Wicked Winters: A Collection of Winter Tales

by Lucy Smoke

  “You dream?”

  “Vampires do dream, yes.”

  He yawned, and she knew they had reached the end of his energy level. “What was the dream?”

  “We were together, in Poland, when I was human. We were married. Part of it was very sexual, and then it changed, you know, how dreams can.”

  He leaned into his pillow. “You had a sex dream about me, and I’m too damn tired to hear about it. That seems so unfair.”

  “I’ll tell you about it next time we’re in bed together.”

  “That’s a deal.”

  Kissing her once more on the nose, he closed his eyes. Ruth lay in the darkness next to him, listening to him breathe. If she had been his Hanukkah gift, he had been hers and tonight would sustain her through eternity.

  Ben opened his eyes to the sight of his grandmother standing over his bed. “Grandma? What time is it?”

  He looked to his left, not surprised but still disappointed to find Ruthie gone. Not like he could blame her. She had told him she had to leave. Still, he’d fallen asleep with a gorgeous brunette in his arms. It would have been nice to wake up that way.

  “It’s after ten. We were worried about you.”

  He sat up. “I’m okay.”

  “No.” She shook her head as she sat on the edge of the bed. “You’re not. Everyone acts like I don’t know what’s going on, and I let them because I’m a selfish old woman.”

  “Grandma…”

  She held up her hand. “No, let me finish. I have to tell you, Benja.” Her voice broke, and Ben wished he could die right that second. He never, ever wanted to see her this way. “That it has been such a blessing to my old heart to have you with us this holiday.” She moved over and kissed him on top of the head, smelling, as she always had, of baby powder. “The problem with your heart is that it wasn’t prepared for how deeply you feel things. You always loved harder than everyone else. It just can’t keep up.”

  He sniffed as a tear fell down his cheek. “What should I tell Grandpa if there turns out to be an afterlife and I run into him?”

  “You won’t have to tell him anything. He already knows.” She stood up. “Can you come downstairs?”

  He thought about it for a second. “I think I can.”

  Minutes later, he walked down the stairs basically fully dressed, except for his lack of shoes. He’d left them somewhere, and he couldn’t find them. Shrugging, he was glad his grandmother’s house was carpeted, even if it was green shag.

  “What are we all up to this fine morning?”

  Jenny laughed and stood up. “Mom and Rob are talking to the weirdo vampire hunter. He’s telling them his plans for the day.”

  Ben’s insides went cold, and he cleared his throat. “Oh yeah? What’s he doing?”

  “He’s going to some old graveyard on the other side of town, and he’s going to set fire to it. Rob is reminding him that arson in a crime. If he can’t persuade him, we’re going to call the cops.”

  The man was going to try to burn up Ruthie? Ben’s already strained heart beat hard in his chest. For the first time in years, he ignored it. Moving as fast as he could, he went to the door. His mother and Rob stood alone on the front porch.

  Rob swore. “I don’t know if I talked him out of it or not.”

  Ben’s mother shook her head. “All of that property damage to people’s graves. It’s a nightmare.”

  There was no way Ben could stand around and wait until nightfall to find out if Ruthie was dead. He shook his head as he carried on his own personal conversation.

  “Mom,” he interrupted. “Go call the police.”

  Turning around, he nearly collided with Jenny. “Sis, would you and Rob do something for me? Even if it seems crazy? Call it your dying brother’s weird last wish.”

  “Um…” Jenny shrugged. “Okay with me. Rob?”

  Rob patted him on the back. “What do you need?”

  “I need you to go to the basement and get Grandpa’s old World War II trunk. The one with the lock. The big, long one. Bring it up here. Jenny, go start your car.” He paused, surprised by just how out of breath he was just from talking. “Please.”

  They both looked at each other before acquiescing to his demand. It didn’t matter if they thought him crazy. He couldn’t wait on the police’s attempt at finding the guy who may or may not want to burn down a graveyard.

  Rob stumbled up the stairs, dragging the awkward trunk behind him. Ben pointed at the car. “Put it in the car, please.”

  Following his silent but he suspected confused brother-in-law out of the house, he climbed into the front seat of Jenny’s hybrid car. Rob climbed in the back. “Where are we going?”

  He looked at his sister. “The graveyard.”

  She shook her head. “Are you crazy? Ben you can’t go running around a graveyard.”

  Rob interrupted. “If that’s what Ben wants to do today, then that’s what we’ll do.”

  His brother-in-law sat back in his seat. Ben knew when Jenny married him that it had been a smart move on his sister’s part. Rob was a great guy.

  “Drive, Jenny, please.”

  “Look, it’s not that I don’t want to help you. Maybe if you could just explain to me why we’re going there, I might feel better about doing this.”

  Rob interrupted. “Jen…”

  Ben spoke over him. “Do you know what the worst part of this whole dying experience has been?” He swallowed, because he was losing his breath again. “It’s not the pain, not the fear. It’s not the fact that I sleep half the day when I’d rather be running around. No, it’s the having to depend on other people to simply do anything I want to do. I had to get someone to come to my house with a wheelchair to bring me to the damn airport. I want to go to the graveyard, and I don’t want to explain to you why. You’re my sister. Can’t you help me with this?”

  Jen was silent as she stared at the steering wheel. When she spoke, it was with a sob in her voice. “Yes, Ben, I can help you with this.”

  She backed the car out of the driveway.

  “Thank you.”

  He closed his eyes. Whatever reserves he had, he needed to save them for what he was going to do.

  Walking through the mausoleum portion of the graveyard in silence, he heard Rob dragging the trunk behind him. Jen had remained distinctly silent the whole drive over, and he wasn’t sure if he’d pissed her off or made her so sad she couldn’t speak with his dramatic speech. Either way, he was sure he owed her an apology, which he would gladly give…later.

  Finally, he saw the one he’d been looking for. Three intertwined circles, but with a line through them. He knew that meant it was a vampire safe-haven. She’d explained the symbol last night. Still, he’d worried that she’d erased it since she was currently occupying the place. The line through it must be the equivalent of ‘this place is lived in.’

  Even as he gasped for air in his overworked lungs, he smiled.

  Rob finally spoke. “Ben, is this what you’re looking for?”

  Ben nodded. “Yes. Rob would you do me one more favor and push open the door?”

  “Of the mausoleum?”

  “Yes?”

  Ben actually heard Rob gulp. “Okay.”

  Jen huffed as she put her hand on Ben’s cheek. “You look awful. This is too much. It has to stop now.”

  “Five more minutes.”

  “No, you’re practically falling over and you can’t breathe. I’m calling an ambulance.”

  “Fine.” By the time the ambulance got there, he’d have accomplished his task.

  Rob pushed open the door, and Ben walked inside. It was dark and musky, but not as stale inside as it should have been. That meant it had been opened recently. He prayed for one more gift this Hanukkah—shouldn’t he be entitled to eight?—he wanted this to be the place. Please, let it be the place where Ruthie was.

  5

  Ruth was having a delicious dream. She knew where it came from. Ben’s silly questions about whe
re she lived had somehow put the idea in her head that he might show up. It was impossible, and yet here he was, in her dream.

  “Ruthie, I need you to wake up.”

  Only his voice sounded too strained, like he couldn’t breathe correctly, and she’d certainly never picture him in a fantasy like that. Her eyes flew all the way open.

  “Ben? How are you here?” She pulled herself from the fog of rest and stood up, rubbing her face.

  “The vampire hunter…” He panted like he’d run a race. “He’s coming to burn down the graveyard. We have to get you out of here.”

  She grabbed him by his arms and held him up. His whole body glistened in sweat, and he shook in her arms. “You came here to help me? Ben, I can’t leave. The sun is shining.”

  “Rob, come here.”

  She heard footsteps and the sound of something dragging. “Ben, man, you better get up here. Jenny is freaking out. Why do you need this trunk…”

  As he rounded the corner, the predictable happened—the person speaking froze in her presence. She sighed.

  “Ben, who is this?”

  “This is Rob, my brother-in-law.” Ben bent over from the waist, even in her arms. “I think he’s, what is called…”

  “Enthralled. Yes, that’s what happens.”

  He pointed at the floor. “Get in the trunk.”

  She eyed the old trunk warily. “Ben, look at you, there is no way you’re dragging me out of here in that thing. You need to be in a hospital.”

  It took him a while to get each word out.

  “An…ambulance…is…coming…for…me.” Another pant. “Get…in…the…trunk…Rob…will…drag…you…out…of…here.”

  “Rob is enthralled. He’s not doing anything except what I tell him to do.”

  “So…tell…him…to…do…that.”

  “You’re going to the hospital. You swear it.”

  He laughed as he shook in her arms. “I…swear…it.”

  This was a nightmare. It wasn’t her own safety she was concerned about. The likelihood that some whacko could set fire to a hundred-year-old mausoleum was small indeed. The thing was pure marble, concrete, and granite. Ben had strained himself possibly past the point of recovery to try to rescue her. Now he might die right before her eyes.

  “I will get in the trunk as soon as the ambulance arrives.” She wasn’t going to leave him here alone.

  Rounding the corner, a woman in her late thirties screamed Ben’s name. Coming to a stop abruptly, she was immediately enthralled.

  “Who is that?”

  “My sister, Jenny. She’ll take care of me. I can’t relax if you don’t get in my trunk. Please.”

  Ruth gritted her teeth. “Fine.” Pulling Ben to her, she kissed him hard. “Thank you for this. You’re a hero. Did you know that? A hero to me.”

  He smiled, a wolfish grin, even as he doubled over on the floor. “I always wanted to be someone’s hero.”

  Don’t die. But she didn’t say the words aloud. She couldn’t ask him to do something he couldn’t possibly control.

  With a final glance at Ben, she smiled as she looked at Rob and Jenny. Pointing her finger at Jenny, she spoke to her first. “Take care of Ben. Help him get upstairs, get him in the ambulance.” The woman Jenny blinked twice before she grabbed Ben’s arm. Finally, Ruth regarded Rob and said the words she never thought to say in her life. “I’m going to get in that trunk. Close me in and drag me out of the cemetery.”

  Rob nodded. She felt sort of bad for the man. She wasn’t heavy but she wasn’t lightweight either, and the trunk was big and bulky. But this had been Ben’s plan, and he panted on the floor. She had to do what he wanted, regardless of how terrible it felt.

  She climbed in the trunk, and Rob pushed the lid down on top of her. Being encased in the darkness didn’t bother her. She’d lived in the night for sixty-five years and slept in cemeteries for most of that time. There was little that could actually scare her.

  Except for the thought of Ben dying in the mausoleum. Closing her eyes, she listened to the sound of his strained heart. It was all she needed to hear. Step by step, Rob dragged her farther away from Ben. It took an eternity. In the distance, but coming closer, she heard the wailing of an ambulance. In her sixty-five years she’d been dead and the twenty-two years when she’d actually walked in the sun, she didn’t think she’d ever heard a more welcoming sound than that.

  With her super hearing, she could still make out Ben’s heartbeat. Tears filled her eyes. It still beat. Banging the lid of the god-forsaken trunk, she bit down on her lip. She needed to admit it. To give it the word it deserved. She’d fallen in love with him. She shouldn’t have been able to do that. She was a vampire. Not to mention, it had been really fast. They’d only known each other three nights and now one day.

  But what did two people with their particular issues need with a lot of extra time? It just was what it was. Ben had just risked what remaining days he had left on the planet to save her, because he thought she needed rescuing. Unless he suffered from delusions-of-superhero syndrome, which she really didn’t think he did, it seemed like he was in love with her too.

  She blinked. It was so easy to admit it to herself. She loved him. God, he was dying, and she loved him.

  Rob dragged the trunk along the ground, still following the direction she had given him. Suddenly, Ben’s heartbeat stopped. She gasped and covered her mouth to stop from screaming. Had he died? Had it stopped? Or had she moved far enough away that she couldn’t hear him anymore?

  For the first time since she’d been changed to a vampire, she closed her eyes and prayed. Please, let it be that she was too far away. Please, let the ambulance get there on time.

  The trunk stopped moving, which meant Rob had brought her out of the cemetery. He’d come out of enthrallment soon and wonder what he was doing. That was fine. There was nothing more for her to do but wait for nighttime. They would be the longest hours of her life.

  Ben woke up slowly. He fought through waves of pain to get to the light in front of his eyes. He could hear the machines beeping before he could see anything, and he knew with a sense of familiarity he was in the hospital.

  For a second, he considered letting himself return to unconsciousness. His family would want to say goodbye. They would need closure. This, he was sure, would be the last trip to the hospital he ever took. Finally opening his lids, which felt like they had either been glued down or had suddenly gotten ten times heavier, he looked around the room.

  It was spacious, as far as hospital rooms went. A giant window lay on the wall to his right. If he wanted to, he could stare into the vast nothingness of the night. From his vantage point, he couldn’t even see stars, which he hated.

  Managing to turn his head to the left, he saw another window, this one displaying the hallway of the hospital floor. Doctors, nurses, and other hospital personnel rushed around under the sign that read ‘Intensive Care Unit.’

  This was it. He wasn’t coming out of the ICU this time. His gaze darted to the machines they had him hooked up to. One gave him fluids and medicine, which was fine. There was another taking his pulse, his blood pressure, his echocardiogram. All of that was acceptable. He had a legal document telling the doctors he no longer wanted any extraneous measures to keep him alive. Sighing with relief, he was glad to see his wishes were being honored.

  He knew what had to happen if he were to live—he needed another heart transplant. With his blood type, he had been lucky to get one once. There was simply no way he was getting a second heart, and he was tired, so damn tired, of waiting.

  His mother stood in the hall. She argued with a man in long white coat—presumably the doctor—about something. She’d done that every time he’d gotten really sick as a child. It was her job, he understood that, but this time, he didn’t need her to fight so hard. This time, he needed her to let go.

  Pressing the call button alerted everyone in the hall he was awake, and soon his mother, the doctor, and three
nurses stood before him. One of the nurses fiddled with his IV and then left the room while the others fluffed his pillow and checked his chart before leaving.

  “Hi, Mom.”

  Sitting down on the side of the bed, she stroked his head. “I was just telling the doctors here that you might have changed your mind. Maybe you would like more help than you’re getting.”

  He shook his head. He didn’t want to fight. “Go home. We’ll talk about it in the morning.”

  “But, Ben—”

  He interrupted, his voice strained. It was even hard for him to hear himself. “Just go home. It’s been a trying day. Go home, Mom. I love you.”

  She looked like she wanted to argue. He knew the stubborn set of her jaw—he shared the trait—but he kept his eyes steeled, telling her he wasn’t going to take any argument on the subject. She finally nodded and kissed him on the cheek, promising him she’d be back the next morning.

  As his mother left, the doctor remained staring at him from the end of the bed. “You know, you might not be here in the morning.”

  Ben smiled, even as it hurt. He always preferred when the doctors told him the truth. “I had a feeling.”

  “Then I’ll wish you goodnight, Mr. Fox.” Nodding, he smiled at Ben before he walked out of the room and into the hall.

  Ben let his thoughts drift away from his current status. Somewhere out there was a woman who could make nighttime seem like high noon. She was everything light, everything good in the world, and he’d been given four nights to know her. A movement caught his attention in the hall. Or rather, he amended, a lack of movement. Everyone seemed frozen in place.

  He sucked in what little breath he had. It had to be Ruthie. It had to be the enthrallment.

  She appeared in his vision as she passed through the hallway window. Turning to look at the people frozen in the hall, she waved her hand. “Go about your jobs. Take care of the people. You cannot see me.”