Sample from a new story I'm working on. Feedback appreciated
“My name is Marvin and I’m a…” vampire “…alcoholic”. He fidgeted in the uncomfortable fold-out chair. “Hi Marvin” the rest of the room greeted in unison. It was a lie though, Marvin was not an alcoholic. Of course saying that you’re a vampire cold-turkeying off of the good old red stuff after nearly a century of abstinence would likely get you removed from said AA meeting on the basis of being an insensitive, tasteless jerk. So Marvin sat in that really uncomfortable chair as Steve introduced himself and told of the time he wound up in a bathtub with a raccoon. That was when he finally decided it was time to quit those delightful happy hour lunches. Natalie went up next and cried over the two truckers who she blew for an ounce of Bolivian Marching Powder and a twelve pack of Miller Lite. They all had their stories, some amusing and some just damn depressing. Marvin had a lot of stories, but he kept them to himself. He wasn’t proud of them, and most would have a hard time believing him at any rate. So he sat there with an aching butt and a cold cup of coffee. It was times like this that Marvin wish he could get drunk, unfortunately... vampires can’t get drunk.
The birds had just finished their morning serenade as Marvin was handed his twentieth one-year-sobriety chip and stepped out of the church. Churches being a place of discomfort for the undead was something exaggerated in media. On the contrary, most of the more vintage vampires rather liked the architecture of older Catholic churches. It was the melancholy slant of the steeples, the sad faces of window frames surrounded by cold, wet stone. Sure he wasn’t a big fan of the place, but that had more to do with what horrors he had seen in times long past. Mulling around what to do next, he stopped and realized that he had been living in the town of Reverence, PA for too long. People would start getting suspicious in another year or so and he was quite tired of working at the guitar shop. Indeed things were getting stagnant and his boss was giving him hell for showing up late.
The fat, red face of Milton Carmichael, the owner of Tune Up, the guitar shop on Elm wasn’t a pleasant person. His band split up and then his girlfriend left him and then his hair left him. All he had was a shop filled of instruments he wasn’t particularly good at and sold them to kids with their futures in front of them, a few who possibly would make it to the big leagues and not end up as a forty-three-year-old bald guy who owns a guitar shop. Marvin did tunings, basic cord repairs, and kept the store in a passable condition. With the meeting adjourned Marvin shared a cigarette with Cindy, the owner of the Village Diner whose house burnt down when she passed out after a bottle of Jim Beam and forgot that her stovetop was still on. Her right hand was more like a fin now, fleshed melted and her face was something most people would lose their lunch around. She liked Marvin, but he either didn’t notice or didn’t care. It’s not that Marvin was put off by Cindy’s appearance by any means, in his long, long life he had seen much worse. Marvin had his reasons for keeping his distance.
They talked about the new mall opening up around Front Street and how it was supposed to bring in more jobs to the dying town. Cindy brought up her niece who had just graduated from a rather prestigious university, but had come back home to look for work. She joked that they might make a cute couple and offered to set up a blind date. Marvin nearly choked on his coffee and excused himself. He stubbed the cigarette out and put on his sunglasses. It was a gray overcast morning and for that Marvin was thankful.
Hameer had sold seven hot dogs so far on that day. Three with ketchup and mustard, three with just ketchup and one with ketchup, mustard, and relish. Marvin bought the eighth with nothing on it. He looked at it, removed the bun and chomped away. Being among the non-living, Marvin didn’t need to eat but he did so anyway out of habit. Thrice a week he would go to an AA meeting and thrice a week he would stop to get a hot dog from Hameer who’s cart was located down the block from the church.”
It had been twelve years since their tri-weekly tradition began, and though both seemed not so far apart in age at the beginning, time was taking it’s toll on the rotund brown man. Grey grew into Hameer’s hair and mustache in small patches at first. But at every meeting, Marvin noticed another streak there, a new line or wrinkle there; the wounds of mortality. No longer could Hameer stand throughout his twelve hour work days and recently had brought along an empty milk crate to perch on when business was slow. Marvin looked exactly the same as he did the first time they exchanged currency for possibly processed beef. His hair was never combed or treated, but remained a messy black mesh. His five-o'clock shadow never seemed to grow; but it never departed. Marvin had the face of a man who if you turned away from for more than a moment, you would forget any detail to what it looked like. He always wore a black shirt, tee in the summer and sweater in the winter. He always wore his faded blue jeans and black boots. He always wore sunglasses during the day, whether it was rain or shine and Hameer always enjoyed when this strange man would sit on the curb next to the cart and shoot the shit with him. “Wanna know a trade secret? Growing old is what makes life interesting.” Marvin said this as he threw the wrapper, bun, and napkins into the trash.
“I take it you don’t have kids.” Hameer replied. Marvin shook his head. “That’s what I thought. Between you and me, it’s when they hit their teenage years when you start to feel your age. You see all that energy and that notion of invincibility. Not a care in the world about bills or aches or having to wake up to piss five times a night because your prostate is the size of Jupiter.”
“TMI” Marvin said, giving himself a mental pat on the back for brushing up on the lingo. Hameer let out a hearty laugh and passed Marvin another hot dog. “It’s on the house. How’s this, you tell me the secret to eternal youth and you can have anything you want from here on the house forever.” The vampire scarfed down the dog in one bite and said with a mouthful “Don’t make promises you can’t keep.” He took out a roll of twenty dollar bills and handed it to the surprised vendor. “Here’s a secret, don’t worry so much about money. It comes back to you… if you hang around long enough,” He walked away, hand in the air. “then it runs away from home again.”
“See you Tuesday” said Hameer, returning the wave.
Books n’ Beans is a little coffee shop a few blocks off of Harver Street. Originally it was made for librarians, scholars, professors and poets to meet up over a brew and some literature, now it’s a hangout for the academic youths with dreams of traveling far and away from the dreary town. It was never an empty shop. Especially when classes were back in session and the out-of-towner student body decided they would make this their home, bringing along with them berets, laptops, and organic muffins.
Marvin ordered a dark roast coffee with two spoons of sugar and a splash of creme. Caffeine has no real effects on the undead, but Marvin enjoyed the taste and smell of the beverage. He flipped open his worn paperback novel to his last read page. “Lovecraft, eh?” a peppy voice piped in. “Not a very original choice, but it’s at least not another Joyce work. I swear, if my next paper is assigned specifically to exclude punctuation again I’m totes going to lose my shit.” A smiling girl with eyes the color of spring grass and hair the hue of a solstice sunset sat down across from him. “I met him a couple of times, interesting fellow.” replied Marvin. He gave her a small glance and continued reading.
“Which one? H.P. or Jimbo?” she asked.
“Both,” he replied deadpan. “Can I help you?”. She blinked at him a couple of times, the smile in her eyes faded, betraying the one that remained plastered on her face. “Aren’t you the tutor? Professor Milligan’s friend?”
Marvin put a palm to his forehead. Milligan and he had been classmates some forty-odd years ago in Boston and they quickly became close. They endured long study sessions with one another, Marvin at least pretending to endure anyway as he already had two well respected degrees on the subjects. After studying they would go to the bars around town and hussle the locals at pool and spend the rest of the night trying to find what other trouble was out there sprinkled about town. As years passed and lives moved on, families started, and weddings turned into wakes, Marvin struggled with the decision to pack up and leave without a word. One early Christmas morning he looked up at the North Star and lost himself in memories. Before maps were popular on a global scale he remembered that glowing light being a guiding mark in the sky. Later as regimes rose and fall, the star was deified and even later used as inspiration for an ornament on the tree corpses that people seemed to enjoy stuffing into their houses and apartments. Another town and another temporary life, he thought, sulking a bit too much for a creature of the night. Bags all packed and silent goodbyes spoken, Marvin had headed to the train station. He had reached no further than his stoop before a young Alex Milligan greeted him with a large ham under one arm and a bottle of champagne in the other. “No need to run old son,” he said with the twinge of an Irish brogue that Marvin had grown fondly accustomed to. “I know what you are and have since that whole cheeseburger incident. And if it means anything, I think it extremely ‘groovy’, as the kids today are sayin’.”
He was one of the few who knew Marvin’s secret yet he never asked any questions or pressed upon it any further. Their friendship only grew stronger until the tides of time came along to part their ways. Milligan became a very successful academic and published several books on the human psyche along with a few novels of the horror inclination. He married and had kids and then their kids had kids while unchanging man could not take a wife or sire a child. He was frozen in time, unable to move along with everyone else. All he could do was watch as they passed him by. Yet after all these years and all the lives he had led since, his old friend was still trying to get him laid. Marvin held in a chuckle. Only humans, he thought to himself.
“I see” he said, taking a sip from his cup and bringing his mind back to the present. “What exactly did the good professor tell you about me?”
“He said to come here and look for a lanky, pale, scruffy guy dressed in black who has, and I quote ‘an insurmountable amount of boredom ever on his face.’ I picked you out the second I walked through the door and...um...here I am. I guess.” Marvin fidgeted in his seat, the second uncomfortable chair of the day.
“So,” she continued, cutting him off before he could finish opening his mouth to speak. “How do you two know each other. Were you a student of his?”
“You could say we were colleagues.” he responded after a pause, nearly losing himself in thought again.
“Colleagues…” she repeated doubtfully, “ you don’t look quite old enough for that.” she said.
“Looks can be deceiving.” he replied plaintively. “So, just what is this assignment exactly? Can’t promise I can help--” he paused, admiring her form and the more carnal part of him, memorizing her scent. “but I don’t have any plans for the day and I wouldn’t want to make you waste a trip because of that crazy old sod.” She removed a notepad from her Prada bag, making a mental note of his interesting use of vernacular and the odd inflection in his tone, as if he was trying to smoothen out an accent long since faded.
“He assigned a novella for me to write instead of a term paper. I told him I want to make it something spooky and thought provoking. Something a little different. He told me to come here and look for you.” That wily old bastard, Marvin thought to himself and grinned. “Spooky and thought provoking, that's me.” He got up, carefully sliding the chair back under the table without making the scraping noise she always found unpleasant. “Meet me here at eight AM tomorrow. You’ll get what you need for your story.” He extended his hand. “The name’s Marvin.”
“Jo” she replied, shaking his hand. His skin was cold to the touch and his grip firm. “See you tomorrow.” Her hand which tingled as if she had fallen asleep on it and she flexed it a few times, trying to regain feeling. She looked up and he was gone. In her notepad she jotted his name down with the word unusual underlined next to it.
Marvin’s apartment was located above a Thai restaurant and each step created a creak as he made his way up the four story walk-up. His room was unfurnished aside from a leather couch and large flat-screen television. He had replaced the ceiling lights with heat bulbs that cast a red hue all around. The windows were covered by lush velvet curtains that were never drawn and the one closet was filled with matching black shirts and faded denim. On the shelf above his clothes rack lay a large brown chest. Marvin removed the chest and set it down next to the suitcase he pulled from underneath the sofa.
Sliding his hands over the rustic carvings of the chest he felt each bump, scratch, and smudge that accumulated over years of weary traveling, harsh weather, dark corners, and a continuation of the cycle. Between the first ding on the steel lock to the latest scratch on the underside, buildings that had their first bricks laid in place had turned to dust, others became landmarks and monuments, tributes to a time forgotten by ost. From the second notch on the corner left side to the red layer of red rust on the latch, bloodlines had spread across the continents and local gossip and rumors had evolved into tales of legends and myths. It was on old box indeed, but Marvin was older. He opened it, picking through the cobwebs and dust within. There were paintings and portraits which gave way to pictures made from film. The latest addition was a CD he had gotten with some photos taken from a party a decade back. In all of those different images one similarity remained. There was Marvin, in different outfits and different materials in various places in various time periods as nondescript and as bored looking as ever, wearing black and a half-smile. Closing it, he began to pack. After the suitcase was full, Marvin drew open the curtains and looked out over the small city he had called home in one den of inequity or another for the last quarter century. Drops began to fall, leaving tear-like streaks along the dusty glass and a low rumble of thunder echoed in the distance. “Bye to you too,” he muttered.
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