Suburban Vampire Ragnarok

Chapter 17

"Are you sure this is safe?" Scott asked. Elizabeth rolled her eyes.

"We went over this, Scott! You're a vampire. Vampires are scary. We aren't afraid of anything. Especially not evil children."

"Time for you to spread your wings, young vampire," Jeremiah said, his gentle baritone not soothing Scott's dancing nerves at all. "Time to become the beast you know you are."

"It's not that I'm 'scared' scared," Scott said, "It's just... I've never been good with kids. Why do you think Laura and I never had them?"

"Then don't think of them as kids," Elizabeth replied. "Think of them as little demons."

"Oh, that's a big help."

"Scott!" Jeremiah said. "We will be just down the street in Elizabeth's vehicle. When you make contact, flash your headlights and we will be right there."

"Promise?"

"God, Scott, you're such a baby," Elizabeth huffed. She then headed down the street toward her SUV.

"Really," Jeremiah said, "you will be fine. Just remember what we told you. And relax! You are scarier than they are!"

"Yeah, I'm bad!" Scott snarled, trying to puff up his courage.

"There you go!" Jeremiah said as he went down the street with Elizabeth. Scott then got into his classic Mustang, cranked the engine back on, and found a space to park that wasn't far off the main drive, but where he could also see Elizabeth's Hummer. He decided to shut off the engine, as the 351 Cleveland wasn't made for fuel economy.

Scott sat in his darkened car, watching people go to and fro down Hawthorne, going from pubs to theaters and vice versa. He watched a couple stop in the shadows just off the street as they held each other and kissed tenderly. It reminded Scott of how much he missed his wife, how much he missed being loved by a woman. And how much he missed sex. Man, he really missed sex. Of course, his thoughts then turned to Dawn. He thought he wasn't going to think of her in that way anymore. There could be no future for them. Yes, she didn't want Scott to shut her out, but what did that mean? Did she mean she wanted to be a part of this crazy world that had become his reality, or did it mean she wanted to be there with him? Right then, Scott wished one of those vampiric abilities he now had included understanding women.

As he sat with his darkened thoughts, fueled by lust and loneliness, suddenly there was a tap on his window. Yes, his vampiric senses should have picked up on the stranger approaching, but he'd allowed his mind to fill with other thoughts. The hoody-wearing stranger surprised him. Scott rolled down the window, and immediately his nose was assaulted by the reek of garlic and beer. Being a vampire, the garlic breath really made his eyes water.

"Hey, dude," the intoxicated young man asked. "Like, do you got any, like, change, or something?"

"Show me your eyes!" Scott commanded.

"What?"

"Pull back your hood and show me your eyes!"

The young man did as he was told. Scott looked at his eyes. They were slightly bloodshot, but were also a deep blue. The drunk kid was not black-eyed.

"Get lost."

"What?"

"Scram!"

The young drunk stumbled away from Scott's car. "Optometrist asshole," he mumbled.

As much as he hated turning away the drunk kid (which he really didn't, as that garlic breath was really getting to him), Scott knew he had to focus now. He tried clearing his mind of his previous thoughts and becoming aware of what was going on around him. It seemed to work; he began sensing a presence approaching his car, from out of the darkness. The child-sized figure approached Scott's car boldly, confidently, fearlessly. Scott wasn't taken by surprise this time when he heard the rapping on the car window, which he rolled down again to see a pale boy, maybe twelve to fourteen years of age by his guess, his eyes cast down.