist. Dorian watched in awe as his daughter drew his digit into her mouth, sucking on it contentedly, her little rough tongue running over it like an experienced lover’s.
He cradled her closer. “You would never hurt me, I know,” he whispered, kissing her forehead.
Stella let go of his finger, pressed her mouth into a tight smile, her eyes languid, half-closed.
“I know,” Dorian said as he kissed her again before getting up. “It’s dinner time.”
Paco walked out of the conference room in a daze. The meeting had sapped him of his strength. There was an important convention coming up and since the chairperson was feeling liberal, he had made the faculty choose who they were going to send. It had taken everyone three hours just to decide who would go. Paco was hoping that his seniority and his position as assistant to the chairperson would make him an obvious choice, but the honor had gone to Sophie Marasigan, a young instructor just fresh out of her MA, instead.
It didn’t bother Paco as much as he expected; Sophie was a good friend and a trustworthy confidant. They had even made out with each other once, when Sophie was still an undergraduate student in Paco’s Language Theory class. Their friendship came after, when they realized that they would never work as lovers, that they respected each other too much professionally for that. Another thing he admired her for was her numerous contacts in various institutions both here and abroad. Most of them had to do with her father being a respected man in the field, but Sophie was smart enough for anyone to see that she was quickly following in her father’s footsteps, if not exceeding him already. And it certainly didn’t hurt that she was pretty, with huge almond eyes, thick reddish lips and a body that would have been more at home as a centerfold of some men’s magazine instead of the academe. Still, it didn’t mean that Paco’s heart was any lighter for it. He allowed himself a small sigh as he fished for the keys to his faculty room.
He sank into his chair and let his head rest on his table’s cool wooden surface. To hell with it if anyone walked in. What he needed was a vacation—a break from everything that had been weighing him down lately. School. Home. Dorian. Stella. His hand groped for the handle of the drawer where he kept a half-finished bottle of Jim Beam. The university had a law against drinking on campus but right now, he didn’t give a shit. Those tight-assed authorities didn’t understand, couldn’t even begin to comprehend the problems their minions faced. What with students who were too apathetic to consider the state of the world they lived in and whose idea of fun was finishing each other off under the banner of brotherhood, would it matter that one of their faculty got a bit tipsy?
His fingers found the neck of the bottle. He was about to pull it ou
t when the door opened and Sophie stepped inside.
“Don’t tell me that the esteemed Dr. San Juan is breaking a university rule,” she joked.
“Was about to,” Paco mumbled, not bothering to look up. “Go away.”
Sophie walked towards him, took his hand out of the booze drawer before closing it.
“Here, you don’t need that,” she said softly.
“Fuck off,” came his muffled answer.
Sophie shook her head, sat on the able, her thigh resting near Paco’s head.
“I know how much you were hoping to be sent to the convention and I’m sorry that you didn’t get picked but I think that it’s not fair that you should be blaming me for it.”
Her hand was on his head, stroking it, ruffling his hair in a motherly sort of way.
“We’ve come too far as friends for something as silly as this to separate us,” she said. “Besides, I have good news.”
Paco groaned. “Do I really have to hear this?”
“It’s about those tapes you gave me.”
“Stella’s?”
Sophie didn’t say anything but Paco knew that she was nodding. “I sent a copy of them, plus some of your notes on Stella, to a friend who specializes in these things. I gave him your e-mail and fax number so you might expect a response anytime soon.”
“Thanks, Sophie.”
“Any time.”
She got up and opened the door. “You’d better get home, Paco. Get some sleep. You look like hell.”
Paco didn’t answer. The door closed, signaling that he was alone once again. This time, he made sure that the door was locked before opening the drawer where he kept his best friend.
He returned home the next evening, having drunk himself into a stupor the night before and called in sick from his own office. He spent the rest of the day in a hangover-created haze, as still as a lizard in the sun, not changing his position even when his muscles turned sore and screamed in protest. Thankfully, his roommate was scheduled to be at a seminar of sorts so he had the room to himself, free to spend his time wallowing in a self-misery that he could find no reason to account for.
When he got home, he found Dorian asleep on the sofa, dried tears staining his face, making his make-up run so that it looked like he was wearing a hideous mask of clashing colors. Paco never likes it when Dorian used make-up. It cheapened him, made him no different from the baklas that monopolized the country’s beauty parlors. He knew that Dorian was conscious about his looks, thinking that they were nothing special, that they needed to be intensified by large amounts of lipstick and rouge for them to be considered beautiful, and no amount of reassurance on Paco’s part could make his lover think otherwise.
“If I wanted a girl, I’d go fuck a prostitute,” he had once said.
“That’s why I do this,” Dorian had answered, “So you don’t have to fuck anyone but me.”
God, he thought as he beheld the sleeping Dorian. Don’t tell me he thinks I was out fucking girls again.
He walked over and ran the back of his hand against Dorian’s cheek. He knew he smelled strongly of alcohol and dried saliva, and that his clothes were wrinkled and his hair unkempt but he didn’t care. He wanted Dorian to see him like this, even though he hadn’t the faintest idea why.
Some of Dorian’s make-up came off but Paco stifled the urge to pull back and wipe his hand on his jeans and continued caressing his lover until Dorian’s deep-set eyes fluttered open and a soft, sad smile appeared on his lips.
“You’ve been thinking,” he said. “You always drink when you think. I hate that.”
“Would you rather I had been off with someone else?” Paco asked.
Dorian frowned. “I’ve been calling the university. They said you called in sick. You left your cell phone here. How was I to know if you were safe?”
“I’m here now,” Paco said. “I’m safe.”
“That doesn’t mean I forgive you.”
“Maybe this will help,” Paco said, hands wandering lower, their movements languid and comforting. Dorian went limp under him, his hands reaching out to draw Paco close. They said no more to each other that night, everything having been conveyed by breath, by touch, by the joining of two souls; two souls unaware of the cat-eyes that watched them from the darkness.
Paco untangled himself from Dorian’s sleeping form. The fax machine had gone on in the middle of the night. He groped around in the darkness, taking great care not to wake his lover. Somehow, they had managed to get to the bedroom during the course of the night and, if Paco remembered correctly, they hadn’t done it very quietly, either.
“I hope we didn’t wake the baby,” Paco thought as he found his robe and slippers, put them on and padded out into the hall.
The fax machine was whirring softly when he reached it, ejecting paper upon paper, smooth, white, and glossy. Must be the fax Sophie told him to watch out for; God only knew why her contact didn’t e-mail it instead. His heart raced when a glance at the fax’s letterhead confirmed the source. He waited until the machine had spewed out all its contents before picking up the pile. Paco scanned the pages, his mind murmuring—his discovery of Stella’s secret language must have been important to warrant such a long fax. He skipped the big chunks, words grouped together in paragraphs that he supposed were introductions and background theories, until his eyes rested on an intriguing paragraph.
The Tiyanak chirps like a bird. It follows its human victims by leaping after them like a nighttime animal chasing its quarry. With sharp nails it scratches the man who picks it up from the ground and fondles it erroneously thinking it is a human baby.—Maximo D. Ramos, Creatures of Philippine Lower Mythology
In his haste and excitement, Paco had forgotten to turn on the study’s lights. He squinted, trying to make out the words by the light that streamed in from the hallway, wondering about what he was reading. It didn’t make sense. Maybe someone had sent him a different fax by mistake. He began to read the fax from the very beginning, and moved to turn on the study lights. He did not notice the movement in the shadows, see the shape disentangle itself from the dark. He did not notice Stella until she was on him, claws out and fangs bared, biting and slashing the man who had made her papa Dorian cry. Paco raised his arms to shield himself but nothing could stop the fury that used to be his daughter. He fell to the floor, knocking over a chair and breaking his ankle in the process.
“Stella!” he cried, his voice high and frenzied as the monster descended once again, bladed hands tearing through meat, exposing bone, spilling blood.
Pain, pain rising, searing, confusing him until it was all he knew. Her teeth were on him, clamped on his neck. He could smell his blood, smell his fear as his sphincter let loose, and through his dimming vision, he could see his daughter, her face almost unrecognizable, her tiny voice rising in a mighty shriek devoid of any humanity as she proceeded to bury her teeth into the soft flesh of his belly.
Dorian woke to Paco’s screaming. Not bothering to put on a robe, he rushed to the study but by the time he got there, the screams had stopped and there was only Stella, sweet, sweet Stella, hunched over Paco’s corpse. She had slashed him open and was now feeding on his small intestine, slurping it up like some obscenely long spaghetti noodle. There was blood everywhere, the smell of it making Dorian fall to his knees, the contents of his stomach coming up in a series of heaves until there was nothing else to throw up.
“Paco,” he whispered, unbelieving.
Stella looked up from her feast, cat-eyes glowing blue and green in the darkness, cat-eyes Dorian knew very well despite the horrible, shriveled body that hosted it now.
“Papa,” she said.
“Oh, baby,” Dorian said softly, rocking back and forth on his heels. “Oh, baby.” Tears were streaming down his cheeks. He was only dimly aware of his throat letting out a soft, strangled sound that was a cross between a sob and a moan, interspersed every so often by Paco’s name.
Dorian walked to the kitchen. His mind
tried to deny everything, tried to arrange the events so that he didn’t have to face them. Coffee. That should calm him. Yet while his mind debated on whether he should add anything to his coffee or not, his body moved mechanically to the stove. His left hand reached for the gas valve, unplugging it, while his right turned the thing on. Still debating on how he should make his coffee, he absently swiped a box of matches from the kitchen counter and walked back to the study.
Stella was still there. She had abandoned Paco’s insides and was happily gnawing on his head. Paco’s eye sockets were empty. Dorian knew that Stella liked to suck out the eyes of her prey, rolling them around her mouth first before popping them with her teeth and swallowing them whole.
The sight moved him. Father and daughter, together in the most intimate, most literal sense. Was this one of his hopelessly tragic romances? He sat down beside the body and placed Paco’s head on his lap. Stella didn’t complain, continued to dine on Paco’s skull while Dorian stroked what remained of his lover’s face. He was still crying, sobs caught in his throat even as hot tears streamed down his already make-up streaked cheeks. He didn’t say anything, afraid that he would explode and that it would be a bad example for his daughter.
He picked Stella up, cradling her against his breast. She was a bit miffed at being interrupted in the middle of her meal, something she made clear by biting and scratching at him half-heartedly. When he wouldn’t let go, she gave up and snuggled against him, her features losing their feral edge, slowly returning to those of a baby girl’s. How he loved her. How she trusted him.
Slowly, the distinct smell of gas filled the house. Black. He would have black coffee. But he had to heat the water first. Heat it so that the water would be scalding hot, just the way Paco liked it. Him and Paco and Stella. The perfect family. Him and Paco and—
Ghosts of Infinity: and Nine More Stories of the Supernatural Page 11