"The nighttime brings promises I can't keep

Givin' in is the one thing that I don't need

Got ahead of myself, gotta retrace my steps'

Cause I lost me the moment I took a piece of you

And you may never believe, but I'm sorry

I never meant for it to go this way (this way)

Only wanted the best and I'm stickin' to my story

This was a moment for me, and this was all it could be"

Destin Conrad & Alex Isley –"Same Mistake"

The state of mental disarray Celeste lived in would've broken the average woman. Having a feral pack of vampires follow her home brought on a fear so acute that she fled her cottage that same night and stayed with Mercy until the next morning.

She didn't tell her friend about the encounter, knowing she'd be packed off to a mental ward, or at least temporarily placed under observation at the hospital where Mercy worked as a nurse.

Mercy wasn't stupid.

She sensed immediately that Celeste's distress was beyond the made-up story about a burglar trying to break into her house. Crime happened a lot in the Easy, and any normal person would call the cops and bitch about soaring crime rates. Nothing would come of it, anyway. Outside of homicide, the NOLA police department wasn't known to haul ass for a B&E —breaking and entering. Mercy's suspicions were affirmed by the way Celeste acted, peeking out of the window every half hour like the time an old boyfriend before Freddie harassed her with stalking and drive-bys to her old apartment. All of her clique knew Terry left the city. She told them he had his job to get back to and things weren't going to pan out long distance. Mercy's lips poked out like she was itching to know if Terry was the problem and the reason for running off to her place in the middle of the night.

Celeste slept on the couch in Mercy's apartment and stayed indoors there while her friend left early for work. Daytime was a safe time. Isn't that what the vampire myths claimed it to be? She stared at the old bite wounds on her neck, thigh, and breasts. How could she be so blind to what they were? Terry had her so twisted up in the fog of lust that she glossed over proof that bloodsuckers were fucking real.

She groaned and closed her eyes. Terry manipulated her trust to feed from her.

New Orleans was the popular gothic home of vampire lore in the south. Countless books, movies, TV shows and the like centered it as the breeding ground for supernatural creatures. People made stories about monsters to scare children into being obedient. Bloody Mary. The Boo Hag. Zombies. Shit, even Voodoo still gave folks around those parts the heebie-jeebies even though white people turned it into a commercial joke. They sold Voodoo donuts, Voodoo dolls, and even ran up and down the French Quarter pretending to be Voodoo Witch Doctors giving graveyard tours to visit Madame Marie Laveau.

Like her ancestors before her, Celeste knew Vodun was real. Hoodoo was real. African retentions stayed rooted in the diaspora, and New Orleans was the most African city in America, witnessing unspeakable horrors done to Black people. White people were monsters bringing them to southern American shores. Surely their monstrosity enabled wickedness to flourish on southern soil and everywhere else. Her people danced at carnival, dressed as skeletons, and masked to hide their true selves. What better city to feed in than one that openly courted secrecy, excess, and spooky vibes? If people disappeared or turned up dead, the law and society could blame it on American's natural inclination to be violent with one another…not anything supernatural.

Vampires walked among them.

She swiped the cracked screen of her smartphone, looking up old wives' tales about Terry's kind. None of them supported anything he would be averse to. He had a reflection in the mirror. Crosses didn't bother him. He shook a priest's hand and didn't freak out. Never even flinched when she wore her gold cross necklace. She fed him garlic in the shrimp she cooked. The only things that tripped her up was that he walked around in the daytime, and she never saw him with fangs. Obviously, his teeth were sharp enough to break her skin, but regular human teeth could do that.

Maybe he was a familiar.

Dracula had Renfield. Maybe Terry was The Deacon's Renfield, luring people to their doom.

Celeste rubbed her scalp and swallowed down the anger festering in her chest. She'd made a mistake trusting Terry. She let a pretty boy's face and five-star Michelin dick trick her into submission of diabolical evil. The only saving grace was Terry's absence from her life, and whatever else ran around the Easy that scared the vampires away. She heard them say Old Ones. Perhaps that's what landed on her roof, causing the bloodsuckers to flee. Whatever it was, it didn't harm her, so she had one less monster to worry about.

As long as she stayed active during the day and locked herself in for the night, the vampires couldn't touch her. Had they wanted her dead or sucked dry, they would've done it days ago when she came home from work at night. They seduced people easily. Moved fast. It wouldn't take much to kill her on a dark street. They wanted her alive for a reason: to get Terry.

She texted Mercy and told her she felt better about going home. Made up a story about getting a burglar alarm. While driving to her small neighborhood in Marigny, she kept her neck on swivel to check for suspicious activity. She spent the rest of her time sleeping. She was so tired lately. Fatigue came easy.

Come nightfall, she turned all the lights on in the house and carried a sharp meat-carving knife on her. In her bedroom, she watched the news on her laptop, feeling drowsy. She typed in the words Shelby Springs into the Google search bar and tried to figure out where Terry came from. He claimed that he lived not too far from the place where his cousin was murdered. Three other parishes surrounded Shelby Springs. Typing Terry's name in the search engine brought up pictures of other Terry Richmonds, all white and mostly old.

Going another route, Celeste typed in the name Michael Simmons with Shelby Springs, and a slew of articles filled her screen. She read about a corrupt police force and an attempted coverup. Not one article mentioned Terry's name. Stranger still, four of the officers involved in the corruption scandal had disappeared months after being charged to stand trial. The only members of the force still around happened to be a Black woman who was set to testify against her fellow officers. She quit the force and refused to comment on any of the charges with the media. Celeste wrote her name down: Officer Jessica Sims. A second officer, who had been shot by his own Police Chief, made a move across the country to work at another police force.

If Terry went to help his cousin, surely Officer Sims would have information about his address, or at least the name of the parish he came from. Celeste stared at the screen. Officer Sims' round face looked haunted by something.

Another thought occurred to her, and she grabbed her cell phone. She called her cousin Butchie, who was friends with Travis.

"Butchie, can you text me Travis's number? I need to ask him something."

"About?" Butchie drawled on the other end.

"None of your business."

Butchie sucked his teeth and twenty seconds later, Travis X's number appeared on her screen. She typed it in fast, hitting the send button.

"Who dis?"

"Is that how you answer your phone? It's me, Duchess."

"Sister Celeste? What's going on?"

"Can you tell me, or ask your brother, where Terry lives?"

"Who?"

"Terry. Terry Richmond."

"Who dat?"

"Whatchu mean who dat? Your friend you brought to the Indian practice last month…your brother Scubbie's marine buddy. The one with the green eyes."

"Scubbie was never in the marines and I didn't bring anybody to the bar with green eyes. Have you been smoking that funny herb?"

"He came with you outside when you lit up my cigarette. The pretty boy."

Travis stayed silent.

"Never mind. Sorry to bother you. I thought maybe you knew him. Goodnight."

Celeste tapped her cell phone against her thigh. Terry used Travis to get next to her. He probably induced some type of hypnotic state like those vampires tried to do at her house… Jedi mind-tricked Travis into letting him hang with them. Once he was no longer needed, the memory of Terry faded from his mind.

She shut off the laptop and curled into a ball with the knife in front of her face. Resting her fingers on the handle, she made plans to visit Shelby Springs the next time she had another two consecutive days off.

###

Celeste drank a red bull to perk herself up for work at the elder care facility. The new client who moved into Miss Irma's old room was a cranky white man who never seemed satisfied with his care there. He often complained that his room was cold and drafty.

"There's no draft and your room faces the garden, the sunniest and warmest part of the building," Celeste said, helping Mr. Crawley with the door so he could move with his walker better to get inside his room.

"I'm telling you people I have a draft in my room and it's too cold, even when I turn up the heat. I pay too much money for this place not to have controlled temperatures," Crawley said.

"May I suggest wearing one of your nice sweaters?" she said.

Celeste grit her teeth, listening to Crawley go off, but she assisted him and nodded her head as his list of complaints grew. She helped him sit at the desk near the window where he wanted to write letters and his autobiography. He probably complained about his life there, too.

"You feel that?" he said.

Crawley held his hand out toward the closed window where sunlight created a square of light on the teal carpet. He grabbed her hand and forced it into the light.

"See?" he said, his pale blue eyes pleading with her to pay attention.

She stood with her fingers splayed out, dust motes floating in the bright light. Where warmth should've been, there was only a cold spot. She moved her hand in different areas around the window and there was definitely an icy chill that shouldn't have been there. Glancing up at the air conditioner vent, she didn't hear it working at that moment. Only the fan whirred, giving a pleasant circulation of air.

"I feel the cold air, Mr. Crawley. I don't know what I can do about it. Is it bothering you?"

"If it stayed in that one spot it wouldn't be a problem." He leaned in conspiratorially, and she moved closer to him. "But it moves around."

"Moves around?"

Crawley's tone of voice lowered, and he genuinely looked agitated by Celeste's facial expression.

"The cold moves around in here," he said.

She glanced at the window and reached her hand into the suspect area. The sun warmed her hand up. The cold spot was gone.

"See? I told you. Now it's all warm and normal again, isn't it?"

"Yeah."

Celeste retrieved a sweater from the hook on the door and placed it on the back of Crawley's seat.

"I'll be back to take you to lunch," Celeste said.

She left the room and worked without incident until she walked down the hallway carrying a bag of collected trash and passed near Crawley's room. A large, cold spot sat in front of his door. The chill startled Celeste. The air in the building had slightly warmed up, but not enough to need the air-conditioning blasting more than it was. She walked through an icy gust and gasped at the sudden drop in temperature. Crawley's door was open. He furiously scribbled at his desk. Celeste moved back and forth between coolness and frigid air. Out of the corner of her eye, she glimpsed someone walking toward the employee break room.

Miss Irma.

Celeste stood cemented to the floor, and Miss Irma turned a corner and glanced back at her. A male co-worker pushed a cart of meds down the hall and stared at Celeste's confused face.

"You alright, Celeste?"

"Did you see someone walk past you?"

"Just now?"

"Yes."

"Nope."

She didn't want to walk down the hall. Ignoring a dead woman should've been easy, but Celeste moved along the corridor close to the wall. When she reached the corner, she prayed no one would be there.

"Oh thank God," she sighed, seeing another empty hallway.

She left the building out of the side door to throw away the trash in the dumpster outside. A supervisor named Diane met her back inside the break room. Diane snacked on a bag of chips and a bottle of coke.

"Celeste, can you get in touch with Terry Richmond? He hasn't returned my calls to collect his grandmother's personal effects," Diane said.

"I haven't spoken to him in a long time."

"Well…his grandmother has boxes in our storage room and I'd hate to throw it out. The clothes we can donate to Goodwill, but there are photo albums and books—"

"I'll take them to him. I get off at five."

"You will? That would be great. Do you have time now to get it and put it in your car? I can help you. Mr. Richmond was told that we can hold items for thirty-days and he said he would get them before he left the city. It's been past the deadline."

Celeste followed Diane to the large storage room, and in the back were four medium-sized boxes and two bags of clothes. They took two trips to her car, and she squeezed all the boxes in the back seat and the passenger side. She dumped the contents of an over-sized box into the trunk and folded it up to reuse later at her home.

"Thank you so much. This makes me feel so much better. There are photos and all kinds of irreplaceable things in them. I'd hate to see them dumped in the garbage," Diane said.

"No problem. I'll keep them at my house and he can pick them up the next time I see him."

Diane left her alone. Celeste grabbed her smokes from the glove compartment and took an extra break. She hid herself in the garden and sat on one of the wooden benches. Seeing Miss Irma unearthed troublesome emotions. She worried that her mind was teetering on the verge of mental collapse from the stress and fear. Seeing ghosts on top of vampires was too much. Puffing and fretting, Celeste closed her eyes. Feeling dizzy, she leaned forward, hanging her head between her legs. Goosebumps pricked her skin as the temperature dropped abruptly around her. She shivered in the direct blazing sunlight.

"It's the baby making you feel sick," an elderly female voice said.

Celeste kept her eyes closed and head low, too afraid to open them or move. Reeling, she prayed silently and hoped that she wouldn't pass out.

"Don't be afraid. You know I won't hurt you…I just have to talk to you."

Celeste opened her eyes and focused her attention on the grass beneath her feet. She looked slightly to her right and noticed a pair of feet encased in pretty yellow house slippers. Moving her gaze higher, she recognized the simple pink floral dress, and the pale wrinkled hands.

"I'm scared," Celeste said.

The hand of a dead woman pulled her up, and they looked at one another eye to eye on the bench.

"Is this real? Or am I losing my mind?" Celeste asked.

Miss Irma's eyes twinkled. She looked more alive and vibrant than her last days at the assisted living facility.

"Your mind is fine, baby. Just fine."

"You're really a ghost, then?"

"That indeed. May I?"

Miss Irma pointed to Celeste's stomach. Celeste sat back.

"You want to touch me?"

"Yes."

"Okay."

Miss Irma rested her soft hand on Celeste's belly. The warmth she exuded seemed so real. Ghosts were supposed to be smoky and floaty. Miss Irma sat next to her like the most solid and alive person on the planet.

"Well, now…Papa didn't waste no time," Miss Irma said.

"What are you talking about?"

"You are pregnant, child. It's still early, but you are about to become a mama for my great-granddaddy."

"That can't be true."

"Getting pregnant?"

"Terry being your great-granddaddy…he's not even…he's not…"

"You know it's true. I can see in your eyes you know his secret…what he is. On this side, they tell me that you've done the impossible, so now I must tell you something important…something I was too weak to say before I died."

Miss Irma cradled Celeste's hands, which shook so badly that the ghost had to clamp them down tight between her palms.

"You have my things. Look through them so you may know Papa's story. He was human once upon a time ago. I spent my long life documenting all I could for my grandson Michael, but he's gone and can't hold the secret for our family. Papa wanted me to tell his story. But my mind started fading and I couldn't finish my work. Now you have become my family, Celeste. There are beings in the world who mean Papa harm… and your baby, too. They hide in plain sight in other places, but because Papa came back here, they might come for him."

"Other vampires?"

"Les Gargouilles…gargoyles. They will seek him out and kill him. Their kind are enemies to Papa. Enemies to that child if they find out about you carrying a vampire's baby."

"I've seen a few gargoyle statues in the Quarter that were never here before."

"Oh no, then it may be too late."

Miss Irma rose from her seat and looked off into the distance. She paced in front of Celeste.

"They're not active in the daytime, so you're safe, even when they hunt at night. I've tracked many during my lifetime taking pictures of them all over the world. They protect humans and won't harm you because you're a child of God. The baby will be safe until it's born and out of your body…oh no…oh no…"

Miss Irma looked at her hands. They began to disintegrate, starting at her fingertips.

"Celeste! He loves you…he—"

Miss Irma's body broke apart and floated away like the graying ash of a dying fire.

Too stunned to move, Celeste sat on the bench for the rest of her shift. She wandered away only when the sun went down. Climbing into her car, she thought of what to do with the information given to her. After an hour of sitting in her driver's seat, she drove herself to the drugstore and bought an early detection pregnancy kit.

At home, she tested herself twice.

She was positive both times.