Curse you, Edward!

Curse you, Edward!
Word Count: 1864


"What do we do with him now?"

"I don't know."

"Drive a stake through him!"

"Cut off his head?"

"Rip him into a bunch of pieces and douse him in fire?"

So here I was, at my ten year high school reunion trapped in a closet. I had found myself in this unusual predicament because of the new movie out called Twilight. Of course, I couldn't fully blame that movie in particular because there were others, but my disdain for the main actor Robert Pattinson had made me biased. However, I knew one thing for certain: It was because of the movies that I was discovered.

Yes, I'm a vampire. Yes, I have sharp teeth. Yes, I drink blood, but just because I am unable to fight my primal instincts does not mean I should be condemned. Not when they're out there indulging their own selfish acts of drugs, sex, alcohol and violence. I graduated high school just like everyone else. I held down a steady job like everyone else. I slept just like everyone else. The only real difference was that I would never die and that I drank blood. Surely they couldn't condemn me on my eating habits when what they ate was much worse? Nobody was telling them to stop eating steak, or to slow down on all the greasy fast food. Disgusted, a low growl rattled in my throat.

"Whatever we do we should do it fast!"

"Yeah, totally."

"What if he breaks out?"

"Or what if he kills us?!"

I shook my head and chuckled in the dark stuffy closet that was my prison. If I had wanted to kill them I would have done so back in high school when they were pubescent brats. That should have counted for something, right? After all these years of knowing them I had never made friends. I had a few enemies, maybe, due to jealousy and insecurities, but never once had I ever given any one of them a reason to fear me. My unheard logic was wasted as I tried to explain to them that I would not hurt them when my secret was out. Now they could no longer hide under the veil of not knowing what I was. They could not longer float blissfully down the river of denial. My very presence exposed their rattling nerves and made them stink with fear.

When the cat is away, the mice will play.

The fear they secreted mingled in the air. It was quite delightful and perhaps if I had been hungry it would have been more enjoyable. My only concern now was what would happen next. I was fairly sure that they wouldn't be able to do me any harm physically, but the thought of what they could do to my lifestyle made me worried. A rumor spreading through the town like a wildfire about a vampire was sure to end my career and force me to move. I may even have to flee underground for a couple of decades before resurfacing. While I was a creature of the dark I had no wish to share my company with filthy rats in a sewer.

"...Okay, open the door."

"No, wait! We can't!"

"We have to, we can't keep him locked in there forever."

"Why not?"

I strained to hear what was going on behind the door. My hearing was excellent, of course, but there were dozens of feet shuffling about which made it hard to distinguish. After a moment I heard someone sigh heavily as if the person had been holding their breath for some time. Next I heard the scraping of chairs and tables as some of them began to clear the door in front of me. My eyes adjusted automatically as some of the bright light from outside sneaked past the frame of the door into my cramped abode.

The door clicked as the person on the other side unlocked it. Slowly, it opened, just a crack.

"Hey uh, if we let you out now..." but the sentence trailed off. I sighed.

The voices outside the door were louder now, no longer quite as muffled by the brigade of obstacles locking me in.

"Tell him if he goes without a scene we won't, uhm, kill him."

The audible noise of people shaking their heads and inwardly gasping overwhelmed my senses as another wave of fear wafted through the air. I tried to ignore the scent, blinking my eyes shut. Their fear was causing an unavoidable reaction to my physical body. Instead of a dull amber my eyes were almost certainly turning redder and redder with the scent of fear. If they'd only relax I would look normal again and could leave without a problem. If they kept their word.

"Alright, yeah. If you leave without causing a scene we'll let you go. How about it vampire?"

I winced. I was a vampire, sure, but the way he said it was insulting. I didn't go around addressing them as human. The voice was familiar, coming from a young man I recognized as Gabe from the football team in high school. While he was pretty popular, Gabe had never really seemed to let it go to his head. A lot of people looked up to him and it was probably because of that reason he was the one unleashing me, the horrible monster, from the closet.

"Yes. I will leave without a scene," I stated, trying to keep my voice even and friendly.

I stood up from my crouched position and waited. The door creaked open slowly, exposing a dozen or so pale faces. Each of them looked tense in their own way. Some were holding knives in front of them, poised in a fighting stance. Others held rope, ready to throw it around me and tie me down if I stepped out of line. In the far back a few people were scattered behind various pieces of furniture like tables and chairs. If only they had been so cooperative and organized as teenagers.

“Alright then, hurry up.”

Stepping forward carefully, I moved slowly as to not startle them.

Loud gasps escaped the lips of a few of them. Maybe they had caught a glimpse of my reddening unnatural eyes. Perhaps it was the unusual pale complexion of my skin. How it seemingly went unnoticed before my secret was revealed but now magnified as their curious eyes scanned me. Noticing every stare, every crinkled brow, I started moving to the exit. As I neared the door, feeling home free, a voice broke the nervous silence.

“Wait.”

It was Gabe. Of course it was.

I paused in my tracks but didn’t turn around. My hand had almost made it to the doorknob. I could feel its smooth cool texture just out of my fingers reach. In response, I only perked my ears up and raised my eyebrows.

“What exactly are you?” he asked, clear nervousness in his tone.

“You know what I am.”

“What are you going to do when you leave?” his voice asked, gaining confidence more and more at the apparent lack of interest I held with the group.

“Who cares man?” It was Tony, the high school loud mouth. He hadn’t changed much.

“It matters to me. Will my wife be safe? My child?” Gabe was beginning to sound more concerned with every word he said. It was a valid question though and something, if I had been human, would have likely asked.

I let my hand fall from its reach and turned around to face the crowd.

“Of course.”

The faces all looked around at each other. I could imagine what their thoughts were. As soon as they looked to each other they looked back at their leader, Gabe.

“How can we be sure?” he asked.

I shook my head softly, probably too subtly for them to notice.

“In all the years you’ve known me, or rather known of me, how many of you have I killed so far?”

The question hung in the air as everyone scanned each other’s faces again before turning back once again to Gabe.

“Lilly Martinson?” he asked accusingly.

Lilly had died a year back. It struck the town painfully like an unexpected hammer on a piano string. Reportedly she had died after falling, or jumping, off a cliff. When they found her body two weeks later it had been severely eaten away by craw-fish and other marine life. If I had killed her the way she was found would have been a perfect cover. The only thing that had given me a chance to deny the murder was that everyone in the town knew how absolutely depressed she had been after the sudden death of her new husband.

But the crowd here didn’t see that, still condeming me because of what I was instead of what I had really done. I could hear it in their movement as they shuffled their feet, murmering in hushed tones amongst each other. Their faces were less afraid and more angry over the death. It was easy to feel that way, I was sure. To blame someone besides sweet Lilly would be a relief and help them feel less uneasy when they encountered her grieving mother.

“I had nothing to do with that,” I stated coldly.

Someone from the back groaned, “Don’t give him any ideas.”

I raised my eyebrow curiously, wondering what the veiled comment meant.

From somewhere further, a loud voice echoed loudly across the stage.

“AND CUT! That’s a wrap!”

The bodies within the stage relaxed. Everyone breathed inwardly before slowly moving to their respective destinations. I could hear a few of them congratulate each other on a day’s job well done. A man with a corny white visor and screaming orange microphone got off his high chair and came down to talk to me. I only stood in the center of the now emptying stage awaiting him. As he approached me I idly wondered what he thought of the performance.

"Yeah, look, you need to look more menacing," he stated critically with his hands on his hips, "I am having trouble seeing you as a vampire."

I suppressed a chuckle. I wonder what he would think if he knew I really was a vampire.

He turned around and began walking away without a response. When he got a few paces away I heard his inaudible response, "Loser."

Excuse me? I thought. Loser?!

I advanced on him quickly, so fast that he lost his balance and stumbled backward when I grabbed his shoulder. His sweet smell aroused my nostrils as he began sweating in fear. The only thing he could manage to muster were short gasps as I locked my teeth against his neck. When my teeth broke his neck he began to scream, but the few people left were too shocked to aid him.

To hell with your play! I thought to myself as I drank his life. To hell with being good!

As he dropped lifelessly to my feet an inescapable curl found my lips. Licking off the blood I raised my face to my stunned audience.

"Next?"


This was originally written for "The Resurrected Stake & Garlic Contest"  but does not qualify as I used all three prompts instead of just one.