The Thirst Within

by Johi Jenkins

  Luckily, Lucy is convinced that I’ll sign the papers tomorrow, and is not paying that close attention to me. She’s also not that interested in making sure the door stays locked, either because it’s a second story, or because the apartment is empty. Or because she has no reason to doubt it locked as I closed the door behind me. I’m guessing a little of each.

  We shake hands enthusiastically and part ways; I walk one block away to the main road, then I go into a store and wait ten minutes for the coast to clear. Then I come straight back to the apartment.

  I feel like a total criminal when I climb the stairs to the second story. I tentatively push the door… yes! It worked; it opens. I walk inside, remove my booby trap and let the door lock softly behind me. I look around the empty apartment, and marvel again at how beautiful it is. But I’m not here for the apartment. I already toured it and I didn’t find what I was looking for. My last hope is the porch.

  I walk to the master bedroom and approach the window, which is sliding glass; I unlock it, open it and ease myself out onto the porch roof. I land softly and try not to make a sound. I shut the window behind me. I can’t lock it from the outside, but hopefully Lucy won’t notice. The building next door is a one-story house, and I’m facing its high roof. I pray no one sees me, and if someone happens to, that they don’t care about some girl on top of a porch.

  The porch butts against a windowless brick wall to the back, which I’m assuming denotes the dividing line between the front apartments and Thierry’s. That makes the back apartments—Thierry’s and his empty downstairs—wider by almost ten feet, although they don’t have a porch. But who needs a porch when you have the awesome little courtyard with a hot tub? I hope I can get in somehow. I move on.

  There are two windows between the one I climbed out of and the brick wall ahead. The first one is the master bathroom’s window; I ignore it. As for the second… score. It’s what I was hoping for. A possible way inside Thierry’s apartment.

  The pane is narrow like some bathroom windows. I look in and all I see is stairs inside. Please be unlocked, I pray. Please be unlocked.

  The window is unlocked, but at first I think it isn’t. It hasn’t been opened in forever. I lift it, hating the noise it makes. I only need to raise the pane about a foot, enough for me to ease through, but I try to open it as high as it’ll go. I want to give myself as much room as I can get because the sill is really dirty and I’m afraid I’ll leave a trail on the dust. Whoever thought to put this window here at the stairs landing, bless their heart, did it possibly to get some light to their stairs, but was not too practical when it came to figuring out how to clean it. I’m not complaining, though, as it’s presently convenient for me.

  Here goes…. I ease my torso through the window and look down. If I lower myself down as far as I can go, holding on to the windowsill, my fall is only about three or four feet to the stair landing below. I won’t be able to climb back this way if the upstairs and downstairs doors are both locked. I’d be trapped. The thought is unnerving, so I almost slide back out. But first I look down the stairs, and see the deadbolt on the door below. That means I can leave that way if the upstairs is locked, that I won’t be stuck in the staircase.

  So okay, I can do this. I come through and balance precariously on the inner ledge to close the window behind me. I lower myself holding to the ledge and then drop down, and fall neatly without making a lot of noise. I take a second to congratulate myself.

  I climb the stairs quietly because I’m committing a crime, but I shouldn’t be worried because Thierry’s out of town, and Corben is supposedly with him. I take a deep breath and turn the doorknob… and it’s unlocked. Yes! I wasn’t sure it would be. This isn’t the main entrance to the apartment. I’m actually not sure where it leads. I open the door and peek in, and find myself in Thierry’s kitchen. I hadn’t noticed this door before.

  Holy crap, I did it. I’m in Thierry’s apartment. My heart is beating like I just ran a mile in five minutes. Apparently committing crimes is a huge adrenaline rush for me. I try to calm myself while I figure out what to do next.

  But now that I’m here, I simply stand, not doing anything. I don’t remember what I wanted to do in the first place. I didn’t come here to read Thierry’s journal or his ex-girlfriends’ love letters. I didn’t even think I would make it inside. But I tried, because I wanted to be in his house. What do I do now?

  I close the door behind me and notice a similar door on the wall to the right. I open it and see a wide pantry, almost empty. Thierry takes his not cooking habit to the next level. I can’t believe I didn’t notice any of these two doors before.

  That gives me an idea for something to do.

  My heart still beating fast with the feeling of wrongdoing, I cross the dining room and move towards the living room, determined to open every little door that I’ve seen in this apartment, and the ones that I haven’t noticed before.

  Luckily, every window in the whole apartment is covered with curtains that are presently drawn. Thierry must have closed them when he went out of town. I walk around at ease, knowing no one can see me. I turn on a lamp, but don’t go crazy with turning all the lights on.

  Aha. Unknown door number one. I find a coat closet off the living room wall by the hallway that leads to the bedrooms. There are a few coats hanging here, and I touch them wistfully, missing Thierry. I close the door slowly, scared to make a sound, as if someone could hear me.

  Then I enter the first bathroom. Inside there’s a narrow door—linen closet. Nothing new here. I exit the bathroom and move to the next room. This is the first bedroom, which is the guest room. It has a full-sized bed and an empty desk with a chair in a corner. There’s only a door to a closet, which is empty. I continue down the hallway.

  I enter the second, larger bedroom, but stop after a few steps. A strangely familiar scent invades my nostrils, to which my body responds earnestly. It’s homey, but I can’t place it. Then I notice that this room’s bed is larger and is dressed more ornately, if that’s the word, than the first bedroom’s. It feels more private. I see a few personal articles on a small desk and I remember. Corben. This is his room. I leave and don’t open any of the doors, afraid of him somehow, even though he isn’t here. Thierry said this bedroom has a bathroom, but I don’t need to see it. And I certainly don’t need to see inside the closet where I suspect there is more personal stuff.

  Back in the hallway, two doors remain between Corben’s and Thierry’s rooms. The first is a huge laundry room that I can’t believe I didn’t notice before. It’s so big that it even contains a utility closet. The second is a small hallway closet, mostly empty.

  Then I enter the master bedroom.

  I see the bed by where Thierry and I kissed the first time. I take a minute to recall every detail of the kiss; how I enjoyed his lips over mine, his body pressed against my chest, and my hands trailing through his hair. I smile as I remember, purposely leaving out the part where Thierry ended it so abruptly. I haven’t been here since that fateful afternoon; when I’ve visited Thierry this week we’ve always stayed in the living room area.

  I wish he were here now. I look at his bed and imagine myself on it. The furniture in this room is handsome, polished wood as the rest of the apartment. A quick glance around the room does not reveal his journal, which I know to be the same as mine. As the small pang of disappointment settles, I realize that although I’m not going to look for it in his drawers or anything, I totally would’ve read it if it had been lying around. I’m such a snoop.

  I’m almost at the end of my self-guided tour, and my body is tingling, either from remembering Thierry or from acknowledgement of my faults and the felony I’m committing.

  There are two doors in Thierry’s bedroom on the opposite wall, which would be the end of this building. A third door in his room, to my right, leads to the balcony that overlooks the patio. I cross the room slowly, my hand trailing the foot of the bed, and walk towards the two doors on the opposi
te wall. The one closest to the center of the room is just a walk-in closet. The door is ajar, so I can tell what’s behind it, but I don’t want to open it further for fear he’ll be able to tell someone was here.

  The master bathroom door is next to the wall that faces the courtyard. I open it and enter his bathroom, and my jaw drops.

  It’s huge. There is a short, four or five-foot long hallway before reaching the actual bathroom space. To my left is a wall left behind which I’m assuming is Thierry’s walk-in closet. There is a row of windows to the right. I push a window curtain to the side and see the courtyard below, but it’s nighttime. Interesting. I didn’t realize the sun had set, since all the curtains are drawn. It’ll make sneaking out of here easier.

  I walk the length of hallway and reach the open space. It’s twice the size of the bathroom outside, and yes, it does have a clawfoot tub in addition to a shower lined with glass doors. I can’t remember what the claws in the front apartment were, but these are some sort of silver bird talons wrapped around spheres. They’re intriguing. Both the floor and walls are covered in the same type of marble, white with delicate gray veins. The towel hangers, hooks and shower hardware are polished silver or something that resembles it, which matches the tub claws.

  Everything is luxurious. I touch the white towels and they are so fluffy I want to strip down and cover myself in them. I wonder if there’s a robe; I’m sure it would smell of him. I turn around looking for one hanging somewhere. Then I notice a door I didn’t see on the way in, on the wall behind me, which looks like the linen closet door in the first bathroom, but not as narrow.

  I pull the door open, expecting shelves like the first bathroom. However, I’m surprised to see the closet is much deeper than the first bathroom’s. In fact, it’s like a walk-in linen closet, but the space inside is only about three feet by three feet, just a tad wider than the door. The shelves are on the wall in front of me, opposite of the door, and are full of different-colored towels, baskets with soaps and hair products, even a few books. The wall to the left is the hallway wall, and it’s plain, free of shelves. So is the wall to the right.

  Hold on. This wall to the right… there’s something odd about it.

  There’s a half-inch gap on the edge of this wall. I examine it further and realize I’m not looking at a wall; it’s a door. A plain door that slides into the wall where the shelves are. It doesn’t even have a doorknob.

  I stick my fingers in the gap and slide the door open, now feeling a little apprehensive. This is beginning to feel wrong. I’m not just sneaking in my boyfriend’s empty apartment, but now I’m opening this door which feels like a secret passageway.

  When I have it halfway open, with the light coming in from the bathroom behind me I can see high, narrow wooden steps leading up to another door, which is closed. Oh. It’s probably just the attic. I guess I never expected this place to have an attic, but that’s got to be it. I consider going up, wondering what’s up there, but it looks a little spooky. I don’t see a light switch.

  I take a last look upstairs, and am about to try to pull the door to slide it back to about where it was before, when something catches my eye upstairs. I look back but I can’t see it anymore. It was like a flickering light. I move my head left to right slowly until I see it again. Apparently there’s a door upstairs as well, and it is also ajar, and I must be seeing a twinkling star. Or, most likely, a streetlight.

  The door doesn’t lead to a creepy attic. It leads to the outside; the roof, maybe. And it’s open.

  Now I’m intrigued.

  I slide open the door enough for me to pass through it, and very deliberately climb the steps. It’s not as dusty as I was expecting, like the steps going up to an attic. These are transited more frequently.

  At the top of the stairs there’s a short landing. The door in front of me swings to the outside, and it’s open a few inches. I peek through the gap, feeling the chill of the outside air. I push the door open and slide out into the young night.

  It’s not completely dark because of the city lights on the street and the courtyard below. I can tell the roof is lined with large stone pavers, and the area in front of the door is covered by an overhang. But it’s dark, so I almost miss it.

  There is a large figure in the center of the roof.

  My heart stops.

  I take a step back automatically, but it’s too late. The person may have seen me already. Then as my eyes adjust, I notice it’s not a large person but what looks like two people embracing. One of them has their back to me, and all I can see from the second person is their hands at the other one’s back, their partly-concealed face, and their hair.

  His hair.

  Thierry’s.

  I know it’s him. That’s his hair, short, but not too short. It falls forward over his handsome face, bent towards the other person. That’s the coat that he wore last week when he rescued me from Mardi Gras. And those are the lips that kissed mine, now wrapped around someone else’s neck. And the other person looks very male.

  I knew it. It was too good to be true.

  I don’t want to believe my eyes, but that’s Thierry with his arms wrapped around a dude. It could’ve been a guy or girl—it doesn’t matter to me his choice of betrayal. What matters is, I can’t be with him if he’s already with someone else. And this is pretty intimate as embraces go. My blood runs cold and I want to go back down to cry. But I can’t move.

  As I keep watching, I notice there’s something odd about the embrace. I can see Thierry’s head moving slightly over the man’s neck, but the man is not moving. He’s completely limp. What the…?

  I haven’t made a noise, but suddenly Thierry lifts his head off the man’s neck and looks directly at me.

  And at first I think it’s some joke.

  His face is flushed beautifully, that I can somehow see plainly in the low light. But what I don’t understand is that it looks like he’s wearing bright red lipstick on his upper lip.

  Then I see the man’s neck where Thierry’s lips were, and I see it’s covered in blood. Like an open wound.

  And I recognize the source of the redness on Thierry’s lips.

  My mouth opens but I don’t make a sound. My eyes are locked with Thierry’s and for a moment nothing happens as we each process the scene before us. We are both frozen. He looks shocked that I’m here. I’m shocked at the whole spectacle. But most specifically, at the blood on Thierry’s lips.

  I can’t move because I suddenly understand.

  That he’s a…. That he’s a what?

  Vampire.

  14. Sacred Silence and Sleep

  My brain provides the name right away. Thierry is a vampire. Vampires are real, and Thierry is one. Holy shit. Thierry is a vampire.

  It becomes truer and truer as I repeat it in my mind.

  He straightens up, slowly, and I know he’s afraid. I’m the one who should be afraid, because Thierry is not twenty feet away from me, and he’s drinking another man’s blood.

  He slowly lets the man drop to the floor, never turning his eyes away from me. The man’s arms fall off to the side lifelessly. I look at them, and I then can’t look away. I notice what looks like a trap door on the roof behind him. It’s just an access door leading somewhere below. I force myself to look anywhere but up. I can’t look at Thierry again. I’m finally afraid, but I’m not afraid for my life. I’m afraid of his caution.

  I’m afraid he’ll shun me, and keep me away. Because I found out his secret. Because he may think I’m afraid of what he is.

  “Tori,” he says softly. I look up at him, and notice his lips are no longer red. They are flushed with color but there’s no blood on them anymore. He must’ve wiped them clean.

  I can’t answer, but I take a step towards him. He immediately steps over the man on the floor and puts his arms slightly out to his sides as if to block me from seeing the body.

  The body? No. The man isn’t dead. He’s probably alive…. I have no grounds to lea
n one way or the other, except that I want to believe he’s alive. That Thierry was just taking a little bit.

  Was he?

  “Is he alive?” Is the first thing I say, and my voice sounds weak and unused. I clear my throat, and take a few more steps towards him.

  “Tori,” Thierry repeats, and he’s pleading with his voice for me to stop. He hasn’t moved; only one of his arms moved forward, to keep me away, while the other one remains to the side sort of shielding the guy.

  “Thierry, it’s okay,” I say, and now I put my own arms up in a sign of acceptance, to keep him from bolting. “I’m just curious. It’s okay if he isn’t.” And abruptly, I believe it. I don’t care if the guy is dead.

  “Tori, stop. Stop, please.”

  “No, it’s okay,” I insist. I don’t stop, and I’m now so close to him I can almost see the guy’s face behind him.

  Suddenly I feel a pressure hit me, and I’m grabbed and transported backwards and down the stairs, and around the closet. I’m moving faster than I’ve ever had in my life, and it’s a little nauseating. I don’t even see the bathroom, but I’m assuming I went through it because when I stop, I’m lying on a bed—Thierry’s, presumably—staring at the ceiling, and at Thierry’s face off to the side. He’s standing next to the bed.

  My heart is beating fast from the shock of the ride, but I’m otherwise calm.

  “I’m sorry about that,” Thierry says, but I can’t tell if he’s talking about the inhumanely fast trip downstairs against my will, or the maybe-dead guy.

  I raise a hand to touch his face, but he recoils back. I frown and move to sit up.

  “Whoa,” I say. My head swims. I’m instantly steadied by his arms on my shoulders.

  “Tori, please, you have to stop. Let me explain. You don’t know what’s going on.”

  “You’re a vampire,” I say, and my voice sounds tiny and disbelieving. I don’t know why, because I really do believe it. I guess it just sounds bizarre saying it out loud.