You implement a little circadian rhythm substitution. He crosses that Tennessee line and you're fine not stopping for a while.
⤷ enzo st. john x human!f!reader. established relationship. 1.7k
Starlight draws those silver strings across his nose and cheeks. You like to imagine living in permanent sundown. The oak-lined road goes on for miles, seems to only grow thicker as you cross the border. Worn brown leather seats harbor something classically modern and the fumes from the exhaust nestle in your nostrils like some reverie, mostly drowned out, still, by gusts of late-summer sky—either way you wouldn't mind. There's something else there and it feels a lot like safety—wafts of his cologne, a strength he doesn't need because neither of you are the type to hold on to puppy love. Nonetheless, he is your rugged poet, better than the moon and one of those who have a taste for experiences in open air. This GMC smells like imperfection. It's your century.
There is no right time and you know that now. The window drops; you let the wind thread through your hair and wash the caution away in wispy streams. He hums along to something old yet recent and the scratchy timbre settles in your chest like moss. Like he's your roadstead and you are vulnerable only to the facts of life.
Nighttime doesn't come in many shades and that's the comfort of it all. You relish the lack of discourse—the implications of his immortality are unaccounted for and you find that satisfying against the backdrop of ontology and technographics. You float in the unfamiliarity. It's easy, though, when he is always there to anchor you back down until you touch dirt, the fabric of his black t-shirt. Innocence and instinct tend to clash. Lorenzo is the grove that cuts through every storm.
The stereo system is pleasantly so 90s still. You dance your heart out as much as the front seat allows (you don't care at all) and he navigates three conversations at the same time: the road, the lyrics, and a third that doesn't really matter. He might say otherwise. You're energetic for a while and he is hot-blooded and responsive yet still the same calm warmth draped over your shoulders. You're drawn to him like to a campfire. He tends to hold you that way, too. You steal glances at his face: that reflective gleam dancing in his eyes—it resembles murky whiskey and that's only topical—and the soft stubble he likes to upkeep because you find it charming.
He is your 'sort of'. You're 'in a way'.
You tell him of your sensitivity for when the shakiness is so perceptive in a voice, how it gets to you. That you love it when the song is seven minutes long. He smiles that magnetizing smile of pure fondness and that is all you ever really need.
The way his accent curls around the pet names makes your blood move and every time you lose yourself in banter you feel as though you're daydreaming a reality turned manifest. You tell him Coetzee got your spirits low. He beats you in a game of band name witticisms. You play that Ginsberg recording you love and laugh the whole way through, gush about the way he sounds, how good he is. The plans include Paris, Rome and Venice but they're all right here. Enzo is a longing with none of the pain and sometimes you catch yourself chewing on that silly thought of how sexy his brain is. Must be all that history. You doubt it is because you would've loved him even then.
You insist on that song—'05 cigarette metaphors and the mopes. Angsty young man stuff. You remember by the green. He indulges you because passion is infectious and he seems to like it when you go a little crazy.
"Am I not Dasein anymore then?"
"Afraid not," you reply, a goofy kind of sullen. "He couldn't possibly have accounted for that."
He lets it simmer for a moment. "But if he had?"
You feel rusty. It's been a while for Enzo too, though, and it never gets any easier to pass on topics that excite you. You take a second to consider the suggested alternative. Everything dies. Well, except the things we keep repeating.
"You could be," you offer with a bit of hesitation. Then, more resolutely: "You are, if it were up to me."
He breathes out a low laugh that sets your skin abuzz. "Want me dead, love?"
It pulls a smile out of you and you hum playfully, teasing. You rest your head back against the crumpled headrest and turn to look at him with all the humanity you can't suppress. "Not just yet."
He reaches out languidly, eyes still following the yellow paint, and his sturdy hand finds yours. His fingers slide through the gaps between your own—veins are just muddy rivers—and he lifts your molded palms then, brings them to his side to press his lips against your knuckles. The soft exhale he expels sweeps across your skin like the whisper of an oath.
Thankfully, idealism's only real in the latter part of the gradation of phenomenological concepts, a mental conjecture without a reference. Jury's still out on that debate. You never feel like you're the fool with Enzo. This isn't control. He listens to the rundown of the plot to that ridiculous teen show you hate to love and vice versa, and it's only endless patience with the texture of a blanket. All snorts, lightheartedness, letting go because you're just too animated when it's not important whatsoever. He makes it seem so easy, like people don't go lifetimes searching for the mirth. You like it when nostalgia's in the same room as him.
You feed him that trail mix you are stocked up on—because it's just so simple for a road trip—and you both know he could reach for it himself but you still do it for him anyway. His guitar rests against the backseat. Every other bite is his. He buys you travel guides at every gas stop. It's your inside joke now but you read them earnestly, out loud. You take the keys, say you should have your rest. The playlist ends and loops again.
He is a shadow and maybe you're the flicker, if you could ever give yourself that kind of credit. You'd drive with him till the end of utopia, even if forever never comes.
You end up in a road-side bar. It looks a little sketchy and you take it upon yourself to make a morbid joke about that Tom Ford movie. It's desolate and there's a town some forty miles from here. You feel content. Untouchable. They've only got a fridge of Miller Lites.
"Could we also get some fries," Enzo emphasizes over the countertop. Glances sideways at you pointedly, with faux exasperation.
You can hardly suppress your smile. "I might make a cowboy of you yet."
He says he's down to wear Wranglers and that's that.
You sit for some of yesterday's game, half-heartedly but with a lightness on your mind, and get roped into a dance—because he has accelerated since the engine turned off, ever the romantic. You've heard this song a couple times, maybe at a Longhorns game, but everything seems to take on a new life when he's around. You sway in time and it's all empty so you feel, foolishly, like it was meant for you: this place, this hour, the melted cheese. Then it slows, he pulls you in against his chest. You peer up at him and see both Being and Time, those Surgeon General cautions on the Marlboro Blends. His eyes find yours and it's the kind of brown that pierces, that echoes the reflection of your heart.
"What's on your mind, gorgeous?" he asks quietly and it is tinged with something soft-hued. His broad palm comes up to cup your cheek and you remember that man-made vampires never got to have compulsion, just charisma and the most mesmeric eyes. You lean into his touch and wonder if he recognizes what he sees in the gaze you fix up just for him, the warmth, the guts.
"Your hand smells like french fries," you say, stupidly, into the stuffy space.
He laughs openly at that, hushed and smoky, which means he understands. You've said the words before. Just once or twice. It's too much fun—finding all the other ways, quoting Auden till you're sick of it and have to reminisce the anecdote about the college girls and their hearty reverence for Rococo. The laughter melts on Enzo's lips and he regards you like you are the pedestal of all you've ever taken in, like you're real, flawed, and he's infatuated.
He's so close you can taste his breath. He glances at your lips but doesn't kiss you. You'd like to think you know the reason. It's just too right, the moment is too tender. He looks at you like you're the one who makes the sun rise on your little strings of paper.
It only happens when you step outside again, crisp air and 4 a.m. constellations. You don't make it to the pickup. He is right behind you, following you by the hand, and the cool touch of his ring grazes your skin like moonlight. You stop and turn to face him, mid-parking lot and all; it's just the wrong cliché, but you are dying soon. He smiles just in time and you press your lips to his to get a taste of it. His arm slithers round your waist to pull you closer and your hands come up to cross wrist-wise at his nape. It's soft and tragically short, leaves a lingering aftertaste dipped in salt and oil. He breathes in your shared mist and takes a beat to contemplate your lips, your nose, your eyes, your hair. His other hand springs up to tuck a strand behind your ear—it doesn't hold and it's almost funny—then his fingers grasp your chin and he is leaning in again to meet you halfway.
Cassiopeia fades out and you are on the road again. You ask him to take you to a place with a shower. The asphalt's chipped all over. He dissects McCarthy. You sink into the mushroom leather and a yawn slips out but he should know by now it's never boredom. You ponder writing your own fake travel guide. There is a world outside.
How do you reconcile the heart's home with the appropriate context for taxidermy? In the cabin, changeless, you become the Fluxus hare.
⤷ enzo st. john x bennett witch!f!reader. established relationship. 2.3k
It's the kind of place where Hitchcock starts to taste like fast food. Big gray Magnavox VCR. It's the kind of circumstance (none like it, many of the same if you look around; many, many worse) that hits you with the urge to scrape a dirty road Marty McFly style, that screams Surf's up! and lets you drown in helplessness.
Fresh air helps, feels remotely magical in early fall, but it's only February—only or already, or too late—and marcescencent leaves are dry and unsatisfying in the cruelest wind. Is youth supposed to be this crunchy? Shriveled, desiccated, as opposed to sticky, running slow like candle wax? You'd rather will the wilting process into expedition, even if a slower death is more poetic. The prospect of canonization is a bitch. The red oak is promised nothing, at least.
He's already got the fireplace going, so you take your coat off when you enter. The turntable's coiling in a rhythm incompatible with the light spots shifting across the furniture, the shadows emphasized, rather perhaps more fitting for the mantle of a brutish November spent off-road with chain-breaker Zampanò. There's comfort in the nook beneath the staircase, the light looks more willing to embrace you over there—olive oil, red onions and that tomato-garlic blend. More paper bags, emptied, so that you'll have to check the fridge tomorrow for a nice surprise.
You walk over, crossing the narrow space between the coffee table and the couch. He's grating parmesan and lime skin. You drag it out and rekindle that mental exercise of gliding through the room with his eyes instead of yours: a table-top calendar with photos of American natural sites and a VHS of Elevator to the Gallows; Hunter S. Thompson on the armrest, bent-up—you know, soft cover and almost pocket-sized, thicker for it. The details matter all the same. More dust on the machine means you're at another plateau; Enzo's noticed, comes to pick up the trash more often, but thankfully (mercifully) remains neglectful of your circadian rhythm.
The record's going back to front—some trick of his—the way he tends to play them on occasion, says it's sometimes better to get the melancholy out of the way first. It's nothing but melancholy with this one, but you know he knows it, mouthing every lyric of Highway Patrolman, magnetic in the way it invites you to appreciate the movement of his lips, his Adam's apple, even from this awkward three-quarter back angle.
"Have a pleasant walk?" he lilts when you approach, facing away still, preoccupied with the aesthetics of the dish—something he just likes to do for fun.
You tilt your head and hum as if to say: Whatever, decent as can be.
"Must you always wander the woods after dark?"
It's just concern, lovesick and therefore justifiably unreasonable. You wouldn't cross over the boundary he's set, the threshold of safety, a minimal amount of ground you can cover outside the confines of the cabin—for him. In the same vein, the truth would hardly soothe him; wouldn't do you any good either: you told yourself not to soften up too much, not for survival, but for the sake of the justice you deserve. So you avoid the casus belli—rhyme, yes, without the reason. Otherwise he'd feel he has to reshape the awful tug of the nightmare, that throng of flames your sleep-sick mind conjured in the late morning, which you could not extinguish till half your grimoire had arched, flexed and twisted, then crumbled into ash before you. Hey, I dreamt that the only record of my existence burnt to a fucking crisp while I could only watch and rot—doesn't work like that.
"I wander at all times of day, you're just not here to see it," you settle for replying. "Besides, I thought the area was safe, smartass?"
He hums low in his throat, unfazed and affectionately warm, annoyingly aware of the effect it has on you, how it melts away the tension you accumulate down to your bones. "It should be. But I'd rather not take any chances, love."
You take a seat at the tiny kitchen island across from him, as he adds fresh parsley to top it all off and turns to face you, holding a plate in each hand. Somehow, the sight stirs up an ache. You're unprotected, all because he vowed to be yours, because he's all you ever need anymore.
You try to trace the simple desire of otherworldly experiences to easily-explicable extensions. Science and witchcraft coexist somehow. There are things you want to ask, but know are more delicious in that weird ontological space some would dub Meinong’s Jungle. Why two hours early? Why this cadence when you say my name, why the taste of margarine on toast instead of moldy wood filling up our lungs at impromptu karaoke takeovers en route to Dallas, hot and ignorant of the historical implications? Nothing fun is ethical. We should be there, in the loamy sand and sturdy leather, my shirt half-unbuttoned, your accent trailing after Brando's "polack". Leave it to me, I'd romanticize the contour of your shoulder in the side-view mirror. Pure intentions clashing, call me 'pressure', electric guitar riffs approaching in the partly cloudy hippodrome, I can't make it back; you fly after me like Damiel in black & white and love me in every language time can buy.
He serves it right here, on the counter, because you've told him so—that the table feels so formal, too solemn in this context, and that amuses him.
"Voilà," he declares, setting a plate down in front of you. "Penne alla bettola."
"Should I play some Morricone?" you offer jokingly, fond smile in tune.
"You flatter me, Ms. Bennett."
It's delicious and you needn't even vocalize it; he steals glances up at you between bites, you catch them expertly and wordlessly admit how much you've missed him. He looks at you like there's nothing certain, and those are the things that leave the deepest imprints; one of those moments that reminds you of the potential: you, stormy, hungry, and the only man who's ever wrangled the thunder-thumped, humid funnel of accelerating condensation-dust you develop under the cloud of your brow, the only one who does it again and again, who holds you through it and drives you up toward the cliff where you can both dive in without a care for the lack of visibility.
He's gallant in that classic Aramisian way, ruthlessly tender and as dreamy as Hardy. The sleeves of his shirt are still bunched up at his elbows and you can't help but wonder if the muscles in his forearms strengthened up this much, if the arteries there are so blue and prominent because of all those hours in the workhouses, the excruciating industrial trade-off. It's never been about pity with you two.
A shaky gust outside, pleasant and enticing, pulls your attention in, appeals to your nature; almost like the elements refuse to realize you can't respond anymore. You peer in its direction and focus on the dreamcatcher hanging off the window pane instead, oddly placed but sweetly idiosyncratic to you. There used to be a time when everything was new and weird in a way that wouldn't even let you catch your breath. Even when it was bad, worse and worse by the day, when it felt so doomed, when all your friends were on the chopping block and cheering for the Timberwolves became a haunting reverie—still, then, it was good. Still, you had Jeremy's jacket over your shoulders on chilly evenings, Tyler's dusky gaze, earnestly somber when he thought no one was looking, you had Matt, that cheeky smile and sneaky discounts at the Grill. You had Caroline. Elena.
He's reading that DeLillo you used to think was brand new, now tipped back and resting atop your legs. It's your fault: you distracted him, abandoning your own book of choice for the time being—because when it comes to history he's certainly more qualified.
"You're telling me you only passed because of your aptly timed fascination with Isabelle Adjani?" he reiterates, somewhat impressed.
"And you know what?" you beam. "The movie's actually quite good."
"Well, look at that. Lucky little witch."
It makes you smile in a manner that gives it all away—so naively enamored. His fingers trace featherlight patterns over the skin right above your knee, comfortable with your legs in his lap. You lean your head against the couch cushion at your side and Enzo seems to sink a little further in too.
"Consider it my retaliation against Reformation-era theologians," you quip.
"Ah. Divine retribution," he says through the stretch of a smirk.
You raise your eyebrows once, playful before the bitterness of reminiscence fully hits its mark.
You pretend to pick up from where you left off, flip the page as if you've read it. Except you're back in class, Elena's stifling a snicker at the concept of an "astral vampire" and Alaric is pretending not to notice, just expands on the early variations of the legend, on Lévi-Strauss and the mythemes, on Slavic folklore and the plague after the plague. You used to draw the line at the Magna Carta; now you agonize at the remnants of his voice, would sacrifice the Balance just to hear him describe the Wars of the Roses just one more time.
They're better off this way. What's the word Tyler likes to use? Right, a cesspool—that's Mystic Falls these days.
"Still insist on taking care of that?"
You grab the sponge without a second thought and shove your hands into the sink, leaving no room for debate: "You know it."
Because it's all you have: washing the dishes, rearranging shelves, strumming awfully until the melody straightens out. Because it gives you something, anything to occupy yourself with. It's why you never fail to ask him to get you a different brand of shampoo, a differently scented soap each time, why you change the lightbulbs before they've even blown sometimes.
He goes to switch the record, asks you what you think and you give him nothing—it's more about watching him listen to the music than the music he listens to.
You make him coffee, which he drinks more slowly than he needs to. When you play the tape he drapes an arm around you, the steel of his ring pressing against your tricep, and you can't help leaning in until he's molded himself around you, till you feel the weight of a gentle kiss on the crown of your head and Miles Davis kicks in against the backdrop of Parisian sidewalks.
"Tell me," you breathe out into the humid air.
He's leaning back onto his hands, sprawled atop the makeshift picnic blanket you brought over to your newfound hangout spot on the roof of the cabin. Tail-end of July. You split a fig. Barely any movement and a whole lot of pretending that you remember Castor and Pollux's story. He looks worn-out. You run your fingers through your hair and delude yourself that it's the breeze.
"Well," he sighs, "their numbers keep growing by the minute, it appears. Alex decided to dispatch more of her 'goons' after me today—new blood, inexperienced, but stupidly persistent. Led them on for a while, admittedly got a tad too frustrated by time we pulled into Louisville, so I stopped to wrestle myself another car... from a Lowe's parking lot of all places."
"Couldn't evade them otherwise, huh?" you tease, ushering the levity you think he needs.
He huffs, the way he always does when you're going back and forth like fools who've yet to drop the act. "I'm gonna pretend that doesn't hurt my pride."
Even in this mess, he is a black star. There is no way to really break the ice with Alex, distant cousins alongside vampirism and all. Just more proof you'll never be strong enough. She doesn't owe you shit, but you've fallen from grace one too many times to let it go, assuming you can even recover from the pills at all. Either way, the truth isn't satisfying anymore—you need more room. And him. More patience of the heart.
"You know," you try, leaning closer, "it's Master of Reality's anniversary today. Forty-three years."
Enzo laughs weakly, returns your gaze with tired eyes. "Trying to distract me, love?"
"Is it working?"
He pretends to think about it. "You're getting there."
You roll your bottom lip inward, tucking it between your teeth, as you take a second to consider him. Then, without allowing yourself the time to question the instinct, you close the gap and press your lips to his. There's no commitment there, except the one that lasts forever—you let him ease into it, make it short and fig-nectar sweet. There is an intermission, a moment after you pull away, in which your mingling breaths spell out an enchantment you can't find in any book on witchcraft, one you can't procure on purpose. You lift a hand up to caress his cheek and lean in for the second time, stealing one more kiss for good measure.
"How about now?" you ask quietly, playfully innocent.
"Hm?" he manages in the form of a low sound, eyebrows drawn slightly together, eyes fixated on your lips like he can't help himself.
"What are you thinking about?"
"You," he husks, gaze flicking back up. "Just you."
And what are you if not two unoriginal, melodramatic killers? You stare at him till all you see is black walnut, full and rich and chewy and not dry or crunchy at all.
"Good," you murmur. "Keep doing that."
You wake up on the bed. He carried you over to it in your sleep, of course, it's what he does. It's the kind of thing you do to spite the postmodernists. When you step out into the clear daybreak cold you become doubly aware of the empty space between your fingers. Maybe you can try to fill it up with borrowed air. You leave the door open for the day. Enzo won't be back for another week. It's a guarantee that lulls your senses. Until then, you'll live. Even if you forget to change the water filter when it's time. Even when the isolated wind chimes at the end of Solitude blur into the draft.
Flagpoles stuck up straight for centuries + an invasive species floating on the Hudson (and ain't it a crock of shit).
⤷ enzo st. john x vampire!f!reader. 5.3k
⟢ II.┆III. (🔜)┆in full.
At some point keeping up with billboard updates turns into a pastime. Fast-paced at a dead end. A Lacanian system of observations. Morphing into the Videodrome, same old flesh under new disguises, new escapism. Internalized audiences, microorganismic societies living in the motor oil puddles at gas stations, my soul trapped inside the billboard frame and your uncaring human nature. One city is enough. We never run out of ways to go insane; there's hardly any fun in living soundly. Corpses roll into the ground; the worms there are in a state of unwait. The transhuman still looks the same—traffic jams and an awkward queue at the corner-side kebab place just when you swore you could get away with being unseen, one less humbling. Truth changes but some fragments linger. Like the symbolism of rainwater and neon lights.
You can never account for gentrification quite in time. Maybe it's the trust. You don't think you are particularly trusting, but hope is a persistent sentiment—it's reflective, and the human eye is a dispersive medium. You'll never grow bored of contemplating others.
The Meatpacking district used to be as bad, as homey as it gets. The Hudson, dirty in these parts, wafting in, mixed with the shipment arrivals over at Genadi's butcher shop across the street. It was never stale, despite what poverty and debauchery tend to smell like to the teflon man. It's mostly just the air of raw chicken breast and carbonation now, plus the impending silk shawl demagogue; getting cleaner and cleaner. The others on this end of Little W 12th moved just last year, one after the other, like brothers whose wives get along better than themselves. Trade's concentrated somewhere in the Midwest nowadays—huge factory sites. The signs are still here, achingly archival in the absence of active business: Parker W. Williams, Inc., Veal & Lamb, Wholesale Distrubutor, Established Since 1914, and: Weichsel Beef, Wholesale Beef & Lamb, Hamburgers•Ground Beef•Delitop Round•Beef Stew•Pepper Steak•Short Ribs•Ox Tails•Pork Loins•Fresh Lamb Cuts. Genadi's place is all that's left, inside and out. Uncharacteristically naïve Genadi and his black Sportster. Genadi and that silly, gleeful logo with the nomadic chicken chasing the sunrise, very much undead.
It's colder yet, so people come in singles. Not particularly fewer, just unaccompanied. It's whatever. You play that new guy Mystikal these days—the record you copped on a spontaneous New Orleans trip back in the latter half of August. INXS and Lenny when you're feeling schmaltzy. It's your show and they're all drawn to you enough to listen to anything as long as you are visibly affected. Seldom a new face this time of year. Pineapple Burst fruit gummies next to the sink. Two left. You snag them both and crumple the plastic, bin it along with an unsalvageable washcloth. Beer and coke orders to be taken. One new face indeed.
You keep an ear on them from your peripheral even as you're serving pints and making conversation. Multitasking is sort of preinstalled in the vampiric kit, comes with the territory. She's coy and receptive, throws her head back laughing, but leaves everything important to the imagination. Part of the reason why you hired her. Pretty, blonde, human, just afraid enough. The only employee you promised yourself you'd need. Across the counter is her wooer: he's sleazy and old enough for the flirtation to circle back to social normalcy after the characteristic, primal concern. Vampires don't grow up.
"—yeah? With a smile like that—"
"Oh, don't flatter me with that accent."
It's cringeworthy and he doesn't even bat an eye when another customer walks in and the frosty draft from the door at his back stirs up ripples in the fabric of her white tank top. She semi-stifles a shiver. You run a semi-dry cloth over the counter, one of four backups. He only eyes you once over, doesn't let on. Taps his fingers on the countertop casually, unhurriedly, sips an imitation of import ale and appears pleasantly clear-sighted. Still, his tone foreshadows the usual affair, the immortal urge. It irks you that he thinks he can get away with it.
The hours pass. When he asks about the signature blue lettering out front, only mildly curious, she offers an interpretation: alligators swimming nearby, right along the state border—the barges that supply the Deli stores. This used to be a warehouse too. In reality, the waterway metaphor is nearly irrelevant, since the High Line has always been the main mode of freight arrival in the district. You don't perk up, but the man's gaze finds yours for the second time tonight, like he has a hunch.
What kinda name is Gator Throat anyway? This isn't Florida, you know, Lexi remarked when you pitched the bar idea years ago, boots soaking in the ice slush swamping the steps under Hammons' Day's End at Pier 53. Her contribution was indispensable, except you haven't felt the obligation to explain yourself since your first death, so nothing really came out. Thankfully, she settled for the hissing wind and never pressed you for an answer. The truth is, it was either that or The Abattoir ('Not USDA Certified' sign and all—you thought that would be witty). You'd given up on the latter because you're not down south anymore and snobbery may go over well here, yet you'd like to keep yours under wraps.
At 5 a.m. your mentee bids you goodbye and you remind her not to rub the stains on her pants, to blot them with the solution-saturated cloth instead. Fizzy drinks and beer are only nasty if you give a fuck—sexier to leave them in; then again, sometimes we all feel fondly purist. She leaves through the back door and you give it barely a minute before you're stepping out into the dew-damp alley too.
The grime coated brick wall on the other side of your thin back street holds the premonition of a genesis veiled in thick, grey cloud clumps—it's the condensation. You doubt there'll be any sunshine to avoid today either. It smells like dog shit and bio-gunk, the accumulation of undrained Pepsi bottles in the bins, dark brown liquid dripping down along with all its pitiful froth. It's the third day of proper East Coast winter cold, still too early for most people to give in to the standard puffer yet. The graffiti reads 'no puedo olvidarte'.
You let the heavy-duty steel service door drag shut behind you as you stop beside it, fishing your Camel Lights out of your pocket. The sound is faint—he's trained enough—but unmistakeable. Obscured from view behind the black industrial skip containers, his teeth have broken skin already. You flick the Zippo's flint wheel and consider, briefly, that you've had this one for a whole year. Odd. Lighters exhaust their flicker even faster than the human brain. You never minded losing either much.
There's the shuffling of clothing, harsh fabric scratching something softer (raw), shaky breaths, a singular plasmic trickle, slow and tough across the available expanse of thin skin on her neck, and the slurp-swallow-inhale cycle you're madly familiar with. You puff just once, let your head drop backward for a moment as you exhale.
"That's enough, don't you think?" you say, voice low and level because distance hardly matters to your kind, keeping your eyes forward and trailing up, following the gust of smoke.
He halts, breathes out, no doubt acknowledging. Takes a couple seconds, as if to evaluate his options, then draws back with a wet squelch, his lips detaching from her with a cruel pop. A few droplets dribble onto the asphalt, heavier than water and more delicious at that.
You take another drag and let the cigarette rest between your lips as you offhandedly reach down to scrub at a discolored spot on the hem of your top—looks like mud, smells like sugar. Nothing indicates he's let go of her just yet, even if the feed is interrupted: not enough movement, considering the denim of his jacket is one of the easiest materials to track sonically. Your tone remains flat but gains some sternness.
"You heard me, loverboy. Let her go."
It does the trick and, finally, you hear what you've been expecting: boots thudding across the jagged pavement. It's proper leather, always appreciated in these parts, but he still doesn't care enough to avoid the puddles of muck on the way. A moment later he emerges, profile illuminated by whatever blue neon reaches all the way from the other side of the façade and yet untouched by the white bulkhead light above the back door. He stops just on the edge of the shadow, like he's fulfilling his Wong Kar-wai fantasy, laughably serious in what you imagine is a creed to retain a sense of mystery and danger, or perhaps to safeguard that eternally fragile male ego.
"I should've known about you." His voice is guttural, amusedly annoyed. You spare a momentary look his way and turn away again, dispassionate.
"They never do."
He huffs and you find yourself imagining a smirk along with it; must be something about the sound, the way he carries himself—that quintessential English self-assurance, a sensibility for cynicism and play.
"Well, I apologize," he offers, slowly. "About your friend."
Friend. Not quite the right word.
You take another drag and exhale through the tight gap between your pursed lips. He shifts and you turn to him again, chin first, then a cutting gaze to follow. His stance is wide, there's too much confidence there for the bedrock to be that robust. The smudge around his mouth appears vaguely dark, messy but hard to name under this light. He swipes a hand over the skin below his mouth, smearing the nameless substance—deadweight blood—on his fingers. The ring resting there is rectangular and colorless. He's far from sorry. You don't care for remorse anyway.
"Be on your way, limey."
"Ouch. And here I was thinking we could have a chat," he says, placing a hand atop his chest, mock-hurt. The amusement is still there, as he tilts his head and regards you with a flicker of genuine intrigue. "Been a while since I ran into a pretty thing like you."
"Been five seconds since I ran into another moron, so how about you haul ass and stay the fuck away from my bar."
It's crude, but what's a vamp without a little bite? You let it buzz between you and wait for him to misunderstand—they often do. The way this works is via quantitative limits: one or two vampires per district. One too many suspicious neck injuries could be detrimental, a pattern the authorities would recognize, even in an area where trade relies on animals, where blood spatter on the sidewalk isn't that uncommon. A careless, thirst-driven idiot could draw attention much too fast. You aren't mad. Mostly inconvenienced. Sleazebags deserve no time of day.
He wavers, drops his arm until it falls limp at his side. You can see the outline of the smirk this time, off-kilter in more ways than one. Is he hostile or entertained?
"As you wish," he husks eventually, voice dropping an octave. So most likely both.
It loiters in the air even after he's gone, dashing out across the cobblestone road before you get to blink. You take a final puff and stomp the cigarette out. Your bartender friend is still some steps away, compelled and docile. You approach the bins, turn the corner and find her dripping and disoriented. You consider your options—a local hospital or the care of an experienced killer, immortal and immoral—as you swoop a hand under her legs and take her in your arms to carry. Her cheeks are stained with clear streaks of salt and distress.
The day drags on but she is fine, resting back at home, taken care of by some Paul Rudd type. You give her the next two nights off, end your own shift a little early out of restlessness. The wind is merciless this time, as if it's making up for something you alone are hiding, pushing down. The gator's throat has had its chunk of meat to gulp, but thirst is something else entirely. You take the A-train sometime around 3 a.m. and find yourself at that inconspicuous little compound with the shitty laundromat that is ridiculously selective about the change it consumes. At the back end, glued to the far west corner, adjacent to the 24/7 bodega next door, is an aluminum door conveniently concealed by the chunky driers from most angles. The place is empty. Beyond the door, however, the commotion never stops.
You're aware of the six of them—one in each (in)significant hotspot in the city. The equivalent of a speakeasy: an establishment dependent on its time, the cultural context. This one's called Basalt—an improvement from the name it had till '79: Beneath the Skyline, courtesy of the previous owner, some dude who got to join Louis Sullivan's inner circle back at the turn of the century, adopted the colossal maxim and invested everything in the skyscraper dream. You owe the comfort of this spot to Lexi too, knowing she got close enough to the guy to conspire intimately on his downfall and claim it for your kind instead.
The lounge is delightfully worn-out by the passage of time, by all the dirty business, cozy after the major 90s overhaul: peach tones, unobtrusive velvet, beanbags, Italian leather couches dragged along from Jersey. It's more human sacrifice than bloodsucking predators tonight, as always willingly eager—revealing outfits, purposefully exaggerated veins, and the consent you wished for when you were human too—and it's exactly where you find him again—the brawny Englishman with no taste for contemporary civility.
Lexi beckons you as soon as you're in view, so you saunter over to the decently crowded cocktail table she's standing at—just a few steps away from the couch last night's intruder has sunken into. You meet his eyes on the way, his expression hardly readable under the throbbing artificial lights. You hope the look you give him is signal enough, that it says you can be obliging in a public setting, but will not engage. Lexi hands you a Rittenhouse Rye Manhattan and you swig the whole thing but catch yourself craving a trashy tequila soda instead.
"—you know, I always thought Americans were the more vicious ones…"
It's him again, that shitty accent enticing your attention from your peripheral. You peek around and catch sight of Lee, freshly turned and insufferably happy, laughing something off from the adjacent couch. The man shoots off another challenge then, and you can't help but be observant; maybe one never gets quite used to this heightening of senses, as Lexi likes to call it; you glance at him again, at the woman at his side. She looks pleased, all bandaged neck, loose fingers and a heavy-lidded gaze, leaning into him like he's the epitome of both the beast of prey and the protector. And he's well-built, sure, muscular and handsome in a classic way, but the appeal is curbed with every nod of the head, every cocky remark you hear from across the room. You down another glass.
He's younger than you, you can tell that much. Sometimes a feeling is all you get in the absence of a clear time limit. Young enough to likelier than not be weaker—a thought more pleasurable than any verbal confrontation. Except there's nothing you can do because this is isn't your bar, you aren't an alligator but a mosquito among many, and the social code is to be abided by: respect the territory, a safe space for all vampires—to feed freely, to flirt, to indulge, to keep covert, the closest thing to legality around these parts. The closest thing to control. There is room for exceptions, of course, but this one's done nothing wrong on communal ground just yet. You don't care if he does or doesn't. It would be a show to see him face the consequence, but you can't find it in yourself to wish for it; it's pointless, meddling with strangers that annoy you.
That is, until they peeve you on a normal night. Until you're reeling off of three Manhattans and five straight vodka shots, having finally gulped down a concoction strong enough to induce the briefest state of inebriation. He keeps chattering, grumbling and snickering about the goddamn thrill, the hunt, going on and on about the simple-minded fun of catching them off guard for sport, of playing the humanoid monster with a silver tongue, shark teeth and mamba venom. Lexi's zeroed in on the conversation too and you know she's listening for those typical Lee placations: the noncommittal Alright, man, it ain't that simple though, or There's a lot of other ways we can have fun around here, trust me. There is pride there, and a lot of love—perhaps wrongly innocent. You love her for it, love them both, but it can't possibly be enough. The guy just won't shut up.
"I mean, it's all about the game... Come on, mate, you mean to tell me no one in this whole damn city misses it at all?"
"We all fucking miss it, transplant," you snap from the side. It's juvenile and stupid and you're hazy with the lack of proper ventilation.
His neck immediately twists in your direction. The whole lounge quiets down—you're not surprised; you've all got those fucking ears and the willing blood-banks, albeit corporeally stunted, are ensured to follow social cues. His eyes go darker than brown, but the intimation there doesn't seem judgmental. You can't say the same about the rest. Lexi's fingers latch onto your forearm as if to temper.
That's not the point, you want to add, giving the room a quick scan, we miss it, but it doesn't matter—but you can't. It's too late, whatever's said's been said. That's that NYC hospitality for you.
Lee's laugh is easy and mellow as he slaps his knee, like he's trying to startle the audience into a seamless change of pace, and calls in another round of drinks.
"We gotta settle down at some point, man," he chimes in apologetically. The room seems to be reintroduced to a fraction of its liveliness. "Especially here. We gotta at least try and make up for the last decade, ya know? The Times Square Ripper? Angelo? I mean come on, he was suckin' 'em almost dry, not even sure how those shots hit their marks. Sure, it's a little dull, but we've got a good thing going here. Too many careless incidents and the cops are on our asses all over again." His accent is a mess but the smile is tranquilizing. By the end of it Lexi's breathed out a nearly soundless huff of air and the peace—the lack of peace and quiet, rather—is restored. People are easy to pour oil on, easily forgetting. The mystery interlocutor hums and reaches for another whiskey glass. He peers up at you again and holds you there for a moment, dark and impudent, traces his eyes down to your neckline and back up, like he's got you by the balls already. Like you've slipped up somehow. You have. Has he sensed a thirst in you that he imagines still exists? Not the trivial kind. A longing for all that naïveté we fight to stave off all our lives and die trying—yet you cannot die, not unless you ask for it. You don't falter. He's going to think whatever he wants either way. You're not a voodoo doll.
"How disappointing," he murmurs against the glass rim.
You look away and leave.
"He bit her?" Lexi stresses after hounding you for details the following night. She's perched on a stool at the right-side corner—the one where a hush-hush little cursive 𝓛 sits pretty, carved into the reclaimed butcher block bar-top. "Do you want me to look into him?"
You give her an admonitory look. She's used to it.
"No," you answer drily while wiping the droplets off the scratched glassware. "I won't give some big-headed prick the satisfaction of being important enough to warrant a background check."
Her hands, comfortably propped up on her elbows until now, drop down onto the counter. "It's not about importance, babe, we're talking about your—"
"Lex," you interrupt, peering sideways at her once more for emphasis. "I can handle a stray vampire."
She raises both eyebrows pointedly. You know what it means: We don't know that. We don't know if it's just him. But you do. You always do. Cocksure, nervy bastards are the loneliest. His hair's gelled, but the nostrils flare up so traitorously. You used to succumb to the paranoia playing defense, when it should go both ways—the aggressor gives away just as much, leaves the frail bone between his shoulder blades exposed.
Your features slacken, forehead easing off completely—for her sake, so that she knows you know. The walls you've built never get to crumble down, but you're grateful she sticks around anyway, that she has the energy to keep peeking through the holes in the mortar, that she isn't as condescending as you are. She mutters something under her breath and the vowels resemble 'If you say so'. Your smile is subtle, you hope, but alert.
"Now shoo," you flip over a shaker pint with the flick of a wrist, letting it glide along your palm until it's rim side down, and place it onto the overhead rack. "You'll scare my clientele away."
It's the lightheartedness you always find with ease when in her presence, like the times you used to sneak around and wait to catch the drunk boys slipping on entrails on their way back home from Hogs at 4 a.m., when you could only suppress the giggles for all of thirty seconds and would nearly be crying from laughter by the end of it. She makes the old feel rare, repetitions never tire—like the awkwardness some years back, when your curiosity propelled you to The Anvil's doorstep, when they turned you both away at the threshold and you mercifully chose to be progressive about it (or conservative, in the sense that you had not accounted for intersectionality just yet) and didn't use compulsion. She used to wear her collar up and occasionally cursed that gutty brother of Stefan's then. You like to tease her about '77 only when it's borderline inappropriate.
"You wish," she cracks back, now smiling too. Glides her fingertips across the carving briefly—a sentimental habit—and shimmies off the stool.
The inertia from her exit gets the door wiggling a tad and you're reminded to fix up the hinges. Chilly evening vapor tumbles in as you step between the tables to get the chairs all set up. You're opening alone tonight.
The shift is standard and you wipe the tables seldom. Regular things and regular people. People-things? Just people. Regular dancing, the witching hour requiescence. You entertain them because vampires need escapism too.
A deprivation of smoke breaks doesn't affect you as much as it used to. It's not about the mouthfeel but the lack of oxygen—it gets stuffy here sometimes, the wooden planks absorb the loneliness through people's footsteps, and the heavy air hanging in the backstreet alley is so pleasantly dirty-cold.
Nothing really happens till he has the gall to show up again. Strides in coolly just like those regular people after their regular construction shifts, except the confidence is unwarranted—he should know by now he isn't Lord Henry, but the pawn. You smell him straight away, the top notes of his cologne flare up in tangs of paper bills and marron glacé. It's an enigmatic combination: the blasé stubble, this trail of nutty, band-aid fiber chalkiness he reeks of, and the namelessness. Admittedly, you like the idea of a sensory contradiction (which is arbitrary, socially-determined like most things), having experienced the pleasures of pigskin jackets and coconut-scented hand cream. There is a lot to appreciate here, but you started off all wrong. He did. Indignation is your strongest suit, so you weaponize it eagerly. Now whatever he is up to will be irksome by default. You're no original, but you'd like to think this still takes guts. He's truly asking for it now.
"You've got some nerve," you say before he's even crossed the room.
"One of my many admirable qualities."
He's got one hand in his pocket and walks unhurriedly, like he wants you to believe he only fronts the thought that he's all that, that in reality it's just a fact, not internalized, but empirically observed by others.
"You have one minute to hit the road, Byron."
"Oh my, is that a pejorative?" he quips, faux-insulted. "Is that your twisted way of practicing hospitality?"
You glare at him and don't bother answering. He still approaches carelessly and takes a seat across from you as you rinse and mop and scrub and crankle wood pulp coasters to trash and organize the under-counter drainboards. It's pointless telling him you're closing; that's why he's here at this hour.
"You left early last night," he notes colloquially, as if you've known each other for a while, and crosses his arms elbow-wise atop the counter.
"Lost my appetite," you deadpan.
"See, I don't think that's quite true."
"Think you know me, do you?" you laugh sardonically, swirling a soft cotton cloth inside a glass to get it dry and polished. His eyes descend to catch the movement, then flick back up to find yours again.
"I think we both know something you don't want to admit."
And, god, is that an infuriating assumption. Who cares if there's always truth in inklings. But what's even worse: do you betray that much? Does he know you like it when the subway trains' window rubber distorts the image on the other side, when it cuts the reflections of people's bodies in half? He can sense it—you haven't felt the sun on you in decades. You put the glass down and slam your hands onto the bar-top, leaning forward on your palms.
"Yeah?" you snap back with a mean smile. "Who the hell do you think you are?"
The corner of his mouth quirks sideways. "I'm the devil on your shoulder, love. But you can call me Enzo."
Haughty. Self-satisfied. He struts and drinks like a young Hemingway, clearly thinks himself an elevated Che Guevara—brawn and brains in tune, and that European post-imperialist consciousness. He's neither, and the charm is there—in the stubble and the jaw—but it's stubbed by whatever's given him the hots for senseless chaos.
"I'll stick to asshole," you retort. "Or perhaps man-child would be more suitable? You know, since you haven't yet outgrown that phase where men still think they know jack shit about the women they pursue?"
You're the one assuming now and the word seems outlandish in the context of your budding non-relationship, but you've had enough experience to be familiar with the contradictions of the heart and its external symptoms.
"Don't I?" he says with a tilt of the head. "Let's see what I know then." You mean to stop him in the empty second he uses for dramatic effect, but his manner is tauntingly commanding. "I know you never asked for this. I know you gained a thousand lifetimes, then suffered all that inevitable—"
"You know damn well I could drive a stool leg through your heart," you cut in through the spongy, cheap, imitative psychoanalysis.
"Ooh," he drawls, only derisively threatened. Taps the counter twice or thrice. His ring is on display again and you tell yourself you aren't envious. It doesn't seem to do a thing to help your case; he just keeps going, obnoxiously observant and awfully emboldened. "I also know that you used to be a menace. You still are, but have come to think what you deserve is lifeless monotony—to make up for all those years. So you settled down. Sketchy part of town. Unassuming. Surrounded by the scum of the metropolis, as a reminder. You opened up a bar. Told yourself you can just… disappear."
"Ten seconds," you warn.
"Look, I'm not a ripper, love, this isn't about that. I just hate to see wasted potential," he doesn't let up, inclining forward now as well, the space between you narrowing, as if pulled in by the negative charge, the friction from all that glass and soft fibers rubbing against each other. "It's okay to let go, you know."
You don't entertain it.
"Two seconds, macho," your fingers twitch over the cool hardwood surface. His forehead goes slack, a cautionary kind of neutrality.
"Careful, darling," his pitch drops low again.
The pet name does it. You swing from your shoulder. The impact is a bland sound, a dull thud against the hardness of his cheekbone, and it's the kind of punch that always ends up being more resounding in memory, more satisfying against all common logic—because it means you've gotten to pummel something solid, inhuman yet just as deserving as any of them, that you've moved a rock with a single prompt blow. What feels most refreshing is the noise he makes: an instinctive little grunt, short and gruff; something to remind you that sadism is easy to grow into. You feel it pulsate in your knuckles immediately after, as his body twists uncomfortably and he staggers off the stool.
He takes an awkward step to the side, to readjust his balance, goes to find his cheek with his opposite hand, but stops himself before the contact; only hovers, looks straight back at you and drops his arm. A muscle twitches in his temple. You enjoy it. His pupils are dilated and you stare back with the kind of intensity you find comfort in. Not often you get to start a fistfight nowadays. He was asking for it.
But it seems that's been his point. The seconds go by in silence, as you glare at him, unwavering, and he glares back, the message clear and physically delivered. The taut skin you went for is now flushed and looking worse by the minute. Suits him better. What you don't entirely expect, however, is the grin—itching to unfold, contained to a slow advance. He straightens up, somehow taller than before. Puffed up and at perfect ease, and that swelling blotch under his eye should be humbling, but instead it only makes him oddly tantalizing. It's the type of bruise-brushed expression that's more magnetizing than those spurts of blood vampires spend their whole lives thirsting over. This is what he wanted. You can't be serious.
"There she is," he hums, amusement tugging at his lips—disgustingly unyielding.
His cheek is bound to swell mere minutes from now, you note somewhere to the side of the immense irritation that's taking up the forefront. That annoying glint his eye's regained kills all enthusiasm, though. He was egging you on. Like he's Erving-fucking-Goffman, he latched onto everything you've given away unintentionally. Your adrenaline turns murky—filthy—where it pumps into your muscles, and you try not to gag on the pitiful reality of being read so easily. It's been a long, long time, and only Lexi can ever see through you like that anymore. Just Lexi, and not even yourself. You take a lot of pride in existing beyond that space of simple humanist mysticism, subtly above their definition of a solvable mystery; you should be indecipherable.
Still, he is a stranger, equally as inept and hungrier for provocation than most. You start to wonder why—and then you don't. You just let yourself get too damn excited. So you get your bearings, ease back from the bar-top and pull down your sleeves, making sure you've regained composure before speaking. Then you do, cold and monotone, with an unegotiable finality.
