Andrew Fox - Fat White Vampire Blues

He heard the door open again. “Jules, it’s Doodlebug. Since you’re still boxed, I take it that Erato’s visit was less than fruitful?”

Jules felt tears welling up behind his eyes. A sob caught in his throat. He felt like he was six years old again, nursing a stinging bloody lip from a schoolyard brawl, and for the first time ever, his mother wasn’t there to protect him. He was abandoned. Betrayed. Alone.

“Aww, Doodlebug, why’d she hafta go and do what she did?”

His friend sighed. “Oh, Jules… I wish I had a good answer for you. I wish people were more perfect than they are, that they’d always be consistent and make wise decisions. I wish I could wave a magic wand and make your hurt go away, and give you back your house and your car, and make all your enemies take up gardening instead of running you ragged. But I can’t do any of those things.”

“So what are you tellin‘ me? That life sucks and I just gotta get used to it?”

“No, not exactly… Maybe the best thing I can say is this. Sometimes people find themselves in a situation that makes them do things they never imagined they’d ever do. Sometimes a man is starving and desperate and alone, and he becomes a wolf who pushes aside a hungry mutt for a few mouthfuls of dry dog food. And maybe that wolf-man then finds himself caught in the power of his animal senses, and he climbs on that mutt and mounts her, despite the revulsion his human brain is feeling. If you’d told me a year ago that you would never,never eat dog food and have sex with a mutt, and then everything happened the way it did, would that make you a hypocrite?”

“Uh, I dunno…”

“Maureen was alone, Jules. Whether your leaving was her fault or not, she was still alone, for the first time in many years. And Maureen’s never been the kind of woman who tolerates aloneness well. She was terribly lonely. And so she did something she’d thought she’d never do. Something she told youyou should never do, even. She never thought she’d be hurting you, or putting you in danger. All she was thinking of was companionship. If you’d just let yourself, I’ll bet you could feel some empathy for her. Some sense of understanding.”

Jules didn’twant to understand. He wanted to stay bitter and hurt and mad as hell at Maureen. He wanted to nurse it for all it was worth. But what Erato and Doodlebug had said made sense, loath as he was to admit it. He thought back to where his head had been during his miserable week in Baton Rouge. If Maureen had experienced even a tenth of that pain and desperation after she’d ordered him to leave, he couldn’t rightfully damn her for grasping another companion to her ample bosom. Even if that companion ended up being a nasty shit like Malice X.

From the next room, low music infiltrated his makeshift coffin. Jules strained to hear the notes. He could just make out the tune. Jules smiled a small, hesitant smile. It was Bix Beiderbecke playing “Tin Roof Blues.”

“Hey, turn that up, would ya?”

No answer. The bits of melody were followed by a powerful, mouthwatering aroma. Coffee. Freshly ground chicory coffee, strong as armor plate, being brewed tantalizingly close. If he listened hard, he could hear the heavenly liquid slowly coming into existence, transmuted from the ordinary elements of water and grounds…drip, drip, drip.

Jules grinned. So the little mascara maniac was trying to lure him out of the box. Jules had to give him an A+ for effort. Wouldn’t be right to let all that energy go to waste.What the fuck… guess it’s time for this ol‘ caterpillar to leave the cocoon.

He slowly lifted the lid of the piano box. The lights in the room were off. Doodlebug had lit some candles instead. Good kid; he hadn’t wanted Jules to be smacked in the retinas by a hundred-watt bulb.

He tried climbing out of the box. Not having been on his feet in nearly three days, his legs buckled at the same instant he lost his balance. He hit the couch like a falling oak, breaking one of the antique’s legs.

Doodlebug ran from the next room. “Jules! You should’ve asked for help!”

Sprawled over the slanting couch, Jules grimaced and rubbed his knee. “When have youever known me to ask fer help?You shoulda been standin‘ by, waitin’ to give it to me!”

Doodlebug helped his friend sit relatively straight on the couch. “Of course. You’re absolutely right. How utterly thoughtless and selfish of me.” He smiled warmly. “What can I get for you?”

“Your coffee smells like the best thing ever to grace the planet. But I’m hungry as all fuck. And bring me my bottle of Doc Landrieu’s pills. I left ‘em in that dresser, next to my keys.”

“Your wish is my command,sahib.”

Doodlebug brought him his pills and two pints of chichi California blood. Jules almost swallowed the mug the blood was served in, he was so hungry. He quickly realized the bullshit behind the old saw that said hunger could make any food taste great. This blood tastedawful. It reminded him of the first time he’d ever drunk skim milk. No richness, no tang, hardly any zing to it at all. But blood was blood, and ravenous as he was, he was in no position to be fussy. He took a second long swig, then hastily opened the pill bottle and counted out six tablets in his palm. He had no idea whether taking that many at once might be bad for him. But the thought of reexperiencing his former state of decrepitude scared him even more. And after all, Doc Landrieu hadn’t told himnot to catch up on his dosage when he missed a pill or three. He gulped the pills down his dry throat two at a time.

“Feeling any better?”

Jules felt life seep back into his extremities. “Yeah. I’m startin‘ to.” He pulled his feet out of the piano box. “One thing I been wonderin’ about for the past three nights now. That evil shit you pulled with them Knight supporters-how’d you know gettin‘ them to drink their own blood would make ’em dissolve like that?”

Doodlebug smiled slyly. “Oh,that little trick. That was a useful bit of vampiric lore I picked up from my spiritual guides in Tibet. They were all vampires themselves, you know. The cornerstone of their wisdom and spiritual practice is the freeing of oneself from vampiric desires. Particularly the desire for blood. All of them were many centuries old. And not a one of them had ever imbibed a single drop.”

“You’re shittin‘ me. Either that, orthey were shittin’you.”

“Not at all. They provided me with proof. And the best proof of all was that, during my entire stay of more than three years, I never witnessed any of them drink the blood of men or animals. None of them ever suffered for the lack.”

“So what’d you eat for three years? Yak gruel? Don’t tell meyou went three years with no blood.”

Doodlebug stared out the window, his delicate features wistful and sad. “Would that it were so. No, they provided me with ample blood to drink during my stay. I’d been a blood-drinking vampire for far too many years by the time I first heard of their teachings. I could never hope to approach the blissful equilibrium enjoyed by those quiet, serene monks. But that was actually part of the reason they welcomed me to study with them-the fact that I was a confirmed blood drinker. In order to add to the ranks of their order, they need a ‘fallen’ vampire like me on hand. While I was with them, I was the one who turned their human initiates from ordinary seekers to fledgling vampires. When the newborns awoke, they found two objects sitting in front of them… a meditation staff of humble, weathered wood, and a silver bowl filled with blood. The monks directed them to choose only one, the object they most desired. Those who chose the meditation staff were admitted as novices into the lowest ranks of the monks. Those who chose the bowl of blood, well… let’s just say the monks didn’t tolerate failure of will gladly.”