"It's too darn hot...It's too darn hot…" The walls of the club rattled in time with the music as a mass of humans writhe. I could see him standing to the side his eyes closed as he took in the smell. Nostrils flaring he zeroed in on a pink haired beauty in a leather bathing suit. Taking long strides he melted into the crowd. His hands wrapped around the ladies waist as the crowed swallowed them whole.
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"Shoot!" Jolting awake I pressed a hand to my nose. "Not again. Mom do you have napkins in the car."
Shooting me an alarmed look she pointed to the glove compartment. "Are you alright?"
"Yeah." Blood ran down my left arm while I rummaged through a slew of car documents with the other. "You sure its in here?"
"That's gross." Lillian snarled from the back seat her eyes rolling in an ever teenage way.
The car pulled to a stop on a large grassy field. Sticking up in perfect rows were ivory tombstones painted orange in the dying light.
"Success!" Pressing fast food embossed napkins to my nose I tilted my head back. "Mom just go ahead I'll be right there."
Both Lillian and my mom stepped out of the car leaving me to nurse myself. Neither were fond of blood in fact it was probably a good thing that we were so close to the cemetery as my mother had a history of fainting at the sight.
Pinching the bridge of my nose I tried to shake the images of the intoxicating man from my thoughts. For the last ten years I have been having dreams about mysterious man.
At first it was great dreaming about a dark haired playboy but a play boy had to play. The dreams started when I was fifteen and since then I hadn't gotten a decent night sleep that wasn't medically induced. Sleeping pills were a god sent it was the little naps in between that got to me.
Nose bleeds were a nasty side effect to a nasty occurrence.
Once cleaned up I shoved the damp tissues deep into my pockets. I stepped out of the car and into the drizly weather of a depressing evening.
I found my family standing around a cleanly dug grave as a black dressed revenant gave the whole 'ashes to ashes' pep talk. My mom was crying again and my sister was slightly texting one of her many boyfriends.
Lt. James Oliver Bradley survived the second world war and Vietnam he just couldn't beat the fight of lung cancer. It had to have been all the cigarettes that got him threw the other two that gave him cancer.
Grampa Bradley was my mom's dad but we were never that close to him. After mom got married she moved half a country away to escape her dad she was probably regretting it from the way she cried. The only thing I remember about my grandfather were the peppermint candies he would give to me and Lily.
"-and now if the family would like to say a few words." Reverent Thomas yawned his face frightfully shadowed in the dark night. Paper lanterns that were supposed to have been lit hung limply in the light down pour.
Everyone stood awkwardly while waiting for someone to gather the courage to speak. Minutes passed before a towering figure appeared from the shadows.
"My father was a great man." The figure started just as recognition dawned on the surrounding relatives.
Looking closer I studied the man: Sharp jaw, cruise cut hair, and the bearings of a soldier.
Uncle Tate in the flesh.
Tate Oliver Bradley Jr. was born in the later years of my grandparents life. Fifteen year separated my mother from Tate so they weren't that close. The last memory I had of Uncle Tate was him visiting us in Washington just before he enlisted. There was a rumor in the family going around that Tate had joined a black ops team but there was also a rumor going around that I got pregnant twice so the information couldn't be trusted.
"I pledge my life to protecting this country just like my father. He will be greatly missed." Turning away he bleed back into the shadows as great Aunt Wilma took the floor.
"My brother was a sinner."
I took a deep breath.
"But may god have mercy upon his soul."
Stepping back I decided it wasn't going to be comfortable to listen in on the next few minutes of this speech. I trecked deeper into the cemetery being mindful of where I stepped. Twenty down and thirty across was my dads grave and surprisingly there was someone already there.
I looked down on the headstone and read the words I knew by heart. "Staff Corps Emerson Bradley: Father, Husband, and hell of a shot."
"Your dad always did have a strange sense of humor." Uncle Tate quipped bending to wipe off the water that had pooled in the crevices of the head stone.
"He got it from me." I braged sticking my hands in my pockets. "Yuck."
I had forgotten about the tissues I had stored in my pockets pulling my hand out I noticed some crusted blood under my nails. Lucky a little rain could wash it away.
"So what have you been up to?" Looking up I barely caught the emerald glow in Tate's eyes the next moment it was gone. I had seen those eyes before in fact I had just seen them in a dream a half an hour ago. "Even better question when did you become a vampire?"
