Teeth

Elsie

I begin to seriously question her idea of 'a little while' quickly, as we continue to drive, the road and exits sort of blurring together into a monotonous haze, occasionally punctuated by a billboard, or, as we reach the outer limits of the city, buildings of decreasing scale. Sometime before the landscape becomes more populated by trees, I actually drift into a half sleep.

You have his mouth.

Maybe I should reward you with a kiss.

I see her face, Lily's face, clearly in my half dream, and she's still handsome and still frightening. Like finding a tiger standing in the room with you. She's that kind of attractive, like something old and strong wearing a person suit. In the dream, we're back outside in the cold, but her entire suit is dark bloody red instead of white, not just the sleeves, and she smells like blood and meat thinly covered by a vanilla perfume.

She leans in close to me, and this time I actually remember the feeling of sharp teeth scraping against the skin of my neck, digging for purchase. I remember the little details, like my breath steaming in the air. The dizzy spin of loosing too much blood. I remember her mouth on my skin, intimate in an predatory way...

"We're here." Carolyn's voice cuts in just before the dream goes any further, and I wake up with an small noise of embarrassment and confusion as the van bumps off the pavement and crunches and pops it's way over a white gravel driveway, toward an enormous wall with an gate that's already swinging open ahead of us.

The wall is towering brick, and along the top edge I can see spikes and what might be the glint of broken glass, indicating that whoever owns this place, they're pretty goddamn serious about making sure no one goes over the walls. I wonder what they do with the gate.  I also wonder if this 'friend' is like Carolyn, or if the house ahead is a giant sprawling Victorian manor house, castles being sort of difficult to find in these parts.

The conversation about blood and saliva killed my appetite earlier, but it's back with a vengeance now, and the headache kicks me on the inside of the skull just to prove it hasn't gone away either.

"Hurrah. Chez Dracula."

"Wow I have never ever, ever heard that joke before that's so clever!" Carolyn chirps, though it has more in common with someone cutting glass than with the cute little bird tone she might have been going for.

"I had aspirin and water for breakfast after a nice helping of 'nearly dead' last night, get me some breakfast and I'll up my bad joke game just for you."

Truth be told though, whatever preconceptions i had from horror movies... this place isn't anything like them. Instead of some vast, rambling old Victorian inspired by the Winchester House, it's a sprawling work of cut stone and mortar, with absolutely massive windows and a shingled roof, so 'Victorian' probably isn't the right word, though it nods to the era with it's gingerbread trim and grace.

The driveway and walks are all matching white stone, with a neatly manicured lawn and garden and clearly artificial pond in which I catch glimpses of fish as we drive up.

There's not a single coffin, bat, or even suspicious bulge in the landscaping to be seen, just some expensive looking sculpture that looks too... I don't know... not plaster... to be the kind that comes from a gardening store.

Much of it is of attractive very naked people, not Greek replicas, but I don't know the artist. Just that they have 'unobtainable perfect body' down across the board, the men and women both.

I don't see staff around, but I kind of have to assume there is one, just because of the scale of the place... and partially because of the tiny bent woman who emerges from the vast front doors and waves at us enthusiastically. I've been surprised today, but I don't see her standing on a ladder with hedge trimmers.