Charlie (Bloodletting Book 1)

by Joe Humphrey

  Charlie closed the box and the closet and left the room in a hurry. She shut the door behind her. However Caroline had come to have this house with this room full of children's possessions, she didn’t know, and she suddenly didn’t want to know.

  The hallway seemed darker than before. The little green cactus-shaped nightlight seemed to suck light rather than emitting it. Looking at the cactus stirred up some tumbleweed of memory in her head, but she couldn’t quite pin it down. She flipped on the light switch.

  Caroline’s bedroom door loomed at the end of the hall. She wanted to go investigate, but for some reason, she couldn’t bring herself to take another step. It felt like a door that should stay closed. At least for now. Besides, she knew what was in that room. She’d been in there already. She’d slept on the other side of that door, yet, somehow she knew there were secrets in that room that she didn’t necessarily want to know.

  She turned off the hall light and went back to the living room and tried not to think about it anymore. Sitting on the couch she had that sense of deja vu. That she'd been in that room before and it made her head swim.

  - 10 -

  It was nice riding in the Cadillac again. It was nice just to be out of the house. It had only been a few days (or perhaps as much as four, she couldn’t quite remember) but it felt like she’d been cooped up in that house for a week. Charlie had no idea where they were headed, but she trusted that it would all make sense eventually.

  Caroline came back after an hour or so, just as she said she would. Charlie hopped up and went to the garage when she heard the door rumble up and saw the big white car roll in. Caroline smiled at her as she climbed out of the car and tossed Charlie the keys.

  “Do you know how to drive?” she asked. Charlie shook her head, looking at the shiny keys in her hand. A gaudy plastic keychain hung from them with the words ‘I got lucky in Las Vegas!’ printed on the side. “Well, then I guess we’ll have to fix that,” she said, looking around the garage as if she’d lost something. After a moment of this, she stopped and looked up at Charlie and smiled.

  “Hungry?” she asked, eyebrows raised.

  “I think so. I’m not sure,” Charlie said. She definitely felt a pulling inside her, demanding something. It wasn’t the same as hunger as she understood it before. Hunger for food. That gurgling, intestinal pull. This was more like anxiety or an impulse. An aching need for something. A need for blood, certainly, though it helped Charlie to think about it in more abstract terms.

  “Well, let’s go have us some dinner,” Caroline said.

  - 11 -

  In the Caddy, Caroline turned the radio on and rolled through the stations. She settled on a station playing old doo-wop. It wasn’t what Charlie would have chosen, but it was fine. Through the window, Charlie watched first the suburbs, then the main drag of Flagstaff slip by, sleepy and unaware. When Caroline flipped on the turn signal and eased them onto the onramp to Interstate 40, Charlie imagined they were a submarine cruising through black water, the soft clicking and flashing light of the signal the only sign that they’ve passed.

  “Where are we going?” Charlie finally asked, feeling more confident in asking questions.

  “There’s a spot in the desert that I’m fond of. We need to talk and I feel like a meaningful conversation is best done under an open sky.”

  A sudden fear gripped Charlie.

  “We’re not going to where you… where you left… Reginald… are we?”

  Caroline laughed and waved a gloved hand at her.

  “Oh gosh no. He’s twenty miles into the desert in the other direction. Pull that worm out of your apple,” she said, reaching over and tapping the side of Charlie's head with her finger.

  Charlie looked at Caroline for a moment. The cool green glow of the car’s radio reflected in the lenses of her sunglasses, giving her face an unnatural, alien appearance. She smiled at Charlie and Charlie tried to smile back, though she didn’t feel like it. It was taking an act of will to keep from hyperventilating. Charlie tried to imagine Caroline burying Reginald, her slender arms lifting the cooler and turning it over, dumping the remains of what was once a man into cold, desert ground. It was difficult to imagine what he looked like in the cooler because it seemed far too small to fit an adult man. Had she cut him into pieces? Charlie shuddered.

  Caroline hummed along with the song, The Great Pretender performed by The Platters, and Charlie felt her chest tighten. She drew in a breath through her nose, forgetting that her body no longer needed oxygen. The feeling of cold air filling her body helped to focus her mind. Her tongue felt dry and fat in her mouth and she felt oddly nauseated and hungry at the same time.

  Caroline reached down and flipped the turn signal on. It was pitch black out and they hadn’t seen another car since leaving Flagstaff on highway 40. Caroline turned onto a road called Walnut Canyon. The Caddy rumbled as Caroline took the turn and climbed back up to speed. Just as Charlie was about to ask again where they were going, they pulled into a small parking lot. It was dark, but Charlie could see the lines painted on the asphalt in the moonlight. Caroline shut the engine off and flipped a switch on the dashboard and the leather top began its noisy journey backward. Charlie looked up at the sky and felt the cool breeze on her face, her nausea drifting away. It occurred to her that she was starving.

  “We’re here!” Caroline said, clapping her hands together and grinning. She opened the car door and got out. Charlie did the same.

  “Where?” Charlie asked, following Caroline to the edge of the parking lot. There were no lights, but the stars and moon were bright enough to make out shapes and the outline of the landscape. The air was cool and crisp, but not unpleasant, and Charlie could hear the creaking and rustle of trees but couldn’t see them.

  “Beautiful Walnut Canyon National Monument!” Caroline said, holding her arm out to the darkness. Charlie walked to the chain barrier just beyond the parking lot and looked out into the abyss.

  “I don’t see anything! It’s too dark!”

  Caroline sighed.

  “I know. You will though. It will come,” Caroline said, putting her arm around Charlie’s shoulder. Charlie noticed that she’d lifted her sunglasses and they now perched above her bangs. Caroline’s eyes seemed to have their own luminance, and were nearly reflective, like the eyes of a coyote staring into headlights.

  “Can you see it?” Charlie asked, tentatively sliding her arm around Caroline’s waist. Caroline gazed into the jagged blackness and nodded.

  “Yes, and it’s beautiful. Down there,” Caroline said, pointing at seemingly nothing, “are little dwellings, built by the Sinagua people seven, maybe eight hundred years ago. In 1915, President Wilson declared this a national monument, protecting it.”

  “Were you here then?” Charlie asked, looking up at Caroline. She shook her head and seemed to be looking at nothing in particular.

  “No. I was in California then.”

  They stood there like that for another long, sad moment, then Caroline let her go and walked back to the car. Charlie followed. There was a deep, almost painful pulling in the center of her chest that felt like hunger but wasn’t exactly that.

  “I think I’m hungry. Like really hungry,” Charlie said. Caroline stopped at the back of the Cadillac and unlocked the trunk. She smiled at Charlie as the lid rose.

  “Good!” Caroline said. Charlie didn’t want to see what was in the trunk but walked back there anyway. It didn’t matter because Caroline slammed the lid shut and met her with a thermos.

  “Let’s eat,” she said, opening the passenger door for Charlie.

  - 12 -

  Caroline popped the cap off of the thermos, which was shaped like a little plastic cup. She handed this to Charlie and unscrewed the top. Something in Charlie’s chest leaped when the smell hit her nose. It was as though the door to the kitchen had swung open and the most delicious dinner smells wafted into her. This only intensified as Caroline poured the dark liquid into the cap and handed
it to Charlie.

  “Careful please. Don’t spill. Take a drink.”

  Charlie brought the cup to her lips, then pulled away.

  “Just to be clear, this is blood, right?” Charlie asked. Caroline laughed.

  “Yes, of course.”

  “It smells so much like cinnamon. It didn’t smell like cinnamon last time,” Charlie said, smelling the cup again.

  “That’s because there’s cinnamon in it! Some people use ginger, but I just like the taste and smell of cinnamon better. Though it’s not for taste. It’s a natural blood thinner. Keeps it from clotting. For a little while anyway,” Caroline said. “Drink! I want some too.”

  Charlie took a sip and was immediately stunned by the intensity of the flavor. The cinnamon was gone, and replaced by the warm, buttery flavor of hot bread and rolls fresh from the oven.

  She was vaguely aware that Caroline had taken the cup from her but didn’t care. She was drifting in the calming waves of flavor. She felt simultaneously stoned and hyper-aware, as though she were standing outside of herself. She could feel the desert air moving every little hair on her arms and neck, but at the same time, she could barely hear Caroline talking to her.

  “Eventually you’ll be able to control your reaction to it, but for now just enjoy how it feels. It’s wonderful, isn’t it?” Caroline said, before taking a drink from the thermos lid herself, the blood staining her lips. Charlie nodded and rolled her head to look at Caroline. She blinked and shook her head, the effects starting to soften enough that she was at least in control of her body again.

  “It’s amazing. Can I have some more?”

  - 13 -

  The thermos sat on the floor, closed up again, at Charlie’s feet. The seats of the Caddy were leaned back and they stared up at the sky. The stars seemed to have arranged themselves into strange and unfamiliar patterns. The desert night was so clear and empty that, it seemed to Charlie at least, new stars and planets were making themselves known to her. The sky was brilliant with colors and lights that flickered and shimmered against the black silk of space.

  “Do you think there’s anything out there?” Charlie asked, barely muttering. Her body felt heavy and the idea of moving even her lips seemed insurmountable.

  “Like aliens? Little green men?” Caroline asked, turning on her side and looking at Charlie. Charlie looked at Caroline and shrugged.

  “Yeah. Like on Star Trek or The Outer Limits?”

  Caroline looked up at the sky.

  “Perhaps, though if there is, I don’t think they are interested in us. And I don’t think they’re out there. I think they’re somewhere else.”

  Charlie didn’t feel compelled to follow up. It occurred to her as Caroline was speaking that she was a little afraid of Caroline’s answer. Perhaps vampires are as far as her mind was willing to go into exploring the paranormal.

  Drinking day old blood was, it turns out, a far less immersive experience than drinking it fresh. While feeding directly from the old man’s body sent her into a transcendental voyage into the history of the horrible person she was drinking from, taking the blood from the thermos was closer to what she imagined being drunk or high was like.

  Caroline opened her purse, which was sitting between them, and took out her pack of Chesterfields and lit one. It was the first time Charlie saw her smoke. She held the pack out to Charlie, who took one and lit it. The smoke burned as it rolled over her tongue and into her lungs, but it felt nice too. It grounded her a bit.

  “How often do we do this?” Charlie asked, drawing on her cigarette. Smoking felt different from how it felt in the past and she was momentarily distracted by this. She could feel the smoke enter her lungs and the usual burn, but immediately after exhaling, she felt a strange speedy feeling. With each hit, she got that same little rush. It made her smoke faster, just to give her more opportunities to experience that feeling. After an awkward, silent moment, she realized Caroline was looking at her, smiling.

  “It’s weird, right?” she asked. Charlie nodded. “I don’t know the science behind it, but I believe, or it’s my theory anyway, that our bodies process the nicotine faster, and more intensely. Our lungs heal immediately. The whole process is sped up, and it feels good. I don’t smoke often, but I thought you might like to give it a go with your new lungs.”

  Caroline’s explanation made sense, she supposed, though she didn’t know much about how cigarettes work. She just knew it felt weird and she liked it.

  “To answer your question, I like to eat every three days or so. You’re going to need a little boost because you’re just a baby, so we’re going to get you fed a few times this week, but it will even out eventually. That’s one hunt a week and a couple of nights with the thermos.”

  Charlie nodded, accepting whatever she said as truth.

  “Where do we get our... food?” Charlie asked, not sure how far around the issue they were comfortable dancing. Caroline seemed to live in an odd middle ground between pretending they weren’t vampires and acting very nonchalant about the whole thing. Charlie was never sure exactly how direct or subtle she should be.

  “There’s a truck stop I go to from time to time. I find that travelers make the best marks. Salesmen and truck drivers mostly. That’s what makes this part of the country such a great place to settle down for gifted individuals like ourselves. Not a lot of people live here, but plenty of people come through on their way to more interesting places. A hundred different motels chock full of folks halfway between home and some lonely place or another.”

  Charlie felt her stomach flip as she contemplated the idea of actually approaching a real person and, somehow, killing them and feeling okay about it. Charlie sat up in her seat and looked at Caroline.

  “Do we... kill… all of them?” Charlie asked, her hand over her mouth. Caroline sat up and took her hand.

  “Here’s how it works: we don’t kill our food every time. I don’t like to play that way. It’s simply not practical you see. Many of our kind travel. They keep moving so it doesn’t really matter what they do, because they're gone the next day. We live here. We might not be the most social of butterflies, but we do live in this community. So we can’t very well kill all our neighbors. We have to think smarter than that,” she said, tapping her temple with a gloved finger.

  Charlie nodded, relief washing over her. She waffled back and forth on the killing aspect of their lifestyle. She accepted it but wasn’t comfortable with it.

  “So we act like little mosquitoes. We go out, we buzz around until we find the right person, and we go with them somewhere, usually a hotel room, and we take what we need from them. That’s how I found Francis — Reggie, or whatever that scab called himself. I only really kill people when I come across ones who need to be killed.”

  “Why do we have to kill anyone? If we can just be mosquitoes and not kill people, then why don’t we do that all the time?”

  Caroline thought about this for a moment and then shrugged.

  “Because we can. I kill the people that I want to kill,” she crushed out her cigarette in the ashtray and looked at Charlie. “Don’t misunderstand what we are. We are killers. We kill people. That’s what we were designed to do. It would only take a few of us to take the world from them if we could get organized enough, but we don’t, because we need them how they are. We need them docile and stupid so we can keep doing what we’re doing. The fact that we don’t kill twenty people every night for the fun of it is a gift we give to them.”

  “Okay,” Charlie said, unsure how to respond to that.

  “I pick and choose my kills because it makes me feel good. I have no guilt about anyone I kill, but I enjoy killing creeps and rapists and abusers. Guilt is a false emotion. It’s something invented by a culture that no longer applies to us. You’ll get over that soon enough.”

  There was a long, uncomfortable silence as Charlie tried to figure out what to say. Caroline spoke instead.

  “This is a lot to take in, I know. I’m doi
ng my best to acclimate you to this. It’s more than I’ve given others in the past and it’s certainly more than I was given. You’re doing just fine Charlie. You just have to trust me. I will take care of you, okay?”

  Charlie nodded and tried to smile.

  “I’m doing my best.”

  “I know, sweetheart. You’re doing great,” Caroline said. There was a long silence, with only the soft murmur of the night-time DJ on the radio. Charlie jumped when Caroline patted her on the leg. It was meant to be reassuring. Charlie noticed that she was still wearing her driving gloves and for a moment felt a longing for a pair of her own. Sitting there in her homemade dress next to Caroline, who looked like a model that stepped out of the Montgomery Ward catalog, she felt like a homely orphan, which wasn’t far from the truth.

  Catalogs. That was it. Something that had been bothering Charlie was the question of where and when Caroline bought all of the stuff she owned. She had amazing clothes and makeup and furniture and books and current magazines. It must all be mail order. She obviously can’t go shopping in a store like a regular person, yet she had such great stuff. She imagined waking up at eight in the evening and opening the front door of Caroline’s house to find boxes of goodies stacked on the porch and it made her smile. She pictured herself wearing one of Caroline’s dresses that should have looked ridiculous and outdated, but somehow came across as amazing, and Caroline’s white-framed sunglasses and little leather gloves, holding a cigarette in a long black holder like Audrey Hepburn. That’s the kind of vampire she wanted to be. She smiled at the thought of dying her hair dark and wearing that black dress and the jewels and big sunglasses. A Breakfast at Tiffany’s vampire.