Solace on the Road
Chapter 1: "The Big Mistake of '88"
"This is a big mistake
And every soon you ll know
Why your whole family told you not to go
Where everybody said to stay
This is a big mistake
And very soon you'll know
Why your whole family
Told you not to go
Where everybody said to stay
How could I ever think that I could feel the same caution as you
When I know it's not true."
- Anthony Green,
Big Mistake
I was twenty-three when the Big Mistake happened and completely ruined my life. The year was 1988 and I was flying high, I was going to be the first person ever in my family to get into college; full scholarship, the works. I had just gotten home, grabbing my bags out of the back of the taxi cab, looking so pretty in my creamy white blouse and my dark skirt as I paid the driver and ran for the front door.
It was so dark outside, but my mom had left the lights on for me. My dad had died five years earlier of a heart condition and we still had pictures of him scattered across our house- I liked the one on the mantle best, because he was standing in our yard with me and my brother and our mom, his arms wrapped tight around us and a silly grin on his face. He looked like the happiest man in the world back then.
I dug my key out of my pocket and unlocked the front door, stepping in with flourish as I exclaimed, "Guess who's home!"
The house was still, silent, and I walked into the kitchen, waiting for my little brother David to pounce on me and shout out his typical roar to try to scare me. I dropped my bags in the entryway and snickered under my breath as I darted around the corner where he usually hid. He wasn't there. I frowned and walked until I was resting my hands on our table, looking for a trace of dinner because it was well past seven o'clock and Dave was a notoriously messy eater. The table was uncharacteristically clean.
I wondered if he and mom were upstairs, so I turned around and headed there. The second floor of our house was one part my mother's room, and the pther part storage. The walls were painted a cream colour with white trimming- it was quaint and kind of cute in its own way. There were several boxes stacked high, most of them were filled with my dad's things, the things that we couldn't bear to throw away.
My upper teeth dug into my lower lip as I breathed out through my nose. No one was here. My high heels were beginning to create an ache in my feet so I sat down on my mother's bed and undid the straps, the shoes falling onto the floor with a loud thunk. I hissed pleasantly as my fingers kneaded the sore muscles of my instep and I released a sigh as I stood up.
My feet padded softly on the floor as I turned to go back downstairs, and then I heard the noise, "Sis!"
I knew that voice, masculine but still high pitched like a child's. David's voice that still sounded so young even though he was already fourteen. I always teased him about that, "Davy?" I called, looking back to where the voice was coming from, "Davy, where are you?"
"Shhh!" was the muffled reply, "I'm in the closet!"
I rolled my eyes and crossed my arms, "Seriously, Dave? Quit being silly and get out of there. And where's mom?"
I watched as he crept out of the closet, crouching over and darting his eyes left and right. When he finally looked back to me was when I noticed that something was wrong. His face was twisted and wet with tears, his shirt was torn in places and he had a long cut on his face, "S- she's dead, sis."
My heart thrummed steadily in my chest as I looked at his face. I couldn't tear my eyes away from the long gash going down his cheek and the blood dripping down across his chin, "What?"
He nodded, and I knew he had heard me, even though I know my voice had been nothing more than a weak murmur, "They got her, they're in the house, I couldn't get to the phone and- and I-"
He was sobbing, hiccuping and choking over his words as I rushed forward and clutched at his shoulders. He threw his arms around me and cried into my shoulder, and I wound my fingers into his dark hair like I had so many times before when he was little with my other hand wrapped around him and bunched into his shirt.
My thoughts went wild with worry, mom was hurt, someone or someones were in the house, my poor little brother was frightened half to death, and I- I had no idea what to do. I knew that dad had kept a gun underneath the mattress, but I didn't know if it was still there and even then I barely knew how to use it. I whispered consoling nonsense into David's ear as his body shook, trying to keep my own tears damned up.
He sniffled and wiped at his nose, pulling back and looking at me, "What are we gonna do?"
It took a minute to lift the mattress, but it was worth it to find the pistol. It was heavy, possessing a lethal weight where it rested in my palms. I sucked in a long breath and told David to wait in the closet, which he didn't want to do. I barked back at him that he'd be in the way and that I didn't want him to get hurt. He barked the same back at me but I was already halfway down the stairs with the gun curled into my right hand.
I sneaked through the house, praying silently to God for help, for myself and my brother. And, if she was still alive, my mom too. I was so nervous as I tiptoed into the garage that my teeth began peeling the skin off of my lips, biting and pulling at the thin flesh until, "Ouch."
My left hand touched gingerly at my bottom lip which stung lightly. I couldn't see to good, as the hallway to the garage was dimly lit, but when my tongue traced over the place where the pain began, I knew I was bleeding because of the sharp metallic tang that nipped at my taste buds.
I heard a low growl from behind me and turned to face… nothing.
I breathed shallowly and changed direction, facing back to the garage, only to come face-to-face with the tall, muscular form of a man. My mouth opened in a scream, but it died somewhere in my throat when he grabbed me up with one hand a threw me backwards. I hit the counter with a gasp and a groan, my back burning as I stood up and pointed the gun at the intruder, "D-don't you dare come closer!"
The man kept on walking until the lights just barely brushed his shoes. I heard a strange noise, watching as his body shook, and realized that he was laughing at me. And then the lights glinted against his teeth, "Oh, God."
They were long and sharp and fierce, growing out of his gums, pointing in strange directions like thick nails jammed haphazardly into wood. He stepped into the kitchen, wincing as the lights illuminated his face which, aside from the teeth, was perfectly normal. He looked like your average guy, but those teeth…
"Don't be scared," he smiled wider, seeming to delight in the way that I shook everytime I chanced a look at his fangs, "I hate killing girls, 'specially the pretty ones."
I cocked the little metal trigger on the top of the pistol, the hammer I remembered, "Stop!"
"You won't shoot me." His smirk was arrogant and terrifying, and suddenly there was a scream from upstairs. My gun was still pointed at his chest, but I couldn't help looking away, looking up to where my brother had been hiding and to where the scream had come from.
"David?!" I shouted, glancing at the man in front of me who had shoved his hands in his pockets. Another scream and I turned my head back to him, "I will shoot you if anything happens to him!"
He sighed and shook his head, his lips closing over his teeth, "Too late, love, the kid's gone," he said, and then he looked up and froze. He was staring at my mouth, his nostrils flaring wildly, and I could feel the thin line of blood trailing down over my chin, "And so are you."
His teeth bared and he rushed forward. I screamed and pulled the trigger. There was a bang and a sudden chill over my throat. There was something warm gushing over my fingers and there were someone else's fingers in my mouth. I remembered a dull pain in my neck and a loud pounding in my head.
And that was all.
When I woke up, I was laying in a pool of blood on the kitchen floor, the wide-eyed, snarl mouthed corpse of my attacker to my left, and the blood soaked gun to my right. The man had a hole in his chest the size of an pecan, and I stood up.
The light was slowly creeping through the windows in the kitchen and I sighed with weariness and slumped down. I wanted to see David, to check if he was alright. I wanted to take a nice, hot shower and rinse this blood off of me. More than anything, as I fell asleep, tucked into the shadows of the counter, I wanted to clean up our blood off the floor.
With my tongue…
I learned soon after that David had died, some mother lovin' vamp had sucked him dry after finding him in the closet. I also discovered on accident that vampires existed after a few burly men and sour faced women showed up at my house and poured holy water over my hand; I still have the large, splash-shaped scar on my left palm to prove it.
The final thing that I learned was that I was a vampire, a damned thing that preyed on innocent people for food. And that Hunters made a pretty decent, but hard to manage, meal…
My name is Solace, or at least, it is now. It was something else before, but that hardly matters. As far as I'm concerned, the girl I used to be died that night trying to save her little brother, died a horrible death and was reborn a monster because she made the mistake of fighting monsters.
Her brother was buried in a churchyard, six feet under as was customary. There was no service, no last rites or whatever you call it. Just a deep, dark hole in the earth that no preacher dared to touch. And then there's me, still alive.
Well, not really.
Welcome to the road…