The door clicks shut. Andreas appears in the doorway; he slows to a human pace mid-step. I can see the change, now. It looks like slow motion. How slow must walking feel to him after so many years.
“Drink this.” Andreas crawls onto the bed and wraps an arm around me. He rests a blood bag against my lips.
I push it away. “I’m not hungry.”
“You’re hungry for this. Trust me.”
I purse my lips before accepting the bag. My fangs pierce the thick plastic so easily, I have to concentrate on not ripping it open over the mattress.
“How do you like it?” Andreas watches me.
I don’t like when he watches me. I look inexperienced—I am, but that’s not the point. Andreas makes vampirism look casual, like a lifestyle. Like vegetarianism.
I carefully back off the bag, long enough to really swallow, to run my tongue over my teeth and let the blood absorb into my body. My temperature rises. A warm euphoria radiates from my skin, swarms my brain, swells between my legs.
“This is good.”
Andreas smiles.
“What’d you do to it?”
“Vampire venom enhances what it finds: clear voice, luxurious hair, firm muscles—”
“Remaining breast tissue; I get it.” I grit my slippery teeth. “What did you do to this?”
“Injected it with testosterone.” He looks thoughtfully between me and the bloody bag. “I didn’t think, when I drained your blood, that I’d depleted any hormones you may’ve injected. Most humans’ bodies keep producing whatever they need.”
“Mine doesn’t.”
“I know that, now. Thought I’d reintroduce what you need. Steer your new vampire body in the right direction.”
“Not bad, Dr. Andreas.”
I crush the bag against my mouth and suck it dry. The plastic crinkles until it’s raisin-like in my hands. A drop spills over my chin and tickles my neck. Andreas leans over and licks it away.
I growl and toss the empty bag onto the floor, accepting Andreas’s mouth against mine. He avoids my chest, though I feel the mounds press against his shirt when he climbs on top of me.
◉ ◉ ◉
I wake up horny. Andreas sleeps beside me, still, his hand draped over my chest to protect me from it. My consciousness stirs him. When he flexes his hand, it brushes my side and I push it away. It’s too much. I can’t stay in and fuck away the bloodlust for the rest of my life.
“Hey.” Andreas props himself up, eyes only half-open. He stares at my body. “They’re gone.”
I look. I don’t want to, but I have to, and he’s right. The area’s not as hard and defined as it used to be. Andreas gently touches the puffy skin. I gasp. The air feels strange in my lungs, like a lump in my throat.
I quickly expel it and sit up. “I need more of that blood.”
◉ ◉ ◉
I burn through T like a bodybuilder. My old dose is not going to be enough and Andreas warns me against trying to visit a human doctor, again.
“They’ll report you. They’ll report me!” He follows me to the front door.
“Why do you even care?”
I pull the door open and storm into the night like an angry teenager. Heat builds under my cold skin. Cis people are all the same: human or vampire.
Andreas grabs my arm gently, by his standards. I pause out of respect—and rather than dislocating one of our shoulders.
“Is it so wrong to want to feel normal for once?” he pleads with me.
I see an ancient monster against canary yellow walls, glossy wood floors, and ergonomic furniture. He tried. He’s still trying.
“I’ll be back.” I leave, running as fast as I can, which is still not faster than Andreas, but hopefully fast enough to lose him and his questions.
Normal. I slow to an acceptably human speed outside the Center Street Clinic. It’s closed. Obviously. Nothing discourages new vampires from visiting like hours that end before sunset. Perfectly legal. Perfectly gross.
I watch patrons drinking in the bar next door, while I walk around it and into the alley. I’ve yet to ask Andreas how long until my body can handle alcohol. Seeing how fast it absorbs hormones, it’d probably take a lot of booze to get me as drunk as the night we met.
I race up the fire escape and crack the glass with my elbow. The clinic is empty. At home in the dark, I easily navigate the clutter of chairs and narrow hallways in search of the pharmacy.
A sign stops me: “Ask about subsidized hormone therapy, today!” Center Street is a good clinic. What kind of asshole robs a pharmacy?
Me. I’m the kind.
There are dozens of bottles of T, here. They’ll know if I take one, so I might as well take what I need for the next six weeks. The clinic can order more.
I load the little boxes into my backpack, grab some needles and syringes for good measure, and climb back out the broken window. Halfway down the fire escape, I consider that Andreas would have found a less obvious and destructive way in.
I jump from the second floor, landing on wobbly feet in the alley. Drunk blood wafts past me from the bar. I hurry away from it, so I won’t be tempted to rip a beer out of someone’s hands—or the jugular out of someone’s throat.
I still smell the alcohol when I pass the gym. Fast-pumping blood, still hot from working out, burns my nostrils. I drag my tongue over my fangs, imagining how one of these late-night meatheads would taste.
“Hey.” A solid, wide-jawed man nods at me. “You’re out late.”
“No.” My razor teeth show through my smile. “You’re out late.” I hear his heart pump faster, smell his adrenaline spike. I bet he tastes even better turned on.
He runs a hand through his sweat-slick hair while he swaggers towards me. He lowers his voice. “I’ve never fucked a vampire, before.”
I press a hand against his abdomen and linger on the over-developed muscle. “You’re subtle.”
“Wasn’t getting the feeling I needed to be.”
“You don’t. Come with me.”
◉ ◉ ◉
Andreas isn’t home when I-still-haven’t-asked-his-name and I get in. I sit my backpack carefully on the bench in the foyer then kick my shoes into the middle of the hall.
“Bradley,” the man says between kisses. “My name’s Bradley.”
“Finn,” I say instead of “I didn’t ask.”
“This your place?”
“Something like that.”
He peers down the hall into open rooms as I pull him into mine. Probably wants to know what a vampire’s lair is like. Apparently it’s like the inside of a Swedish furniture store. Sorry to disappoint.
Bradley tugs his shoes off and leaves them behind the bed. He smashes his mouth against mine—a move I assume is sexier to someone who can’t literally bite his face off.
But I go with it. I relax. I let him push me against the mattress—even pretend he’s pinning me there. His sweaty shirt sticks between us when he pulls mine off over my head.
“You feel like marble.”
Big vocabulary for a gym rat. “If that’s a problem, I can put my clothes back on.”
“No, no, no.” He kisses down my chest. “I like it. It’s just . . . different. You’re cold.”
I snake my hand down the front of Bradley’s drawstring pants. He’s already hard. My hand glides easily over his sweaty cock.
He moans against my lips. “You want that? Want me to warm you up?”
As cliché as his lines are, his arrogance gets me wet.
“Do it,” I say, helping his clothes off. I accidentally rip his tee shirt. His pants slide off unharmed. His swollen cock bobs near my face and I fight the urge to suck it. Bad idea, teeth.
“Hey, you should know . . .” I trail off. I could kill him and I’m still afraid to tell him our genitals don’t
match.
“What? This your first time?”
I shake my head.
“Afraid you’re going to hurt me?”
“No—well, a little, but I—I’m trans.”
“What?”
“I’m transgender.”
“You have a dick?” He pulls my briefs down, throwing me off balance.
“Excuse me!”
“Are you kidding? I find the only fucking gay vampire with no dick?”
“Didn’t think I’d need one for what you planned to do.”
“I’m not putting anything in your pussy.”
I tense up at the word. “Please don’t call it that.”
“Whatever.”
“I have another hole, in case you missed it.”
Bradley shakes his head and reaches for his clothes. “I’m not into girls.”
I grab his arm and flip him onto the bed. “And I’m not into transphobic douchebags, but I’m hungry so I’ll make an exception.”
My fangs lodge easily into his neck. My tongue slides over his salty skin and I overwhelmingly realize why Andreas bit me. I can’t even blame him.
Bradley doesn’t taste like Andreas, though. He tastes like steroids and adrenaline with a hint of alcohol. He doesn’t fight me or he stops fighting me. His heat floods my veins.
The front door clicks its quiet, controlled click shut. Andreas’s eyes meet mine in the dark. He doesn’t speak. He walks slowly, at human speed even though no one’s around to judge him, and kneels at the foot of the bed.
“He smells delicious,” Andreas says.
I swallow a mouthful of Bradley’s thick, heady blood, then pull out. “Want to share?”
Andreas kisses me, his tongue flicking against mine for a taste. He licks the corner of my mouth, cleaning me up. I’m a messy eater. I’m a monster.
“No thanks,” Andreas says. “Once was more than enough.” He bites his wrist and lets his blood drip into Bradley’s wounds.
“You didn’t do that for me.”
“You’re not even close to draining this man, Finley.”
The effects on Bradley are instant; the ragged holes in his neck stitch themselves back together. Seamless.
Bradley opens his eyes on Andreas’s.
“You and Finley had a good time, but it was a one-time thing. He’s not really your type.”
“Yeah,” Bradley says.
I roll my eyes.
“Why don’t you head home and shower off that gym stench,” Andreas says.
“Good idea,” Bradley agrees, robotic.
When the jock’s dressed and gone, Andreas says, “Get what you need?”
I stretch my jaw and crack my neck. Slide my tongue over my teeth to get the last of the taste. “Mostly.”
“Let me help you.”
Help me. How is an old cis vampire supposed to help me when he doesn’t understand the first thing about my body? My eternity?
I ask, “Do you have any nails?”
◉ ◉ ◉
Andreas leans against the threshold, sipping blood while he watches. His skin is pale, but not pallid. His pose casual, but precise. “Little more to the left,” he says. “There. That’s it.”
I walk backwards until I bump into him. He hands me the mug and I take a sip. “Not bad,” I say.
My last sunset hangs over the bed. With my new eyes, I see the thick texture of paints where the colors blend and my brushstrokes overlap like waves. Apricot, wine, and goldenrod blur together, each clearer and more real than anything printed by a machine on one of Andreas’s quilts.
“Small changes over long periods of time, you said?”
“Yes,” Andreas says. “Why?”
“Just making sure.”
I imagine what a real sunset will look like when I’m old enough to experience one. If they’ll still exist or if smog will cloud the skyline. The only thing that won’t change is me, my body, my canvas. “What about a tattoo? You know, to remember.” Blood drips from the corners of my eyes.
“Possible. It’ll hurt, but possible.” Andreas tightens his hold on me. “Are you sure you’re okay?”
“Yes,” I resolve. “Haven’t cried this much since—before, you know. It feels good.”
“Since before I turned you?” he asks.
“No,” I say. “Before I turned myself.”
END
Clearly Lettered in a Mostly Steady Hand
Fran Wilde
Entrance
There’s a ticket booth on my tongue.
Don’t look in my eyes, don’t plead curiosity, you won’t get anywhere with that. Try it and you’ll see your reflection in my sea-green gaze: your shadow sprinting through the heavy glass doors. You’ll smell a whiff of brine, perhaps something more volatile. You’ll be caught and held, while your likeness departs. You don’t want that.
No one wants to be pinned between an entrance and an exit, unless you’re part of the show.
Here’s what you do instead: drop your dime on the rose carpet, just there. Don’t pick it up. The carpet’s sticky. Don’t ask why. Stare at my lips, my hands clasped over my velvet skirts, what rests below that, and wait.
If you’re worthy, I’ll say the word. Your dime gets you a look and a souvenir. Your hands are beautiful, did you know that?
◉ ◉ ◉
Welcome
Three steps backwards: follow me. See the boiserie panels, carved with nymphs and satyrs and stained just so? See the seam between the boards? Push on that, right there, until it parts. You can see the hinges now in the shadows between the nymphs. Hold the door open and let me pass through. The wood feels warm to the touch, your fingers brush a leg, a horn.
Wait there. Let me light the way before you. Phosphorous hisses against air, kisses the kerosene lamp wick. We’ve had electric since the collection began, but most of us feel gas is easier on the eyes. It was our first disagreement with the curator.
A shadow ducks low, then high. You hear soft breathing, a giggle. Curious?
You’re too big to fit through that small hatch. Most guests are. You’ll have to crouch, chest to knees, head down so you can feel your lungs press your spine.
Now duck-walk, your fingertips dragging on the rose carpet, until red lint clings to your cuticles. Move beyond the nymphs, into the wood, the wall.
You think you’ll be able to straighten once you’re through the door, but the ceiling’s too low. Keep your stoop. Bend your knees and wish, only for a moment, that you were smaller. Notice the mirrors, set high in the walls, like eyes.
Don’t worry, I’ll stay right behind you.
◉ ◉ ◉
A Hallway of Things People Have Swallowed
Observe: here are several obvious groupings: fishhooks (seventy, mostly steel, a few bone), one hundred fifteen clambroth marbles. Glass cases of them, lining the walls. Pencil nubs, matches, rows upon rows of teeth. Don’t touch the glass just yet.
Yes, those are butterflies. Someone always tries to eat a butterfly. It tastes like dust.
There are three hundred fifty worms there, the longer ones rolled up in apothecary jars along the wall. Here are the instruments used for removal. Notes on the amount of time each extraction took. The state of the patient before and after, clearly lettered with a mostly steady hand.
Don’t miss the cases, their drawers of pins and needles, thimbles too, as if we could sew ourselves back together from the inside. The jacks and rubber balls, the charms, for good luck. That last drawer contains beetles. They are a particular delicacy, especially the large ones. They taste like solder and licorice, but don’t eat the claws.
Come this way, the ceilings grow higher in the next room. You won’t have to stoop much longer.
◉ ◉ ◉
A Radium Room
Stop there, your feet within the box marked with black tape. Stay very still. The X-ray device hums as it warms up, but don’t let it worry you. The technology is very safe. Hold still. Let me slide a film in and I’ll take an image of your soul. Hold Still.
Your cellulose shade and shadow came out beautifully. You may move now. A few streaks of still-pure hope run the film’s darkness. Unless that’s bone? I can cut that out if you like.
No, you can’t keep the image. It goes in our collection with the others. Careful of your fingers, we don’t want prints. Neatly write your name on the tape at the corner. The date too. These details are important.
Silly, you thought that was your souvenir?
We spread the souls on the floor sometimes, during staff breaks. Look at them, debate their merits.
Keep moving. Through that doorway. Watch your head.
◉ ◉ ◉
A Room of Objects That Are Really People
Here, straighten up now. Hurts, doesn’t it, all the tiny bones settling back into place? We have pins, if you like, to help hold you together.
Maybe take this chair. I’ll push you around. The wheels squeak on the wood floor, and the chair is really more of a bin. Don’t mind the parts in there with you, the arms bent at angles, some screws missing; the legs, still braced, the leather straps, the metal bits and the plastic… remember, plastic’s newer and we don’t really respect anyone who’s turned on by that. Comfy?
I wish you could see yourself. Slouching! You’re becoming a mess. Mouth wide open. And that stare. At the glass cases, at me. Surely you’ve seen us before, on the street? In a shop? Surely you haven’t gaped quite so much. Is it the ceiling? Impressive, with all the mirrors?
Perspective. The angle you choose, how you observe us, makes everything change. You’re nearly lying down now, which is fine. Relax. I’ll push you along.
You see, I can walk just as quickly as you, despite what the posters say. You’re wondering how. You’re imagining what’s beneath my skirts. You think you can guess at me. You think you hear scales scuffing the old wood floor.
You might. But see here, the cabinets here are so nicely illuminated. They’re walnut, you know. Brass fittings. Take a moment to stare at them. You paid your money, you might as well have a look.
Nebula Awards Showcase 2019 Page 35