On the Far Side of Darkness

by R. C. Graham

  “I guess you’ve been away too long, cher,” I say aloud.

  She turns her face to mine, gives me a weak smile. “Yeah, I guess I have.” Looking at her father she greets, “Hi, Dad. I guess this is a surprise.” Her features warm, with more than a little apprehension showing.

  Mr Patterson looks back with the same expression.

  A voice emerges from inside, a woman’s voice with a slight quaver of age to it. “Jim? Are you all right? The dog just ran by and he didn’t look happy.”

  “Lilly, you’d better come see this,” he replies.

  The woman exits the house. I can see the relation between her and my love immediately. They share identical builds although her mother is stooped a little with age. Blue eyed, her face is a sweet as Diane’s despite the lines on it.

  Lilly stops, blinks in surprise. Then she smiles widely and rushes forward, arms spread. Diane hustles to meet her. A moment later they are wrapped in a warm embrace. A moment after that her father joins them.

  “Honey,” says Lilly after a quick kiss on the cheek, “it’s so good to see you. I wish you’d given us some warning though.”

  “We didn’t want to make a big fuss about it, Mom,” is my love’s reply.

  “You’re looking a little pale,” her mother says next. “Are you all right?”

  “I’m fine, Mom. I’ve never felt better in my life.”

  I manage to keep a quirk of amusement from showing at that observation.

  Lilly’s eyes focus on me. Her husband’s do as well. I stay where I am. I’m not part of the family yet.

  Diane pulls herself from her parents’ arms, steps back and takes my hand. “Mom, Dad. I’d like you to meet the man I fell in love with. Georges Belleveau.”

  “Bonsoir, Monsieur et Madame Patterson,” I say to them. “Comment-allez vous?”

  Her parents show the astonishment Diane’s announcement keeps causing. Their eyes go wide and their mouths drop a little. They hold that for a moment.

  “Is this the person that was making you so unhappy, sweetie?” Diane’s mother asks.

  “We were both responsible for that,” my love returns.

  “Yes, I am,” I overlap. Then we grin at each other.

  “I didn’t want to fall in love,” I explain then, facing her parents once more. “I’d not been a success at it in the past, and I didn’t want to hurt your daughter the way I had other people I’d been involved with. So I talked her into letting me go.”

  “And then I did something foolish.” Diane picks up the thread. “I did something to drive him away. When I came to my senses, he was gone.”

  “It took me a while before I realized my mistake,” I continue. “So I asked Diane to come to me. She did, we repaired our rift and we’ve been together ever since. I’ve never been happier.”

  “And I’m just as happy.”

  I lift her hand to my lips. Her grip tightens ever so gently.

  Her parent’s expressions lighten, lift into smiles, with a little confusion shaping their eyes. “We could tell from your e-mails and phone calls that something was going on, and there were so few of them,” Jim says. “It hurt a lot that you didn’t share. We’ve never poked into your business, always waited for you to open up. You didn’t this time. That hurt as well.”

  “I’m sorry, Dad. I didn’t understand myself what I felt and why. It was such a strange place I was in, I didn’t think anyone could help. Please forgive me.”

  “Of course, honey,” comes from Lilly. “You’ll always be our daughter.” She turns to me, steps forward and takes me in her arms. “Welcome to the family, Georges. Anyone my daughter loves, I’ll love.”

  I return the gesture with a smile. I can tell her declaration is an honest one.

  Lilly releases me and Jim steps forward, extending his hand. “Welcome, Georges. My wife speaks for me on this.” His smile is forthright. However, there is a small amount of concern in his eyes.

  I take his hand and shake it, careful to show none of my strength. “Merci,” I tell him, “I’m happy to be here.”

  “Come inside,” announces Mrs. Patterson then. “Would you like some ice tea? Or lemonade?”

  Diane steps towards me and we take each other’s hands once more. “Thanks, Mom,” she replies, “but we’re fine.”

  Jim and Lilly mirror our action. It gives me a warm feeling to see people who’ve been together that long still showing their affection. As far as I know, Diane and I are unique amongst our kind. I’ve sometimes been concerned the weight of time might be too much for us. To see her parents gives me hope.

  Diane’s mother and father turn and head for the house. “Let us show you around, Georges,” says Jim.

  “D’accord,” I tell him and we follow them.

  The Patterson’s have a lovely home. It’s well maintained and very comfortable. They show us the living room, dining room and kitchen. There’s laundry machines in a room behind the kitchen. Across a hall is a television room and Jim’s den. His room is full of books and magazines. A computer sits on a desk sits here. There is a locked gun cabinet containing a small collection of firearms, all of them meant for hunting.

  They lead us up the stairs. First is Lilly’s sewing room. The next room is my love’s bedroom.

  They’ve left it as it was when she lived here. I can see her in it. The single bed is covered by a thin comforter with lace trimming. A pillow in a case of the same design and color sits atop it. This shows her femininity. The rest of the furniture is bookcases and a desk with writing materials on it. Her so deep intellect is displayed by these items.

  I smile. I can see my lady here, what made her the person I love so dearly.

  “That’s our room at the end of the hall,” Jim tells me. “We won’t go there. That’s where the dog is hiding. I don’t think he’s used to you yet.” A small frown fills his face and he looks at us with worried curiosity. His wife shares that expression.

  “Let’s go to the living room,” is Lilly’s request then. Diane and I step into the hall and leave space for her parent’s to precede us. They head for the stairs with the two of us a couple of steps behind.

  A mournful howl cuts through the air. It spills from the master bedroom. The wavering sound contains the agony of a canine losing a loved one.

  We all start and turn our heads in the direction of the Patterson’s bedroom. Lilly’s hand jerks, hitting a glass figurine sitting on a small table. The statue topples and heads for the floor.

  Diane lunges forward and catches it before it’s a quarter of the distance to the ground. Straightening, she places it back where it had been.

  Her parents stare wide eyed at her. Their astonishment at the wondrous speed and precision their daughter showed is writ large on their faces.

  “I know how much that meant to you, Mom. I couldn’t let it break.” She smiles, with tension showing underneath.

  Jim and Lilly’s amazement fades, pulls back to a smile like Diane’s. “Thanks, honey,” returns her mom. “Let’s head to the living room. We’re going to put Georges through the third degree.” She winks at me, although her unease weakens the humor it was meant to convey

  I smile back, put a faux look of fear on my face and return the gesture. Diane chuckles, squeezes my hand. “You’re in trouble now, buddy,” she snickers.

  We go to the house’s main room, Jim and Lilly taking the large sofa, Diane and I the smaller one.

  “So what’s your story, Georges?” asks Jim.

  I tell him the almost truth. How I was born to a minor noble family in Alsace and how I grew up in my family’s villa. That’s followed by relating my parent’s insistence that I work in the local vineyards so that I wouldn’t suffer the arrogance so many of my class possess. Then my speech wanders to the tutors hired to make sure I gained the education required of me. My tale describes my moving to Paris as a young man. Finally, I talk of my travels, mostly to North America.

  I don’t tell them how long ago I was young, or the leng
th of time these events took place over.

  “Damn,” remarks Jim when I’m done. “I’ve done my own traveling, when I was in the Army. Alsace was one of the places I visited when I was posted in Germany. A lovely region. Interesting history as well.” He sighs. “That was before Diane was born, or I met Lilly.” He turns to smile at her and squeezes her hand. They look so much like Diane and I, I can’t help but smile myself.

  He turns back to me. “I have a book, A Flame Rekindled by a Georges Bellleveau.”

  I bow my head a little in acknowledgment. “Oui,” I tell him, “that’s mine.”

  “Considering it’s twenty years old, you must have been very young when you wrote it.”

  “Yes,” I reply. “Just past twenty. But I’d long had an interest in The Enlightenment. That book was the result.”

  “I liked it a lot, learned a fair bit. You had a viewpoint I wouldn’t expect from a man as young as you at the time.”

  With a shrug of my shoulders I say, “I think it’s my love of history. Often had my nose buried in a book about the past. I guess it affected my perspective.”

  Jim smiles. “I can see know why my daughter likes you so much.” A moment later his lips tighten and his eyes dart back and forth between us.

  Lilly stands. “Would you like something eat?” she asks. “It’s a little late and I could use a snack.”

  Diane and I look at the clock. It’s almost midnight. We return our attention to her parents as their daughter replies, “Thanks, Mom, but we’re okay.”

  Her mother nods. The older woman’s face holds a brittle smile. She looks at her husband to ask, “Could you help out, dear?” He agrees, rises, and they both head to the kitchen.

  Concern sharpens the corners of our eyes as We glance at each other. I squeeze her hand to reassure her and smile to let her know I’ll always be with her. We wait to see what their parents are deciding.

  I pray that this won’t be a situation where we can’t leave witnesses. That’s a thought I keep to myself.

  A radio comes on in the kitchen. It’s loud enough to obscure anything Jim and Lilly say, even to ears as sharp as ours. They talk for several minutes.

  Diane grows nervous, her free hand fidgets a little. That makes me lean over to kiss her cheek in reassurance. Her face warms, as it always does when I show my support of her.

  The radio goes off. Jim goes to the hall and down to his den. Indistinct metallic sounds follow. “Georges,” sounds his voice, “could you come here for a minute?”

  I rise, wink at Diane and head to his room. I guess I’m getting a man-to-man talk. As I reach the door I turn into it and enter the den…

  …to find myself looking down the barrel of one of Jim’s shotguns.

  “What have you done to my daughter?” he asks in a tight, quiet voice.

  I have to slam the monster down. It does not care for surprises of this type. “I did nothing that she didn’t agree to.”

  “She’s so different now,” he goes on, not seeming to hear me. His eyes are a little distant. “She moves differently, and so pale. Diane was always a self-contained girl but now she seems so…restrained. The dog is scared of her and I couldn’t believe how fast she moved when she caught Lilly’s figurine. I’ll ask again, what have you done with my daughter?”

  “Just what I said,” I reply.

  His knuckles turn white on the barrel. “Not good enough. Give me a reason not to pull this trigger.”

  There’s a rapid pattering noise and Diane is standing between me and her father. “Dad,” she states in a flat voice, “don’t. You’ll have to shoot me first.”

  Mr. Patterson’s jaw drops, the muzzle of the shotgun droops as his muscles relax. He blinks as his mind tries to grasp what he’s just seen.

  Lilly comes into the room in a rush, her face ashen with shock. She stops and then her expression matches her husband’s. After a moment she steps over to her husband and wraps her arms around him.

  “Mom, Dad,” my love tells them then, “we have to talk. Let’s go into the living room.”

  They nod. Diane reaches for me and I for her. We turn to the door. “You won’t need the shotgun, Dad. I promise.” she says as we exit.

  On arrival in the living room, we take the second sofa. We sit, hips touching, hands clasping. Her parents enter and sit themselves across from us. Their faces are studiously blank although tears twinkle in Lilly’s eyes.

  “Can Georges and I take a moment?” Diane asks.

  They nod a careful agreement.

  My love and I lean our heads close. “What can we do?” she asks.

  “Several things,” I tell her. “You know what they are.”

  Her mouth tightens. “No. I won’t kill my parents. I can’t.”

  “Then we won’t.”

  She ruminates for a second. “Could we erase their memories?”

  “Doubtful,” is my reply. “They have too many of you. I doubt we could create a lie that wouldn’t fall apart and quickly.”

  Diane gets a very bleak expression on her face. It seems to her we have no choices, and she’ll have to participate in a horrific act. One that will scar her deeply. Perhaps more than she can stand.

  That isn’t the case though.

  “How much do you trust them?” I ask then.

  “They’re my mom and dad, Georges.”

  “So we tell them. We know they can keep a secret.”

  She nods. “Fangs only,” she says. “That will be enough.”

  “Fangs only,” I agree.

  We draw apart and turn to face them once more.

  “Mom, Dad. This is what you need to know.” As she finishes I pull my lips back and extend my fangs. I know she’s doing the same.

  Lilly makes a strangled noise, buries her face in Jim’s neck and starts to weep. His face falls. No tears emerge but his eyes glisten.

  Diane releases me, gets up and walks over to them. She kneels to place a hand on their thighs. “It’s still me. I swear to God, it’s still me!”

  Lilly swallows her sobs, looks at her daughter. “Are you?” she asks. “How can you make us believe that?”

  “What would you do if you wanted me to be honest in the past, Mom? I’ll do it.”

  Diane’s mother ponders for a moment. She looks just like her daughter when her offspring is thinking. Lilly gets up and goes down the hall. In a minute she returns with a leather bound book in her hand.

  A moment’s fear tremors through me. What she holds could be dangerous to my love and I. But I keep quiet. I don’t dare interfere.

  Lilly extends the book. “Swear on this,” she says. “My daughter wouldn’t lie on this.”

  Diane turns on her knees to face her mother. She places the palm of her right hand on the tome. “I swear, Mom. I’m still me.”

  She jerks back with a pained groan as the stink of burned flesh suffuses the room.

  In a second I’m wrapping her in my arms. Together we stare at her hand. The skin is black, red streaks of flesh showing through the cracks in it. Wisps of smoke still rise from it.

  Then it begins to change. The black returns to the pale pink it was, the cracks vanish. In moments her hand is back to normal.

  A gasp sounds from both her parents.

  Diane grips me very hard. She sounds a whine of effort and her body strains against my grip.

  “Shh, cher,” I tell her. “I’m here. Hold on.”

  Her mother takes a half step towards us. I look up, give my head a little shake. She stops, drops her Bible with her face is full of misery.

  “Jim,” I say then, speaking quickly, “go to our vehicle. There’s a fridge in the back. Bring three. Hurry!” My voice places a heavy emphasis on the last word.

  He’s goes without a word, moving with a speed and grace that belies his age and size. In barely a minute he’s back.

  Extending my arm, keeping a tight grip on my love I say, “Give me one.” He places a blood bag in my hand and I bring it to Diane’s mouth. With a
convulsive movement she sinks her fangs in it.

  “Gently, mignonne,” I tell her. “Don’t waste any.”

  She sucks at it with a voracious strength, showing how close to starvation she is. Her throat works, drawing the sustaining fluid into her stomach.

  I squeeze the bag as she drains it to make sure she gets every drop. As she finishes it I reach to Jim for another. He gives me one, I offer it to Diane and she starts to feed again.

  She’s not as hungry now, so emptying this bag takes more time. Her body relaxes so I loosen my hold.

  The third bag she takes her time consuming. When done, she turns her head to peck at my cheek. “Thank you, love,” she says.

  I take her lips in mine and we share that deep kiss. Then I release her, move back and nod my head at her parents.

  At once they kneel and embrace her. “I’m so sorry, honey,” her mother blubbers. “I didn’t mean to hurt you like that.”

  “I know, Mom,” is the reply. “I’m as surprised as you.”

  I let them hold there for several minutes. It’s good to let them be. It will help rebuild the bond nearly broken by our revelation.

  “We have to finish our talk,” I say finally. “We’ll need the rest of the night.”

  They draw apart and we take our previous positions.

  “Convinced now, Mom?”

  Her mother gives her a smile flavored with shock. “I am. You always did the right thing no matter how much it hurt.” Lilly looks at me, her eyes and lips slit with anger. “Why didn’t you warn us?”

  “Because what happened is a very unusual phenomena,” I tell her.

  Lilly’s anger fades. Both her parents frown with confusion.

  “You have faith, Lilly. Not just belief, faith. You know without proof that the power behind the words in that book exists. You have no doubt of it.

  “So, in your hands, the book becomes a focus of that power. Diane and I come from a different power. Thus the power of the book hurts us.

  “I didn’t know you well enough to be aware of that. I’m sorry. What happened is my fault.”

  Her parents smile again. “Forgiven, Georges,” Lilly tells me. “It did prove she’s still my daughter. As I said she always did the right thing no matter what the consequences. I don’t understand how He works but anything else wouldn’t have convinced me.”