Synopsis: Willie adapts to his new independent life, runs into old friends, and learns the Dewey Decimal System. How can he still be bored?


The tranquility of the secret room was certainly not disturbed by any form of entertainment or activity. Four stone walls, one messed up coffin on the floor and one tall candlestick, that's all there was, besides the satchel and a duffle bag of worthless junk. Willie never would have believed it when he was alive, but he missed doing chores, being fed by Mrs. Johnson, listening (sometimes) as the old bloodsucker imparted philosophy and wisdom, or reading convoluted volumes and looking up the big words in a dictionary.

Now, his nightly routine seldom varied. Upon rising each evening, he took himself to the public library, which was a great place to meet college girls, and they were his meal of choice. There he would hang out in different sections, depending on his preference, thumbing through books until someone tasty came along. He knew which types majored in psychology, political science or music theory. When the pickings were slim, he headed over to Fiction and lingered by the Stephen King or Anne Rice collections.

When the library closed, Willie would haunt various enterprises where single women might be found as they left offices, beauty salons and grocery stores, walked their dogs in the park or jogged along the docks. He sensed spring was coming; folks weren't bundled up as much and they stayed outdoors longer.

The hours from 10 pm to 2 in the morning were spent at the Blue Whale. There were rarely unaccompanied ladies there, but that was okay; he had almost always dined by that time. Willie sat alone and unobserved each night in a dark corner, watching the townsfolk chatter, drink and dance. He was always on the lookout for his new friend, Buzz, but the young man must have had more important things to do. Maybe he was married now. Frequently, Maggie Evans would stop in with her father or boyfriend. The vampire would retreat farther into the shadows and observe with quiet intensity.

After last call, Willie would walk back to necropolis and sit on the mausoleum's front steps or rooftop until sunrise. His only companion was an oversized marble angel seated over the doorway, holding a sword in her lap. He studied the constellations Jason had taught him and practiced his developing skills. The disappearing thing was getting much easier, but flying was still a bloody disaster. The young vampire could now transform himself into a bat but graceful flight continued to elude him. The wings were oversized and ungainly, and refused to perform in a synchronized manner. He sputtered on the ground in circles or slammed into trees and tombstones. Once he was nearly carried off by an owl.

When the sun peeked over the horizon, the dead man went back to his boring little room and climbed into his coffin. Being a vampire was not quite as exciting as he thought it was going to be.


Willie woke with a lecherous appetite for a Dramatic Arts major that evening. That meant loitering in the .790 and .812 stacks. He could quote some Romeo and Juliet, which he had all but memorized by this time, and then take her behind the newspaper rack. The young man looked down at his clothes. They were dirty and wrinkled, and starting to look shabby—not conducive to picking up pretty ladies.

The vampire opened the stone door to his secret room. He jumped back with a started yell at the sight of David Collins sitting on Sarah's tomb throwing a ball in the air.

"Oh, hi, Willie!" David threw the ball against the wall and caught it. "Is that where you live now?"

Willie stuck his head tentatively back into the main section.

"Ya know about this room?"

"Sure, Sarah showed me. That's where they used to keep the vampire. Are you a vampire now?"

"Uh, yeah...kinda." He thought it over. "You okay with that?"

"Oh, Willie," David explained, rolling his eyes. "I grew up in Collinwood. My mother is a phoenix and all my friends are ghosts. A couple of vampires are not that big of a deal."

The young man shrugged. "Guess not."

"Anyway, I'm glad you're not dead." David tossed the ball to Willie, who threw it back. "I mean dead dead."

"Does Miss Winters know you're out in a cemetery alone at night?"

"She's on a date, and nobody else cares, so I went out to play."

"Are ya lookin' for that little girl?"

"Sarah? She's outside, taking a walk with some man who's teaching her a new song."

Willie peered through the iron scroll gate. The semi-transparent figures of little Sarah and Jason McGuire strolled hand in hand among the tombstones.

"Oh god, I hope it's not the one about whores in Calcutta—wait here, David." Willie left the tomb and approached the mismatched duo.

"I'll take you home again, Kathleen
Across the ocean wild and wide"

"Hey, Jason."

The specter looked up and flashed the blarney grin at his former partner.

"Willie, m'lad! So we meet again on the other side. It seems the font of our friendship will not run dry."

The boy remembered all too well the lecture Barnabas had bestowed the night Jason had been dispatched. "You were never my friend. Friends don't do things like you did."

The dead Irishman sent Sarah off to play with David so the grownups could talk. He sat on a grave marker.

"Ah, say that ya forgive me, lad; don't be holdin' a grudge."

"I think about ya sometimes—about diggin' up your grave in the basement and hackin' at your corpse with the shovel and then drop kickin' the pieces off a cliff."

"After all we've been through together, why would ya say a thing like that?" The spirit looked aggrieved.

"You were a greedy, thievin' liar, and you used me." Willie's fist aimed for the ghost's jaw, but it sailed through the air, knocking him off balance.

"I looked after you when no one else would," Jason corrected him. "Did your vampire boss tell you that? He's the one who abused ya, not I, before doin' away with your old man in cold blood. Oh, you shouldn't have let him do that, son."

"I ain't your son, and you deserved what ya got. Ya wouldn't listen to me and then you broke my hand."

"I admit now, I should've heeded your warnin'," the apparition conceded.

"Yeah, maybe."

"Come, walk with me. 'Tis lonely without me old sidekick."

"I don't wanna walk with you, and I don't want ya to come around here." He strode purposeful steps back to the mausoleum, shouting over his shoulder. "And don't go near them kids anymore. You're a bad influence!"

Jason dematerialized and appeared in front of Willie, crippling his gait.

"Stop that!" The young man shouted. "Get outta my way."

"I know somethin' you don't. You're not the only fish in the pond, laddie."

"What's that mean?"

"Nor the only bloodsucker in the graveyard." And with that, his dead partner disappeared.

Willie scratched his head. What the ghost said made no sense. If there was another vampire in town, Barnabas would've known about it. It was a small community.

The young man sniffed the air and soon pinpointed the scent of rot coming from the west. He followed the smell to a small, modest mausoleum (nothing like the grandiose Collins crypt) and found the gate to the entrance open.

"Hello? Anybody home?" He cautiously peeked inside. The place reeked of putrefying flesh but no vampire answered the door. Inside he found a marble tomb with the lid ripped off and lying in the corner. The wooden casket inside was open and empty. A decaying corpse was heaped in another corner, obviously the original tenant of the box before it was appropriated.

So there was a new kid on the block. That could be a good thing, but most likely, it was not. Vampires were not by nature friendly, social creatures. In fact, they tended to be rather territorial. Willie wondered if the other bloodsucker knew about him.


Willie was in the library when the headline caught his eye: Murder Mystery Continues. He sat down and read the article, which went on to relate the story of a brutal serial killer in Collinsport. Every day the mangled remains of another young woman were found with the blood drained from her body. The possibility of ghouls and satanic rituals were mentioned. Now there was a curfew in effect for the town, and ladies were strongly advised not to go out alone at night.

Shit! This ignorant newbie was ruining the playing field for everybody else. Why did he have to go and kill them? That was dangerous and wasteful when a living victim can provide another meal someday. The vampire spotted a policeman patrolling the building, asking questions of the patrons and checking their IDs. Shit shit shit. He evaporated and slunk out the door. There was another cop in the park and yet another at the Blue Whale. Willie went home hungry.

"It's that new feller causin' all the brouhaha." Jason's ghost was standing next to him as vampire entered the graveyard. "The whole town's got their knickers in a twist."

"What does that even mean? And why are ya still followin' me? I told ya to fuck off."

"Oh, I knew you weren't serious; you always had a mean little temper." Willie groaned in exasperation. "Besides, I can't wait to tell you about me new plan. It's goin' to make us rich."

"Jason." Willie looked him in the translucent eye. "You're dead, and so am I. There's no more scams, and the money's no good to ya anymore."

The Irishman sighed. "I know it. I'm pinin' for the old life, is all."

Willie nodded in commiseration. "Sometimes I want a smoke or drink, just 'cause I remember that it used to feel good."

"I miss me old sea chest."

"I miss my truck."

They walked together for a short while.

"It was a fine plan, too," The spirit remarked.

"They always were. Well, mostly."

"I was wonderin' if you'd be willin' to do a good deed for your old partner."

"No, I told ya, ya can't pull no crazy cons. You're gonna haveta get another hobby."

"No, no, It's me sea chest. They still have it up at Collinwood, stored in a locked room in the basement."

"So? If ya know where it is, go get it."

"It's like I'm not welcome there." Willie suppressed a laugh, barely. "There's somethin' that stops me from crossin' the threshold. Would you get it for me, lad?"

"What for?"

"It would be a comfort to me, and you can keep whatever's inside." He smiled slyly. "Who knows, may be somethin' of use to you."

"I can't go back there, I'm a plague in both their houses. How would I even get in?"

"There I've enlisted the aid of wee Sarah and David. They're waitin' for you on the rear terrace at Collinwood."


The children were as McGuire's ghost had predicted, behind the house, playing in the fountain.

"David," the vampire said reprovingly. "Don't you ever sleep?"

"Sure," he responded. "During my school lessons."

Willie laughed out loud. "That's okay. I used to do that, too."

Sarah and young Collins led him into the sleeping house and to the basement room. There is a fine art to cracking the code of a padlock, which Willie ignored, ripping it off the bracket and tossing the twisted metal aside. In the room, the little girl took him directly to where the sea chest, covered in cobwebs and dust was stashed among the other storage items. Willie toted the trunk quietly out the back door and to the cemetery where it could be reunited with its owner.

The Irishman was nowhere to be found, so Willie plunked the chest down in his vestibule and twisted the lock until it broke and fell off the latch. Sorry, Jason, no key.

Inside were old guy clothes. They weren't his size or style, but Willie needed clean duds so he pulled out the turtlenecks. There was a bottle of Irish whiskey, Cuban cigars, shaving equipment, hair oil, black hair dye and a fake Rolex watch. There was nothing of interest to a vampire; once again Jason had conned him. Wait—he discovered some books near the bottom: James Joyce, William Butler Yeats, Edmund Burke...nobody that Willie ever heard of, but he thought he might take a stab at reading them anyway to pass the time.

Willie was about to repack the case when an old memory returned. He knocked on the inside floor of the sea chest, then removed the false bottom. His eyes bulged at the sight of wrapped packet after packet of $100 bills. Nestled in the cash were select pieces of Elizabeth Stoddard's jewelry that McGuire had pilfered. Jason hadn't been leaving town broke, he had a goddamn fortune. But the crook had been greedy and wanted to rob Barnabas too. It had been a costly error in judgment.

Willie took what he wanted and left the chest for Jason in the main room, on top of Naomi's tomb. Then he climbed into his coffin and dreamed about what he would do with his sudden windfall. The next evening Willie stuffed his satchel full of cash and jewelry and walked to the railway station, where he hopped a train out of town.