Count On Me

by Abigail Graham

  The same when I put on a pair of shoes. I don’t bother with socks and put on a beaten old pair of Chuck Taylors. The canvas on my skin and the rubber cap as I wriggle my toes feel oddly familiar, and I feel the corners of my lips curling up.

  Part of me wonders whose clothes these are. I’m not sure I want to know the answer.

  Nothing to do now. I sit on the bed and I wait.

  At least he knocks first.

  “Christine? Are you decent?”

  “No, but I’m dressed.”

  I trail off as I say the words. I don’t know where that came from, either. A gin flashes on his face but fades as I gaze back at in him with a dull, annoyed look on my face.

  He walks in and hands me a plastic cooler. I open it and there’s a blood pack inside, sitting in crushed ice. He doesn’t say anything and I don’t ask, I just gulp it down and fight through the nausea, hating him for watching me go through this.

  He reaches out to touch my shoulder. I pull away.

  “Don’t touch me.”

  Frowning, he stands, looks away, and scrubs at his eyes with his thumb and finger, before dropping into the chair next to the old hearth.

  Folding my legs under myself I wait and stare at him as he rests a legal pad on his lap and pulls a pen from his pocket.

  “Oh my God,” I say. “Please don’t tell me this is an interview.”

  He smirks.

  “Call it an interrogation.”

  “I don’t want to answer any questions.”

  “I didn’t ask if you want to. You’re in my home and a guest. You’re obligated to pay me back for the food I just gave you.”

  The collar pulses around my throat and I gaze down at the floor. Then I look up.

  He knows things. He could tell me…

  “What am I?”

  He shifts in the seat. “What makes you ask?”

  “You know about this stuff. You kept me in that thing and made this,” I touch the collar. “You woke me up in the daytime. You must know. What am I? Why am I like this? Why did this happen to me?”

  “Some of that I can tell you. Some of it we can work out if you talk to me.”

  I sigh.

  “We’ll make a deal. You answer my questions, and each time I’ll answer one of yours.”

  I smirk, just a little. “Quid pro quo, yes or no?”

  His expression brightens for a bare instant, before his face goes neutral again. “I suppose.”

  “Fine,” I say. “What do you want to know?”

  “The earliest thing you remember. You can lie down if you like.”

  I turn on the bed and spread out, propping my head on my hands, but all I can do is shrug. “I can’t really remember. Sometimes I think I remember my first real memory, but there’s always something else.”

  “I want you to reach back, as far back as you can.”

  “I was in a hole. I dug myself out and I was covered in dirt and there was blood in my mouth. I think somebody buried me.”

  “Where?”

  “I’m not sure. The desert, maybe.”

  “How did you get away from there?”

  I shake my head.

  “Can’t remember that, either.”

  He sighs and shifts in the seat and scribbles down some notes. I can hear the graphite scratching across the paper. It sounds like a bug trapped in a wall.

  “You have a peculiar hunting strategy.”

  I arch my eyebrow. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Why bars?”

  “I have my reasons.”

  “Illuminate me.”

  I sigh. “Fine. I only kill people that deserve it.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “I don’t know how it works,” I say, with a little shrug. “I look people in the eye and things happen. I can feel things, hear things, sometimes see things. If I stare into their eyes they kind of glaze over and just do what I want. I don’t know how or why.”

  “So you read your prey’s mind before you take them.”

  “I don’t take them. They take me. I give them every chance. They don’t have to drug me or buy me enough booze to get black out drunk. They don’t have to take me home. They don’t have to…” I trail off.

  “Do what?”

  “One guy was different. He was worse than I thought. Worked in a funeral home. He was planning something. He liked to play with the corpses, but you don’t get very many pretty young corpses, do you? Not fresh, clean, intact ones.” I stifle a little laugh. “Hilarious, isn’t it? The necrophiliac and the vamp… whatever I am. Like a cheesy romance novel.”

  “What happened?”

  “I gave him a chance even though I caught a glimpse of what he was planning to do. He hit me on the back of the head with a tire iron. I guess he didn’t want to mess up my face.”

  “You killed him.”

  “Yes. Yes, I killed him. I dragged him into the bathroom,” my voice rises, “and I took the sharp end of the tire iron and I rammed it into his gut, and I did it over and over and over and over again until he stopped screaming. I didn’t even feed off of him. I didn’t want to swallow that. I left the apartment that night. I don’t know what’s worse,” I’m shouting now, “that there are people like that or that none of the neighbors heard or cared about him begging for help. I watch the news, I read newspapers when I can. I never saw any reports about a man stabbed to death with a tire iron in the bathtub. I never saw any sign that anyone even found him. Somebody just disappears from the world, and nobody cares.”

  He waits, while I unclench my fists.

  “So why the bars?”

  “I don’t know. What does it matter?”

  “If you’re hunting for predators, you could go lots of places. Parks in the middle of the night. Dark alleys. The bad part of whatever town you’ve been holed up in. You always go to these upscale places, though. Fancy bars in gentrified parts of town.”

  I look over at him and narrow my eyes. “You know a lot of details.”

  “Yes. I do.”

  “How long have you been following me?”

  “A long time. I’ve been watching you for a while.”

  “Why?”

  He sighs softly and scribbles something in that damn notebook. “I’m afraid that’s two questions. You have to tell me more.”

  I grit my teeth. “Fine.”

  “You always do it the same way. You order a screwdriver and sit at the bar, waiting for a man to approach you. Why?”

  “I told you, I don’t know.”

  His impatience is palpable. He crosses his leg, resting his ankle across his knee, and his foot inscribes a circle in the air. After a few seconds I realize I’m staring at his foot, like I’m trying to figure it out.

  He’s wearing boat shoes and wool socks. I don’t know why I notice the detail, but I do. My eye moves to his hands as he writes in his notebook. There’s something off about that, too. He keeps it pointed so I can’t see the pages. I watch the pencil move, and then it catches my eye. There’s a ring on his left hand. A cheap costume jewelry ring, something a kid might wear.

  “Did something happen to you in a bar?”

  I’m not really paying attention when he says it. I feel the words, somehow, before I feel them. They sink in past my clammy dead skin and settle inside and I answer him before I even get a chance to think about it.

  “Yes.”

  “Tell me.”

  No. No, I don’t want to remember that.

  “I can’t.”

  “You can. What happened in the bar? Where was it?”

  “I don’t remember.”

  He shifts in the seat and I catch a hint of frustration in his voice. I clap my hands over my ears to drown it out.

  “Yes, you do.”

  The notebook claps closed and he rests it on the side table and places the pencil on top, so it settles in the little channel that runs along the spine. I watch it wobble, and the familiarity of it makes me aware of the dull sti
llness in my chest where my beating heart is supposed to be. That’s the funny thing about souls. You don’t know what it feels like to have one until you don’t have it anymore. He looms over me and I shrink back on the bed.

  “Tell me.”

  “What if I don’t?”

  He sighs.

  “You’ll understand why I’m doing this. I swear.”

  His voice is so heavy with genuine apology I almost believe he doesn’t mean to hurt me. If he’s acting he’s good. He sells the look of compassion he gives me.

  He doesn’t speak, but his eye twitches, and the collar closes around my throat. I claw at it and writhe on the bed, kicking my feet out as he seizes my arms and forces me down, a blank expression on his face. When he cups my head in his hand my instinct is to sink my teeth into his palm but the collar only tightens more and I go rigid, the agony of it crushing me to stillness.

  His thumb brushes between my eyes, rubbing the bridge of my nose, a little higher. His touch is strangely tender, but all I feel is pressure, not even the warmth of his hand. He rubs at that spot between my eyes and murmurs, “memoriae”.

  Then he pulls back. The collar loosens, but that doesn’t matter anymore. Something cold and liquid is moving around in my head. I can feel it, like a sinus headache with a mind of its own.

  “Please,” I whimper, “don’t make me tell.”

  In spite of everything he’s just done his touch as he brushes the hair out of my eyes and holds me still is firm but gentle. Some dull unremembered part of me wants to curl up and put my head on his lap, wants to feel his fingers on my skin. I can smell him.

  I know that scent.

  “Shhh. Close your eyes.”

  I press them shut.

  “Lie back and don’t fight it. Tell me what you remember.”

  My voice catches as I struggle for a breath that never comes. I hate this, hate this, hate this. I hate my body, I hate the world, I hate him.

  “Tell me, Christine. Tell me how it happened.”

  I swallow, by my throat is still dry. My voice is thin and reedy and I feel a boiling mass of shame and revulsion when I give voice to the words that haunt me when I close my eyes to flee the sun.

  “A man sat down next to me at the bar. He said ‘this is what’s going to happen…’”

  3

  Andi punched me in the shoulder.

  She was my best friend, ever. Since kindergarten we were absolutely inseparable. It only made sense that she would be with me on the Vegas trip. Andi was tall, and had long red-gold hair. I felt out of place with her, being short and shy and hiding behind my long dark tresses. I was not a party animal. I was not a party creature of any variety.

  The world was wide open with promise. We left from Philly International in the dark and landed in Las Vegas in the light. The sky was so bright, so blue, I can’t believe there could ever be so vibrant a color. There was not a cloud to break it up, only the blinding glare of the sun, commanding even in the autumn. I had to put on my sunglasses when we stepped off the plane or be blinded.

  It was hot, too. The sun hammered the windows of the bus as we rode to get the rental car. I just wanted a nap after eleven hours on two different planes and a stopover in Minneapolis, but Andi was so excited you’d think this was her trip.

  She was like a big kid, bouncing up and down in her seat until the bus stopped and we all stepped down so the driver could hand off our bags. Andi tipped him a twenty and a flirtatious wink and strutted into the rental car building. All the rental agencies at McCarran operate out of one huge garage. Her enthusiasm was dampened somewhat by the line at the rental counter, even though we already had a reservation.

  “I need a nap,” I yawned.

  “Nap?” Andi laughed. “Nap? Girl, we’re only here for two nights. We have to make the best of it.”

  Two more days. We would be back in Philly late Friday night, and then the big day.

  Something was happening, something important and I was more interested in that than I was this stupid vacation. I resented her for dragging me here when I had something bigger coming up, something I’d been looking forward to for years.

  I was so excited and nervous about that, it made Las Vegas a foggy dreamworld. Yes, even the rental car counter. Andi slipped the attendant a twenty and he looked at it in confusion but pocketed it anyway, and checked us in. The sky was blue and beautiful and the heat kissed my skin when we went outside to pick out a car, but I wanted to go home. This vacation was something to be suffered through. An obligation.

  I looked at Andi and tried to make myself feel better about this. We were like sisters. When her mother left her father and left Andi too, she practically moved into my house.

  When I saw how happy Andi was, my frustration faded. Pretty soon we would drift apart as we started our new lives. She would be moving. Andi was engaged to an engineer and they were heading out to Silicon Valley for his job in a few weeks, but she delayed as long as she could manage for my big day.

  That was the other side of the coin. My youth was ending. I was willingly giving it up for the future’s sake and it put butterflies in my stomach. I was so distracted I just stood there until Andi poked my shoulder again and I tossed my bags in the trunk of the Mustang she picked out, a gaudy red convertible.

  “As your attorney,” Andi chirped, “I advise you to rent something fast and red with no top.”

  Ah, the Fear and Loathing references had started. I rolled my eyes and got in. Andi put the top down immediately and pulled out of the garage, into the blinding sun, her hair streaming out behind her.

  It was somebody’s poor decision to put the famous Welcome sign past the airport, so all I saw of it heading into town was the back, the part that says Drive Carefully.

  The sky was huge. I just kept staring up, marveling at the blue as much as the buildings. I lived most of my life in a city, so I was used to tall buildings, but the sheer mass of the Strip casinos was unbelievable. The Luxor was across from the airport, gleaming black and ominous in the sunlight, its pyramid shape a blade of gleaming onyx.

  There were fake statues and fake Venetian villas and sidewalks twice as wide as I was used to, and all of it teeming with people. People in suits, people in shorts, hawaiian shirts and dudebros in polos and a guy in a foam rubber suit that looked like a cartoony Michael Jackson and had to be as hot as hell.

  People paid other people to take pictures for them or with them and people shouting and handing out papers advertising strip clubs and escorts. Andi honked the horn as a billboard bearing a half naked woman rolled by us in the next lane over, drawn by a beaten-down pickup truck.

  A Jeep full of boys our age hooted and hollered and I had to grab Andi’s arm to keep her from flashing them.

  “Oh, calm down,” she shouted, waving at them as the light turned and we started moving.

  “We’ll get arrested.”

  “B-b-but Andi,” she whimpered, mocking me, “We might get in trouble.”

  “Andi,” I groaned.

  “Baby, what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas. This is your last forty-eight hours of freedom. We are going to enjoy it.”

  “Let’s just get to the hotel alive, okay?”

  “Pussy,” Andi snorted, and floored it.

  For a few feet, anyway. Traffic was deadlocked, between the sheer volume of cars and all the people crossing the street at the intersections. It took us an hour to drive about five miles, from the airport to downtown. Freemont Street, the other section of town devoted to tourists and gambling. Primarily, I mean. There were slot machines in the airport. The whole place was devoted to gambling.

  Looking around, I didn’t feel like we were in a den of iniquity. It felt like any other city, even with all the surreal sights like a fake Eiffel tower and a fake Statue of Liberty and the Stratosphere, a giant tower hefting a flying saucer far into the sky. I craned my neck to stare up at it as we passed under, and wondered why we weren’t staying there. Andi planned all this. I just hoped she
knew what she was doing.

  The bizarre part was the section of town we drove through next. The huge casinos, bright lights and glamor all just disappeared, and it looked like any other low-rise urban sprawl. It looked like a nice town, at least in daylight. Finally Andi turned off and pulled up to the valet parking at the hotel.

  Our place was at the far end of Freemont Street, next to the gigantic Golden Nugget. It was a smaller hotel, called the Freemont Star. The valets helped us with our bags, paying particular attention to Andi. She bathed in the attention, strutting around and thrusting out her chest.

  I wanted to hide behind my ring. She gave them a tip, I guess to park the car close to the door so we could get it ourselves. Then we checked in, and again Andi greased the clerk at the counter. I was starting to think she had a stack of bills dedicated to passing out to random people.

  I’d never been in a casino before. I was just barely old enough. While Andi and Kelly (who’s Kelly?) bantered with the lady at the counter, I wandered over and stared out at the casino floor. Every surface either had a flashing colored light or was brightly polished to bounce the lights around the room. There was so much motion.

  Moving lights, moving people, dice flying through the air, roulette wheels turning. It was a little intoxicating, even if it did make me want to curl up in the hotel room with a book. I couldn’t believe I’d agreed to this. Crowds and places like this were never my cup of tea, but it was important to Andi. I stood there and wished I could turn time forward and get home for my big day. I couldn’t think about anything else. Andi tapped me on the shoulder.

  “Come on. I got us a great room.”

  I sighed. I wanted my room at home.

  “Cheer up!”

  Fine. I rode the elevator in sullen silence. My phone beeped and before I could check the text, Andi snatched it out of my hand.

  “Hey!”

  “I answered him and I told him it was me, relax. This is your last forty-seven hours of freedom. I’m keeping count. You’re off the leash until we get back.”

  “Andi, give me my phone.”

  She turned up her nose. “Nope.”

  I sighed, and the elevator door opened. The place was super plush, and I wondered how Andi was able to afford this. The room was incredible. There was a sitting room as big as a regular hotel room, a kitchen and a huge bedroom with a hot tub and giant, floor to ceiling windows showing a spectacular, two angle view of the strip and Freemont Street. There was a big metal superstructure over the street itself, which was closed to cars for pedestrian traffic.