Crooked Fang

by Carrie Clevenger

  “A dirty old bar, huh? I’m going to have to have a talk with Liz. I’ll have her know we’ve always kept it clean.”

  She laughed, and just like that, the ice was broken. I endured a half hour of questions about guitars–which I could discuss all night–and being famous–which I wasn’t–before Scott stepped out back, still in his long wool coat and cap, with a bottle in a brown bag.

  “So that’s where she went.” He looked at his daughter. “You better get cleaned up for bed.” Chelsea groaned but got up and went back into the house. Scott unveiled the half gallon of whiskey and set it on the table in front of me.

  “Oh, man. Thank you so much.” I reached for it and unscrewed the lid.

  “Jesus, Xan. Let me get you a glass. I didn’t know you’d dive right in.” He went back inside and returned with a tall glass of ice. I threw the ice into the grass and filled the empty glass with whiskey. He watched me take a drink.

  “What?”

  “I have a feeling I should have bought more.”

  “I’ll go easy on it.”

  He took a seat at the table and gazed up at the night sky. “Cold outside, but not too bad without the wind.”

  I lit another cigarette. “I miss Pale Rider already.”

  Scott glanced at me. “Yeah, you look out of place here somehow. I guess you’ve grown out of the city life.”

  “Meh. I never really liked it much anyway.”

  “It’s nice having you here. I know we haven’t talked much. I keep wanting to ask stuff about you. I know you wouldn’t care, but it still seems rude.”

  I sat back in my chair. “You have a nice place, Scott. Chelsea’s awesome.”

  He grinned. “Yeah, but she’s a handful.”

  “You can ask whatever you want, man. The past few years we’ve seen each other at loud rock shows and quick social events. I know we haven’t really tried to talk since I found you again.”

  After I became a vampire, lived the whole vampire house life and left my sire, I wandered around for a year. When I answered the ad for Pale Rider, it brought me back to Colorado, but not Denver. Another year passed before I tracked down where my car’d ended up. I knew my dad had it when I died, but not whether he’d sold it or what. Turned out, Scott had bought it from him. He busted me checking it out in his driveway back at the old place, and mistook me for somebody looking to steal it. It was pure luck. After he’d gotten over the shock that it was his best friend instead, who was supposed to have been dead for over twenty years, Scott’d given me back my car. I let him in on my secret, and we picked up like nothing’d happened.

  “It’s okay.” He gave me a smile. “I’m just stoked to have you here.”

  “Yeah, it’s awesome to just sit and shoot the shit without a real timetable.”

  “Did you figure out anything on where you’re going to stay? You know you can stay here as long as you want.”

  “I talked to Charlie earlier. He said he was going to get someone out tomorrow to find out what it’d take to rebuild.”

  “Cool.” Scott pulled his coat around him. “Did you want to go inside? I figure you’re not bothered by it, but I’m freezing out here.”

  “Yeah, want to shoot some pool in the garage?” I stood and picked up the bottle of whiskey and my glass.

  “That sounds great.” We went back inside.

  Our obvious differences put aside, Scott and I were still very much the same. Sure, he was richer, had a family and a nice house now, but his personality hadn’t changed. I was always the mechanical one, while he was awesome with numbers and technical shit. I bet he would still toss bottle caps in the garbage disposal given half a chance. He used to have the oddest habits back when we were roommates. One of them was his inability to wash a dish. Or throw away bottle caps from his beers. He’d just pass by the sink and ka-chunk! right into the garbage disposal. Later, I’d do the dishes and run the thing only to have it spit up water and screw up the blades. It sounded more like a Volkswagen in a blender.

  “Man, Chelsea really looks like Debra.” I waited while Scott measured out his angled shot. I’m surprised he didn’t bust out a protractor and a scientific calculator. This was why he usually wiped the floor with me at playing pool. “And you let her get her lip pierced?”

  “Yeah, why?” Scott raised an eyebrow at me and returned his attention to the game. He tapped the cue ball just enough to get it to move, which clipped the seven and poked the three ball into the side pocket.

  “Damn. That was kind of bad ass. Too bad it took you twenty minutes to figure it out.”

  “Everything takes time.” He leaned the cue stick against the table and opened the fridge to get another beer. I noticed with no small amount of surprise that he pitched the bottle cap in the trash. “Everything that’s worth a shit anyway.”

  “She’s fourteen, though.” I meant Chelsea. “Is that the style now? On the side, not in the middle or the eyebrow?”

  Scott snorted. “Eyebrow piercings are old news, man.”

  “She’s growing up. Pretty soon she’ll be my...” I let the sentence drop. Yeah, I’d gotten used to being twenty-seven for almost the equal amount of years. If Chelsea hit twenty-seven, that would make her my technical age, which gave me a weird twist in my gut. Kids turned into grown-ups.

  “And then mine.” He sunk the eight ball.

  I gathered the two balls I had left on the table along with the others and started a new setup. It wasn’t fair. Life wasn’t fair. The kid that still lived inside of me stamped his feet and balled up his fists at the thought of losing all of this. Scott was the only one that knew the times I knew. I needed a drink. I left the balls in the triangle and retreated to my bottle and glass.

  “You’re dropping into emo gear. I get enough of that from my fourteen-year-old.”

  I snorted and fiddled with an unlit cigarette. “No shit? Fourteen-year-olds get depressed?”

  “Haven’t you noticed her? Oh, it’s all black: black drapes, black carpet, black notebooks. Liz and I put our foot down on dyeing her hair black.”

  “Wouldn’t that be feet?”

  “Fuck off,” Scott said with a smile. “You breaking this time?” He jerked a thumb back at the pool table.

  “Nah, you go ahead. If anyone’ll get balls flying, it’ll be me.”

  “You are one sick fucker. I’m keeping your ass in the basement and barring the door.”

  “Is that where you keep the booze?”

  He shook his head and gave me the bird. “Asshole. No. That wouldn’t be torture exactly, would it?”

  “Depends on how drunk I stayed. I’d demand restocking once a week.”

  “No wonder you have to live in a bar.” He leaned down, lined up the cue stick with the table and snapped the balls into a frenzy all over the table.

  I shook my head and clucked my tongue as I stood to take my turn. “Aww, too bad. A Dolly Parton break.”

  “A what?” He laughed and gave me a funny look.

  “Dolly Parton break.” I chalked the tip of my cue stick before taking my first shot. “All bust, no balls.”

  * * * *

  I fit in pretty well around there. Liz approved of me after I folded laundry she’d left in the dryer. Hey, it wasn’t like I had much to do. Besides, it kept me busy and not thinking about other stuff, like where I was going to go for the next few months while Charlie tried to get Pale Rider back in order. He’d said a while. I guess he needed time. I didn’t know how long it took to rebuild a place, but also the scene was under investigation for accelerant found in the charred wreckage. That meant arson, which I already knew about but couldn’t tell anyone because then they’d ask questions or worse, try to get me to come in and talk to them. So I sat around, did dishes, watched TV and folded laundry to try keep from going insane over the whole ordeal.

  Scott talked me into riding up with him to Slater Enterprises one night, probably to distract me from worrying about what had happened to Serv and the whole fire thing. I’d j
ust woken up and was in the process of finding my first cigarette to take upstairs. He tossed a fresh, unwrapped pack in my lap.

  “What, are you a mind reader or something?” I peeled the cellophane away and opened the box. My brand too.

  “No, but I noticed you were running low. Say, I’ve got to go up to the office for something tonight, wanna go?”

  I frowned. “No, not really. I don’t think I need to be going into a place I used to work at.”

  “Come on, man. None of the original staff is there. And it’s nighttime. The office is empty anyway.” He smiled. “Aren’t you at least a little bit curious to see it?”

  I shrugged. “Maybe a little... I need to a take a shower first.”

  “Do you actually get dirty, sitting around the house? I mean, you don’t sweat.”

  “Well, not really, but it feels good and gets me fully awake.” I snorted. “Besides, my hair would smell like a bar if I didn’t.”

  Scott held up his hands. “Cleanliness is godliness. Nothing like a freshly showered vampire to keep that new-car smell.”

  I threw my shirt at him. “Give me twenty minutes.”

  I’d gone twenty some-odd oblivious years without having to deal with myself, and all of a sudden, my past was jabbing me like a knife to the ribs every chance it got. Sure, I was curious if Slater had changed any. If my old desk was still there. If any of the old stuff was still there, but it would be painful to see. If the place still looked the same, it’d bring back memories. If everything had been changed around, it’d be that time in my life erased from reality. Did my name ever come up? I doubted it.

  I showered and got dressed in the time frame promised, and joined him in the den, my hair damp over my shoulders.

  He lived close to the ad agency, maybe about the same distance Pale Rider was from Tabby’s house. My heart thumped hard once when the old five-story office park came into view. Slater was located on the bottom floor, in one of the larger office spaces. The old fountain was still there up front, turned off for the night, or maybe it just didn’t work anymore. A new maroon awning stretched over the double-door entrance. When I’d worked here, it’d been green. Scott walked behind me, maybe because he knew I could find the office on my own. It was to the right of the foyer, third door down. I stopped in front of it and stared at the gold-foil name on the door. That hadn’t changed a bit. Scott unlocked the door and switched off an alarm.

  I raised an eyebrow. “Alarm system?”

  Scott nodded. “Had an incident a few years back with a movie company. People fishing for information on the new flick.” He switched on the overhead lights.

  “Damn.” I looked around. It was better than I’d expected. Kind of a mixture of old stuff with improvements. New chairs and desks. A hell of a lot more desks. And the one I’d worked at was gone.

  Scott stood at my side. “Your desk was here until a few years back. I needed the space.”

  We glanced at each other and I nodded. “I get it. These new desks are smaller. With little walls around them.”

  “Cubicles. The future of the private office.”

  I’d seen cubicles in movies and on TV. They looked like little boxes, with fabric walls. I got the functionality of them, but the thought of being stuck in one all day made my skin crawl. My desk had been pretty big, wooden, with an adjustable part that could be tilted up so I could draw on it. None of these cubicles even had drawing space, just huge thin monitors and computers.

  “Nobody draw on paper anymore?” I ducked into one of the cubes, testing the desktop, thinking maybe it lifted up or something.

  Scott laughed at me. “Rarely. Most everything is done digitally now.”

  “So they just scan it in?”

  He shook his head and picked up a fat pen-looking thing. “Nope. It’s drawn right on the monitor.”

  “No shit?”

  He laughed again. “Damn, man. Somebody’s behind the times. Let’s go to my office. I’ll show you how it works.”

  His office was Julian’s old office. I half expected the old man to be sitting behind the imposing cherry wood desk, twitching his little moustache. In truth, he had been a cool boss, and never really bugged us much at all, except when I’d miss days of work. Scott was always his favorite because he was responsible. Not to mention creative as hell. I gave Scott a run for his money on layouts, though. And he always said I could capture people’s emotions in their faces.

  I walked into the private office before Scott and stopped dead in my tracks. This was where Scott kept Slater Enterprises’ history alive. Photos of people who worked there, some I even recognized, stood testimony on the now half-empty shelves. The walls were decorated with framed advertisements from clients throughout the years. And above his chair, between the two windows, was one I’d done.

  It was for a car company that didn’t exist anymore and was actually a photo with a lot of retouching and added-in cowboys on galloping horses. The client had mentioned concerns about the car not being cool or tough enough, and even though I’d given it my all, the truth was, that car was a piece of shit, and ugly as sin. But I guess Scott had kept that ad I made, which was kind of really touching. Not that I’d ever tell him the extent of what it meant to me.

  “I still think that is an ugly ass car,” I commented, and Scott cracked up behind me. I’d said as much while I was doing the project. Maybe more than a few times.

  “Yeah, that’s why I kept it. You had some hate for it. Then I find out you’re playing dead.”

  “All that reverence for nothing. So, you gonna take it down?”

  Scott shook his head with a smile. “Not a chance in hell. My best friend did this. It’s got sentimental value.”

  “Huh.” I sat on the corner of the desk as he took his seat and moved the mouse. The screen lit up, one of those big ones, like everybody else had. He picked up one of those fat pens, which turned out to be a stylus and opened a program. I raised an eyebrow. “Hey, that’s pretty cool.”

  “Wanna try it?” Scott handed me the pen.

  I waved it away. “Nah, it’s your thing.”

  “Oh, come on. How long has it been since you’ve drawn?”

  I stood and went to the door. “I’m good. Really. I’ll just step outside for a smoke.”

  And I did. I breezed out of the office, with my tongue sliding down the back of a fang and weird anger filling me. I shouldn’t have gone with him. All it did was make me remember what I’d lost. What I couldn’t do anymore. Picking up that stylus to prove the skill was gone would have just rubbed it in even more. I stayed outside until he came back out.

  “Hey, are you okay? I wasn’t trying to make you feel bad.” He punched the remote on his key fob and the Escalade winked at us.

  “It’s nothing, man. I just want to go home, if that’s all right with you.” I meant Pale Rider, but his house would have to do. I guess I could’ve run off to some bar and sat with a drink, feeling even more alienated, but I didn’t. I also didn’t say shit on the drive back, which was cityscape, freeway lights, sprinkles on the windshield and a whole lot of blah.

  My mind kept revisiting the night I left Serv alone. The phone call. I clenched my fists and gritted my teeth, but there wasn’t a lot I could do about it.

  But I had an enemy, that much was certain.

  I stayed scarce around dinnertime at the Barrows’. I didn’t need Liz feeling offended because I couldn’t eat her meatloaf or whatever she made. Though Scott knew what I was, it wasn’t something I felt the rest of his family needed to know. He understood and tried to cover for me, but I was still woken around five in the afternoon. Scott wasn’t home yet.

  I popped awake to full consciousness the minute Chelsea set foot on the basement stairs, and sat up to greet her. It was good they had the stairs. Waking a vampire by poking him in the ribs during daylight hours was not a good idea at all. I might bite.

  “Liz wanted me to tell you dinner is almost ready.” That day she wore pink sneakers, and black eve
rything else. I raised an eyebrow at her almost too-short skirt. Scott was really lenient with her, and I was starting to sound like my own father. Her nails were bitten to the quick and painted black. She tucked her hair behind her ears and approached me sitting there on the mattress.

  “Ah.” I rubbed my face and pulled my hair back into an elastic band.

  She watched me. “So are you coming?”

  “To what?”

  She rolled her eyes and smiled. “Dinner, silly.”

  I shook my head. “No, I don’t think so.”

  “Why not?”

  I sighed and lay back down on my side, facing her. “Not feeling too hot.”

  Her expression melted into concern. “What’s wrong with you? You’re not sick, are you?”

  “Nah, probably just smoke from the fire. Leaves you feeling queasy for a while.” It wasn’t an absolute lie had I been in the fire, but she didn’t know what happened and she nodded.

  “Okay, I’ll let her know. Do you need anything? Ginger ale or something?”

  I couldn’t help but laugh. “No, sweetheart. I’ll be fine. Just not hungry. I’ll probably step out later for a bite.” Thankfully, Denver was full of people. Vulnerable people. I wouldn’t take much. Just enough from a few girls at a bar, or maybe...eh, I was disgusting. But yeah, I was also getting hungry. I could feel the craving sink slowly into my veins, tightening my insides to begin with, transforming with downhill speed into a full-out need if not addressed soon thereafter.

  Chelsea seemed satisfied with my answer and went back upstairs, and I went back to sleep until Scott came down. He was still in his button-down, long-sleeved executive-type shirt and slacks. He even wore a blue tie. The old Scott would never wear a tie. I wore an old black Scarlet Claw t-shirt and jeans.

  “Hey.” He approached me cautiously, like I was a coiled cobra.

  I smirked at him and stood up to stretch, running my fingers over the rough surface of the pipes overhead before dropping my arms to my sides. “How was work?” I grinned and reached for my jacket, which contained my cigarettes.

  Scott shrugged. “It was work.” He watched me as I pulled out the pack. “I’m guessing you want to smoke. Want to head to the garage?”