Joe Vampire (8 page)

This experience has been a lot like learning the ugly scoop about Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny and Ziggy Stardust all in one truth-revealing go-around. Only in this case, I’m sort of happy to learn that whatever I’ve come to believe about the magical land of Vampiria was going to be less magical than all the fictional mumbo-jumbo had let on. I would much rather have heard that Santa and Ziggy were real and vampires were bogus, though; in that scenario, everyone makes out like a bandit and no one craves anyone else’s blood. Just cookies and super-bad haircuts. But you don’t always get to choose what ends up as fantasy and what turns out to be reality. Sometimes you have to ride the wave you land on and dodge the rocks as best you can.

For the moment, I’m just hanging ten until I hit the shore.  

After talking to Don, I realized that this was going to be a long-haul sort of thing. There will be no quick fix; I’ll have to tough it out, and somehow fit it into the life I’m still determined to have. The vital statistics don’t lie: as far as my major systems are concerned, I am not entirely living anymore. That means a whole lot of things will be different for me, all of which I’m still discovering as I go. And as isolating as it feels sometimes, I am not doing this entirely alone. I’m getting by with a little help from my friends. 

One friend, at least. Now that he knows what’s going on.

I had fully intended to devise a way to hide the Vampire Within by covering up the Vampire Without. Once I had a handle on what the situation would be – even if was bound to change up a little as it progressed – I could at least fall back on a standard collection of lies and excuses that I would have at the ready.
Who’s good for a full day of Warped Tour?
Sorry, guys… three more ultraviolet rays and this freckle will be a melanoma.
Join us for happy hour at the Samurai Ham On Rye?
Not after the last time, thanks – previously undiagnosed fish allergy.
You’re looking a little peaked… are you okay?
Iron deficiency… just need to up my spinach intake. I could totally play this off, with my workmates, my family – just about everyone.

But not with Hube.

And anyway, after everything I’d learned I knew I had to unload on someone. Aside from my sister, who would be hard-pressed not to share it with the rest of my family, he’s the only one I would go with something so enormous. Fortunately, I didn’t have to go to him.

He came to me.

He showed up one Wednesday night and walked right in, which isn't anything different for him. I thought maybe I’d missed another practice, but I saw right away he wasn’t here for music. His hair was combed, his shirt buttoned up to his chin. He looked stern and sort of preacherly, like he'd been rolling through the neighborhood passing out postcards with Biblical scriptures on them. He was even carrying a little black book. When he laid it on the table, I read the title:
How to Conduct an Intervention
.

Oops. 

Then he began conducting. “Hey, Joseph.” He never calls me Joseph unless he has a point to make. “I think we need to have a talk.”

I started in with something sarcastic, then decided it probably wasn’t the best approach given the touchiness of the situation and changed course. “You’re right, Hube. We do.”

I don’t think he expected that. “I’ve been worried about you lately. You’ve been… different… since you got
sick
.” He made little air quotes when he said it. “I thought you’d be better by now, and then you blew off the doctor… do you want to talk about what’s going on?”

“Dude, it’s not what you’re thinking – believe me.”

“And what am I thinking, Joe? Hmmm?” Whoa. He was calm, superior
and
condescending – all at the same time. And he wasn’t cursing at all, not even PG-rated stuff. He had really rehearsed this. “What is it that I’m thinking right now?”

Without even trying, I picked up his thoughts. Since we're pretty much on the same wavelength anyway, I figured it would be easy. And it was, almost like Radio Hube had switched itself on in my brain. It was even easier than it had been with the nurse. I read it all to him, word for word:
You weren’t sick; you started hitting the smack and now you’re trying to hide the fact that you’ve become addicted.
“Hitting the smack, Hube? Is that from your book? Come on… you know me better than that.” His mouth dropped.
Holy fuck… you just read my mind
! “I know… yours and everyone else’s. It’s freaking me out big-time, and I really need your help with what’s causing it. But it has nothing to do with drugs.”
This is some sort of trick… something you learned on You Tube.
“Not a You Tube trick, buddy – something else. Something way worse.”
I don’t believe this.
“I don’t believe it either, but it’s true." He fell totally silent, except for a few incredulous squeaks. We had just held a two-way conversation with me doing all the talking, yet he still couldn't get what was happening. 

I would have to prove it to him on his own terms. 

"Okay," I told him, "let's try this another way. Think of something totally random – anything, whatever comes into your head – and I’ll tell you what it is. Okay? Anything – no holds barred.” He eyed me warily. "Whenever you're ready." Then it came. “Dodgeball. Paper clip.  Chicken leg. Pamela Anderson’s left nipple. Dodgeball again.”

Hit, hit, hit, hit. And hit.

Hube was not prepared for something like this. Honestly, who would be? He sank onto the couch. “I thought you needed an intervention, not an exorcism.”

“It’s not like that, Hube,” I assured him.

He didn’t believe me. I don’t think he knew what to believe, actually. “What’s it like then? Tell me, Joe,
what is it like?
You’re pale as hell; you don’t seem to eat anymore. You won’t go outside; you hide out in your house all the time. You’re gone from work for nine goddamn days and I can’t get you to pick up the fucking phone! Were you sick, dude, or were you strung out, or were you possessed by the devil? And what are you right now? ‘Cause I’m watching my best friend go through some pretty dark shit here, and I feel like there’s nothing I can do to get him out of it.” He was crying. “So what the
fuck
?”

Yikes. I was so busy worrying about what had happened that I hadn't stopped to realize I wasn’t the only one who was being affected by it.

The human part of me that was still in there felt like a total shit.

I flopped down next to him on the couch. “First up: I’m not on anything, Hube – I swear to you, I’m not. I know how well junkies can pull off a lie, but I would never lie to you about something like that. Plus, you know how I feel about putting foreign substances in my body, right? Germs and everything?” He accepted that. "And as tempting as I'm sure it would be for any demon to get all up on my sweet ass, I’m not possessed, either.” That made him laugh a little. “But close.” 

That didn’t. 

I spent the next two hours explaining to him what had happened at Pomme, and my conversation with Don, and everything that had gone on between the two, right up until the minute he walked in the door. He was dumbstruck, which made me sort of glad for the mindreading thing.
Is this even possible?
“I wouldn’t have thought it was, until all the fun-filled features started showing up. The doctor visit was enlightening, though. Hard to deny a missing heartbeat.” 

Hube was quiet for a while. I just let him absorb it all. “Sorry I accused you of being on drugs, dude. That wasn’t cool.”

I waved it off. “Forget it. You were trying to help me out. How were you supposed to know I was a vampire and not a crackhead? I made it kind of difficult to tell the difference.” The tension was fading. “Sorry for waiting so long to tell you. It hasn't been easy to find the right way to say it. Bet you wish I really had been on drugs after finding all this out, huh?”

He chuckled weakly. “Nah… we’ll figure it out,” he said, not sounding terribly confident about it. I, on the other hand, couldn't have been more relieved to have spilled it all to someone – to Hube, especially. I kind of felt like I had a partner in vampirism now. 

“Thanks anyway for the intervention. Aren’t there supposed to be a few more people at these things?” He told me he’d called my parents, but tonight was a new episode of
Breaking Bad
, and they wondered if this couldn’t be done next week instead. My sister was out of town; my brother didn’t pick up the phone. “That sounds about right.”

Hube looked sort of embarrassed. “But I didn’t want to wait any longer. So you just get me… an intervention of one.” I slugged his shoulder.

As it turns out, one was all I needed.

POST 13

The Man with Two Brains (And No Girlfriend)

Since spilling my guts to Hube, it’s become quite a bit easier to deal with all this vampire crap. Whenever some new aspect crops up – say, little fanglets (yep – they’ve started coming in) or a slight pointing at the tips of my ears – I bounce it off of him to make sure it’s real and that I’m not going insane. He’s a great sounding board for stuff like that. He’s also not afraid to let me know when I’m getting a bit too dark – shocking, I know, but it does happen – and he doesn’t let me stay bummed for too long when it all threatens to overwhelm me. For a member of the fully living, he has some pretty keen insight about how to have a normal life while being somewhat dead.

He’s like my second brain, that guy.

He’s also willing to make all kinds of crazy sacrifices to help me out, things I end up having to put in perspective for him so he remembers that this whole shebang is a little more wonky than what we’re used to facing, being a couple of work-a-day dudes in a synthesizer rock band and all. Hube prefers to think of
This
as a wake-up call, something to remind me how alive I still am, and how lucky I am to be so. A near-death – or un-death – experience, of sorts. He thinks I should approach it like I’m on some kind of an adventure, like a super-pale Bear Grylls or the Indiana Jones of the undead. I’m thinking no. Adventure is something I prefer to experience from a distance.

And through television.

Hube is also ultra-aware of how much the whole human bloodfeeding deal really bothers me, as it should bother anyone who thinks about it for even a second as a real-life possibility. But he’s all about the solutions… to the point of excess, sometimes. “Maybe you could become a vigilante, like, a superhero sort-of thing,” he suggested once, when the topic of feeding came up.

“Nah… I’m too lazy.” I come from a long line of very still, very conservatively-dressed people. The last thing I wanted to add to my list of shit to figure out was how to move quickly in spandex without everything jiggling.

“Right… right. You could become a missionary, then, dedicated to tracking down terrorists and dictators and human garbage in general.”

“That’s mercenary, not missionary. And no.” How would I fund something like that?

“So, no criminals and no terrorists." I think my reluctance irked him. "I understand you're walking a moral tightrope here, but is there any faction of loser you actually would be willing to suck blood out of in order to avoid biting the innocent? We have to find you someone to feed off of.” This is precisely the reason I love Hube: he speaks in terms of
we
, as if even my being a vampire is something we’re going to tackle together. He’s always been this way. He doesn’t stop to think about it for a second, doesn’t hesitate. I tell him I’m a vampire and he just jumps right in with both feet to help me out, no matter how whacked things get. He’s more of a brother than my own brother, really.

My own brother is just an asswipe.

Before I could stop him, Hube jumped in one more time. “Got it. You could feed off of me.”

I was sure he was kidding. “Yeah, right.”

“I’m clean and healthy, had all my shots. No history of blood-borne illnesses.” 

A little less sure after that. “Hell to the no, bro.”

“Why not? We’ll make a schedule… it’d be like a donation at the blood bank. They take a pint every eight weeks, so we could start with that and see what happens.”

He was totally serious. “No freaking way!” 

“I’ll have to double up on my protein pretty quickly… how many Slim Jims do you have on you?”

This was too much. I stopped him as he was tapping his neck to make his jugular pop out. “Hubert, pal, listen… you’re the best; you’ve stepped up to the plate like no one else ever would – not even my family. I know how totally there you are for me with this crazy vampire shit. But dig me here: I’m not going to take your blood. I’m not going to take
anybody’s
blood.” He kept insisting this would work, saying he couldn’t just sit by and do nothing while I circled the drain. I assured him I was nowhere near the drain – I was way at the back of the bathtub, and the water wasn’t even halfway down the sides yet. True, I could sometimes see a scummy ring from where I was, and the soap was full of hair, but I didn’t let on. “You’re a vampire, for crying out loud,” he reminded me. “You’ll have to feed eventually.”

“No, I’ve got this – I’ll just be non-practicing. I already do it with my religion and that seems to be working out okay, so why not give it a shot with this stuff… am I right?” He didn’t think that was as funny as I did. So I explained how I’d experimented with uncooked steaks and stuff, and how just sucking the juices out of the flesh seemed to energize me a little, like licking a battery or downing half a Red Bull. The charge didn’t last long, maybe because everything I sucked out was from something that was already dead. But I assured him I’d find a way around this, that this was a perfect opportunity to put my hard-earned D in college biology and my internet addiction to good use. There had to be some non-invasive, unfelonious solution that didn’t involve biting my friends or consuming raw animals on the regular. It might take a while, but eventually I’d figure it out. “How much of a while do you think you have?” he asked.