Death Bite (Peterick)

Part 5: Vampire Savior

Patrick's POV:

I had lived my whole life believing that vampires and such were fantasy, over exaggerations in horror movies and chick flicks, tall tales in novels and late night sleepover stories. Never once did I think they were real. Then out of the blue one tried to kill me, and another saved me. It was hard for me to process, of course. There were so many questions circulating in my mind, and yet the only one I could focus on was: What else don't I know?

Maybe I had let the whole thing consume my thoughts far too much because even though I was finally able to hang out with Joe and Andy today, here I was wondering where Pete had gone off to. Right as dusk came about yesterday Pete disappeared from my apartment without a word. He had just told me he was a vampire, and now he probably assumed I would forget about it. He was far from right if he thought I'd completely let it go.

"Are you going to eat your fries or what?" Joe asked.

     "Oh yeah. Definitely," I shoved one into my mouth and fake-smiled," How's work going?"
"Good. We recently killed off a ton of rats at that warehouse downtown," Andy answered.
For a couple of exterminators, Joe and Andy were always pretty passionate about their jobs. Right out of high school they started their own company and hadn't stopped working since. 

They had recently told me that they were doing well financially, so going to college wasn't an interest anymore. What I did find strange was that they never mentioned the company name to me nor had I ever seen them in their uniforms, but supposedly, they hadn't come up with one yet, and they didn't like showing off their gear. What did I know about the whole pest killing scene? Zilch, so it didn't make sense to question it further.
"Gross," I commented.

"You would say that," Joe laughed taking a huge bite of his burger.

"What else am I supposed to say? Wow? I'm completely fascinated by the poisoning of bugs and rodents?"

"Well maybe if you had a little more consideration for what we do you'd appreciate it," Andy said.
"Oh yeah? Like the world would go to hell if there weren't people like you to control our pest population."

"You wouldn't believe how much trouble everyone would be in if we weren't here."

"Andy, if you two were to quit your jobs right now Chicago wouldn't even blink an eye."
They exchanged looks and burst out laughing.

"What? It's true. You guys make as much of a difference as subtitles do to a blind person."
"Rude. I'll have you know we are very important." Joe argued, mouth still full of burger pieces.
"Okay whatever," I chuckled, "Can we go back to the bookstore now? My parents didn't want me gone for too long."

"Oh so you let your parents control you? Last time I heard you're an adult now. You don't have a curfew anymore," he said.
"You know what's been going on in this neighborhood, right? The killings and all?"
They nodded.

"Well I don't want to end up like them, so I'm gladly taking my parents's advice and going home before it gets dark." I stood up and headed to the exit.

"Hold on now. We'll go with you. We need to watch over our friend," Joe told me before the two of them followed me out.

We trotted along the street, shoes tapping lightly against the pavement, and the sky turned black rather quickly. It had become like a ghost town around these parts, and I figured it'd be a matter of time before everyone avoided these streets altogether. There hadn't been news of a death since the day before William attacked me which probably meant the guy was lying low for a bit. 

He would spring up again sometime soon. I could feel it. Maybe too soon. A shadow raced across the road, knocking down a pair of trashcans a few feet in front of us.
"Did you guys see that?" I looked back at them to see cautious expressions upon their faces.
The shadow appeared once again, a low growl rumbling in its chest. It was most definitely William.