Do you ever wake up and the next thing you know you’re at work getting a cup of coffee? You don’t remember getting out of bed and dressed or showering or driving to the office but there you are at work anyway. Sometimes in life if you do something the same way so many times that it’s possible for you just to go on auto-pilot. It’s weird, but no one freaks out about it. We should really freak out about it. It’s insane when you think about what’s actually happened.
Next thing I knew everyone was leaving and I was sitting at my desk. I had been working for hours without realizing it. My mind was swimming, drowning in monster thoughts, and the rest of my body went on doing my dumb job like it was fine. It’s depressing when you stop and realize what that is. We program ourselves to be so used to all this stupid shit we get paid to do that we can do it without even being aware.
Fred wasn’t at his desk. He didn’t come back after our little chat. Maybe because he was avoiding me. Maybe because he had work to do. He’s always going out in the field because the sales staff can’t do the simplest things with technology on their own. He complains about it all the time. Maybe those are the people he nightmare attacks. People have nightmares all the time anyway. Does that make it okay? I’ll never tell.
I was so out of it that I sat at my desk typing away as everyone else left. Well, not everyone. I usually have a good radar for when Duke is creeping around behind me. This time I didn’t notice him until I heard him sniffing at me, accompanied by a smack lip sound like he was tasting the air. Normally I always stand up when he comes into my cube so he doesn’t loom over me. This time I just swiveled around dully in my chair.
“Did you still want to talk about my Q12 Duke?”
He inhaled again deeply and then jabbed a finger in my direction, somehow his finger seemed longer than normal, like it might stretch out and touch me “I knew there was something special about to Ela. I could taste it. I’ve never met someone like you.”
His voice seemed different. He always talked with confidence, but it was the bullshit confidence of a bullshit artist. The kind of bullshit confidence act that only dullards and little kids buy into. And women drunk off their asses at bars. But only if they’re really drunk. Or mad at their boyfriend. This was different, he seemed imbued with a real air or authority, of command. He seemed like a man among men instead of a yapping dog amongst turds.
“Uh, what are we talking about?”
He grinned, his grin was still cheesy as hell “Oh, let’s not play that game Ela. You know about me, I know about you, it’s all out in the open now. We can talk freely. Isn’t it wonderful?”
I looked around “So the sunlight doesn’t hurt you then?”
He laughed “Sunlight? Why would that hurt me? Didn’t you see Twilight Ela? Sunlight just makes us sparkle with pretty lights. You and I, we’re just like Edward and Bella aren’t we? Your name is almost Bella isn’t it? I love that scene when she finds out.” He lowered his voice to a rasp “Say it.”
“I never saw that movie, what are you talking about?”
He put his hands on the arms of my chair, his face just inches from mine, his smile seemed to grow wider, too wide for a human mouth “What indeed.”
I tried to push him away but he didn’t move. He looks like he weighs 80 pounds but he was unmoving, like I was trying to push on the side of the building. “I like you Ela. Here’s what I’m going to do for you because I like you so much. Next time you fall asleep, that’s when I’m going to kill you. That way you won’t be afraid. No screaming. No running. No pain. You might wake up at some point, after a fashion, I’m told that the initial sensation is very cold, like water is being injected into your veins. But after that, you won’t feel much. It might feel like you’re getting drunk, then nothing.”
He chuckled dryly “Do you know how much blood is in a human body Ela? Around seven percent of your body weight is blood. How much to you weigh? I know it’s not polite to ask a woman that question, sorry. Seven percent, sometimes there’s more than two hundred ounces. Can you imagine drinking that, two hundred ounces at once Ela? Through a little hole in a neck no less? It takes hours and hours. But I’m going to do it for you Ela, I’m going to take it all from you. You deserve nothing less. You’re special. I wonder what you’ll be like. Bitter? Sweet? We’ll find out next time you sleep. Together.”
I started to say something, I don’t even know what, but my words fell away when his tongue came out. I guess it was a tongue, it came out of his mouth anyway, it wasn’t like a human tongue. It was more like a two foot long mauve centipede with no legs, there was even a head-like thing with pincer on the end. It groped through the air like a blind cave snake.
I’d like to tell you that I grabbed it or smacked it away from me and said something witty and then kicked him in the dick and escaped. I’d like to be able to tell you that. Instead I sat there, petrified, as he ran that tongue-thing all over my body. I couldn’t do anything, I couldn’t say anything. I’d like to tell you that I was hypnotized, that he used some kind of vampire power on me. He didn’t. I was just scared. Too scared to do anything.
The next thing I knew he was normal looking again and standing by the door with his stupid briefcase in his hand. He winked before heading out the door and turning out the lights, leaving me sitting in the dark illuminated by the ugly glow of my computer screen.
I had my phone out faster than a tween who . . . something, something TikTok. Is TikToj still something the kids do? Are the kids still doing TikTok? Are they on to something else now? Clubhouse? Caffeine? Scrunt? Qwonkerbelle? Slabbishnet? FlurP?
Fred answer on the first ring “I thought you might be calling, I . . .”
For some reason I was hiss-whispering, I think it’s hard to speak at full volume naturally in the dark “Duke is going to kill me!”
“Uh . . . I mean, I know why you might think that Ela but . . .”
I looked around over the cube wall, like Duke might be hiding in the shadows “Think my ass! He just fucking told me he was going to kill me. He said the next time I fall asleep he’s going to drink all the blood in my body. He said it right before he finger-banged me with his giant purple penis-tongue!”
“Uh, okay, it was a finger, a tongue, and a penis? That’s uh . . . that’s something alright.”
I was half standing half crouching for no reason “That’s all you have to fucking say me to!”
“Look, I’m sure he was just trying to scare you Ela.”
I had the urge to throw something “It fucking worked! I am very fucking scared! So what do I do? Stake through the heart? Does that work? Sunlight doesn’t obviously. Isn’t there something with garlic or holy water?”
“What are you talking about?”
“How do I kill him before he kills me?!”
“I . . . . I wouldn’t. . . . you know, let’s not do anything rash here.”
I almost dropped the phone I was shaking so much “What the fuck are you talking about? My life is on the line here! You were just all over my ass about a dying declaration of friendship, well this is it buddy boy, we’re friends and I’m in trouble, time to step up! What do I need to do? Isn’t there something about a crucifix? Is the crucifix supposed to be the stake? He mentioned that Twilight movie, how did they kill vampires in that?”
He was quiet for a heart-draining moment “Look Ela, I can’t . . . we don’t . . . we don’t fight each other. We don’t interfere you know? We have enough problems . . . it’s like prison, you don’t get involved in other people’s business.”
I sat back down heavily, almost spinning out of my office chair “Are you fucking kidding me?”
He sighed, like my impending death was really ruining his night “I can’t help you Ela, but I know someone who can.”
Rocket Cat 