Mike Driver

They spilled out onto the pavement with the rest of the late night theatre crowd and made their way east whilst the crowd moved west towards the bright lights and the trendy watering holes. Bill took Lisa’s arm and leaned his head close to hers, smelling honeysuckle and camellia in her hair, whispering nonsense just to hear her laughter. He felt so alive, so energetic, like a kid with a new toy, and this wasn’t like him. He was Mr Cool, with his killer smile, sharp clothes and even sharper lines in self deprecation but with Lisa it was different. Until now women had just been conquests, needing him more than he needed them, nothing more than numbers; forgettable; disposable; replaceable; not anymore.

As they walked they passed a homeless young man sat in the shadowed doorway of a building, one of dozens that might be passed in any night, but they were so engrossed in each other they did not see him. But he saw them.

He watched them through red-rimmed eyes behind heavy black-framed glasses. He sat on a torn leaf of cardboard, his long legs folded awkwardly at the knee. He watched their breath billowing and spiralling in the frosty night air. He wanted what they had; their warmth, and their happiness, something to replace the cold emptiness that lay inside him. He unfolded his legs and stood too quickly, his vision blurred and his head swam, it had been several days since his last meal, he steadied himself against the icy cold portico. The sensation passed and he began to follow them. He walked leaning forward, weight on the balls of his feet, heels lifted, like a cat walking on its hind legs. The young man's street name was Link and for a man of nearly seven feet tall he moved quickly and silently.

Bill counted cracks in the paving stones; she loves me, she loves me not. How does she feel about me? He realised he was torturing himself again and he revelled in the delicious sensation.

This was their fifth, maybe sixth date if you counted the time they met in the bar and with anyone else the story would have been over a long time ago. She intrigued him at first, annoyed him, made him laugh, made him wonder what he saw in her and then miss her every moment they were apart. He wanted to tell her all about himself but knew that wasn’t possible, he hadn’t always been a nice guy. If he did tell her everything she would run a mile but if he didn’t he would lose her anyway. A kaleidoscope of options tumbled through his mind and whichever way he looked at it he could only see one answer.

He would tell her. He would wait for the right moment. But he would tell her. He was in love and without love, he realised, there was nothing.

Link wore a large green parka with a grubby fur lined hood. The parka was split from the sternum to a point around his midriff, the lining flashed orange, and white lint padding spilled from the gaping hole like the intestine of an eviscerated man. It fitted him badly. It had fitted the previous owner less badly but Link had taken it away from him, creating the slash in the lining in the process.

Bill wondered why he acted so differently when he was with her. He was different in ways that he did not recognise and that confused him. He lost his reserve and he needed her in a way that he found hard to comprehend. He wanted to be with her and he yo-yo’ed between trying to give her space to come round to him and trying to push the issue and bring them together sooner. 

On their second date, when they had been alone, he had seen his chance and he had gone to kiss the elegant pale lines of her neck. The desire had welled inside him as his mouth had edged closer to her alabaster skin, a single fine blue vein pulsing just beneath the surface, but she pulled away suddenly. She looked at him with a coy smile as if to say “I know your type”, and he smiled ruefully back at her.

And on the occasions when he went to kiss her full on the lips she always turned her head to the side, just a little, and his lips would brush achingly close to the moist soft skin of her mouth as he kissed her cheek.

Link closed the gap between them. His excitement rose. He would get ahead of them, surprise them. He had done this many times. He liked to see their fear, liked to hear them beg. Then he would take their money and when they thought it was all over he would take their blood. His narrow domed head shone in the amber glow of the street lights. He did not shave it, he had no need, the same childhood illness that had reconstructed his legs had left him unable to grow hair. It didn’t matter, he didn’t need hair, and he didn’t feel the cold. He barely felt anything anymore.

Lisa’s hand slipped comfortably into Bill’s and the feel of her small cold fingers wrapped in his made him feel like he could melt. He wondered if there was anything he wouldn’t do for her at that moment. Maybe even stop a bullet. They had so much in common, so many shared interests, they were so alike in many ways. They just had to be each other's soul mate. But still Bill agonised. Because something about her just wouldn’t let him get close, maybe she didn’t trust him enough. Whatever it was she seemed to be holding back.

Well he would try to change her mind on that score. He had it all planned. He steered her down an empty side street towards the soft blue window lights of a small Italian restaurant that sparkled benignly and made a joke of having a surprise waiting. Then the tall man in the ragged green parka stepped out of a dark recess ahead of them and the night grew tighter around them.

Link had cut ahead through a narrow ginnel in the alley. He was ahead of them now and he waited. His hand moved fondly over the smooth wooden handle of his special friend. This was the one friend that he could count on. The one who had helped him gain the coat he wore, the one who helped him whenever he needed help. That night he had bathed his torn and ragged fingers in the blood of its wearer. He would do the same again tonight.

The seven-foot figure loomed out of the darkness and stopped them dead. Bill wondered briefly if such an apparition could be human, so unrelated was the terrifying visage to anything he had seen before. And it was only when the figure spoke that Bill had any concept of what it might want with them.

“Give me the money now or I’ll cut you,” spat Link, stepping forward and flashing a long straight-edged razor that glinted cruelly.

“Easy now,” said Bill, holding his hands out, palms forward, in a placatory gesture, trying to place his body in front of Lisa’s. “You don’t want to do anything hasty. We don’t want any trouble. We can sort this out. Just take it easy fellah.”

“Don’t bullshit me,” snapped Link, scything the blade and catching the tip of Bill’s index finger.

Lisa stifled a cry.

Bill jerked his hand back. The wound was just a nick but it sang with wicked intense fire and dripped a steady flow of large crimson drops that spattered on the dank concrete. Bill held the finger between his lips and sucked at the blood.

It tasted bright and sour like a jar of old pennies.

Lisa took Bill’s hand. She put her lips to the small puckered scar that still welled with blood before placing it in her mouth. She sucked tenderly at the wound and when Bill withdrew it from her mouth a single drop of blood rested on her lower lip. Her pink tongue snaked out and licked the drop away and behind it razor sharp teeth glistened sharper and brighter than the blade.

Bill stared in astonishment.

Lisa smiled at Bill displaying needle sharp canines.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t want you to find out this way, she said.

Then she fell upon Link.

When it was over she stood before Bill, her mouth frothed and bloodied and the front of her coat swathed in blood.

“Now you know,” she said.

“What will you do with me?” Bill asked nervously.

“What do you want me to do?”

Bill offered her his throat.

And the first sting was like a needle stick and then there was no pain only the rushing of blood in his ears.

The End