by Billy Wells
A policeman standing on the adjacent corner saw the young woman running away from Jason, and crossing the street, confronted him, “What did you do to that woman?”
Jason looked at him without the slightest bit of timidity and replied, “I asked her what street Le Circ is on. Is that a crime?”
The officer, incensed by Jason’s impudent response, looked at his pale face and his black gloves and pulled his service piece from his holster. He instructed him to place his hands on the FedEx Mail drop they stood next to.
“I don’t see many citizens dressed for Halloween on Fifth Avenue this time of year. Are you a Goth?” the policeman said sarcastically.
“I certainly am not, and you are being extremely disrespectful to a law abiding citizen.”
“The officer read Jason his rights and said, Pardon me, but you look exactly like the picture of the killer the media is calling “the Vampire”. I’m taking you in for questioning. The policeman called for backup and placed the cuffs on Jason. A minute later, a police car pulled up to take him to headquarters.
When a man in a dark, disheveled suit entered the interrogation room, Jason said, “I’m an upstanding citizen who’s never had so much as a parking ticket. You’re harassing me because I have very pale skin like an albino, and I wear gloves in the summer time. Neither of which is a crime. I’d like to call my lawyer.”
“Settle down, Baron whatever your name is. Don’t get your shorts in a bunch. Let’s start with your name. The officer who brought you in said you were totally uncooperative and wouldn’t give him an ID. Do you always go out on Friday night without your wallet and ID?”
“I have both, but the officer was extremely rude and rubbed me the wrong way, I didn’t respond to his heavy handed tactics.” He passed his driver’s license to the detective. “I know my rights, and I did not commit any crime. He was out of line. My name is Jason Cooper. I live at 8300 West End Avenue,” he stated tersely.
“That’s better,” the policeman said examining the ID and picking up the phone. After a pause, he read the data into the receiver, listened intently, and hung up.
He stood there looking at Jason and then said, “You were right, you don’t have a single parking ticket.”
Jason smiled, and returning his license to his wallet, he replied, “It’s not so hard when you don’t own a car.”
“I guess you’re free to go.”
Jason looked at him incredulously and rising from his chair said, “That’s all?”
“That’s all. Next time, don’t be such an asshole when an officer asks you a question. There’s a serial killer on the loose that’s killed ten innocent women. Except for your being somewhat younger, you look just like him.” The detective passed him a blowup of a surveillance camera photo of a man who looked like he could be his older brother.
“Jason’s mouth dropped open in disbelief.”
“Do you mind if I ask if you have an older brother?”
“I have no siblings.”
“How about your father?”
“He passed away five years ago.”
“Sorry, I had to ask.”
“I do apologize for the blowup, but I’ve been dealing with hurtful barbs concerning my gloves and my pale complexion all my life. What the officer said hit me the wrong way.”
“You don’t have a picture of your father in your wallet, do you?”
“Actually I do have a picture” Jason rifled his wallet and slid the picture across the table.
“This is your father?” the detective said looking back and forth at Jason and the photo.
“That’s him.”
“You don’t look like him at all. Were you adopted?”
“The records show my real parents raised me. Why I look like a vampire, nobody knows. My father was the kindest man anyone ever knew.”
“I really appreciate your candor. I’m sorry for the inconvenience, but you’re the only lead we have right now. We’re drawing straws at this point.”
“I apologize for my lack of cooperation. I learned a valuable lesson tonight on how not to talk to a policeman. I hope he learned something as well.”
Jason rose to leave and shook the detective’s hand.
The detective grimaced at his touch and said, “What’s with the gloves?”
“A skin disease.”
“Can you show me?”
“I’d rather not; it’s embarrassing.”
“It’s okay. You don’t seem like a bad sort after all. Just don’t bite me on your way out.”
They smiled good-naturedly and parted company. Jason headed for the subway.
Before taking the train, Jason felt the sudden urge to pee and darted into the men’s room before descending one level to the platform.
At this late hour, Jason had seen only two others waiting for the train. He suddenly realized this was not the best part of town to be in at this time of night.
As he approached one of three urinals, he noticed the man standing in front of the head next to the wall wore black gloves, similar to his. Looking more closely, he saw the man’s extremely pale face. After he finished urinating, the strange looking man approached the sinks and soap dispensers, but instead of washing his hands, he checked his teeth in the mirror. Jason noticed the abnormally extended canines and his uncanny resemblance to him.
The stranger noticed Jason staring at him and turned to confront him. Even with a raincoat and a scarf partially concealing his face, Jason immediately recognized him as the man in the photo the detective had shown him. “What do you want?” the stranger said in a belligerent tone.
“You must be the one who’s murdering those women and drinking their blood. I just saw a picture of you at the police station.” Jason moved toward the exit and locked the door.
“Get out of the way, and I won’t kill you. You don’t know what you’re getting into.”
Jason didn’t flinch and replied, “What’s with the gloves?”
“I’ve had an allergic reaction since I started drinking blood. I guess it comes with the territory. Believe me, dickweed, you’re playing with fire, and you’re going to get burned.”
“What about your face?” Jason said firmly, not giving an inch.
“You’re a dead man. The infusion of blood has made me incredibly strong. Leave now before I tear you limb from limb. I have a black belt in karate.”
“Humor me. What about your face? Why are you so pale?”
“I had plastic surgery to whiten my skin to make me look like a vampire. I also had dental implants to give me vampire teeth. You should see how the young ladies scream when they get a look at me.”
The stranger extracted a stainless steel set of claws from his raincoat pocket and held it out for Jason to see. “This is what I shred their bodies with after I sink my teeth into their jugulars. I actually drink some of their blood and use a suction device to completely drain them to fuel the media. People love blood, and I give it to them like I’m about to give it to you… in living color.” He raised the menacing claws and prepared to strike.
Jason looked at the stranger and smiled, showing off his own elongated canines. Removing his black gloves he said, “It sounds like you’re a vampire wannabe. There’s nothing genuine about you. You’re a total imposter. You wear a costume and pretend it’s Halloween every night of the year. How pathetic.”
“I’m going to slice off your tongue and cram it up your ass,” the stranger shrieked, bounding toward Jason in a fit of rage.
The shimmering claws whipped through the air where Jason had been standing, but to his utter surprise, he struck nothing. At the same time, he felt his insides falling from a gaping hole in his belly on to the tile floor.
The stranger fell against the sink with blood spewing like a fountain in all directions. To his amazement, Jason stood across the room.
“How did you get over there?” The wannabe asked with an astonished look on his ashen face.
“I flew.”
The str
anger looked at him with unbridled terror. Gasping for breath like a fish out of water, he kept trying unsuccessfully to keep the rest of his guts from spilling out on the floor.
Suddenly, Jason moved like magic across the twenty-foot space until his face was only a foot away from the stranger’s face and asked, “Can you still see?”
The stranger struggled to raise his head as Jason said, “Do you see my teeth. They didn’t require dental work. They’re the real things.
Plunging his fangs into the stranger’s throat, he began draining him of blood.
After satisfying his thirst, he twisted off the stranger’s head and his hands and placed them in a black garbage bag.
Jason stuffed the mutilated body in a dumpster inside the maintenance closet in the men’s room, and unlocking the door, he disappeared into the train station. A minute later, he heard the police sirens wailing from the floor above.
Later he discarded the head and the hands of the wannabe vampire into the Hudson River, and pondered what he would do with the rest of his life.
Did he want to take the stranger’s place and continue his reign of terror? Would he enjoy drinking the blood of young beautiful women and being a media celebrity until the authorities finally tracked him down and drove a stake through his heart? Or… would he rather remain an upstanding citizen, performing his menial job, paying his taxes, and living a passive, lonely life for all eternity?
Jason chose the former.
* * *
Confessional
The young blond altar boy opened the priest’s office door and ran across the church and fled into the street. He was shaken and confused by what had happened. The ramifications of telling his mother about the incident weighed heavily on his mind. One of the other altar boys had told him what happened behind closed doors in the priest’s chambers, but he never believed it until now. He sat on a bench across the street and wept. A tall man sitting nearby saw how distressed the boy was and asked what he could do to help.
An hour later, the priest was working on the mass for Sunday’s service when he heard the chime on the entry door. He arose from his desk and looked out to see a giant of a man dressed in a black sweat suit heading toward a confessional. He had to stoop to get inside and struggled to a kneeling position as he closed the door. The priest didn’t think he’d ever seen the man before, and he was good at remembering faces.
It was six o’clock, which left only thirty minutes until dinner would be served. He hoped the stranger would be a light sinner and he would make it on time. Rosemary said they were having roast beef with mashed potatoes and gravy and apple pie. His favorite.
He entered the confessional and a green light came on above the door.
Both booths were dim inside, separated by a wall with a lattice insert for some measure of discretion between the occupants. The stranger could see the priest, but the priest could not see the stranger distinctly.
After a short pause, they both made the sign of the cross and whispered, almost in unison, “In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.”
The priest read a passage from the Holy Scripture. When it was completed, he waited for the stranger to speak.
After a pause, the stranger began, “Bless me, Father, for I have sinned. It’s been more than a year since my last confession. I have taken the name of God in vain often and have surrounded myself with others who use profanity.”
The priest thought, “This won’t take long at all if this was his most regrettable sin.”
“I haven’t been to church for so long, I don’t remember.”
The priest thought, “Sin number two. A common fault among churchgoers. Nothing earth shattering.” He was tabulating the number of “Our Fathers” and “Hail Marys” in his mind.
“I used to smoke pot and drink scotch on the rocks excessively.”
“Did this contribute to a poor performance at work?”
“Yes, Father. I was on probation for missing too many days when I had the accident.”
“Accident?”
“In a drunken stupor, I back-ended a car that was stopped for a red light.”
“Were there any casualties?”
“The two in the back seat were crushed to death.”
“My God!” the priest blurted. “Were you hurt?”
“The airbag saved me, but I lost my license for two years.”
“You are supposed to start with the serious sins first. You seem to be going in the opposite direction. Is that it?”
“I’m sorry, Father. There’s more. It’s really been much more than a year since my last confession, and I’m a bit rusty.”
“You do feel sorry for your sins and have come to me seeking absolution?”
The stranger thought about the phrase “the pot calling the kettle black” and the hypocrisy of the monster in the next compartment passing judgment on his sins. “Absolutely. I can’t live with myself any longer.”
The priest sighed deeply and said, “Continue.”
“I have been unfaithful to my wife.”
“How did you meet this person?”
“It was a man I met at rehab.”
“A man?”
“Yes, Father. I’m a homosexual.”
“When did you discover this?” the priest asked as he thought of the delicious roast beef and potatoes that would be cold by the time he sat down to the dinner table.
“I was about eleven when my father made his first move on me.”
“Your father?”
“Well, I think it was my real father, but it is difficult to say for sure. My mother fooled around a lot when my father was out of town. He was a truck driver.”
“Why did you marry a woman if you are not heterosexual?”
The stranger paused to concoct a plausible response. “I promised my mother I’d have a child so she could be a grandmother.”
The priest scratched at his temple and thought about the apple pie he was sure to miss. This man was a serious sinner and desperately needed help if he really did seek salvation.
“Have you been to counseling?”
“Many times.”
“When was this?”
“It was when I was serving time in Rahway.”
The priest thought he heard a chuckle from the man in the booth, which seemed bizarre considering the nature of his confession. The interior of the church had become dark, and he suddenly remembered he hadn’t switched on the lights at the appropriate time due to the stranger’s sudden appearance.
Excusing himself, the priest opened the door of the confessional and peered out into the church. The only lights were the votive candles flickering in the distance and those of the confessional.
He saw the full moon shining through the skylight in the ceiling high above the altar. He raced across the aisle and snapped on the lights. Instantly, four statues of Jesus and Mary were illuminated on both sides of the altar and at the corners of the church near the entrance. The stained-glass windows were ablaze with beautiful and awe-inspiring tapestries of heavenly landscapes. He smiled and returned to the confessional.
“I apologize for the interruption. I forgot to turn on the lights when the sun went down, as I was so enthralled by your confession. You say you were in prison?”
“I was just getting to that part.”
“What were you in for?”
“Child pornography.”
The priest groaned under his breath at this reply and tried to think of something constructive to say, but the stranger responded first. “My life has been a hell on earth. I can’t help it if I get an erection when I see a man’s hairy ass. Do you think I want to be like this? It’s not my fault; I was born this way.”
“Was that another chuckle?” the priest thought. He knew the confession was bullshit. He could spot a pedophile or a gay guy a mile away. After all, he was one. He didn’t know what the man was up to, but he was getting hungrier by the minute. Nonetheless, he decided to play along. “Do you b
lame God for your homosexuality?”
“Not anymore than I do for my bloodlust.”
“Bloodlust?”
“Yes, Father. I have the overpowering desire to devour human beings when the moon is full. God is totally responsible for my condition. He made me a werewolf. It wasn’t my choice.”
“Why did you come to my door? I am a man of God.”
“When I was an altar boy, a monster like you called me into his chambers. I never forgot how I was violated, but didn’t have the courage to come forward. God answered my prayers for revenge when he let me live after being bitten by a werewolf. Now that I’ve become one myself, every full moon I quench my insatiable hunger for blood and revenge with a pedophile. I was waiting for the moon to rise when I saw the troubled young boy run from your church. God works in mysterious ways, and I’m his devoted servant, not you.”
The priest’s started to recite a litany of “Our Fathers” and “Hail Marys” as the faces of many young victims flooded his memory.
The stranger chuckled. “I was having so much fun with my false confession I committed another sin when I disobeyed what my mother taught me. She told me never to play with my food.” His voice morphed into a bloodcurdling howl that filled the church.
The priest squirmed in his chair and tried desperately to catch his breath. His teeth began to chatter as he saw the hungry eyes of the beast ogling him through the latticework. And then the hairy shape rose from its kneeling position, and he heard a snuffling sound like a bloodhound smelling the scent of prey. The stench of spoiled meat assaulted his nostrils as he shrank backward into the shadows and waited for the retribution he knew would come.
From Billy Wells
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