The Traveling Vampire Show (5 page)

“Used to be prepared.”

“Next time,” I said, “we’ll make sure and bring some bandiges along.”

“The hell with that,” said Slim. “Bring guns.”

Rusty and I laughed at that one.

After about five minutes, most of the bleeding seemed to be over. We kept pressing down on the cuts for a while, anyway.

Then Rusty looked at me and asked, “You were kidding when you said that about going for a doctor, right?”

“What do you think?” I said.

“Just wanted to make sure. I mean, I figured you must be kidding, you know? ’Cause I would’ve done it if I had to. I nean, if Slim really had to have a doctor. Like if it was life or death, I would’ve jumped on down and done it. dog or no dog.”

It seemed like a strange thing for him to say.

Strange and sort of nice.

Slim said, “Thanks, Rusty.”

“Yeah, well. It’s just the truth, that’s all. I mean, I’d do anything for you. For either of you.”

“If you wanta do something for me,” I said, “how about once in a while using underarm deodorant?”

Slim laughed and winced.

“Screw you, man! If anybody stinks around here, it’s you.”

“Nobody stinks,” said Slim, the peacekeeper.

I checked underneath my bloody shirt again. Rusty looked under his, too. We both studied Slim’s back for a while.

“Bleeding’s stopped,” I announced.

“Good deal,” said Slim.

“But it’ll probably start up again if you move around too much. You’d better just lay there for a while.”

“Not like we’re going anyplace anyhow,” Rusty said.

I stood up, stepped to the front of the roof and leaned forward to see over the top of the sign. The dog, already staring up at me, bared its teeth and rumbled a growl. “Get outa here!” I shouted.

It leaped at me. I flinched and my heart lurched, but I held my position as the dog hit the wall about four feet up and tried to scramble higher. It worked its legs furiously, claws scratching at the old wood for a second or two. Then it fell, tumbled onto its side, flipped over and regained its feet and barked at me.

I muttered, “Up yours, bow-wow.” Then I turned away.

Rusty, sitting cross-legged beside Slim, gave me a worried look. “What’re we gonna do?” he asked.

“Stay right here,” I told him. “At least for now. Give Slim’s wounds a chance to dry up a little more. When we’re ready to go, we’ll figure out something about the dog.”

“Maybe it’ll be gone by then,” Slim said.

“That’s a good one,” Rusty said.

“God, I’m being nice to it and the thing tries to rip my face off.”

“Sometimes,” I said, “being nice doesn’t work.”

“You can say that again.”

“Sometimes, being nice ...”

“Okay, okay,” Rusty said.

I sat down beside Slim and turned my hands over. They were rust-colored and sticky. I wiped them on the legs of my jeans, but not much came off.

Rusty looked at his hands, too. They were as stained as mine. Frowning slightly, he brought his right hand close to his face. He stared at it for a few seconds, then raised his eyebrows and licked his palm.

“Oh, that’s cute.”

Lying on her stomach with her face toward me, Slim couldn’t see Rusty. Rather than twisting around and maybe reopening some of her cuts, she asked me, “What’s he doing?”

“Licking your blood off his hand,” I explained.

He did it again. Smiling, he said, “Not bad.”

“Grade-A blood, buddy,” Slim informed him.

“I can tell.” He sucked his red-stained forefinger. “Maybe those vampires’ve got something. Tasty stuff. Try some, Dwighty.”

I shook my head. “No thanks.”

“Scared?”

“I’ve got no problem with Slim’s blood.”

“As well you shouldn’t,” Slim pointed out.

“But I just got done swinging a filthy damn cur around by its tail.”

“Weenie,” Rusty said, grinning and lapping at his hand.

“Speaking of which,” I said, “what’ve you been touching lately?”

Things dawned on him. He put his tongue back into his mouth and frowned at his hand. Looking a little sick, he shrugged his husky bare shoulders and said, “No big deal.”

A smile on what I could see of her face, Slim said, “I’m sure Rusty must’ve washed his hands after going to the bathroom.”

“I didn’t piss on ’em, if that’s what you mean.” Then he managed to blurt out, “Not much, anyway,” before he burst into laughter.

Slim and I broke up, too, but she stopped laughing almost at once—either it hurt or she was afraid the rough movements might start her bleeding again.

After a minute or two of silence, Rusty asked Slim, “Want me to lick your back clean?”

“God no!”

“Christ, Rusty,” I said.

“What’s the big deal?” he asked me. “I’m just offering to clean her up a little.”

“With spit,” Slim said. “No thanks.”

“Get a grip,” I told him.

Meeting my eyes, he said, “You can do it, too. You want to, don’t you?”

No!”

In fact, I did. Blood or no blood, the idea of sliding my tongue over the hot, smooth skin of Slim’s back took my breath away and made my heart pound fast. Under the layers of my jeans and swimming trunks, I got hard.

But nobody knew it but me.

“You’re out of your gourd,” I said. “I’m not licking her and neither are you.”

“What’ll it hurt?” Rusty asked.

“Forget it,” Slim told him.

“Okay, okay. Jeez. I was just trying to help.”

“Sure,” I said.

“’Cause you know what? If we don’t clean all that blood off Slim’s back, it’s gonna draw the vampire like a magnet.”

“What?” I gasped, amazed.

“Points for originality,” Slim said.

“You think it won’t?” Rusty asked.

“I think there’s no such things as vampires,” I said.

“Me, too,” said Rusty. “But what if we’re wrong? What if this Valeria is one? All this blood’s gonna bring her to us like chum brings sharks.”

Though I didn’t believe in vampires, I felt slightly nervous hearing him say those things. Because you never really know.

Do you?

Really?

Most of us tell ourselves we don’t believe in that sort of stuff, but maybe that’s because we’re afraid to think they might exist. Vampires, werewolves, ghosts, aliens from outer space, black magic, the devil, hell ... maybe even God.

If they do exist, they might get us.

So we say they don’t.

“That’s such bull,” I said.

“Maybe it is and maybe it isn’t,” said Rusty.

“Probably it is,” Slim threw in.

So I said, “If Valeria is a vampire, which she isn’t ... A, she’s not even here yet. And B, even if she gets here, she can’t do squat to us till after dark. And we’ll be long gone by then.”

“Think so?” Rusty asked.

“I know so.”

Sure I did.

I eased myself down on my back. The tarpaper felt grainy against my bare skin, but at least it wasn’t scorching hot the way it might’ve been on a sunny day.

“What’re you doing?” Rusty asked.

“What does it look like?”

“We’ve gotta get out of here.”

I shut my eyes, folded my hands across my belly, and said, “What’s the big hurry?”

“You wanta get caught up here when they show up?”

Slim asked, “Why not? We came to see Valeria, didn’t we?”

“To get a look at her—not to get caught at it.”

“I’d rather get caught at that,” Slim said, “than get my butt chewed by Old Yeller.”

Rusty was silent for a while. Then he said with sort of a whine in his voice, “We can’t just stay up here.”

“It isn’t just the dog,” I told him. “The longer we wait, the less Slim’ll bleed on the way home.”

“But they’re gonna show up.”

“Maybe they’ll have bandages,” Slim said.

“Very funny.”

“Let’s give it an hour,” I suggested.

“If we’re real quiet,” Slim said, “maybe the dog’ll go away.”

“Sure it will,” Rusty muttered.

Then I heard some scuffing sounds. Turning my head, I opened my eyes. On the other side of Slim, Rusty was lying down. He let out a loud sigh.

The way we were all stretched out reminded me of the diving raft at Donner’s Cove. Whenever we swam at the Cove, we always ended up flopping for a while on the old, white-painted platform. We’d be in our swimsuits, out of breath, dripping and cold from the river. Soon, the sun would warm us. But we wouldn’t get up. You felt like you never wanted to get up, it was so nice out there. The raft was rocking softly. You could hear the quiet lapping of the water against it, and the buzz of distant motorboats and all the usual bird sounds. You could feel the soft heat of the sun on one side, the hard slick painted boards on the other. And you had your best friends lying down beside you. Especially Slim in one of her bikinis, her skin golden and dripping.

Too bad we weren’t on the diving raft at the Cove. Too bad we were stranded, instead, on the scratchy tarpaper roof of the BEER—SNACKS—SOUVENIRS shack. Not surrounded by chilly water but by the wasteland of Janks Field. Not waves lapping peacefully at the platform, but the damn dog growling and barking and every so often hurling itself at the shack.

This just wasn’t the same.

Not quite. The raft was paradise and this was the pits. And even if the dog should magically vanish, I knew Slim would start bleeding all over the place the minute we hit the ground.

She’d already lost a fair amount of blood.

She would lose a lot more on the way home.

What if she lost too much?

I turned my head. Blinking sweat out of my eyes, I looked at Slim. Her eyes were shut. Her face was cushioned on her crossed arms. It was speckled with tiny drops of sweat, and dribbles were running here and there. Her short hair, the color of bronze, was wet and coiled and clinging to her temple and forehead. She was marked from temple to jaw by three thin red stratches.

I found myself wanting to kiss those scratches.

And maybe also kiss the tiny soft curls of down above the left comer of her mouth.

While I was thinking about it, she opened her eyes. She blinked a few times, then raised her eyebrows. “Time to go?” she asked.

“Hasn’t been an hour!” Rusty protested from the other side of Slim.

“I’ve been thinking,” I said.

“Hurt yourself?” Rusty asked. Apparently, the rest period had improved his mood—if not his wit.

“I don’t know about walking home from here,” I said.

“You and me both,” Rusty said. “We try, the dog’ll have us for lunch.”

“I’m not thinking about the dog.”

“You oughta be.”

“Dog or no dog, I don’t like the idea of trying to walk home. Slim’ll probably start bleeding again.”

“Big deal,” she said.

“It might be.”

“It’s not like I’ll bleed that much,” she said.

“What I was thinking, though, is that maybe one of us better go for help.”

“Oh, joy,” Rusty muttered.

“And what?” Slim asked. “Send out an ambulance for me? Forget it. I’ve got a couple of little cuts....”

“More than a couple.”

“Even still, it’s no big crisis. I don’t want to have a goddamn ambulance coming for me.”

“What I thought was, I’ll run to town and get somebody to drive me back here. Or I’ll borrow a car and do it myself. Either way, we end up driving you home.”

Slim’s upper lip twitched slightly. “I don’t know, Dwight.”

“You wanta leave us up here?” Rusty asked.

“I’d be back in an hour.”

“But shit, man, an hour. I don’t want to be stuck up here for an hour.”

“Take a nap.”

“What if something happens?”

“I’ll protect you, Rusty,” Slim said, speaking loudly because her face was turned away from him.

He tossed a scowl at her. Then he said, “Anyway, what about the dog?”

“Long as you stay up here, it can’t....”

“I know that, man. What about you? You think it’ll just let you leave?”

I shrugged. “I’ll take care of it.”

“Oh, yeah? Good luck.”

He said it sarcastically, but I answered, “Thanks” and got to my feet. I stepped to the edge of the roof. Knees almost touching the back of the BEER—SNACKS—SOUVENIRS sign, I bent forward and looked down.

The dog, sitting, suddenly sprang at me and slammed against the shack.

“I think it’s a moron,” I announced.

“Do you have a plan or something?” Slim asked. ,

“Not exactly.”

“I don’t want you to get hurt.”

I looked around at her, feeling a nice warmth. “Thanks,” I told her.

Sitting up, Rusty said, “It’s gonna have your ass, man.”

The dog again threw itself at the shack, bounced off and fell to the dust.

I gave the sign a nudge with my knee. Though it felt sturdy, it was nailed to the roof on wooden braces made of two-by-fours. With a little effort, I could probably kick one of the braces apart and have myself a club—maybe with a few nails sticking out.

Only one problem.

When you’re my dad’s son, you don’t go around destroying other people’s property. Not even a crummy sign on a closed snack stand in Janks Field.

It’s not only wrong, it’s illegal.

If Dad ever found out that a son of his had kicked apart someone else’s sign in order to make himself a club in order to beat the crap out of a stray dog ...

“What’re you doing?” Rusty asked.

“Nothing.”

“Want help?” he asked.

A laugh flew out of Slim, but then she groaned.

“You okay?” I asked her.

“Been better.” She grimaced slightly, then added, “Been worse, too.”

“Do you have any fond feelings for the dog?” I asked.

“You kidding?”

I shrugged. “I mean, you’re sort of an animal lover.”

“That has its limits,” she said.

“So ... you won’t be upset if something bad happens to this dog?”

“Like what?” she asked.

“Like something really bad?”

Looking me steadily in the eyes, she said, “I don’t think so.

As I, nodded, I saw Rusty giving me this very weird look. His eyebrows were rumpled in a frown, but his eyes looked frantic and his mouth seemed to be smiling.

“What?” I asked him.

“What’re you gonna do?”

I shrugged, then walked over to where the sign ended. Down below, the dog watched me and followed. When I stopped, it stopped.