Chapter 3: Alexis

Chapter 3: Alexis

Whatever fumes I was running on were already exhausted when I reached Bangor. There was no more fight left in me. Although I had never been a quitter, in my mind, the most convenient solution to all my woes right now was to just let go and let the vampire kill me. At least then, I would be able to locate Will’s spirit in the afterlife, give him a good ethereal beating for dying on me, and then ask him what he’d meant when he had said Ariana’s name. There was a one-way ticket to all of that happening, and it was wrapped around my throat, drawing out my life force.

It would have all happened exactly like that had Izzie not been standing there in the back, her hands grasping the baseball bat as if she was some sort of hero in a dystopian video game.

“Your flesh crawls with fear,” the vampire said, his face next to mine. It took me a second to realize what he was doing. He wasn’t just choking me; his claws were digging into the skin of my neck, drawing blood, undoubtedly attracting the vampires that had come along with him.

And that was when it ended, my passive acceptance of death. A cluster of vampires in this back alley would mean havoc for Izzie and everyone in the bar. A bunch of feral vampires loose in the streets of Bangor, driven into a frenzy by blood…who knew what hell would break loose if that’d happened?

Izzie’s bat collided with the back of the vampire’s head, breaking his crushing hold on my neck. I slid down the floor as fresh air burst through me, granting me back my sight and eliminating my passive acceptance of fate. I struggled to my feet, trying to understand what had just happened. Izzie still held the baseball bat in her hands, with one of its ends steeped in blood. The vampire was reeling, holding his bloodied head with both hands.

As he staggered about the alley, he eventually passed through a spot where sunlight had managed to shine despite all the wires, rooftops, and awnings. The moment he came into the sunlight, his skin started sizzling. The vampire yelled and made a run for the darker part of the alley.

Izzie stood by me, one hand clinging to the bat, the other wrapped around my shoulder. Ever since the death of my parents, I had never felt such a feeling of familial protection. It was not the same with Will. He had been my lover. Half the time, I had to help him adjust to the ways of the new world. Vince and Maliha, while close friends and all, were within my age bracket, and although they had helped me out a lot, it had never been like this. Never the comforting arm on my shoulder.

Only mom used to do that.

“Fucking meth heads,” Izzie spat. “We’re in the middle of one of the worst drug epidemics in the country. The streets are filled with junkies shooting scag in their system, smoking meth, and doing all those new sorts of designer drugs that have a fifty-fifty chance of getting you high or killing you. Best buy yourself a handgun and stand your ground when you get jumped like this.”

Neither did I have the heart to tell her that I knew exactly where the meth had been coming from, nor did I have it in me to inform her that the thing she had driven away was not some drug addict but a scorned vampire. All I knew was I had to stick around, if not just for my sake, then for Izzie’s.

“That bed still up for grabs?” I asked.

“For sure. Just…be extra cautious of these folk in the alleys. Half of them are stoned out of their gourds and don’t know what they’re doing. The other half is just in pursuit of chaos. You best avoid both.”

“This isn’t the first time you’ve had to defend your property I’m assuming,” I said.

“Honey, I’ve lost count.”

“I never understood why there’d be a full-fledged bar in the middle of the back alleys. Why not a main road or avenue?” I asked. It was only a deflective question meant to slow Izzie down. What I was really looking out for was the vampire. Had his friends arrived? The rooftops and alleys were clear so far, but that could mean anything. Maybe they were ganging up around the corner.

“This bar was part of the old town. Everything around it was built within the last five to fifteen years. Mulligan’s has been around for a hundred years. At this point, only those who know of its existence come to visit it. It’s a sanctuary if you think about it like that. Just every so often, we pick up a stray.”

“Hey, don’t expect me to meow.”

“I don’t expect none of that. Although, do take the First Aid kit to your room, patch up your neck, and come back down for lunch. I will show you the ropes on running the place, and then we can get you started in the kitchen or behind the bar.”

“Thank you.” I was mostly just grateful that I didn’t have to shift into my wolf form in front of Izzie. More grateful that the sun had been where it had been and had scared the vampire away. I could not help but think how docile I had been when the vampire was choking me. How could I have let myself accept death in such a lackluster way?

“Don’t mention it,” Izzie said, sliding behind the bar lithely. “Just find your room, and see if it’s to your liking. Don’t go expecting the Ritz or anything. The last person who stayed there was a bit of a hoarder and a kleptomaniac. That’s why we had to fire him.”

I picked up the First Aid kit and climbed up the dingy staircase. It smelled like the inside of Will’s ship on the staircase. All this wood, some of it wet, some gone soft from mold. There was a big window on the top of the staircase from where I could see beyond the alleys. In the distance, the murky waters of the Penobscot river flowed in a zig-zag. Beyond that was the lush green forest that I had come from.

There was only one door on the first floor. It was black, like most of the bar’s interior. I gently pushed it open, preparing myself for whatever awaited me in there. As Izzie had instructed, I was not expecting the Ritz.

But to my surprise, it was not bad at all. Keeping in theme with the bar, the floor and the walls were made of black wood. There was a giant window on one side of the room from where I could see the Penobscot even clearer. The alleys spread below me like a series of webs. From here, I could see into most of them, just as I could see past them onto the main road, on the rooftops of all the buildings around me, and at the wilderness in back of Bangor.

I had the urge to open the window and let the fresh air come in. The room was not shabby by any means. The only thing wrong with it was the stuffy smell. I slid open the windows and greeted the cold air inside, now turning my attention to the rest of the room.

There was a shabby bed in one corner, stripped of its bedsheet and pillow covers. The mattress atop it was stained yellow in numerous places. I was no one to complain. For me, all of this stuff came for free. I could fix this fixer-upper of a place in no time. But with what money?

I opened the cabinet, only now realizing what Izzie meant when she said that the previous tenant had been a kleptomaniac. Given all the stuff in the cabinets, I wouldn’t have to go on a shopping spree to fix this place. Most everything that I needed was already in there. Linen, pillow covers, candelabras, rugs, crockery, utensils…the cupboard had it all. There was even a designated section for stolen clothes. I yanked some of them out and sniffed them. Other than the scent of the cupboard, these clothes didn’t have any odor and didn’t look dirty. I chose a plaid shirt and black jeans from this pile, fished out a towel from the cupboard, and then headed into the bathroom.

After a hot shower, I put on my clothes, bandaged my neck, refreshed my old bandages, and then headed down. I had exhausted my limit of spending time all by myself. The more I stayed by myself, the more the horrors of my previous life came to haunt me. It was a lingering sadness that saw loneliness as an opportunity to attack when all my defenses were down. It all revolved around my dead mate and the last word he had said.

I was not gripped by the fact that I had moved away from Fiddler’s Green. That had always been the plan, even after Will became my mate. I had foreseen that he and I would move somewhere like San Francisco or Los Angeles, far away from the madness prevailing in that vampire-infested port city. I did not miss the people there. Well, apart from Vince and Maliha. The real sorrow infused down to my marrow was the loss of my mate. Had he been my mate at all, though? I couldn’t help but think that in his mind, I was always Ariana and that when he was dating me, feigning to be my mate, he must have been thinking that he was having a romantic affair with the woman of his dreams, the woman whose name he uttered before dying. What a fucking travesty.

Thoughts like these perfused the air around me whenever I was alone, making it impossible to stay in seclusion.

I raced downstairs, eager to join the chatter and the bustle of the bar and leave the maddening din of my mind behind me.

“Don’t you look a million bucks?” Izzie asked from behind the counter. The place was far more populated than it was when I left. More people were sitting in the booths and around the tables, many of them with drinks and food in front of them. “I bet you feel better too.”

“Tons. There was hot water in the bathroom. And a couple of painkillers in the First Aid kit. I’m much better,” I said.

“Good. Then go in the back. Emilia, our cook, is making some lunch. You can eat in the back while she tells you what your responsibilities will be,” Izzie said.

“Or I can just take the bar,” I said. “I was a bartender for a long stretch back in my old town.”

“Initiative. I like that. All right, then, kiddo. I hope you don’t mind if I go out in the back and have a smoke break, do you? Also, I’m taking a long lunch. So, yeah. The bar’s all yours,” Izzie said and then disappeared in the back.

I went behind the bar, assessing the number of people in there. There must have been no more than thirty patrons in the bar. Most of them were already drinking. Only one fellow was sitting at the bar itself, a man wearing a crisp suit, his blonde hair parted down the side. He was chewing on a toothpick, scrolling through his phone.

“What’ll you be having?” I asked as I flung the washcloth over my shoulder and donned the apron. It was always good to be wearing an apron while behind the bar. Many of the drinks made quite a bit of a splash when I made them.

“Well, I seem to have a cause for celebration,” the man said, smiling warmly at me. From his face, I could see that he was not much older than me. Thirty, at the most. He had a clean-shaved and angular face with a slim nose and sharp chin. “See, I got promoted at work today. They put me in charge of acquisitions. It’s kind of a big leap from my previous job. I was just a truck driver when I joined the company. But now, look at me.”

“I’m looking at you,” I said, realizing I was headed into flirting territory. I passed him a smile. “Back from where I came, real men celebrated with whiskey. Are you a real man?”

As reckless as it was, being behind the bar and wooing the customer brought back some shred of sanity to my warbled mind. It helped that the man was easy on the eyes. It wasn’t like I was engaged or in a relationship. I was in mourning, but there was no written law in the Millennial’s Guide To Mourning that said that I couldn’t do what I was doing. In fact, there was an entire chapter called Rebounds especially written for people going through terrible breakups. Wasn’t I broken up and terribly so? Hadn’t my mate rejected me by saying another woman’s name before he died? Didn’t he reject me by dying on me?

“A real man, jeez. That’s a term you don’t hear much, what with gender being a spectrum thing these days,” he said.

“A real man’s a real man on any spectrum,” I said, pouring him a shot of whiskey and sliding it across the bar. He deftly caught it and lifted it to his face.

“I’ll drink to that,” he said.

“I’ll join you,” I said.

I filled my shot glass with whiskey and clinked my glass with his.

“To real men,” he said.

“And to your promotion,” I chimed in.

“Another one, miss….”

“Richards. Alexis Richards.”

“Another one, Miss Richards. And make it a double, please.”

“And you are?”

“They call me Lawrence Fischer. But my mom calls me Fishy on account of my not being up to a lot of good.”

I chuckled. The man was amusing. He was serving his purpose just as I was serving his. For me, Lawrence was a mild distraction from the abysmal darkness all around me. I couldn’t help but feel that I had deserved some distraction.

“Your accent’s not from here,” Lawrence said, downing two more shots.

“Neither’s yours,” I said.

“You caught me. I’m a Yankee.”

“And I’m a Fiddler’s Green hick,” I said.

“Looks like it’s just us two outsiders in a place filled with born and bred Bangorians.”

“You got that right,” I said, pouring him his fourth drink. “And I just moved into town.”

“Pardon me, and I’m sorry if it’s not my place to ask, but what’s with the bandages?” Lawrence asked.

“You’re right. It’s not your place to ask,” I said, reverting back to my rigid, defensive self.

“My apologies,” Lawrence said, lifting his hands in an apology.

“I’ll tell you this much. If I were your man, I’d treat you like divinity. You’d never have so much as a strain on your face, let alone all those injuries.”

“You’re coming on too strong there, Lawrence. I’m guessing you’re not used to drinking all that much,” I said.

“Well, it is called liquid courage, and without those four shots in me, I wouldn’t have the courage to ask you out,” he said.

“Why are you asking me out? Look at me. I’m a hideous mess of bruises and bandages,” I said.

“I figured, what with you and me being new to this town and all, we could go see the sights together on a date. Talk about things. I’d tell you about how my dad was a shoemaker in the Bronx. You can tell me how you got those bruises. We can eat some lasagna.”

“That’s an odd first date. You often take ladies to first dates and feed them lasagna?” I laughed. This was good. He had taken it to rocky territory, but he had then swiftly adjusted course. We were okay again. Smooth sailing as it went.

“Well, I am Italian. And there’s nothing wrong with a big bowl of lasagna. It goes super well with most aged wines,” Lawrence said, gleaming.

“Sob stories, sightseeing, lasagna, and wine. Anything else?”

“Well, we can go see a movie. Eat some shrimp or split a lobster. Anything you like, really,” he said.

His proposition was quite intriguing and tempting. I’d have something to do in my off-time. Lawrence could serve as a nice rebound for me. Though, I wouldn’t let him touch me.

“As long as we’re on the same page about me using you,” I said. “I don’t want to get into it, but I’ve been through some horrible shit. I’m only saying yes so I can use you as a distraction from all the fuckery going on in my head. Is that a problem?”

“On the contrary, I am pleased to see someone being so upfront and honest for a change. I’d love to be your distraction.”

“And no touching.”

“No touching.”

“Are you going to just talk about it, or are you going to take me on a date?” I asked wryly, raising my eyebrow.

“All right. Be here, six in the evening. I’ll pick you up,” Lawrence said. He slid me a hundred-dollar bill. “For your troubles. Keep the change.”

I watched him leave the bar, then tucked the hundred-dollar bill in the cash register.

“Holy shit, girl, that was some hustle,” Izzie said, watching me from the back. “A hundred dollars for four drinks of Jack Daniels? You might run this bar in the black yet.”

“Does it need to be any blacker than it already is?” I asked, then we both burst into laughter.

***

“I had a really lovely time, Alexis,” Lawrence said as we walked back to the bar.

“It wasn’t half bad for me either,” I said.

“Did I serve my purpose as your distraction?” he asked.

“You were quite entertaining,” I said.

“Thank you for this evening. May I see you again?” he asked.

“That depends on whether you come back or not.” I took off his jacket and handed it to him. Bangor was chilly in the evening, but now I was home and didn’t need any more of his chivalry.

“I’ll stop by on the weekend,” he said. “You take care now.”

“You too,” I said, waving at him as he left.

Since I was not on shift, I used the fire exit to get to my apartment. The date was nice. It was just as he had advertised. We went to this strange Italian restaurant where we each had shrimp lasagna paired with red wine. Then we walked along the river and talked as we drank our peach smoothies. Nothing else happened except talking. I refrained from telling him my story. He resorted to making me laugh by telling me odd tales from his life as a poor kid in New York.

I opened the window and stepped inside my dark apartment, feeling tired, feeling a bit relieved at the start of this bizarre new chapter in my life. I could see myself enjoying this life in the long run and even getting over the losses of my past. Today had been a good example of that. What had started as a chaotic day ended on a nice note. Bangor wasn’t all that bad, either.

My hands struggled to find the switchboard. The light was dim in the room, what with the walls being black and it being nighttime, but it was enough for me to make out the outline of the bed, the cabinet, the bathroom door, and a silhouette standing in the corner of the room.

Before I could scream for help, and before I could so much as scamper back through the window, the silhouette walked toward me, stepping into the meek light of the overhead lamp.

I tried to tell myself that this was just my sorrow-addled brain undergoing psychosis. That this could not be real. I was asleep, and this was a nightmare. That could be the only explanation for what I was seeing.

Who I was seeing.

It was Will, standing in front of me, looking as pale as a ghost.