We Only Come Out At Night Page 5

  David hung his head. "Sorry. I didn't want to make trouble."

  Saul wasn't finished. "Gods! I ask a few simple things in exchange for eternal life, and what do you children do? Bung it up. How many of the old covenants do I enforce? Only the most important. Why do you think we have rules? Discipline makes us strong. If this were Old London, I'd have to take your head, or I'd lose face in front of the whole clan. Mark my words, if hunters come to burn us out at daybreak, we'll have you to thank."

  "Look, I'm sorry. I didn't think."

  "I'm aware of that."

  David winced. "Look, can I go now?"

  Saul snorted. "Go where?"

  "My room?"

  Saul waved his hand disgustedly. "Why bother asking my permission? You'll just do as you like anyway." David hung his head. I wished Saul would let up a little. I know David felt plenty bad about everything already.

  David said, "Look, I just wanted to say, I'm sorry. I love you guys." He slunk off to his room. I did the same.

  ***

  It was too early to go back to sleep, and nobody was really in the mood to talk to anybody else. Nadia, I think, was still kind of in shock from the shooting. Funny, huh? She'll rip someone's throat out and drink their blood, she's immortal, but guns still scare the hell out of her. One time she told me why, but I'm not going to go into it.

  Anyway, everyone was just kind of killing time in their rooms. I smoked a little pot, and read a Stephen King book for a little while, with the radio on low. After that I wrote some. I kind of lost track of time, so I didn't realize how late it was until I saw, through the crack of my door, David padding barefoot through the living room. Worried that he was going to take off again, I got up off my bed and went to the door. When I saw that he wasn't going to the garage, but to the roof, I didn't stop him. I guess I was curious, because I followed him. I caught the door to the stairway before it closed, and I slipped through.

  Barefoot, I snuck after David as he climbed up the three floors to the roof, around and around and around on the stairs. I rushed up to the roof door before it closed, grabbed the doorknob, and followed David onto the roof.

  It was still dark, but just barely. The first smudges of dawn were beginning to appear in the east, but the stars were still out. I mean, as much as they ever are in the city. David hopped up to sit on the ledge, the same spot where I had talked to Saul two nights ago. I moved a little closer, staying out of his field of view.

  "Hey, Paul." he said.

  I guess I wasn't as sneaky as I thought. I said, "Hey David. How you doing?" I came over to stand next to him.

  He sniffled, and I could see he had been crying. "Not so great. I guess I'm a little fucked up. I've been having a hard time."

  I said, "Yeah." Because I couldn't really think of anything else to say.

  He went on. "I mean, I just don't know what to do. Every time I try to make something better, I just fuck it up. Everything I touch turns to shit. I mean, I can't believe what I did. I loved her, I really did. Maybe that's stupid, I don't know. I barely even knew her. But I don't think I really believed in love until then. And then all of a sudden I found what everyone is always talking about, and I destroyed her. I just destroyed her. And then, when I just want to go to her, to tell her myself that I was sorry, I almost get us all killed. I'm just no damn good at this. I'm tired. What's the point, Paul? What's the fucking point?"

  I didn't know what to tell him. Really, it's a question that nags at me sometimes, too. I gave him the best answer I had. "To see what happens next?"

  He said, "That's a pretty fucking shitty point. I don't know if that's good enough." He lit a cigarette, and the cherry lit up his face.

  The sky continued to brighten. All of a sudden I figured it out, what David was doing up there. I felt stupid for not seeing it earlier. My stomach lurched. "David, It's getting pretty late. Let's go inside."

  He shook his head while he held the cigarette to his lips, taking a drag. "Nah, I'm gonna stay out a little longer. Look how pretty that is." He pointed to the horizon with his cigarette He was right, it was shaping up to be a beautiful sunrise. Pink was just beginning to bleed into the dark blue horizon.

  "David, you're scaring me. Let's go inside."

  He blew out smoke. "I don't think I want to do this anymore. I'm just tired of it. Sick and tired. I'm not having any fun, you know? What's the point if you're never having any fun?"

  "I don't know, cigarettes? What about cigarettes and pot?" I was really scared now, but I was trying to be funny.

  He smiled and stared out at the gathering sunrise. "You got me there. I will miss that."

  "Then for us. For me. Come on, man. Things are gonna get better."

  David swallowed and didn't answer me.

  "David," I said, "don't. Please. Don't talk like that. Come inside with me."

  David smiled. "Sorry."

  "You know Saul isn't really that mad with you. And things aren't as bad as he says. If they were and he was, he would have just left without you. This is all going to blow over. He's just taking precautions. Everything's going to be all right. Things will get back to normal, in some other city."

  David laughed. "Normal? You call this normal? We were a freak show even before we got made. I was half-hoping Saul would leave me, so you guys wouldn't have to know. This is kind of embarrassing, really. I almost didn't even come back. But I just wanted to apologize. I just wanted to say goodbye."

  I started to cry. I said, "David, what would I do without you? What would I do without my best friend?"

  David started crying then, too. He said, "I'm sorry. I'm just tired. Tired of everything. Tired of killing. Tired of blood. I don't want to do it anymore. I don't want to do any of it anymore. Just tell Nadia and Saul that I'm sorry."

  "David, come on. We can figure this out. You've got forever."

  "Yeah. That's the problem."

  I grabbed his elbow then, and I tried to tug him back towards the door. He resisted, hanging stubbornly onto the ledge. The morning sky glimmered. I said, "David please. Don't." I managed to pry one of his hands loose, and he bit me on the arm. I let go of him for a second, and he got a new grip.

  "You better go, or you're gonna cook too." He said it almost casually. His cigarette fell out of his mouth. He looked down at it and said, "Dammit."

  The sun was trying to spill over the horizon like water in an overfull glass. I was really about ready to give it up and run for the door. I couldn't stop him, and I really don't want to die. I think I've made up my mind about that, at least.

  So just as I'm about to let go of his elbow—at least I think I was—I feel an arm like a tree limb wrap around under my armpits. It's Saul, and I see he's put his other arm around David. He lifted us both off the ground, just as the sun spilled into the sky. Saul threw himself at the door with us tucked under both arms, and we crashed in a tangle at the foot of the stairs. My bare foot still lay in the triangle of sunshine that intruded onto the stairwell, and it started to blister before I pulled it away. It hurt like hell. Saul picked himself up and brushed dirt from himself. I stood up, and so did David.

  Saul turned to face David again, for what I thought would be a huge chewing out. Instead, he brushed dirt from David's black t-shirt, and then hugged him. He pulled back but left his hands on David's shoulders. He said, "David, I've wronged you. I've been too harsh, and I'm sorry. You've been through a great deal, and I've no right to compound your sorrow with more guilt. Come downstairs. Please." Tears still ran down David's cheeks. He looked like was about to just completely lose it. Saul turned David gently towards the stairwell.

  For a second, I thought David was just going to go downstairs. Like maybe Saul got through to him. Maybe we could just get over all this, and try to get back to normal. Then all of a sudden David breaks away, like a football player or something. He rolls away from Saul, fakes me to the left and then breaks right, runs past me, and dives. Like an end-zone slide. He sailed past the threshold and into the sun. I
reached for him even though I knew I was too late. If Saul hadn't grabbed me, I would have gone right after him.

  Sunlight. It was the first thing Saul warned us about. I knew in general what would happen, but I never saw it with my own eyes before. I didn't want to watch, but I couldn't turn away. David started to blister all over, then sizzle, then in a few seconds he caught fire. It was like the sunlight was eating him away, just peeling him back in layers. The smoke was thick and gray and greasy. David screamed and rolled around on the rooftop for what seemed like hours, though it couldn't have been more than a minute. Eventually, he stopped screaming and lay still. The fire reached his insides, burning hotter and hotter, until I could feel the heat of it even from where I stood. He burned until his body lost its shape and became a flaming pyre and the tarpaper on the roof started to catch.

  Saul loosened his hold on me, then let go once he saw that I wasn't going to go after David. He turned his face away from me then. I think I heard him sob as he fled down the stairs, muttering in Latin.

  ***

  I'm not really sure how long I stayed up there, just watching David's ashes burn down and smolder. I can't even begin to describe that feeling. It must be what it feels like to lose a limb. I guess I was in shock. I'd feel numb, and then all of a sudden it would hit me all over again. Over and over. You just want to wake up, but you can't kid yourself. It's not a dream, and it's not going to go away. I sat down on my haunches in the vestibule, my back pushed into the corner, as the tears poured in a steady stream down my face. Every time I thought I had it together enough to stand up and walk away, I'd come apart again.

  I met David in the fifth grade. If we had lived, we both would have been twenty-one now. For a lot of that time he was my only friend. He was like my brother. And then, then he went and killed himself. For some stupid reason, I kept feeling like it was my fault, like there was something I should have done, or something I should have known. Like I should have been able to help. I was his best friend. If I couldn't help, who could?

  And then after a while I got angry. I yelled at him. I screamed and beat my fists on the ground. I called him a fucking idiot, I called him an asshole. Because when you think about it, suicide is the most selfish thing you can do. It's chickenshit. It's just giving up. It's just copping out and giving in to everything, and completely fucking over all your friends and family and anyone who ever gave a shit about you, and all the people who won't ever know if they could have maybe done something else. It hurt to know he was in that much pain, but God-damn it, it just pisses me off that he didn't try harder. I mean, come on dude. Scream at me. Grab me and shake me. Punch me in the face. Just get the message through. I'd have done anything, if I'd only known. But now it's too late.

  And that's the worst part. It's too late. That's where we leave off. When I was younger, my mom made me take piano lessons for a while. The teacher once told me that if you screwed up in the middle of your song, people wouldn't remember, but if you screwed up the ending, they'd never forget. And that's what David did. I'll never be able to think about him without thinking about how it ended. Without this anger and this pain and hurt. And there's just no god-damned way to fix it. It's as broken as anything can ever be.

  I sat out there until I couldn't stand to look anymore, until nothing was left of David but ashes, drifting away on the wind.

  ***

  Saul had already told Nadia. I'm glad I didn't have to. Her door was closed, and I could hear her sobbing inside. I went to my own room. I didn't think I'd be able to sleep. But I put my head down for a second, then I opened my eyes and it was twelve hours later. I remember I was dreaming that David and Michael were both alive, and waking up just made me hurt all over again. Someone was knocking on my door. I stood up and answered. Saul, of course.

  "Paul," he said, "time to go." I suddenly found that I wasn't sad to be leaving the place behind. It felt ugly now. Haunted.

  "Can I take a shower first?"

  "You can shower when we reach Champagne. I want to get the hell out of here."

  "Okay." I didn't mind. Saul was right. We just needed to go. Saul said he was going to be down in the van, and I went to find Nadia. She was in her room. We didn't say anything to each other. I mean, what's to say? We hugged for a long time, like brother and sister. Like survivors. Finally, I said, "Hey, we've gotta go." She nodded, and we stepped away from each other.

  Our bags were already in the van from last night, so we didn't have to get anything. We just walked to the elevator, slid the door shut, and rode it down to the garage. Saul was behind the wheel, smoking a cigarette. I let Nadia have the front seat and climbed into the back, sliding the panel door shut. We drove away with only the engine and the road making any noise. Saul drove down Lagrange to the interstate, then put his foot down once we were pointed south.

  Soon we were out in the cornfields. Another perfect August night. It was a relief to get out of the city. After a while, Nadia turned the radio on low. I think it was Lou Reed, playing "Walk On The Wild Side."

  ***

  Just as we pulled into a bland little two-story motel on the outskirts of Champagne, the skies cut loose with a warm summer storm. It was a biblical rain. I mean it just came down in buckets, with midwestern thunder shaking the ground and lightning lighting up the sky. Saul walked through the downpour to the office, the rain sheeting off his leather jacket, and got us checked in. For a while I just stood out on the motel lawn and let the rain drench me while the lightning crashed and thunder rolled. It felt good, like the water might wash away…something. I don't know. Anyway, I just got wet.

  None of us really talked that night. I wondered if anything would ever get back to normal. But like I said, it never does.

  We got to our room and Saul put out the "Do Not Disturb" sign, then duct-taped the drapes shut. I got my shower, and while I was in there it occurred to me for the first time to maybe just go off on my own. Saul and Nadia, I loved them, but every time I looked at them, I thought of Michael and David, and the whole mess we had just run away from. I wondered if Saul would let me go. I decided not to worry about it right then. I'd wait and see how I felt in a week or two. Saul took a shower after me, and Nadia and I watched the motel TV. Saul volunteered to sleep on the floor, so me and Nadia got one of the double beds each.

  The storm let up right around sunrise. Like somebody shutting off a TV set, the static of raindrops just quit all at once. I was laying in bed but not yet asleep, and I watched the curtains begin to glow with sunrise. I know I've read books where vampires miss seeing the sunrises, but I don't. I don't miss them at all.

  Chapter Nine

  After that I fell asleep. Another day passed. I woke up a little while before sunset. I could still see daylight through the curtains, so I went back to sleep. I figured Saul would wake me when it was time to go.

  It was probably ten at night before I sat up and noticed that Saul wasn't there. I stood and turned on the light, then checked the bathroom. I noticed the note on the table, held down with the van keys and a stack of new hundred-dollar bills, still in the paper wrappers from the bank. I said, "Nadia, wake up."

  She rolled over and squinted at me. She never liked waking up. "What time is it?" she asked.

  I didn't quite know. I said, "I think Saul took off."

  She sat up. "What? To where?"

  To answer her, I read Saul's note out loud.

  My children:

  The time has come for us to part ways. Children must go into the world, and an old man needs his time alone. I have no doubt that you two can get along without me. The room is paid for the week. I've left you the van, and enough money to settle down someplace. Use what I have taught you and prosper. Don't ever convince yourself that you aren't living. We will meet again.

  The best of everything,

  -Saulius

  "What the hell is that supposed to mean?" said Nadia. "He just left us?"

  "Yeah, I think so." After everything else that had happened, I just co
uldn't managed to get worked up about it. I wasn't really surprised. Hell, I was thinking of doing the same thing.

  Nadia sat there and looked like she wanted to cry. She she pushed her hair back and said, "What the hell do we do now?"

  I opened the door. We were on the second floor, so I could look over the freeway from the balcony. The storm was long gone. It was another beautiful night, warm and humid.

  She asked again, "Paul, what are we going to do?"

  I didn't know what else to tell her. I said, "I'm hungry. Let's go out."

  ***

  Me and Nadia only lasted for a few more weeks after that. It didn't take very long before we both agreed that maybe we should just be apart for awhile. I think she got to like the idea of being alone, too. We were the only little bits of our past that we had left, if that makes any sense.

  I got my own car with some of my half of the money Saul left us. I last saw Nadia in Springfield. We hugged for a long time, and we both cried a little bit. She said that we should try to come back to Chicago in five years, so we could catch up. We wrote down the date and time and a place and everything.

  I left her there standing in the parking lot. I drove east all night, and stopped for the day someplace in Kentucky. Eventually, over the next two or three nights, I drove all the way down to Miami, for no other reason than I didn't think I could take another midwestern winter. It took a few weeks to find a little rental house off in the mangrove trees, but not too far from the city. It's where I'm writing this, on the table I put out on the front porch.

  Miami is a crazy city, and living next to the swamp is great. I love all the noises the animals make at night. I feel like a hillbilly, sitting out here on my porch. I like the alligators, too. I guess most Floridians get upset when they find alligators in their yards, but I like them. They look like dinosaurs or something. They are kind of dinosaurs, though, aren't they? Anyway, I encourage them with tidbits.