Chapter One: The Living
Nina Lee stepped out of a nightclub, holding a water bottle in her hands. The music tried to follow her out of the soundproof doors, but was stopped as they swung shut behind her. Even then the music pounded against the walls and could be heard clearly even from the street. Her and her mother had had a fight earlier in the night, and Nina was out to de-stress with a few dances at the nightclub, but the music was giving her a headache. She knew that she shouldn’t be out so late, but she also didn’t care. She had a fairly common strain of tuberculosis, and pushing herself to do too much could be dangerous. Her doctors told her that she was lucky to have lived up to this point.
She took a sip of water and looked out at the town. It was a little place, but over the past few years had become far from quiet. Every other family was dysfunctional in some respect, and most people were generally rude. As if to illustrate this thought, a young woman who looked about twenty walked out of the club briskly, knocking into Nina and causing her to spill some of her water on the sidewalk, then walked in the opposite direction.
A few blocks away, a sandy-haired boy was sleeping on his porch. As the woman who had walked out of the club moved past him, he bolted awake.
“I didn’t eat the bagel!” He screamed in panic, standing up and tripping over his own shoelaces. Standing up and dusting off his clothes, he muttered to himself. “Damn. And I was having a good dream, too…”
Nina ran after the woman who had bumped into her. She seemed to float along the street with a kind of weird grace. When the boy jumped up and tripped she almost immediately forgot about the other woman. “Are you crazy, or did you just get drunk at the club?” She asked him, taking another sip from her water bottle.
“Who the He-” The boy began angrily, stepping toward her. He noticed that she was a girl, an attractive one too, and quickly changed his tone. “Hi there.” He said coolly.
“Hello.” Nina replied, sitting down on the steps of his porch and laughing a little at how quickly he’d changed his mood.
Well, this sucks. She doesn’t like my charms. The boy thought, sitting down on the porch banister.
“So, are you new in town?” Nina asked, taking a sip of water. The boy looked extremely irritated by this question.
“I’ve lived here all my life. Name’s Shane Marker” He responded, crossing his arms indignantly.
Nina laughed and looked him up and down, raising an eyebrow. “Really? Sorry, but I’ve never seen you around here. Besides, I always thought that this house was empty.”
GOD! She’s annoying and stupid! It says “Marker” right on the mailbox! Shane thought, shaking his head out of frustration. “Why would this house be empty?” He asked her. He’d lived there his whole life, and she apparently thought that no one had set foot in it that entire time. He couldn’t believe it. After a few minutes, he thought Oh, this just keeps getting better! Now she’s not even answering me!
Nina noticed how annoyed Shane seemed to get when she didn’t answer and had to hold back a giggle. “It’s just that I never saw anyone in this house when I passed by here on my way to the club.” She said. At the same time, she was thinking I’ve been sneaking into this guy’s house for over a year, and he hasn’t noticed once…” She had to bite down on the water bottle to stop from breaking out in laughter.
“Maybe it was the ghost!” He said excitedly, almost falling off of the banister. He stepped toward the middle of the porch. “There’s a ghost in my house, you know! It probably turned off all of the lights while we weren’t looking. It comes and goes, leaving muddy footprints all over and stealing food. Usually it leaves a big mess that I have to clean up.” He said absently.
I can’t believe that he thinks I’m a ghost. Nina thought. Also, note to self: Find a new hiding place. She wouldn’t be able to hold back a laugh for much longer. “Yeah, I, uh… heard that this place was haunted…” She lied, her voice shaking with laughter.
The boy was shaking his head as if to say “God, you’re stupid.” And moved toward her, thinking Of course I know it was her. I left a camera out after the third time the “ghost” stole my food!
“So, you want to stay the night?” He asked. Nina turned around and looked at him. He was a good head shorter than her, and was walking over to her. He placed a hand on her shoulder and continued. “Then I can call the police, tell them that I’ve finally caught the robber and live happily and lazily ever after.” Thinking about the food made him hungry though, and he wasn’t sure if he was going to be able to stop her if she tried to run away. She got up and bolted down the street before he could react, and he didn’t bother chasing her.
“I’m hungry.” He said to no one in particular as he began walking toward a combination restaurant/coffee shop that he tended to visit quite frequently. The place was called Darien’s Café. As far as anyone knew, no one named Darien had ever lived in the town, so the place became a curious little gather spot. In one corner of the café portion, a hipster kid was giving a really bad poetry showcasing. Shane avoided that corner altogether and sat on the restaurant side of the little place. He told the waitress to get him a soup and some steak.
As he waited for his food to come, he looked around at all of the women in the restaurant and silently complained about the fact that none of them were his age. He was only seventeen, and getting a date in this town was hard enough without being shorter than almost every girl in the damn place. Once his food came, he thanked the waitress, a tall brunette that he recognized from school, and said “itadakimatsu” as he began to eat his food. It was one of the few Japanese words he remembered, and he only remembered it because it meant “thank you for this food.”
As he finished eating, he noticed a twenty year old blonde looking at him from behind a cup of either coffee or tea, Shane couldn’t tell. For some reason, the sight sent chills down his spine, and he calmly got up, walked to the back door of the restaurant and bolted out into the street. He ran until he got back to house, where he kicked off his shoes and sat down on the couch. Out of breath from the run, he picked up the remote and absently began to flip through channels.
“Move.” Murmured Nina as she plopped onto the couch next to him, snatching the remote and changing the channel.
“What the hell?” Shane shouted, jumping off the couch, his heart beating a mile a minute. “You do know it’s illegal to break into someone’s house uninvited, right?” He pointed out, moving toward the phone. No one had ever told him to “move over”, and he was ready to call every type of office on her. The police, the fire department, the hospital, the FBI, CIA, NRA, NCAA, NFL, NBA, NHL… He didn’t know what half of them meant, but they sounded official enough.
“You invited me in, remember?” Nina said dryly. Shane was too lazy to actually dial the police on the phone. That seemed to be a weakness of his. He was always too lazy to actually do things. Laziness and heights. One day, those would be the death of him. Irritated, he stood up and went to his room upstairs, where he turned on a second television. He knew that he should be more careful with the money his parents had given him when they gave him the house, but if they hadn’t wanted him to spend it, why would they have given it to him in the first place?
Nina watched the T.V. for as long as she could keep her eyes open. After dozing off a few times, she shut the television off and looked at a nearby clock. It read 3:00 A.M. “Oh, great. I just hear Mom now.” She muttered, walking outside. Just a few feet outside of the house, she heard a low but familiar voice.
“Hi, Nina.”
“Hello, Kress.” She looked at her friend. He seemed to be searching for something, but Nina knew better than to ask. He was a bit of an enigma, and like Nina’s own mother, believed in things like vampires. They were all crazy, in her eyes, but Kress was otherwise a pretty interesting guy. She left him to his search and walked back toward her house.
Shane walked outside, looking for Nina, but was disappointed when he couldn’t find her. He saw a strange man wearing a black trench coat looking through some bushes. The man turned on his heel suddenly and ran into the forest, yelling “I’ll get you this time, you monster!” A little scared, but not wanting to lose contact with the only girl who’d spoken to him in days, Shane started walking aimlessly trying to find her.
Lightning and candlelight were the only things that Nathan could see by. He was rummaging through what was left of his grandfather’s belongings that had been left behind in Maine when he went south. The little house overlooked a lake below, and Nathan had been living in the house for some time, but his food supply had finally run dry. He was done reading a text on ancient vampires that was dated somewhere around the early middle ages. The candle was almost entirely burned out, and he was dozing off. A peal of thunder woke him with a start, and he knocked the candle to the floor. It caught a number of the papers scattered there on fire, and Nathan scrambled toward the door, pausing only to grab his sword, which he strapped to his belt as he ran outside. Within minutes, the house was completely aflame, and Nathan was watching from the hood of his car, completely shamefaced.
“Some grandson I am…” He said, pounding one gloved fist on the hood of the car. “I go out to prove that my grandfather isn’t crazy, and I torch his summer home…” He grumbled, looking away from the house and looking at the mailbox. Someone had left a letter in it. Curious, Nathan got up and took it out. It was a plain white envelope with the words “To Nathan Alladan, Troubled Hunter” written on it. Nathan tore it open and eagerly began reading.
“Dear Nathan,
I know that you probably don’t remember, but I can assure you that I am a friend. If I were to tell you my name, it would be irrelevant, as you would not remember me regardless. But attached is an address. You will find a group there who can help you, and there you will find me.
-B”
Nathan was so intrigued that he forgot he had just burned down his grandfather’s house. He quickly wrote down the address, followed by the words “They can help” and put the car into gear. Casting one last look at the house as he drove away, he muttered under his breath “He’s going to be so pissed.”
