Page 122 of Blood Lovers

Where am I?

A sign for a scenic overlook flashes by and then up ahead I can see the pullout. Needing time, I pull the truck into it, park on the side of the highway, and just sit with my forehead on the steering wheel as I play back what happened in the conservatory.

Cars and trucks are passing by, making my truck rock. I squint at the sign where I’ve pulled over. A scenic route I’m familiar with. I’m not that far from home.

Home.

Paul’s place is not home. Not the one I had, nor the one I have.

A sharp pain shoots through my temple and with it comes a flashing image. A woman. Not Syrsee, because she’s too small and slight. Syrsee is tall and curvy. But this woman shares some features with her. The eyes, for one. Green. Like a witch’s. Like Lucia’s.

Lucia.

Paul.

Blood.

Syrsee.

What the fuck happened back there? I drank her. She’s the Black witch I’ve been hunting. She’s been feeding me. I’m dying.

That’s what Paul said. He said I’m dying.

And maybe I am. The heat is not normal. But I’ve been hot like this for so long now, I’ve just gotten used to it.

The highway is covered in snow and even though it’s barely noon, the clouds above me are thick, and gray, making the early afternoon feel more like evening with a threat of a coming storm.

What are you doing, Ryet? What are you doing?

I don’t know. That’s why I have to ask. I don’t know what’s happening, I don’t want to go, I don’t know what to do, and I’m tired. I’m just tired of all of it.

I lift my head up off the steering wheel and look over to my right at a very dramatic sky. The clouds are rolling now, almost churning. Like special effects in a horror movie.

And why not? My life might as well be a horror movie. Death. Blood. Remote location. The monster. Who will make it out? I guess that’s the only unknown variable.

I don’t think it’s gonna be me. It’s gonna be Paul. It’s always Paul. He makes it when no one else does. I’m gonna die, and Syrsee’s gonna die, and—

Movement just outside my field of vision disrupts my thoughts, making me turn my head. An RV is pulling into the scenic overlook behind me. I sit back in my seat and watch from the rearview mirror as a family spills out: a couple of kids who probably aren’t even school age, their puffy jackets making them look much bigger than they are as they point their phones to take pictures; then a woman holding a baby so bundled up, I can’t even see it; finally a man, who must be the father, wearing a ski jacket and a matching knit beanie.

They go over to the iron fence that separates the parking area from a long drop over a steep cliff and both of the little kids put their feet on the bottom rail, trying to look down. Even through my closed windows I can hear their excitement and before I know what’s happening, I’m smiling.

I had kids once. I know that much.

Jane and little baby Susan. But there were more kids. Two more. In fact… I turn in my seat so I can see them better.

Yes. That was me. That man was me once upon a time. Before the Darkness took over my life. Before Paul made me his. I was that man. I wasn’t planning on buying an RV—we called them trailers back then—but we were gonna buy a boat. I feel these things in my heart.

We weren’t rich, or even middle-class, but we weren’t poor anymore. I was…

A wave of images floats through my brain. A garage, the smell of oil and transmission fluid, and old cars. Those beautiful old cars that came in all kinds of happy colors, like Easter eggs.

Tools replace the garage and I see my own hands picking them up.

I was a mechanic. And I had a wife and three kids.

Then I see stained glass and in that same moment I hear singing.

But it’s not in my head, it’s the kids outside my truck. They are singing a church song. Something all little kids sing.