Antecedent

by Susan Stumpf

During the auction, I was completely bored. One after another people held up their little sticks with numbers on them while a guy was spouting out numbers faster than anybody could possibly comprehend. I didn't know why he needed to talk so fast, what was the point of that? Bo was sitting in a group of chairs in front of the display stage while Wu and I stood against the back wall. Somehow I thought working for a vampire would be more exciting than this.

  "I bet you had no idea that an antique auction would be a hot spot for vampires," Wu said to me quietly.

  "Are there more here than just Bo?" I asked.

  "Oh yes," he said and started pointing some out.

  "How do you know who is and who isn't, they all look pretty normal to me."

  "Vampire radar I guess," he said with a smile.

  "Are there any Ants here?" I asked.

  "Antecedents? No. They rarely come out. If you thought Bo was big on security, you should see one of them. They usually have others do their running around for them, and a mob of Ectype bodyguards. They are like royalty, so they never travel small or expose themselves too much.

  Wu was pointing out more vamps to me when he gestured his head to the door to point out a couple more that had just walked in. They scanned the room and looked right at Wu and said something to one another.

  "Oh no!" Wu said. "Em, I'm going to stay right here, I need you to go tell Bo that the hunters are here. Quickly!" I didn't know what that meant, but I assumed it was something bad. Vampire hunters I guessed. Was Bo in danger? I walked up to where Bo was sitting and weeded my way through the row of chairs with much protest from the people who were trying to follow the auctioneer. I leaned down to Bo to whisper to him which brought more protests and hisses from the people who were around and behind him. "Get your girlfriend out of the way," one hissed.

  "Wu said the hunters are here," I told him and his head whipped around quickly scanning the room and rested on the guys at the door then back at Wu.

  Bo grabbed me by the arm a little too hard and we hurried to the back of the room where Wu was standing.

  "Can you run in those shoes," Bo asked me.

  "Yeah I think so," I answered, and we sprinted down the hall and to the outside door. In the parking lot, both men gained speed and I had trouble keeping up. The van was parked toward the back of the lot. I stumbled a bit on the gravel and one of my slippers came off. I looked back and saw that the men were also coming out the door so I didn't stop to pick it up. I just shed the other shoe and kept running. I stepped on something horribly sharp and screamed. In a split second, Bo was back to me and threw me over his shoulder and continued to the van so fast it made me dizzy.

  Wu was in the van behind the driver's seat when Bo slammed us both inside. Wu took off before the back door was even closed. I could see the three men stopped chasing us and had turned in the other direction, I guessed towards their vehicle. As Bo closed the doors, I sat up to look at my foot. The whole bottom ring of a broken bottle was actually stuck to the bottom of my foot.

  "Wow, you guys sure know how to show a girl a good time," I said as I peeled the glass from my foot. Bo got a roll of brown paper towels out of the glove box and handed it to me. I ripped off a large wad and held it to my bleeding foot. I sat there on the floor of the van while Wu drove at excessive speeds and Bo kept looking around to see if we were being followed.

  "We have no chance of outrunning them in this," Bo said. "Our best bet is to hide." Wu made a few turns and we ended up in front of a big factory. Wu drove around back and parked in a dark corner of the lot next to a dumpster.

  "So these guys are vampire hunters?" I asked.

  "No," Bo answered. "Seed hunters."

  "Ok, what's a seed hunter?"

  "Vampires, true vampires-Ants as you call them-are actually becoming endangered. More and more seeds are choosing not to become Antecedents themselves and are choosing to live a mortal life. So the Ectypes who work for Antecedents go out hunting unchanged seeds. They bring them to their employers to be changed against their will."

  "But don't they need their fathers there to change them?" I asked, confused.

  Wu answered this time. "A father changing his son or daughter is a ceremonial affair-it's a rite of passage- kind of like a Bar Mitzvah. It's done by the father out of honor, but it does not have to be the father. A seed can drink the blood of any Antecedent and also become one because we are of the same bloodline."

  "Why did you choose to be mortal?" I asked him.

  "It all started with my grandfather, I guess. He met my grandmother when he was quite young and they fell in love. My grandfather didn't want to live forever without the woman he loved so they ran away and got married. My great grandfather tracked him down to turn him, but by that time my grandmother was already pregnant with my father. Great grandfather took mercy on them and didn't turn him. In turn, grandfather gave my father the choice also. He could have taken my father to an Antecedent and had him turned but he gave him the choice. Unfortunately, my parents both died when I was young and my grandfather raised me. So he also let me choose if I wanted to be mortal or not. There are those out there who think it is a seed's duty to be turned and turn their children and not be given a choice."

  "I'm sorry to hear about your parents," I said. "I lost my parents when I was young also." Bo got out of the van to keep a better watch. Wu and I sat talking for a long time before Bo got back in and said he thought it was safe for us to leave. We took a different route home, along the back roads, which took even longer. We didn't reach my house till almost two o'clock. Wu helped me inside since I had lost both my shoes and my foot really hurt. I did as little of my bedtime routine as possible and just went to bed. I had nightmares of being chased by vampires and dogs. My dream crossed over into reality as I woke up to what I thought was a dog licking my foot.

  "Bo! What the hell are you doing?!" I screamed. He was kneeling at the foot of my bed. He had pulled the covers back and was licking my foot.

  "I'm helping," he said.

  "Ew!" I said and tried kicking him away.

  "My saliva has natural anesthetic and antibiotic properties as well."

  "I don't care!" I screamed. "You can't break into a person's house at?" I glanced at the clock on my nightstand, "?3:48 in the morning and just start licking them! It's?.disturbing!"

  "Fine," he said dropping my foot to the bed. "Get gangrene then."

  "What's your problem?" I asked. "Are you mad? I thought vampires didn't get mad?"

  "I'm not mad," he said. "I'm annoyed. I came over here to help you, and you're yelling at me!"

  My voice went an octave higher in defense. "You broke into my house in the middle of the night, came into my bedroom when I'm only half dressed, and started licking me without my permission! You don't see anything wrong with that?!"

  He touched his hand to his chin, pondering the question. "No" he finally said.

  "Agghh!" I exclaimed and threw my pillow at him. This man was impossible. He had no filter of what was and was not over the line.

  "Well, may I have your permission to break into your house in the middle of the night and lick you?" he asked.

  "NO!" I couldn't help but laugh, was he serious?

  "Not even if you're injured?"

  "No! Get out, Bo, go home."

  "Alright," he shrugged and was gone in an instant.

  I guess that whole vampires have to be invited in thing was a myth as well. You can imagine how well I slept the rest of the morning. I kept waking up to make sure I was alone in my bedroom and no one was licking me.

  I got up and tried to manage my usual morning routine. I showered, got dressed, and bandaged my foot. It didn't look too bad, and I wondered how much licking had been done before I woke up. I shivered at the thought. That was just gross and weird and gross some more. I hobbled downstairs to make some coffee and on my kitchen table were the shoes that I'd lost in the auction parking lot last night. Next to them was a note: "I am sorry I licked you without your permissi
on. I will try to remember that you do not like that." signed Bo. "He's SO weird!" I said to myself. I was happy to have my shoes back, though. They were one of my favorite pair.

  I lounged around most of the day. Wu called that afternoon and said that he would take care of the dogs and that I was to take the next couple days off. I did work on the eBay postings so I wouldn't feel like a total slacker. I did pretty much the same thing the next couple days. Not an ideal first week of work. Friday morning, I found an envelope sitting on my kitchen table when I came down. Oh lovely, Creepy McCreeperson let himself in again. I opened it. The envelope contained a note, a hundred-dollar bill, and a smaller envelope. I read the note first.

  Ms. Polanski, I hope you're feeling better. I just have one task for you today if you can manage. Take this money down to the florist shop and have an arrangement put together- something yellow- and deliver it to the following address?and Em, stay for the drink. Also enclosed is your first paycheck.

  P.S. I came nowhere near you last night.

  Awesome! They weren't going to withhold the first week like most places do. I opened the smaller envelope and there was a check, my first paycheck! I did a little dance in my kitchen. It felt great to have money. I would no longer have to strategically pay bills. Not bad for basically two days of work. I hadn't done anything on Tuesday, Wednesday, or Thursday and honestly I wouldn't have protested if he hadn't paid me for this week at all since I hadn't done much. After breakfast, I got dressed. It was a little chilly outside for sandals but with the bandage on my foot, I didn't think it would fit into much else. At the florist, I picked out a beautiful arrangement of yellow lilies, with daisies and yellow poms.

  I drove to the address Bo had given and wasn't sure what I would say as I walked up to the door. A very old lady answered,

  "Hi," I said, "Bo Pavlock sent me."

  "Oh yes, come in, come in," she said. "Do you work for Bo?"

  "Yes," I answered.

  "That Bo is such a gentleman," she said. "He always remembers my birthday and remembers my favorite color." That was funny, out of all the words I had to describe Bo Pavlock, 'gentleman' definitely wasn't one of them!

  "Please have a seat," she said. "Would you like some lemonade?"

  Bo's note had said 'stay for the drink.' I wasn't sure what he'd meant till now. He obviously knew this woman very well.

  As it turned out, Esther had managed the antique store before Li and Wu came along. She'd worked for Bo for thirty years till she decided to retire twenty years ago. She turned ninety-six today. She was a hybrid and in decent shape for her age, and she was a talker! I spent most of the morning there listening to her tell stories of Bo and the antique store. The name 'Forever Young Antiques had been her idea and she'd helped Bo get it started. To hear her talk about him was a cross between a mother full of pride and a girl smitten with an older man. She was a sweet old lady but seemed so lonely. She didn't want me to leave, and I saw my life flash before my eyes. Sixty some years from now would one of Bo's employees be bringing me flowers on my birthday. Would I talk their ear off about the time we ran from seed hunters at an auction and I cut my foot? Maybe so?