Furimmer

The club was dark. In the air was the scent of cologne mingled with sweat from the pretty young boys tearing up the dance floor; their moves indicated their deepest sexual desires. Dozens of spinning, flashing lights illuminated the dance floor, reflecting off the mirrored ceiling, casting glows of a divine nature upon the foreheads of the flock of fresh young meat. I was aware of it. Every sound, every deep breath taken from exerting too much energy echoed in my head, vibrated with my heart, pulsed with the drums' deep beat from the music pounding out of the giant speakers. I embraced it all, for it had been too long. It was time to taste a little life and take a little with me. There, before me on the dance floor, was the one. In an instant, I knew from centuries of existing and learning the trade that the end of his life was nothing short of being hours away.

It smelled of a rich, deep sadness- death- and it was alive, and my body ached for its warmth- its essence- to fill me up, make me whole again, desirable. I watched from the shadows as he teased the others around him with his body and his eyes, the biting of his lower lip. I bit my own, drawing blood that ran like water but evaporated before hitting the floor. The floor was covered with dried bits of vomit and alcohol, even small traces of semen from weeks ago, possibly months. I could smell it, and although I was weak, its smell filled me with the uninhabitable hunger for the mortal flesh- inside and out. His name was Xavier, and he was no more than sixteen, passing for someone much older with the help of a fake I.D. and an attitude that could rival even the most enthusiastic prison inmates. Yet, he was more beautiful than a choir of angels singing their holy word on high. His long brown hair hung limp in his face, his blue eyes peering out between the strands as a world that could not possibly know him- or even love him.

He longed for the strong hands of a savior, the warm kiss of a protector, and the recondite love of a lover. His very soul screamed to be released, allowed to fly among the heavens- pitched into an abyss where pleasure was dominant, and the pain was merely an element that was a pleasure to him also. I knew that I could love him. I was capable of that still. Years buried in the Longfellow Cemetery's soft dirt could not steal that away from me, not even now. Not with the resurgence of strength, appetite, my own needs of being loved and cradled in the hands of another lost soul. I closed my eyes and imagined a world filled with only the young Xavier and myself. We could save one another, mold one another, into ourselves over and over again. I could teach him of worlds long gone, others now defeated at the hands of the preachers and teachers of God, the ability to live now… and forever. He could teach me the art of youth again, push back the years that aged my soul, yet not my skin. All the years I spent angry, frightened, and alone, searching for the one who could rescue me.

The music quieted, and a voice announcing closing time reverberated over the loudspeaker. Moans of disappointment rose up and away with the smoke from the cigarettes and the machine creating the dark, eerie fog. House lights came on in a flood of brilliant white light. Squinting eyes looking around for boyfriends and girlfriends, no one noticed me standing there, the corpse that stood motionless, invisible. I watched him move towards the double doors with the enormous orange "exit" painted in segments across their surface. He had thoughts in his head and a plan he would follow through. I made my way through the pushing crowd and out into the street. I could not see him, but I could smell his fear and feel his turmoil that twisted his gut, wringing out his flesh- it was delicious. He was walking down the street with his head down and hands shoved deep into his pockets, his fingers twirling the razor that would be his ticket out of hell. Above, the clouds spoke, telling of rain and a humid night after that. Raindrops began to fall, slow at first, then a pleasant, continuous pouring, like tears shed over death. Lightning struck across the sky, webbing out like the devil's pitchfork. I wondered what heavenly body it would disembowel tonight, and whose blood would spill, and at what price. I knew, and I moved on.

He stopped at a place I knew all too well, the Longfellow Cemetery. At the gate, I paused, not wanting to step back but knowing that I must. Yes, at what price would I suffer for desire? I swallowed hard, the dryness of my throat and the scent of decay indicating my hunger all the more. I came upon him sitting on a headstone that was his mother's. He was talking to his mother, as if she were sitting beside him, sipping a cup of tea, nibbling at a Danish. He was telling her how much he loved her and how much he missed her. He spoke of his father and how he was worse now than ever before. His drinking was slowly killing him, dehydrating his heart. He cried tears, like ones that I would never know, or feel sliding down my face, again. Oh, how I wanted to touch them, taste them, and kiss them away. I sat watching and anticipating his move, and it was made. The razor gleamed in his hand from the streetlight, and tiny beads of rain collected in his palm. I looked into his heart and saw that it was the other end of the rainbow; he knew that there, in death, lay his pot of gold. I needed to strike before he made the first cut.

I latched onto him, sticking my face in his and telling him I loved him. I kissed his lips, his face, tore open his shirt and kissed his chest, and mounted like a wild beast. I could see the fear in his eyes, feel the beat of his heart pounding with the adrenaline. My eyes rolled back into my head out of sheer ecstasy. I lunged at his throat, sinking my teeth into his delicate ivory skin, and the blood, his very life force, began pouring into my mouth, like a burst of fire; it all came exploding back out of me in a violent rage. It tore at my throat and sloshed against his skin, forever staining his white shirt. Feeling the brittleness inside our blood, I pulled away and in an instant saw the gash and the pouring red juices of his life seeping onto the ground. While I submerged myself within my desires of the flesh, he drove the razor deep into his wrist, bringing for the first drop of spilled blood, forever containing any life that I could drain out of him, corrupting any chance of my rebirth. At what price would I suffer for my desires?

His eyes met mine, and I wanted to jump into their blueness, create ripples in the essence of time and space as if they were an ocean untouched. Tears still formed there, and I knew that their poison would kill me and crumble my skin to dust. His lips parted, and the pinkest, most delicate, I lunged forward and licked his teeth so that I could see the mouth that might have once flooded this body with kisses. Then words, so pure and right, rose from his soon to be lifeless face; they pierced my ears like nails driven into the core. "I'm… I'm sorry." I watched as the life slowly drained from him. He trembled in my arms once, and then he died. I carried his body back to the hole in which I crawled out of and placed it gently within the darkness. I felt like I was feeding the dark side of mother earth, the one that feasted upon the flesh then gently rebuked the bones.

The rain had stopped, and the clouds were now breaking. The moon's glow began to feel the cemetery, reflecting off of the tombstones of so many other lost souls. They appeared as ghosts dancing in the place containing the dead, but always rich and full of life, even if they were just words on the stones. I lowered myself into the hole and lay down upon the one that could have rescued me. I stared into his face and gently kissed his lips; they were as dead and cold as my own. With the last bit of my strength, I prayed for the wind to fill the grave and close the world away forever.