Jacob, p.25
Jacob, page 25
To any investigating agency, I was merely a renter in one of the more elegant and respected buildings in the neighborhood. The building was owned by a small property-management firm, which also managed properties in the Bronx, Queens, Harlem, Brooklyn and several spacious brownstones on the upper east side, just off Park Avenue.
Every quarter, the company sent a profit-and-loss statement, plus a sizable check to a downtown corporation, which distributed the earnings to its various shareholders. Several of those shareholders were companies based in other states. They distributed their earnings monthly, quarterly, or annually to other companies and other shareholders. Eventually, after passing through at least a dozen shell companies, some of the funds would arrive at my current lawyer’s office, and the rest to the offices of other lawyers in other cities. Most of the time, the lawyers and the executives managing the various properties were scrupulously honest. Several times they were not.
I wish I could report that lawyers are an acquired taste. They are not. They taste of dust and dogma. They are oatmeal.
But that’s a different discussion, which we will have another time. I was speaking of my apartment in the village. It was small and comfortable, a retreat from the responsibilities of a larger domain. Many of the furnishings were leftovers from an earlier time, dating as far back as the turn of the century. The twentieth was a century of escalating horrors, a delicious era. The first half, anyway.
The war in Europe had ended, but the war in the Pacific was dragging on. War weary combat troops were arriving from England and France and Italy by the shipload, almost every day—and just as fast, they were loaded onto westbound trains, where they would be loaded onto other ships—headed for some unknown island base from which the invasion of Japan would ultimately be launched. Everyone expected it to be a hard brutal campaign. Perhaps a million casualties. No one knew.
So, even this far away—even at this remove, the city was a pressure cooker of uncertainty, a mixture of giddiness and fear. There were good times ahead—but maybe there weren’t. The Japanese weren’t like the Germans. The Germans had momentarily succumbed to the insane fantasies of a madman, but the Japanese had invested centuries in the conviction that their emperor was the living son of heaven. The Imperial Sovereign was much more than a political delusion. He was the nation. Americans were having trouble understanding this—it was too alien.
So down in the streets, the mood was alternately grave and manic, depending on the hour.
Daytime, people went about their business, rushing to work, rushing home, rushing to the store, rushing to spend their ration coupons on butter and eggs.
Nighttime, however, as the storefronts shuttered, as the office buildings locked up, a different world began. The later it got, the more interesting the night became. Darker buildings beckoned. Shadowy doorways flickered open, briefly revealing red-lit spaces within. Silhouettes moved together. It was heaven.
This particular June night, I wasn’t hungry, I wasn’t anything—I was restless. The night was hot and humid, the city stank of sweat and garbage—there was no magic anywhere. But it wasn’t the city, it was me. I recognized the feeling, it was a different kind of hunger. When you’re that old, even novelty isn’t novelty anymore, it’s just a different way of recycling the past. When you’re that old, you don’t look for newness, you look for nuance.
Eventually, I gravitated to a midtown bar—not one I’d visited often, I didn’t like the flavors of humanity here. They swirled around me as if I didn’t exist. I understood why. Mostly servicemen—they were still unfolding themselves from the rigors of the war. They didn’t know how to talk to anyone who hadn’t been over there. So I chatted with the bartender.
He had a friendly smile, not just a professional one—he actually enjoyed his work. He flashed a flirtatious grin and slid a beer in front of me without my even asking.
Maybe his name was Bud. Everybody called him that, but I got the feeling it was only a nickname. He wore a black silk shirt and a red bow tie—and a gold ring in his right earlobe. Did he know the meaning of that? I’d grown up in Seattle in the 1860s. A fisherman wore a gold earring in case he died—the earring would pay the undertaker for his burial.
I doubted that Bud knew that particular history. Apparently, in this world—this place where men sought intimacy with other men—apparently, it meant something else, I wasn’t sure. I hadn’t kept up with the nuances of this subculture, but I was charmed by it. Bud was proud of his difference. That should have been a warning, but I wasn’t paying attention to my own senses. Or maybe I was enchanted by his silk shirt—it suggested he had a sensual side.
I admit, I was preoccupied, not just that evening, but for several weeks preceding. Although the tumultuous circumstances of my own recent past had been resolved, albeit not as smoothly as I had intended, my designs for the future remained uncharted. I was unfocused and still circling through my thoughts, rehearsing all the mistakes I’d made, as well as my fumbled recovery, wondering how I had stumbled into that situation and if there had been any possibility of extricating myself more effectively than the clumsy way I had finally resorted to. Only the urgencies of the moment, the influx and transshipment of massive numbers of troops and all the mishaps and miseries that inevitably accompanied such a circumstance, had spared me a closer examination by the local authorities.
This internal conversation had been continuing long enough to become an annoying loop, a broken record of repetition. Night after night, I had fled from the cage of my apartment seeking redemption, and if not that anything else that would distract me from another evening of relentless self-absorption.
As chance would have it—Bud’s casual flirtations were essentially meaningless, but for the moment I played the innocent again. I was doing post-graduate work at NYU, or I was here on business from St. Loo, or maybe I was just another lonely soul, out on his own for the night and looking for an illicit thrill—a dalliance, a bit of sexual adventure to prove that I was still young and virile and attractive. Or perhaps I was once again just another college boy from Boston, all alone in the big city.
Whatever. I let Bud flirt with me and I smiled in appreciation. I was flattered at the attention. Men of our nature do not flirt in the same manner that men of another nature flirt with women. It is a dance of meanings, both deliberate and casual, it is a testing of intention—playful banter disguising a very real negotiation. It is the construction of a different kind of relationship than exists in the more common world.
In the larger domain of humanity, when two men meet, there’s a brief flicker of hesitation. They size each other up. The unspoken question is “Can I take him?” Sometimes they test each other—the relationship remains unresolved for as long as it takes to determine which of the two will be the stronger, which will lead and which will follow. If the question never gets resolved, the men become rivals, enemies in a constant state of opposition.
But when men of a different nature meet, the unspoken question is not one of opposition, but intimacy. “Can I take him?” exists in a vastly different context. It becomes, “Do I want to be naked with him?” Not just physically naked, but emotionally as well.
And yes, it is that same emotional nakedness that Nightsiders still crave—even after a century or more of life. Everything else is just cardboard dancers moving against a flattened panorama—as unconvincing as a theatrical backdrop. It does not have to include a sexual intimacy, but when it’s possible—
And in that moment, I allowed myself to be charmed by Bud’s easy flirtations. When he said, “Stick around. I get off at midnight,” I was charmed. I said, “I’d like that.”
No, I was not hungry—not for that. That’s another assumption that daysiders make—that Nightsiders are only interested in feeding. We are not. Well, at least, I am not. I am not a glutton. There are too many other pleasures in life, and with the enhanced senses of my condition even the simplest of flavors can be a joyous delight. Vanilla ice cream? Most people just eat it—never truly tasting the complex ballet of flavor and texture and temperature. If you take the time to savor its delicacy, it can be as filled with discovery as a seven course banquet.
The same is true of the other senses, particularly that frenzied grappling for position that passes for sexual connection. The way that sexual relations are portrayed in cinema—it’s a pernicious lie, a fable for the impoverished souls who hunger for intimacy and accept physicality as a poor substitute. What is portrayed is not even the palest intimation of what is possible.
Did I believe that true connection might be possible with Bud? No, I did not. I wasn’t hoping for it, either. As I said earlier, I was exhausted from the recent past, I was allowing myself this convenient bit of exercise. Then again, I have been surprised more than once by what can occur when I let go of expectations. This evening, I expected little more than some enthusiastic pistoning leading to an easy climax. It would be enough—a sufficient diversion to hold back the onset of ennui.
When the hour arrived, Bud and I left quickly. He asked if I had a place nearby. I nodded. I had a midtown apartment I maintained for one of my out-of-town identities, a convenient and disposable safe-house. We walked the few blocks without talking. We both knew what we were up to, there was no need to negotiate. Once inside, we wasted little time removing our clothes.
The bow tie was a clip on, his silk shirt unbuttoned smoothly—revealing an attractive, rugged body. His chest hair, dark and curly, formed a classic tree-of-life. He stretched his arms, his upper torso muscular, his shoulders and arms well-corded, but he moved with an easy grace, comfortable in his body. Levis dropped to the floor, revealing well-shaped legs and calves. His black silk boxers bulged with anticipation.
He pushed me backward onto the bed. I allowed it to happen. Normally, I am not the submissive partner, but tonight I was coasting, allowing events to proceed as they would. In contemporary terms, I am pansexual, I am whatever my partner wants me to be, so it was easy for me to lie back in anticipation of what this man intended.
He tugged off my briefs, studied me for barely an instant—I have always been slim, never truly muscular, and after my transformation, I have maintained an unusually youthful appearance. Young blood helps with that, the younger the better. I admit it is uncharacteristic, but I’m not yet ready to age. Older blood has more character, but younger blood has greater vitality, and I prefer the bounce it gives me.
But I wasn’t looking at Bud that way. As I have said more than once, I am not a glutton, and I do not need to feed as often as portrayed in the movies. Once or twice a month is sufficient. And it isn’t necessarily a fatal encounter for my selected partner. Only when—but I’m still getting to that.
Bud studied me for a moment. Compared to him, I was skinny, undeveloped. And because I was so slight and pale, perhaps he saw me as effeminate. That had always been part of my attraction to some of my patrons. And certainly, Bud had chosen me for some reason. He had flirted with me deliberately, and he had asked me to wait and meet him at midnight. He would not have done so had he not desired me—
So I expected Bud to be as affectionate in bed as he had been at the bar. I expected a slow sincere seduction. Instead—
He flung himself at me, straddling me like a cowboy on a steer and began slapping at my face and arms, the whole time shouting a stream of invective so startling, I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry—
I cried.
What? You think Vampires have no souls, no feelings? We do. And so much more intensely than even the most passionate of daysiders—
Bud had caught me when I was vulnerable. When I was still feeling the pain and hurt of what I had previously lost. I had not yet expressed my grief, I was still carrying it around inside, like an oyster clutching the sandy irritant that would some day become a pearl, but for the moment was still a source of anguish. He’d caught me by surprise and my emotions burst from me in an explosion of sudden gasps and sobs. I had not known I was still so deep in my distress.
My tears must have excited him, because he now increased his efforts. Enraged, he kept slapping at my face, shrieking now—
“This is what you deserve, you ugly little piece of puke. This is what a real man does to a faggot like you—” And more. Much more, much worse. He used words I would not repeat anywhere. And the whole time, he pumped furiously at his organ. The greater his abuse, the greater his arousal.
I let him pummel me—for the moment, I wasn’t afraid. In fact, I welcomed it. The stimulation of this beating was a purge, a scouring, a scourging of the horrible detritus of the despair that had crippled me for so many long weeks. So yes, I welcomed it. I encouraged it. I shrieked with pain—and yes, it hurt, but it was a delicious hurt—
And the whole time, part of my mind was wondering how this charming bartender had become the author of this monstrous assault. Was this his normal release? And if so, where did he find partners? And why hadn’t anyone else at that bar warned me? Surely, someone else must have known this truth.
It was only when he started punching me that I realized the intensity, the depth of his fury. This wasn’t just a sexual release for Bud—he intended to hurt me. His expression was distorted with rage, his mouth twisted, his eyes burning. This crazed man was strong enough to injure me and he was furious enough to do so. Despite my enhanced ability to heal, I began to fear the level of damage he could inflict. He might even need to kill me to achieve the emotional release he so desperately craved.
It was when he raised his fist too high—high enough to deliver a punishing blow—that my alarm finally exploded. With a burst of internal fire flooding outward from my heart, I flashed into Q-time, that acceleration of the flesh that turned the rest of the world into a slowed-down panorama. His fist came down slowly—slow enough for me to watch it in amusement—and sank deeply into the mattress beside me. I had already twisted away. Missing me, not meeting the expected resistance of my terrified face, put him off balance, he fell slowly sideways just enough that I could roll backward, bringing up my knee, my foot, to sink it into his solar plexus, pushing into it, pushing and pushing and pushing until he rose up and away, flying slowly, gracefully backward off the bed, arms spreading outward in surprise, astonishment creeping across his face, until he slammed against the ceiling—hard! Even in Q-time, I could feel the impact. He held there for a long slow-motion moment, then began descending as gently as a deflating balloon—by which time I had already rolled off the bed, sticking the landing like a champion gymnast.
I only look harmless. That’s my power.
Bud splatted onto the bed, face-planting into the mattress, sprawling in shock, gasping, unable to breathe, barely able to curl himself into a ball around the horrible knot of pain in his gut. I had aimed my kick deliberately.
There’s this about violence—as much as the movies lie about sex, they lie about fighting even more. In the real world, most fights are over quickly. In the movies, the opponents are always equally matched and equally indestructible, enduring assaults that would cripple a normal person.
In real life, the one with the power disables the target as quickly as possible, usually with a single well-placed application of force to the most vulnerable part of his opponent’s body. One good kick to the solar plexus—actually one exceptional kick—and it was enough to slam Bud into the ceiling above the bed. Hard enough to crack the ceiling plaster—and possibly his spine as well. After that, gravity did the rest.
By the time he was mostly through vomiting, Q-Time had eased, not completely, but enough that I could start to recover my own strength. I had my head low, my hands on my knees. I was gasping for breath as well—that sudden swift exertion of energy was going to cost me. I was good for another hour or two—after that, I’d need a few hours of dormancy. Four, maybe six.
I awoke to sunlight streaming in through a crack in the curtains. I was sprawled across the living room sofa. Judging by the angle of the sunbeams, it was late afternoon. I’d slept longer than I intended. And I still felt weak and groggy.
Coffee first. While it was brewing I took a long hot shower. I ignored the muffled noises coming from the bedroom. Time enough for that later.
When I finally entered the bedroom, Bud’s frantic eyes followed my every movement. He made some noises from behind the gag, but I ignored them. I did check the bindings on his arms and legs; they were secure. My long-dead father had taught me well—I still remembered how to tie a secure knot. It was the only legacy he’d left me, but I’d made good use of it more than once. This time, I had cut Bud’s black silk shirt into narrow strips, braided them for strength, and tied him spread-eagled to the four bedposts.
I dressed in silence, there was no need to talk to Bud. Not any more. He’d waived all rights the moment he curled his hand into a fist—the moment he’d decided to hurt me. First, I had some shopping to do.
It was late enough in the day that most of the streets were already shadowed. That’s one of the advantages of living in a city of canyons. It’s easy to avoid direct sunlight. I spread my purchases up the east side of Manhattan and down the west. There wasn’t a lot I needed, but I didn’t want to look suspicious, either.
By the time I got back, the sun had already set. I unpacked the shopping cart methodically, laying things out in neat rows on the table in the dining nook. Decisions, decisions. I started with the baby bottle. I filled it with milk and put it in a pan of water on the stove. A very low heat. While it warmed, I unwrapped the rest of the packages.
First, I lit the incense. Patchouli. A particularly noxious scent, but while it wouldn’t blanket the most offensive odors, it would mask them enough to be tolerable.
Then, I filled a bowl with warm soapy water and dropped the bathing sponge into it. As I expected, when I entered the bedroom, Bud was a mess. He lay there in a puddle of his own urine and feces. He looked haggard. His eyes were wild. And even without asking, I could tell that his muscles were cramped with the effort of trying to break free. Not from my daddy’s knots. His distress was palpable.
