The Vampire’s Lover
The Vampire’s Lover
Makoto Sanda
1
She had beautiful eyes, the color of currants.
I saw her in the garden that my wife had left to me. Brightly colored roses surrounded her—perhaps that’s why she left such an impression.
Her hair seemed combed with moonlight, and the daring cut of her dress appeared entirely unreal. It was as if she stood in a moment out of time.
Yet…
“Joel,” a voice said. “Joel Garland!”
A friend called my name, summoning me back to reality. I still resent him for it.
Of course, there was no woman standing among those roses. I was alone, just gaping like a fool with a watering can in my hand.
“What’s got into you?” my friend asked.
“Oh, nothing. I just drifted off a bit.” I pressed a finger to my brow, shaking my head. If my desires were strong enough to cause hallucinations, I would have liked to enjoy them a little longer. “For a moment I thought I saw a girl here.”
“You, with a girl?” he snickered. His laughter made his khaki jacket crinkle. He always wore army surplus clothing. Appropriate for his line of work, but perhaps it was a bit too much. I sometimes worried he’d lost track of where work ended and his life began. “That’s rich at your age! Suddenly getting a taste for the ladies?”
“It was all my imagination!” I objected.
He shook his head. “You’ve always been one for fainting spells.”
“And you’re the one who took off work to take me to the doctor each time.” This was an old joke between us. He was one of the only people I kept in touch with from my days at the post office. I was never the most popular man, and few old acquaintances cared enough to come see me all the way out here in the country, although my friend made his visits less out of genuine concern and more due to an inability to leave well enough alone.
“But I suppose it’s about time you started looking for someone else,” he said.
“Easier said than done.”
“You said the exact same thing before you got married.”
“My parents set up that match. And they’re no longer with us.”
Perhaps he felt he’d stepped in it. He was silent for several seconds as he looked around the rose garden. Scratching his head, he elected to change the subject.
“You still writing?”
“Not lately,” I admitted.
It had been quite a while since I’d touched a sheet of paper or had so much as picked up my beloved fountain pen. I simply stayed out here in the country, tending the roses as my wife once had. Sheer inertia was all that kept me going. It wasn’t that I wished to die myself. Mine had just become a life that didn’t feel worth living.
Perhaps that was why I felt I had nothing left to write. The need to write, whether for ambition or as an outlet, is always the result of some powerful drive.
“You always had an ear for a good turn of phrase,” he said.
“Nobody ever complimented the plots.”
“Who could follow them? They were all…philosophical. Reading them made my head hurt!”
“Ha ha.”
I’d been told as much in college.
The rows of novels on my shelves had been a bad influence, I supposed. I didn’t believe complexity was better; rather, everything I wrote simply turned out that way. If I let my guard down for a second, the wording would get ever so stiff, to my great regret.
For a while, he smiled.
“Well, if you write anything more, let me read it.”
“I will.”
A promise I did not expect I’d ever need to keep.
***
Wrinkly and gaunt. Hardly my type at all.
I had loved someone to death recently and was now looking for a new lover.
Oh, don’t get the wrong idea. My old lover had died, to be sure, but neither violently nor involuntarily. I may not have explained the price he’d pay in so many words, but I’m sure he figured it out on his own. Really, all any poet wants is to pour their soul onto the page and then die. Savoring the fading aftertaste of his demise, I was flitting about, still rather intoxicated.
I’m a leannán sídhe.
We’re a sort of vampire that gives men talent and takes their blood as payment.
Using the word vampire may make me sound quite mad, but the world is a far stranger place than people realize. There are still alchemists and mages around, you know. It’s just that humans can’t usually see us faeries.
And while we do drink blood, it’s a mutually beneficial deal. Those on whom I set my sights die a little early, but I give them a little more talent in return. This is where those tedious alchemists start trying to define “talent” or asking about the relationship between blood and life energy. Such dreary bores, alchemists. None of that matters to us!
Anyway, I’ve been repeating this pattern for more years than I care to count. From time to time it did cross my mind to try something new, but that’s really all there is to know about me.
I suppose I’d just lost my way.
I got lost rather a lot. I’d live it up with others of my kind, meet a poor banshee sitting in a ruined home. You know, as one does.
The skies that day were clear—hardly common for this time of year, in this country. I was flying around, enjoying the sunshine, when I discovered the most beautiful rose garden. I like wild flowers, too, but gardens tended by human hands have their own kind of wonder. Unless you look after roses with incredible care, you don’t get these massive blooms, like baby cheeks. Lovely!
I’ve always had a weakness for such things.
I drifted down to the ground, lured in by the roses.
Their color entranced me. Their fragrance stole my heart.
I couldn’t help but wonder who’d raised them.
That’s why my discovery came as such a surprise.
I could feel someone’s gaze on me. I looked up, and our eyes met.
“………”
Wrinkly and gaunt. Hardly my type at all.
Oh, absolutely not my type. He was far too old to have such childlike wonder in his eyes! His neck had no beauty; it looked weak! He was all hunched over, clinging to that cheap watering can! Nothing about him plucked at my heartstrings at all.
Well…nothing should have.
“Joel,” a voice said. I looked up.
This human appeared to have a visiting friend.
“Joel Garland!”
“Oh.”
The man turned in answer to the name. When he looked back in my direction, he could no longer see me. Still, he was no mage, no alchemist. So how could he have seen a faerie? What had happened was a fluke, surely. One that would not occur again.
Yet I kept standing there.
Of course, it was the roses. What other reason could there be to remain? I wasn’t here for this man who spoke in such apologetic tones. There was no reason for my eyes to follow him as he scratched his cheek awkwardly.
It was nothing but a whim.
The man—Joel Garland was far too imposing a name for such a quiet man—definitely found no favor with me. But on a whim, I decided it might not be so bad to remain with these roses a while longer.
2
My life was rather dull.
Once I finished watering the roses and tending the soil, I did nothing but prepare meals and lock myself up in my study. A vast selection of books filled my sturdy bookcases. Unfortunately, I was getting awfully close to having read the lot.
I’d imagined I would retire one day, but I had done so far sooner than anticipated. Now, I found myself at a loss for how to fill the time. This had led to me conquering nine-tenths of the bookshelves rather quickly. Attempts to supplement my stock proved inadequate. I ordered new books through the post, but most were scarcely worth reading. The good books I found were hardly enough to assuage the boredom of a bibliomaniac hermit.
I’d nearly finished my current mystery novel and had begun to feel frustrated. I tried to pace myself. Rereading books was fine, but nothing could compare to the pleasure of that first read.
Taking a deep breath, I gulped down the rest of my now-cold coffee and pressed a finger between my eyes. When I was younger I could happily read all day long, but the activity took more out of me now. Perhaps slowing down like this was some small salvation. I stretched my arms to ease the stiffness in my back and took several deep breaths.
When I was young, I had never imagined my lungs would one day ache just from breathing in.
Even sitting still like this wore me out now.
A girl with eyes like currants…
That daydream crossed my mind again.
She was an illusion surrounded by roses. Considering she’d surprised me, the way her own eyes widened had been shocking. Still, that fleeting glimpse remained burned into my retinas. Yes, it must have been just my imagination, but it was unforgettably clear. Every color, every hue remained etched in my mind as if carved in stone.
Like a novel I’d read long ago…
“That’s right,” I said aloud.
Once the idea came, I acted swiftly. I had what I needed right here in the study. Opening the drawer, I found everything ready.
For the first time in years, I held my beloved fountain pen in my hand.
I had purchased an ample supply of writing paper many years ago, and here it remained. I hardly planned to enter any contests with this piece. As long as it was legible, I could even write the entire thing in a notebook. Even if this was just for me, I’d prefer to maintain certain standards.
The last time I’d used the fountain pen, I’d cleaned it properly. It still worked well.
I drew ink from the pot and scratched a few lines on the side of the notepad to get a feel for it again.
I hesitated before the blank page for a while, but at last I began to write.
The first sentence…
***
My life was very repetitive.
I wandered about outside the house, returning before Joel hauled his lazy ass out of bed around noon. Sometimes I’d gaze at the color of the wind. Other times I’d listen to the trees whispering. Mine was a very laid-back life. Maybe some humans would say, “How very like a faerie!” Like they understand anything.
But I spent much of my time looking at roses.
In the chilly morning garden, I loved watching the tiny rainbows that formed whenever Joel tilted the watering can. He really had the laziest life! Apart from tending to the roses, he grumbled whenever he had to do anything, even cook!
Books filled his study, and I didn’t mind watching him read his way through them. As a leannán sídhe, anyone who loves the written word is okay in my book. But above all else, we desire a lover who will create wonderful new works. This human hardly counted.
Until one day, his life took a turn.
“That’s right,” he muttered.
Then he opened the drawer to his study desk.
When I saw what he took out, my eyes went wide.
“What? What! So he is a poet!”
When he picked up a fountain pen, I couldn’t help but smile.
Yes. This was how it should be. This explained why I’d lingered here so long. Leannán sídhe are drawn to poets. We take their blood in exchange for talent.
The first words he wrote were:
A rose garden, hazy like a dizzy spell, fragile like a soap bubble.
I met her amongst the white roses.
“………”
For a moment, I felt as if he’d touched my very heart.
In fits and starts, Joel’s pen moved down the page.
The story was simple enough: a man and a woman meet in a garden, exchange simple pleasantries, and catch a glimpse of each other’s hearts. No challenges, no real resolution. He wrote as the thoughts came to him. The man and woman parted without any real progress being made, and Joel’s pen stopped.
“Hmph.”
It wasn’t much of a story, I thought.
He certainly wasn’t overburdened with talent. He wasn’t hopeless, either, but not at all what I usually went for. I liked words that flowed like gentle rain. While there was a dewy quality to his prose, it was much more like a driving wind.
But something about it caught in my heart, a slight twinge that tugged at my attention, like something stuck to my skin. It was hardly great, but the words were distinctively his. When his pen moved again, I listened closely to the sound of it scratching the paper.
And… And if he was writing, that was enough.
“Hey,” I whispered.
My words would never reach a normal person. Only mages or alchemists could hear me. But someone with talent would catch the ripples of my voice. This was what we faeries lived for. This was why we lived.
Heat laced my voice. Blood scented my breath.
“Would you like to create the greatest art, even if it cost your blood and your soul?”
The echoes of my voice filled the room.
But if my whisper reached him, he did not respond.
Like he can’t hear me at all! Hmph, I thought. You might be writing a story, but why can’t I reach you?
The reason was obvious. Someone who had truly dedicated their life to writing might reject our invitation, but they would certainly hear it if they were worthy.
Oh, if only he was one of them.
This man might like novels but not enough to risk his life for them.
Such a shame. I was a fool. I could hardly call myself a leannán sídhe, drawn to a man like this.
But wait.
Then what was that rose garden?
All he needed to do was dedicate his life to art. Any form of beauty would do, not just the written word. Half-praying, I whispered to him again.
“Don’t you want to make those roses even more beautiful?”
“The roses aren’t mine.” This time, he whispered an answer to the page, his pen never stopping. “The rose garden belongs to my wife.”
Wife!
I’d imagined our connection. It was all my own fantasy. I wafted backwards, ready to keel over. The shock and the shame were so great, I felt ready to vanish from the earth. For a moment, I genuinely wished that I could.
I blinked. The urge to die dissipated, replaced by something else.
I’ll get in his way.
A fiery rage possessed me.
Of course, this was not jealousy. It was simple revenge. Anyone who tricked me would receive a decisive, fatal blow in return. Joel looked around the room, as if wondering why he’d spoken out loud, but I was far past caring about his reaction.
I had no choice now.
I was going to have to stick around here until winter at least.
3
I wrote whenever I had the time.
It was a very short story, and I rewrote it over and over. I’m sure that a computer would have helped greatly, but pen and paper were just more my style. Besides, there was little point in making the process more effective. I was the story’s sole intended audience. Perhaps I might show it to a visiting friend on occasion. I’d been inspired just enough that I didn’t want to write this story entirely for my own self-satisfaction, but I wasn’t trying to make it as a writer.
I had felt differently, once. I think.
Back then…when my wife was alive.
The rose garden was hers.
She had always been a frail woman. Our parents set us up. Shortly after the wedding, she came down with tuberculosis, and we moved to the country for her convalescence. After she started feeling better, she announced that she wanted to grow roses.
At first I thought it was just a way to occupy her time, but she grew so passionate about digging, watering, and the occasional dramatic pruning. Soon it was as if she had married those roses instead of me. Neither of us were great talkers, so perhaps she filled the silence with those flowers.
I enjoyed helping her with them.
Wiping the sweat off my brow with the back of my gardening glove, I thought marrying her was the right choice.
But our time together lasted only a few years. I suppose those few years made our move to the country worth it. She passed away without us growing much closer, leaving me with a house that was far too large and a garden full of roses.
In a sense, only force of habit kept me going.
I kept doing what she had done for no real reason. If I’d really been in love with her, there might have been meaning to it, but my feelings never deepened. I’d thought of her as family but nothing more. Perhaps this was my punishment.
Punishment was probably too grandiose a word. It was smaller than that, a thorn pricking my heart. Like when I pricked my thumb while tending the roses. Not a strong pain but one that throbbed dully for a while after.
Perhaps remembering that pain made me feel as if I could write a little longer.
Hopeless, wasn’t it?
“Hopeless? I’m just an old fool,” I muttered. It felt like someone agreed with me.
If I was seeing and hearing things, perhaps my end was drawing near. Honestly, I found that thought comforting. This house was far too large for only one person. It was just too much space.
My vision blurred, so I took off my glasses and stretched.
These days, I tired easily. Maybe I was just old. Perhaps I should take up jogging, but I was never one for exercise. If I ever admitted as much, that khaki-jacketed friend of mine would surely mock me.
“Let’s have a cup of tea,” I said. I stood up and picked out some leaves.
Today, I went with chamomile. Not my usual tea, but I felt like trying something different. I mixed it with a little orange peel, a recently acquired taste. I had a strange feeling someone would like the scent of it, but that was foolish. Who else but me would drink it?
***
I’d lost all motivation.
My passion for interfering with Joel had dissipated two seasons ago. All a leannán sídhe could really do to a human was love—or rather, drink—them and give them talent. Beyond that, we couldn’t be seen or touched. We were little more than air, or even less, since our absence did not inconvenience humans in the slightest.
But those roses were still beautiful.
Joel hadn’t done anything unusual to the roses, so perhaps the ground here was just suited to them. Perhaps Joel’s lazy, whimsical style matched the garden’s needs. The roses bloomed all year round, so my eyes always had something to see.
However, Joel’s writing did not seem to be getting anywhere.
He always started the next revision before he’d finished the last.
I didn’t object to his struggle. Our kind love watching writers struggle with this wording or that. But since he wasn’t devoting his life to his writing, I thought he should at least finish the story before starting again. A hundred disasters lead to a single good work and ten thousand lead to a masterpiece.
And this was just a short story! You could read the entire thing in a matter of minutes. Fast readers could be done in fewer than ten. How much fiddling did a story that length need?
As I watched him struggle away in his study, I grew suddenly furious.
“You’re hopeless, you know that?”
“Hopeless? I’m just an old fool,” he said, as if answering me.
Things like this happened from time to time, though I no longer paid it any attention. Our words matched up on occasion, but it was all just coincidence. Perfectly natural, considering we lived similar lives.
Yet, I didn’t hate the time we spent like this.
If he enjoyed revising his work, then oh well. It’s not like I would die anytime soon. He could do what he wanted, and I would sit with him.
“Let’s have a cup of tea,” he said, stretching.
“Make it chamomile,” I ordered, and he obliged.
See? He made what I asked for sometimes. Well, about once out of every five requests.
Even faeries love the smell of herbal tea. The crisp scent of chamomile perfectly mingled with a touch of orange peel. These days, he seemed to enjoy mixing that into everything.
“Yes, this might be your calling. You’re no great shakes as a writer, but you could open a half-decent café,” I said. I watched him savor the scent and then take a sip.
What a fool I was.
I’d sworn revenge and then never done a thing to him. I could easily drink his blood, but doing so to someone who didn’t live for his writing would go against the very nature of the leannán sídhe.
So I did nothing, and nothing happened.
But I didn’t mind that.
I settled down for a nap on his shoulder. He couldn’t feel my weight on him.
“Such a shame. You can’t even enjoy the smell of a fine lady like me.”
“Who says I can’t?” he replied.
I jumped.
But of course, he wasn’t looking at me.
“Hmm. I suppose that would work.”
He was talking to the page, sipping his chamomile tea. The words he spoke matched so closely to mine that my heart skipped a beat. If my fist could have touched him, I’d definitely have hit him for that.
I meant it!
Honestly, he deserved it!
Before I could unleash my anger upon him, he spoke again.
“I used to hate roses.”
He must have been talking to himself; he couldn’t know about me. I braced myself and listened closely.
“I enjoyed helping you, but the thorns pricked me, and the work was a pain. The cost of the fertilizer every month is absurd. It’s only force of habit that keeps me going.”
The sound of his scratching pen filled the study.
I felt like you could sense his emotions in the stroke of the pen.
“But that’s not the case anymore. I don’t know why…but I feel like the work is giving someone pleasure.”
He frowned at this, puzzled, like he didn’t understand the words he had said. His words rattled me to the heart—how pathetic! I clutched my hands to my mouth.
Still resting on his shoulders, I closed my eyes.
“I love the roses,” I murmured.
Why?
I shouldn’t have been able to feel the heat of his body, either—yet in that moment, his shoulders felt awfully warm.
The warmth was bittersweet.
“Yes, I just love the roses. As long as I can see the roses, I don’t mind staying here.”
4
Several years passed.
I still tended the rose garden, still wrote.
Or rather, rewrote. I wrote the same scenes over and over, without ever growing tired of them. Anyone observing would have considered me a fool. I’ve heard of military tortures where people are forced to dig holes and then fill them in again. The sheer exhaustion of this labor drives them to the brink of insanity, and what I was doing was not far removed from madness. Of course, I chose to do this, so I did not suffer. However, I doubt the distinction would matter to a stranger.
No.
That’s not right. I did suffer.
I felt like I was plunging into clear lake water. If I ran out of breath, I could always surface; no one forced me to dive deeper. Yet every second I could spare, I dove back under. Without even thinking about it, I would find my pen in my hand as I tried to get another sentence down.
I sometimes wondered if I would ever finish the story.
It’s not like the story had anything like a proper plot. I simply allowed my pen free rein as the whim struck me. Any real writer would laugh at my efforts. Some might even grow angry with me.
But I was no real writer, and I didn’t care to have a stranger read my work.
This story was more like a diary, a reflection of myself at the time I wrote it.
The roses were different every day, too. The dew dripping off the petals, the staunch thorns, the leaves soaking in the sunlight; not once were they ever the same. I realized this after I started writing. Up until that point, I’d looked after the garden purely because I always had, but lately that had begun to change.
One could say I’d become more aware of the seasons.
Just being conscious of the moisture on the wind or the way the sun shone had a shocking effect on the flowers’ bloom.
Once I became aware of that, a single day turned into more than a collection of twenty-four hours. The blanks where the loneliness became too much to bear, the joy of discovering a great new book—every experience became a unique moment in time. Instead of feeling repetitive, each moment became something special.
The story was the same.
Every time I wrote it, the description of the woman in it changed.
Sometimes she was blonde. Sometimes she had black hair, like my wife. Eventually, I began describing her hair as the color of moonlight. The first time I wrote the word “moonlight,” I called out in surprise.
“Ah!”
I blinked at it, astonished and somewhat mortified.
How had I only just realized?
How many years had I been circling around this one thing?
“The girl with eyes like currants…”
***
“How dense can one man be?!”
How many times had I said this?
Honestly, all this time Joel had been writing and rewriting the same story. Several winters had passed, and I kept hanging around and looking at the roses. In all that time he’d never once found an ending for his story.
Seriously, he had never tried to finish it. Why was that?
But what did that say about me? I knew he was never going to finish, but I remained.
I couldn’t understand it, and that infuriated me. I was constantly angry. The roses bloomed year-round, so at least I could appreciate some gorgeous flowers. Wrapped in their fragrant scent, yet always angry… I was a fool.
Yet however many times he rewrote his story, I couldn’t bring myself to hate Joel’s writing.
His style was far from what I liked, but something struck me about the stiff wording, the traces of fleeting emotions. You could hardly scream from the rooftops about his talent, but the shade of his heart was definitely visible within his work.
The hue of his soul.
The flavor of it?
I stuck out my tongue.
I knew he wasn’t much of a talent, but I wondered what his blood tasted like. I didn’t expect it to smell of roses, but I imagined it did. Perhaps it would be more like stale wine, a wine so old it was no longer drinkable. Its rich fruitiness would be long gone, but a bitterness might linger on the tongue, reminding you of what it once had been… You know, that sort of flavor.
He was rewriting that story again.
I met her in a rose garden.
He always started there.
He’d trimmed the embellishments, making it far easier to read. No draft was inherently better, but I preferred this version. His pen moved on to the next line.
Eyes like red currants. Swaying gently between the flower petals, her hair was the color of moonlight.
Oh…
Why?
What was he writing?
I couldn’t understand. I didn’t want to understand. If I accepted this, something fundamental in me would crumble. My every instinct screamed.
Yet…
“Oh,” Joel said, nodding. Sheepishly, a smile played across his lips. “The girl with eyes like currants might be my first love.”
I stopped breathing.
What?
My chest froze. My faerie heart had turned to ice. The chill spread through my organs, through my blood and nerves.
I could not know the answer to this unforeseen question. I couldn’t make this choice. Had I been waiting for this? I knew more about love than anyone. If he desired it, I should just grant his request.
My thoughts fragmented, as if I’d split into two.
Like a fool, I was fighting with myself. How absurd! There was no reason for me to do this. I felt nothing for this wrinkly man!
I fled the house.
Outside, I found myself surrounded by brilliant flower petals.
The red and white roses swayed in the strong breeze. A gust of wind blew a cluster of petals into my path, cutting off my escape.
Those beautiful roses were now terrifying.
For the first time since I could remember, I hunched over and crawled away. I couldn’t fly. Flattened, I dragged myself across the ground. My feet felt like anchors. My heart had turned to stone. I couldn’t think straight. Faerie bodies would leave no marks on the garden’s soft soil, but I strained desperately to get away from that house.
At last, I reached the forest. Only then did I look back.
Joel’s house seemed so tiny. If I kept running, the forest would soon hide it from view. Yet I couldn’t bring myself to go further.
“………”
I clutched my chest and doubled over.
For ages I sat like that, unable to move a muscle.
5
One winter afternoon, I received a rare visit from my friend.
He stood clutching the sleeves of his coat in the cold. He glanced over me and scowled.
“Did you just get out of the hospital, Joel?”
“No? I’ve been just fine.”
“You always looked older than you were, but it’s like you’ve added a decade since I last saw you. We’re supposed to be the same age, you know!” he said.
“I remember. But honestly, I’ve been feeling pretty good lately.”
A look of genuine concern crossed his face. “Were you not before?”
“I’d gained a bit of weight, I expect. Please don’t give me any lectures on how I should take up jogging or drink grapefruit juice.”
I let him in and put the kettle on.
As the water boiled, I put leaves in a pot, realizing absently that I’d added enough for three people instead of two. I warmed the cups and slowly filled the pot with hot water. Today it was rose hip tea. My friend would be tired from the trip here, so the acidity would refresh him. I added a little honey a nearby beekeeper had given me and carried our tea to the living room.
“Here,” I said.
“Thanks.” He took a sip. “Well, at least you’re getting better at one thing.”
He was full of pointed remarks today.
He put his cup down. “Truth is, I’m getting married,” he said.
This sudden announcement did not surprise me.
I nodded and picked up my own cup.
“Congratulations.”
“Thanks. It’s a workplace marriage. You know, the receptionist who admired you.”
This did surprise me.
“Since when has anyone admired me?”
“You didn’t realize?”
“No, no. You must be pulling my leg.”
“Nope. She liked the way you used to gloomily read by yourself on breaks. You’ll catch a woman’s eye like that, you know. Or I suppose you don’t, since you never noticed.”
“Huh. Well.”
It wasn’t just that I’d failed to notice her interest.
I’d lost my wife before we ever really fell in love, and it had taken me years to realize my feelings for a mysterious woman I’d glimpsed for a single instant. Comparing these two memories made me quite cross with myself.
If someone out there was odd enough to adore me in full knowledge of my quirks, then I’m sure—
Sure of what?
What was I even thinking?
Who was I fantasizing about here? These dreams were far too good to be true. I was behaving like a young fool. I loosened my collar, feeling the heat of embarrassment. I felt like someone had just asked me out on my way to school.
“You’ll come to the wedding?” my friend asked, winking. His teeth gleamed.
How theatrical. But he was often like this. Of course, he always got what he deserved.
“How many marriages does this make?”
“It’s my third,” he chuckled.
We could not be less alike.
I believe that’s why we’d stayed in touch, even after I moved out here. At the very least, I never minded preparing a pot of tea for his visits. Fortunately, the cookies I served weren’t stale, so we chatted a while longer.
Eventually, it occurred to me to mention my own news. “I’ve been writing again.”
“Oh!” he cried, overjoyed.
Embarrassed, I thought that his reaction was far too effusive for what amounted to little more than a collection of noodling.
“You’ve got to let me read it.”
“If I ever finish it,” I said, with a shrug.
After I saw him to the bus stop, I looked at myself in the mirror.
“I suppose I do look a little gaunt.”
I was a widower, after all.
I made sure my diet stayed balanced but could never fix my innate laziness. Even with my wife gone, I simply didn’t feel like hiring a housekeeper. Should I die like this, the postman would find me, or my friend would when he came to visit. Perhaps I should do something about my situation.
“At the least, I should eat a bit more meat,” I muttered, glancing at the ceiling.
Lately, I felt like I hadn’t heard anyone agree with me. True, I’d never actually heard an agreement, but it was also true that something felt missing. Perhaps that made no sense, but it reminded me of my earlier conversation with my friend.
Had I benefitted from something without ever realizing it?
In that case, perhaps I’d made a terrible mistake that I could barely understand.
6
“Huh!”
A yelp of surprise.
I was in the forest.
Dew dripped off the branches, each drop sending the smell of cold earth to invade my nostrils.
I sat on the damp ground.
I hadn’t moved at all since that day. I wasn’t human, so I could go months or even years without moving an inch if I felt like it. I hardly ever had to feed on blood to stay alive. But when my heart suffered, so did my appearance. Even a creature like me can’t avoid such a fate.
I’d lost all sense of time. It took me ages to respond to the voice I’d heard.
“Are you still not back in town?”
Another leannán sídhe stood beside me, making a mock show of horror.
Come to think of it, I’d been talking to her before I found Joel’s house. We faeries didn’t have names of our own, nor did we really identify each other as individuals. Still, I vaguely remembered her from the way she spoke.
“Did you already…” I began to ask, trailing off.
“Yes. I found someone new, and loved him dry.”
Her smile was so beautiful, like mine had once been.
She glanced in the direction I was staring.
“Oh, you settled in on that house? Found one you like?” she asked.
“I don’t like him!” I cried, almost reflexively. “He’s all wrinkly! Gaunt! Lazy!”
“Hmm. Like any of that matters.”
She yawned, looking as if she didn’t care at all.
She was carefree, like I used to be. I’m sure I’d have said the same thing to her if our positions were reversed. Our lovers’ talent was all that mattered. Caring at all what they looked like was a mistake. I knew that, but I couldn’t bring myself to admit it.
“I just…can’t stand those roses,” I said.
“That’s great, sweetie!”
These words did not come from me or the other leannán sídhe. Rather, they came from a faerie hovering nearby. She looked like a young girl, with wavy hair and unnaturally large, bright eyes. Bird’s wings grew from her back, and two feelers sprouted out of her forehead. All these details indicated what she was.
“Ariel!”
A spirit of the air.
She was not of our kind, but if the whim struck us we would talk with anything.
“There’s a storm coming soon!” she said, displaying the innocent, delighted smile of a child talking about a trip to an amusement park. Faeries often looked like this.
“A storm?”
“Yes! A very big storm. I’ve been drawn here by it, sweetie. It’ll blow away all those roses you can’t stand.”
My throat went dry.
If a spirit of the air said this, then it would come true. This was a prophecy. The storm would come, as if the ariels themselves had called it here.
To that garden. To that house.
To him.
“You can’t!” I said at last. I shook my head. I felt weak. My stomach hurt, like I was digesting rocks. “You can’t! Those roses are—”
“But you said you couldn’t stand them! In that case, what’s wrong with getting rid of them all?”
“Everything!” I screamed. Clutching my head, I bunched up and hurled my words into the ground. “Those roses don’t deserve that! I could never love them, but I don’t want them scattered. I don’t want them gone! Not ever!”
“Well, don’t yell about it to me!” The ariel shrugged. “The storm’s almost here.”
Dark, sinister clouds covered the sky.
7
That evening, I made tea in my study.
Chamomile again. No particular reason. I didn’t especially like the taste, but I’d begun making this tea whenever the mood struck me.
I kept closing my fists and opening them again.
These days, I definitely felt better.
The suffocating weariness I’d felt was long gone, along with unwelcome apathy. I felt five or ten years younger. I wasn’t exercising, so I’d never anticipated feeling this good.
Yet my writing had stopped.
Despite what I’d told my friend, I hadn’t touched the page in a while. It felt like I no longer had anyone around to read the finished work—which was absurd, of course.
I’d never had anyone like that.
“I wonder why I felt that way,” I muttered, glancing out the window.
A dense forest lay beyond the rose garden. With my bad eyesight, it resembled nothing more than a dark green blur. For some reason, though, I spent a lot of time staring at it.
Clouds boiled over the sunset.
As night arrived, the winds began to howl. The storm’s strength shocked me, and my eyes widened.
“Oh, dear.”
I hastily turned the radio on.
An announcer read a high wind warning over the static.
Storms were rare in this area, so I’d missed the signs until now. I remembered the legends of the Wild Hunt. They were stories about a band of hundreds of faeries and spirits that raced across the sky during powerful storms. Areas with few storms were especially likely to cast a mystic veil across such natural disasters.
But this was no time to let such fanciful things prey upon my imagination.
I quickly changed my clothes, preparing myself as best I could, and ran out of the house.
“This is bad,” I groaned.
Even in such a short amount of time, the storm had grown far worse.
The wind cut right through my body, scattering petals from my garden everywhere. Several hundred petals whipped all around me, as if a giant hand had scooped them up. The sight hardly seemed real. I could not afford to gaze around in wonder, though.
Enduring the pounding rain, I hammered stakes around the roses, laying down as many nets as I could. My newfound health gave me the energy to do so. Hard to believe that a few months ago this amount of exertion would have left me ragged. I’d have collapsed with the job half-done.
My nose filled with a rusty scent. Was I straining myself so much I’d popped a blood vessel?
I didn’t want to lose these blooms.
Why was that?
Because my wife had planted them?
No. Something inside me shook its head. That was part of it, but the real reason lay elsewhere.
I felt like these roses provided a vital link between me and someone else.
But who?
I don’t know.
I didn’t know anything. Why I was acting like this. How I really felt. What I wanted to live for.
There were no guarantees in life, no matter what you did wrong or right. I only ever seemed to learn the truth about things when it was too late. A pervasive gloom knotted in the pit of my stomach.
All the wasted hours of my life piled up inside of me, like dust in my study.
Still…
Oh.
Part of me was slightly happy.
This wasn’t inertia. I’d thought I was tending these roses simply because I always had, but that wasn’t the case anymore.
For love?
I felt it.
I mean, that’s what it was.
“After all, you might come to see the roses.”
I’d met her here first, so I couldn’t afford to lose them.
From the bottom of my heart, I prayed for at least one bloom to survive.
***
The storm grew visibly stronger.
Even with the ridiculous amount of time I’d lived, I’d rarely seen rain and wind pound the earth like this.
I couldn’t bear to watch this happen and fled the forest.
Flying at full speed, I was only a few minutes away.
All I could see were roses. White and red petals swirled around me and filled the air, like blood gushing out of the garden.
In the thick of it, I saw him struggling.
He placed nets around the roses, pounded new stakes around the places that had no nets. His frail body struggled against the storm as he tried to save what roses he could. Just seeing him like this made my heart want to break.
Yet I knew his actions were futile.
No net was going to save those roses from wind like this. One mistake and Joel would be in danger. It wasn’t at all unusual for humans to die after being struck by lightning or hit by flying debris. Deteriorating houses, bricks—danger waited all around. Joel knew that perfectly well.
So why did he look so happy?
“After all, you might come to see the roses.”
“………”
At his words, something released within me.
Backing away, I clapped my hands to my mouth. As I did, I found the ariel I’d spoken with earlier hovering beside me. She’d said the storm had brought her here, and she was clearly enjoying the spectacle.
So I called out to her, my voice hoarse.
“Please. Stop these winds.”
“I’ll need payment, sweetie,” she replied.
I’d known she would say that, but I froze anyway.
I had nothing but my body. Nothing to offer her.
But this time she had a proposal.
“If you leave him be in this storm, he might wander over to our side.”
The ariel glanced meaningfully at Joel, at the way he fought for those roses.
I’m sure that was just a whim flickering through her mind. Our kind tempted or meddled with humans. They did not speak to us on their own. But my reaction to Joel’s words must have caught her interest.
“It’s not often we get a wind this good. There’s every chance at least one human might wander into it,” the spirit said. “What he said just now was ever so interesting. Living together, having fun together, laughing together…that doesn’t sound like such a bad idea, does it?”
“………”
I was tempted.
I doubt any normal leannán sídhe would even have considered it.
But if I could stare back at him, talk to him…if he could make me tea, if I could eat sweets with him. If we could talk about the stories he wrote, even a little bit.
The temptation was so wonderful.
I wanted to say yes. I longed to be with him forever.
But that temptation was reward enough.
“That’s not right.”
The tremor in my voice vanished.
I looked the ariel right in the eye.
“That’s not what I want. The only way my kind can love humans is to sip and inspire. That means…that means I don’t love him.”
I couldn’t love him. That could never be.
I’d believed that for so long. Love would have to be a miracle.
“Then what do you want, sweetie? Do you take back your request?”
“Chamomile tea,” I whispered.
“What?”
“Chamomile tea with orange peel blended in. When he goes in to rest, I’m sure he’ll make a cup. You’d enjoy the fragrance and color of it, right?”
Whatever she made of my offer, the ariel simply nodded. A smile traced her lips.
“Let’s call that a deal, then.”
She put her finger to her lips, winked at me, and then turned into the wind.
“All I can do is ease the storm a tad, and only in this area.”
“That’s enough,” I said.
“Then pray this goes well.”
The ariel pleaded into the wind.
Her words were like a song, a melody that altered nature itself.
I was fairly certain her last words were spiteful, but I, too, prayed in the face of this rushing wind. Vampires had nobody to pray to, but my pleas were genuine.
How could they not be?
I’d first met him here. I couldn’t lose this place.
“Yes,” I whispered. “If I was the only one who remembered these roses, that would be awful.”
8
The wedding day was beautifully clear.
My friend’s new wife, two decades younger than he, seemed lost in the moment. My friend, now married for the third time, looked worn out yet happy. I barely remembered a thing about my own wedding, but I recalled being so exhausted I swore never to go through it again.
I believe this was a good wedding.
I never did let my friend read my story. I’d finally written an ending of sorts, but that could wait for another occasion.
As I made my way home, the sun began to set.
I could see my house in the distance.
From far away, everything around the house seemed covered in white.
Somehow, I’d saved nearly half the roses. The postman said it was a miracle that so many of them had survived that storm. I’d never been one to believe in God, but if you had told me that some higher being saved me, I’d have believed it.
After the storm, I’d had a sudden urge to make a cup of chamomile tea before collapsing into bed. Perhaps that was why.
Dwelling on the memory, I squinted at the world bathed in the red of sunset.
Dusk. Twilight. Magic hour.
Would I meet someone?
If I could pick any one person to meet…
My gaze dropped to the ground to the shadows at my feet.
My shadow alone should have stretched out before me, but for a moment I believed another shadow hovered beside mine. A lady’s shadow.
“Now, now,” I said, shaking my head in disbelief.
It was a trick of the eyes. A fleeting fantasy. The woman I had dreamed about, appearing in a delusion. This was a one-way ticket to the madhouse.
“………”
But nobody else saw, so whom did it harm?
Cajoling my tired body and aching back, I held up one hand.
“May I take your hand, young lady?”
I couldn’t imagine saying that to anyone real.
I would never even write that line into my story. It wouldn’t make it into a poem. Even saying such things aloud with no one else around made my ears burn. At my age, it was still possible to turn beet red.
But just for today…
Today, surely it was allowed.
***
I thought it was all going to disappear.
The ariel and the other leannán sídhe had long since gone. I alone remained in the rose garden. When I saw Joel headed back from the wedding, I went out to meet him on a whim. Nothing more to it. The only reason I stayed was because half the roses remained. I felt I might as well gaze upon them a while longer. No other reason at all.
Yet.
When I caught up with him, he reached his hand out towards me. I froze, as if snared in his spell.
“May I take your hand, young lady?”
His voice quivered. Not exactly smooth.
His hand wasn’t at the right angle, and his back was bent. He’d pulled the tuxedo out of storage too late to get it altered, so it was far too baggy. Nothing about him made my heart yearn.
I hesitated for a few seconds. Maybe a few minutes.
But then, slowly, I took his hand.
“Why thank you, kind sir.”
Mimicking good etiquette, I bent a single knee.
No serenade played for our ball. There were no gorgeous chandeliers. There wasn’t even a campfire for us to gaily prance around.
But his feet tapped out a few steps.
I don’t believe it.
You don’t believe it, either, do you?
A few steps of a waltz.
The movements were clumsy, like a toddler playing house. He made a stiff, yet natural turn, followed by a closed change. These were just a few steps but performed with such heart that they seemed to last forever.
I’m dancing with you.
It was like…
No. No metaphors sufficed.
In the light of the sunset, to music no one could hear, he waltzed with someone human eyes could never behold.
***
If someone had seen me, they would have thought me a fool.
They would have yelled at me for my foolish dreams.
***
Even faeries would have believed me foolish.
They’d have scolded me for forgetting what I was.
***
Yet…
Until we vanish from this earth, may this moment never be forgotten.
The End