IMMORTAL BITE

by Long, Andie M.

  Eynsford, Kent.

  Pushing the laptop to one side, I dragged out some clothes from the floor, sniffing them and putting them on. A pair of ripped black skinny jeans, a red t-shirt, a black hoody. Kate Spade pumps would be the only ‘tell’ to fellow Tube and rail travellers that I wasn’t some junkie out looking for a fix. My reflection showed my pale face with its hollowed cheekbones, and dark shadows under my dead-looking eyes. I pulled my greasy looking hair into a ponytail, and grabbed my essentials, plus my sketchpad and pencils.

  Travelling on the Circle Line, I stared between heads watching nothing in particular. Most passengers ignored me, but I could feel the judgy stares of the others. How they held their handbags closer to their chest because they felt I might covet what they had. If I let myself I would, but it wouldn’t be the contents of their handbags. I would want to steal the looks that passed between them and their loved ones, their excitement at wherever they were headed. I had money; it fed my body, but never my soul.

  I pulled at my sleeves often, ensuring they didn’t ride up. Didn’t show my wounds any more than my face did. People couldn’t read pain and sorrow. It was much easier for them to dismiss someone as a junkie or an alcoholic or a bum. Then they could step back, dismiss. Consciences couldn’t do that if they saw misery and despair. Then they’d feel a need to step in, and no one really wanted to do that. They just wanted an easy life. I couldn’t blame them, and I wouldn’t want anyone’s help anyway. I’d already told you; people made my skin itch. Their help would make me bleed, literally.

  From the Tube station, I walked and caught a train at Blackfriars where I had to sit for another fifty-five minutes until I finally reached Eynsford.

  Off the train, I had an approximate twenty-minute walk to the stone bridge if my Google Maps was correct. Given how spectacularly I usually managed to fuck up reading it, it was unsurprising when it took me closer to forty-five minutes to get to the edge of the manor. Wooden and barbed wire fencing surrounded the estate, but I had anticipated it would. I took the bolt cutters from my backpack and made an opening at the edge of the estate where woodland met wildflower meadow met unruly untended fields. I continued walking the periphery until I saw the stone bridge.

  This would do for today. I sat amongst the overgrowth, took out my pad and pencils and sketched until the light had left the sky.

  I knew I needed to get up and go home, but my body felt quiet for the first time in a long time. My mind was not overrun with thoughts and I could feel the tickle of the grass. The insects here would bite me if I stayed, but I didn’t want to leave.

  From the photographs, I knew that some of the supports of the stone bridge jutted out of flowerbeds. It was a place I could put down my backpack as a pillow and pull my hoody tighter around me. The evening was not cold, and this area escaped the rain. If I slept here, even for just a few hours, then I could sketch again when the sun rose. I had a flask of cold coffee and snacks.

  Mind made up. I moved over to the bridge and I laid in its shadow and slept until sunrise.

  When I awoke, for a moment I panicked, wondering where I was. My neck was stiff and so my first thought was that I’d fallen asleep in the studio. It wouldn’t be the first time I’d hurt myself doing so. But the bright light hit my face and I remembered I was lying in the flowerbed near the bridge.

  Shit! What had I been thinking? People would use this bridge to get to the castle, wouldn’t they? Tentatively, I looked up to see if there was anyone peering down at the strange woman lying in the soil, but there was nothing. I could hear noise and the hum of an engine, but it wasn’t close, and I just knew without knowing how, that there were two stone bridges, more or less side by side; identical in every way, except one was used and one was not.

  Sitting up, I took out my ponytail, shook my head, and ran my hands through my hair in case any spiders or other creatures had decided to live there overnight. Then I tied it back up. I moved back to the place I sketched yesterday, relieving myself behind a tree first, and I drank some now rank coffee and eagerly ate a KitKat.

  I was obsessed with my work and I stayed there for hours. Occasionally I leant against a tree and snoozed for an hour, but then I was back at it, sketching page after page.

  My craving started, but this time it was not for razor blades.

  Come closer. Closer than this. See me. Feel me. Hear me. Touch me.

  Gathering my belongings, I walked back to the stone bridge but this time right around to where I could step onto it.

  I shouldn’t do this.

  What if I was caught?

  I was now clearly trespassing on private property.

  Well, they should have ensured their boundaries were more secure.

  Anyway, I only wanted to paint. Their valuables were worthless to me; my yearning only for a naturally discarded petal.

  I walked the whole length of the stone bridge and no one stopped me. As I reached the end, I saw the rose bush from my dreams, but it was not dead, not withered. Not in the slightest. It bloomed, but the petals were yellow, and it was covered in greenfly.

  This rose was me right now, and I knew its future.

  Dead.

  Withered.

  Uncared for.

  Unless someone stepped in to save it.

  I sat next to it and began to draw.

  The sound of voices startled me, and I slipped back into the shadow of the huge bridge.

  What the fuck had I been thinking?

  As soon as the coast appeared clear, I made my way off the bridge, through the land and back to public transport.

  I was given even sourer looks and wider berths given that I was now covered in dirt, smelled of body odour, and possibly had even half-peed down myself. It’s not like I had a lot of practice of urinating in bushes.

  I didn’t care. All I wanted to do was to get home and get in my studio.

  And that’s what I did. Once through the door, I painted and sketched, painted and sketched. But it wasn’t enough. The dreams told me so, when I took the time to close my eyes.

  You didn’t come to us.

  We need you.

  Come back.

  I woke knowing that my lips just uttered ‘yes’ on the edge of waking.

  Caleb

  When Daria brought me my blood the next day, her hand went to her throat.

  “Sir, can I hear…?”

  “My beating heart? It would appear so.” I scratched at my hair.

  “I do not understand it, Daria. I, of course, know about finding one’s mate and it starting the beat of a vampire’s heart, but nothing has changed. Yesterday was exactly the same as any other day.”

  A cautious smile broke out on her face and she reached out and gently tapped my shoulder before removing her hand.

  “Something must have changed somewhere. With a gesture, or a thought; at some point during your day, the fates aligned, and you found your mate.”

  I noted Daria was far more excited about this than I was.

  “I shall go to see Nicholas at some point. See if he has heard of this phenomenon happening in other instances.”

  Daria nodded. “Well, Sir, I shall leave you to your drink and your ponderings. I shall no doubt see you in the garden later while I tend the vegetables and you tend the roses. Good afternoon, Sir.”

  “Good afternoon, Daria. I hope the sun shone on the crops today.”

  “I hope its warmth caused your roses to bloom.”

  I smiled up at her, cheered by the chatter of my beloved garden. “How amusing that we welcome the sun on our gardens, given the damage it can do to us while we slumber.”

  “Very true, Sir. Very true.”

  With that Daria left.

  It wasn’t long before I was interrupted; something that rarely happened during my first mealtime after waking and usually meant an urgent matter.

  I immediately tensed as my main security officer, Jenson, walked into the room.

  “Sir. The perimeter alarms went off late last
night. It would appear we had a visitor. Looks like maybe a homeless person. Would you be able to come and see?”

  I nodded and rose to follow him.

  My instructions on intruders were clear; unless they caused harm or crossed the outer walls of the property, they were to be left until I had checked the security footage. My estate was vast enough and secure enough that if someone wanted to camp outside for one night, it didn’t hurt to let them.

  I watched as the intruder, a small dot on the screen, made their way over to the stone bridge and then settled there. No harm, no foul. I was disinterested. It looked like a youth, given the hoody.

  “They then got braver.” Jenson explained as the screen changed to show different footage. Now daytime, it was clear to see as the woman walked up the bridge getting nearer and nearer until she reached the rose bush that stood halfway between the bridge and the wall of my property. Fascinated, I watched the screen as the woman fell to her knees and began sketching. After a while, I saw her startle and look over more in the direction of the main house, then she turned and left.

  “So, she just sketched the place?”

  “It would appear so, Sir. It’s a strange one; to come all this way to draw a rose bush. No disrespect, Sir, I know they’re our business, but I’m sure she could have gone to a garden centre or somewhere a lot nearer. I can’t help but feel suspicious. Why did she come here?”

  His question set off something in my brain. It was like my synapses snapped together.

  Why did she come here?

  “Can you zoom in on her? I doubt I know her, but we should make a note of what she looks like in case she returns.”

  “Good idea. Shame she didn’t leave a self-portrait behind, hey, Sir?” Jenson quipped.

  “Indeed.” I humoured him. He was a nice man and loyal, given he was human and served a vampire.

  As he zoomed in, her features became more apparent. Lank hair, dark shadowed eyes, and the cut-glass cheekbones of the malnourished.

  “Definitely looks like an addict, or a homeless person. Perhaps painting gets them money?”

  I shrugged my shoulders. “Who knows? Let me know if you see her again.” I watched as she walked back down the bridge and away, and I noticed a small piece of paper left her pile and fluttered away in the breeze.

  After dealing with things in my office, I made my way towards the rose garden, but just as I almost reached there, thoughts of the wayward paper hit me. I should go see if I could find it.

  My mind ridiculed my thoughts. As if that will still be around. It will have blown into the lake by now.

  Spotting Daria in the vegetable garden, I smiled and carried on past, noting first her look of pleasure at seeing me, and then her look of confusion, her forehead creasing as I turned and walked in a different direction.

  She ran after me.

  “Is everything okay, Sir?”

  “Yes, Daria. Don’t mind me. I don’t want to upset the dinner routine. I just fancy a stroll down the East Bridge. It’s been a while.”

  “You sure you don’t want company?”

  I waved her off with my hand. “No, I’m fine.”

  I walked out of the walled gardens, across the fine gravel pathway and reached the rose bush where I noted its greenfly.

  “I shall be back to attend to you, dear one. You may not be one of my prize roses, but you are family nonetheless.”

  Then I passed around it and started my walk down the bridge.

  At the end of the bridge I stepped down into the overgrown grass and saw where it had been trampled by recent footsteps. Without really thinking about it too much I followed the trampled grass. My visitor had been under the stone bridge and also in the edge of the woodland, but she had left no other trace than her feet trampling and her scent.

  Coming back to the reality of the day, I decided to head back to the gardens to tend to my dear roses, and then I saw it. A white piece of something, billowing slightly from where it was stuck in a shrub, like a large Cabbage White butterfly on brassicas.

  When I reached it, I plucked it from the bush and then gasped as the pain hit me again.

  Th-thud

  Th-thud

  Th-thud.

  My eyes alighted on the paper, a small drawing of a rose and then doodled words.

  Come to me.

  Touch me.

  Taste me.

  Feel me.

  My cock stirred and my heart beat so hard in my chest, I thought it would burst from its cavity.

  I now knew what had caused my heart to beat again.

  The mystery artist.

  But what had brought her to Tetburn Manor?

  Was she a vampire?

  Or… human.

  How could she be my mate?

  What was her name? I turned the paper and searched for an artist’s signature but found nothing.

  Disappointed, I dropped to my knees, dropped the paper, and surrendered to the pain in my body.

  Vivienne

  I painted all through the night, but now my artwork was not only of roses. I sketched the bridge, I sketched the castle, I sketched a shadow man. Just a black silhouette. I had no idea how I knew his height, his frame, but I drew him in the periphery of the castle or at the window.

  My dreams stopped speaking to me, or maybe it was my complete exhaustion. That morning I awoke and I felt… calm.

  The peace I felt was only usually experienced for brief blissful moments after cutting and so I laid there, staring at my ceiling, drinking in the contentment that currently blessed my body. I waited for it to leave me, but it remained.

  Practically leaping out of bed, I pulled upon the curtains revealing a bright, sunny day and I opened the windows, letting in the fresh air. I took a deep inhale, annoyed to smell the fumes of London instead of the air of the countryside. Turning back to my room, I glanced around taking in the complete and utter mess and devastation. Paint was smeared on the bedding, the floors. I looked down at myself; yes, I was covered too. Discarded clothes littered the floor. My footprints trailed out of the door, no doubt all the way to the studio, maybe to the kitchen.

  I felt the urge to clean, starting with myself. I grabbed a shower, and then dressed in clean clothes. I left the house to grab a coffee, food, more painting supplies, and cleaning materials.

  Sat in the coffee shop nursing an Americano after a quick hit of an espresso, I took a bite from my bacon sandwich and took in its flavour.

  “You have a little ketchup running from your lip.” Another customer, sitting at the next table pointed out. Usually, I would have scowled, wiped my mouth and thought ‘mind your own fucking business’, but today I smiled, thanked them and licked the sauce from my lip as if it were blood dripping from the mouth of a vampire. Mmm, except blood wasn’t bursting with fruity flavours. I’d smelled mine, tasted it as I licked up my cuts to make them smart more. Sometimes I’d poured whisky down my throat and then into the scratches.

  I’d looked at my arms as I’d showered. Faint scarring showed, but my latest cuts were scabbed and healing. The lack of fresh ones was unusual. I felt unusual.

  Numb. Black. Despondent. Bleak. That was my normal.

  I had no idea how to describe what was happening to me right now. Even as a child I’d been melancholic.

  Somehow, I just knew it was all connected to Tetburn Manor. Even thinking of the place made my heart soar. Was that… joy?

  I left the coffee shop, even saying goodbye to the person who’d been sitting at the next table and to the serving staff. I walked to the art shop and stocked up on the paint I’d run out of, and then I bought white spirit and other cleaning things and returned to the apartment.

  By the time I collapsed into my bed that night, exhausted, the warehouse was clean. The vast living room smelled of freshly laundered clothes as I laid them out over every available surface to dry. My paintings were stacked in a pile and fresh canvases were out ready. Only one painting had been moved, hung on the wall above my bed.

/>   A watercolour of Tetburn Manor, set in a border of roses, with a shadow man at one window.

  And a new rug laid at my feet. No longer would I be punished by Aztec prints. I’d been back out to the shops, frustrated that I couldn’t carry everything I’d wanted, and a rose-petal design rug now covered the space at the side of my bed.

  My bliss lasted barely twenty-four more hours.

  After breakfast I walked to my nearest park and yanked off all the rose heads before the park ranger told me to fuck off.

  Back in my flat, I pulled off the petals one by one and threw them on the floor so that everywhere I walked, I walked among their fragrance, their colour. I could feel my own fading. The pinks of the petals began to fade, drying and curling up at the edges becoming oranges and browns, and I could no longer smell them. My mind was full of death and decay and I swore I could smell bare earth, like it was waiting for my rotting corpse.

  I closed my bedroom curtains, blocking out the day, and I laid down in my freshly made bed and I cried. Sobs wracked my body until the numbness returned and my bedroom once again became my prison.

  And so I closed my eyes to sleep, because it was the only way to escape.

  “Who are you?” The voice came from behind me. From behind the stone bench.

  “I’m Vivienne.”

  “Yes, but who are you? As in why are you here? Why do you keep visiting my castle, my garden?”

  “I don’t know. I just need to be here.”

  “But why?”

  “Because it’s the only place I feel alive.”

  The dream moved on and I was standing inside the castle in a room with bare white walls. Yet, instead of feeling the peace I got from Tetburn, here my heart was gripped with fear as I turned around and around, seeing nothing but the white.

  And then there was pain.

  I most certainly was not numb here.

  The pain at my throat was excruciating and bright red blood sprayed out and coated the bare white wall in front of me.

  I looked down at my white gown. It looked like I’d spilled red wine, but I knew it wasn’t wine at all.

  The door opened and the shadow man was there. I could feel his presence.