Vampire Love Songs #4: Brandy Alexander

Tired of being on the heights I deliberately went to the depths in the search for new sensations. - "De Profundis", Oscar Wilde

They call him Billy, and lately that's what he's been calling himself. At first it was a novelty; like going on holiday. Bleaching his hair and getting himself inked had been the first step in creating distance from his old self, running into Seth and Mallory that night had been the second. So when Seth jokingly first christened him, he didn't bother to correct him. Now, Billy seems just as good a name as the one he had before.

The TV is broken, making the flat feel even emptier without the two guests who have fast become a fixture. He doesn't know where they are, wonders if he's allowed to ask. Decides he's not sure he wants to know. Everything is so new, he's careful of pushing. So instead, he lies on the sofa, not calling them, but thinking of how their voices would sound if he did.

This curious relationship he has with the two of them, it's one of the more interesting turns his new life has taken.  Sharing his time (and his body) between men and women isn't exactly a change for Billy, but the ease and speed with which their ménage à trois has become the norm surprises him.  When he first met Seth and Mallory, he had not expected to see them beyond that night.  The decision to let them bite him had just been another experiment of his, like the tattoos.  The search for an answer to a question he doesn't think he has ever voiced out loud:

What can't I do?  If nobody stops me, how far will I go?

The tattoos are six months old.  His white blonde hair is darkening at the roots.  Up until last year, Billy had never smoked more than a couple of adolescent, clandestine cigarettes out of his bedroom window. Now the bottom drawer of his night stand holds a small baggie of undisclosed pills, a pouch of amphetamine crystals and a considerable amount of Mary Jane. As much fun as all of that is, though, Billy still prefers a drink on days like this. Shit days when Mallory isn't around for him to fuck and Seth isn't around to fuck him.

He wonders if he has the ingredients for a Brandy Alexander. For somebody who doesn't eat much, he thinks it's basically the same as comfort food. The smooth cream and the warmth of the Courvoisier almost always make him feel better. It's like New Year in a glass, and Billy wants to feel new.

He is in luck: there's some brandy under his bed and a small amount of pouring cream in the fridge. Billy doesn't remember buying it, but a quick sniff convinces him it's consumable. He is delicately mixing the two together over ice when the phone rings, so he leaves it for the machine.

It's Randall, a friend of his parents. Billy once nursed strong suspicions that his mother was cheating on his father with Randall. Hardly seems to matter now.

"Alex," the machine says, "I'm worried about you. You said you'd check in, let me know you're alright. Haven't heard from you in a while. Call me. Please."

"Fuck you, Randy," Billy raises his glass to toast the thin air and then downs its contents. The rich cocktail doesn't have the desired effect: the sweetness soon sours in his mouth, and instead of a warm glow, Billy begins to feel slightly sick. Too much Courvoisier and not enough cream. Or maybe the cream was bad to begin with.

He goes into the bathroom and sits on the floor against the wall in case he needs to throw up any time soon. Probably for the best that Seth and Mallory aren't around, he thinks. Nobody wants to see the calf vomiting before it gets served up as veal.

The bathroom tiles are cold on his bare feet, and Billy can feel a chill through the seat of his jeans. After a while, half an hour maybe, it becomes apparent that the dodgy drink isn't going to make him ill, so Billy stands up and leaves the bathroom. He only briefly considers making another one, before heading to bed with a copy of Howl by Allen Ginsberg. He gave up halfway through Tropic of Cancer but holds out hope for this one. The page keeps shifting in and out of focus, and the words seem to continually change order – in the end, Billy gives up and closes his eyes.

And that's when he sees them.

His mother looks beautiful, as always. He can't bear to imagine her with a broken neck. The damage done to her, thankfully, hadn't been instantly visible. His father, however, has seen better days. His nose is black and flattened between pale, flat cheeks. Three tiny cuts, from glass one would presume, decorate his right temple. Miranda and Gregory Brown have not changed one bit since the day he identified their bodies in the mortuary.

Billy opens his eyes before they can speak. It's always worse when they try to talk to him.

Something beneath him vibrates: he rolled over onto his mobile phone when he nodded off. It's a message from Seth and Mallory: On our way over. Can't wait to see you.

Billy swings his legs off the bed and goes back into the kitchen, checking the vodka is in the freezer. All three of them enjoy a little drink before going to bed. He busies himself cleaning a few glasses, then takes himself off into the living room to wait. While mere moments before he'd been filled with a queasy sense of exhaustion, now he can feel his cock stirring in his jeans.

In his mind, the scenario plays out ahead of time. He will take what he needs this time. He will push Mallory down onto the bed and clamp his hand over her mouth as he enters her. He'll feel the weight of Seth at his back before he forces himself in, and he won't know which hurts more, that, or the teeth on the side of his neck, but either way he'll cry out. Everything will go into that wordless noise: everything that made him who he was before he was Billy. Afterwards, Seth will lick the blood from his lips while Mallory lies panting on the bed, and he'll say: “You're quite the howler, aren't you Billy?”

Here they come now.

~

Vampire Love Songs #3: Dr. Feelgood

She's cheating on him, and the only reason Seth knows this is because she's giving him a blowjob. In the years they've spent together, he has come to recognise this as one of the myriad, more exotic ways in which Mallory's guilt manifests. He wonders if it's to spite him after the thing with the dancer. He wonders if she even knows about the thing with the dancer.

There are cobwebs in the corners of the ceiling. Seth can't seem to look away, and it breaks his... well, concentration isn't quite the word. Mallory looks up at him questioningly. He pulls her up level to him, kisses her on the cheek, and hops off the bed. Before Mallory can figure out what happened, the bathroom door is closed and he's in the shower.

He considers masturbating while in there, but can't muster up the will. Instead he stands under the stream until the water runs cold. By the time he steps out, he has decided to start following Mallory.

She's sleeping when he comes out of the bathroom. As quietly as he can, Seth locates the bottle of vodka, and pours what little remains into a dirty glass, necking it. It barely touches the sides. He knows what would hit the spot – what always does the trick when vodka won't quite take the edge off. Seth could really do with someone to drink. But a glance at his sleeping wife stops him putting his shoes on and going out.

He's stopped going to meetings, because a weekly circle wank was never going be enough to curb these cravings.  Many try to sublimate the urge with something else, but he's already an old acquaintance of just about every vice going. Seth is beginning to think a cure is impossible.  And he's surprised by how little he minds.  Mallory, he knows it bothers Mallory.  The killing.  And when you get down to it, it bothers Seth too - conceptually.  But when it's happening, when it actually matters, he's usually too lost in his own bliss to care.

***

Two nights later, Seth follows Mallory to a building he recognises. It takes him a moment to place it; it is the home of the young man they met, what, two weeks ago? Seth had called him Billy, as a joke, because he had white blonde hair and a pretty punk mouth. Mallory disappears into the apartment building, but Seth follows her no further. Instead he walks to a bar he knows just a few streets away, and does his best to get wasted.

Odd, how much Seth can see while trying so hard not to. The once familiar look of arousal on Mallory's face, and the twin swallows that adorn Billy's young, muscular chest.  The smooth, unspoiled flesh of his buttocks as he flips her over, making her squeal with giddy pleasure beneath him.

Seth knows his wife is sleeping with somebody else.  And now he knows who that somebody is. All that he doesn't know is what he plans to do with this information.

Kill him? The ease with which this thought comes into his mind should worry him. As if it were the most natural thing in the world. Which Seth realises it has become, for him. He doesn't know whether it's the alcohol or the rage, but his stomach feels like it is on fire.

Mallory is still gone when he gets back to the hotel. He paces the room, palms itchy, chest tight. He thinks he's going to be sick. Withdrawal. And for what? Seth has long known he's a bad man. He has tried to be better for Mallory, to be the kind of husband she deserved. And where is Saint Mallory now?

He goes through all of his pockets, through the handbag Mallory left on the floor, through every drawer in the night stand until he finds something sharp enough. A small pair of scissors. He presses his thumb against the blade, wincing when the pressure gives way to hot, searing pain. So that's what it feels like, Seth thinks, as he brings the thumb to his lips, hungrily sucking on the small cut. The tightness in his chest loosens slightly. He feels his panicked breathing slow.

He kicks off his shoes and climbs into bed, still sucking his thumb like an insecure child. Only now does everything he had to drink earlier come rushing to his head. The room begins to sway like a cabin on a boat, and Seth finds it helps rock him to sleep.

***

When he wakes up, Mallory is in the bed next to him. He rises without waking her and changes into some clean clothes – or, at the very least, cleaner than the ones he slept in. He deliberately avoids looking at Mallory as he walks around the bed and leaves the room.

It's sunny out – oppressively so. Seth wishes he had a pair of sunglasses to protect his sensitive, hungover eyes. After just a few minutes of walking he can feel the white shirt clinging damply to his back, and his legs sweltering in the black trousers.

He doesn't realise until he is standing outside the door that he hadn't even been sure which flat number he was seeking. Seth doesn't knock, just lets himself in.  The blinds in the living room are almost completely closed; smoke floats in the thin shafts of light that remain.  Billy is lying on sofa, a joint in one hand and an open paperback in the other.  He jumps a little when Seth enters, although he regains his composure far too quickly for Seth's liking.

"Tropic of Cancer?" Seth asks, gesturing to the book.

"It's my aim to get through every book that's ever been banned for lewd content," Billy replies.

"How's that going so far?"

"Not well," Billy sighs and drops the book onto the floorboards.  "I'm shocked by how little it takes to shock some people."

Seth ponders asking him his opinion on Lady Chatterley's Lover, but dismisses the idea as too crasse.  Instead, he says casually:

"You're fucking my wife."

Billy doesn't speak for a moment.  When he does, he surprises Seth.

"I think it would be more accurate to say that she's fucking me."

"Excuse me?"

"The first night we met," Billy says, "You remember?  I brought you back here.  I let you do this," he tilts his head to one side, exposing the healing marks on his neck, "and then later, she came back and we had sex."

He gets up off the sofa, walks over to Seth and offers him the joint.  He takes it.

"I let you take what you wanted," Billy says.  "Both of you."

"But you have feelings for her."  Seth does not like the way Billy keeps looking at him - straight in the eye.

"I don't know.” Billy shrugs. “I think so.  She's..."

"Complicated?"

"Fascinating."

"She has feelings for you," Seth tells him.  "Did you know that?"

Billy doesn't say anything.

"She's my wife."

Billy ignores that comment too, simply saying:

"You're no open book either, are you Seth?"

Seth exhales heavily. He doesn't know why he came here. He passes the joint back to Billy, fully intending to turn and go.  But when their fingers brush together, and Billy's touch lingers for just a second on his lacerated thumb, he knows he won't be leaving this room for quite some time.

“Would you like something to drink?” Billy asks.

~

Vampire Love Songs #2: Happy Hour

"Happy Hour" is a follow up to another short story, "Rehab" - I'd recommend reading that first to get to know the characters a little.

~

Her dress was ruined.  It hadn't cost much, and it was hardly as if she didn't enjoy buying new clothes, but still.  Was it that hard not to get blood everywhere?  Seemed to Mallory that Seth never spilled a drop of vodka, but when it came to the red stuff he became a dribbling child.  She never could stand messy eaters.

"Calm down," she told her reflection.  She knew this was just one of those moments that transpired in a relationship, where every single thing her husband did, and the way that he did it, felt like it was done with the sole purpose of driving her crazy.

"Breathe," she said to herself.  The hot, nauseous sting of irritation, so much worse in its own way than real fury, began to abate.  Mallory tried to think of something positive, and found it when she remembered that at least they hadn't killed this one.  Knowing Seth he probably wouldn't have minded, but she'd stopped before things went that far.  Ever since the pretty redhead, going all the way had bothered Mallory.

"You alright in there, sweetheart?"  Seth's voice through the door almost sounded like it belonged to someone else.

"Fine, baby," she called back, swabbing her dress uselessly with a damp cloth.  "Out in a minute."

By the time she emerged from the en suite, Seth had expertly cleaned and patched up the neck of the tattooed, peroxide-blond young man who had offered himself up to them so willingly, and was now reclined on the king size bed.  He had a pretty face, softer than the anchors and swallows that decorated his lean torso might suggest.  Mallory could see straight through the ink and piercings; anyone with a place this nice, with a bathroom that big, wasn't an outsider.  He was a daddy's boy.  That biker jacket slung over the bottom of the bed probably contained an iPhone and the keys to an Audi.

"Ready to go?"  Seth asked.  Mallory nodded.  She wanted out of this dress.  The pale sheets on the bed were spotted red.

"Try salt water," she told the boy.

"Bye, Billy," Seth called out from the doorway.

"Bye," the boy said.  "Wait, what?  My name's..."

"Anybody who tries so hard to look like that," Mallory said, indicating his lean physique and bleached hair, "has earned the right to be called Billy."

All that got her was a blank look.  God bless him; he was probably oblivious to who Billy Idol actually was.

"Get some rest," she suggested, fishing around in her handbag.  "And take a few of these."  She tossed him the little bottle of iron supplements she bought a few weeks ago for just these occasions.

"You're so thoughtful," Seth took her hand in his as they made their way down the stairwell.  "How about we go get drunk then fuck 'til dawn?"

"Drinks are on you," was her answer.

***

It was going to be one of those nights.   She knew it straight away.  The awful kind, where it didn't matter how much she had to drink, she was never going to be able to relax.  Seth had no such problem, of course.  He rarely did.  He sank vodkas and caressed her thigh while she couldn't stop thinking about the red marks on her dress and the young man they'd shared like a platter of nachos.

"Honey," she whispered in his ear, then repeating in a louder voice when it became clear he couldn't hear a word: "I'm really tired.  Why don't you have a couple more drinks and I'll see you at home?"

He nodded, and kissed her goodnight. But Mallory had no intention of going home.

She retraced her steps with minimum effort, arriving back at the apartment only a few hours after she and Seth left together. After knocking on the door, she very nearly turned and left. But she didn't. She waited, feeling rather conspicuous and out of place; a woman in a soiled dress, obstructing an otherwise perfectly respectable hallway. Then Billy answered the door.

“You're back,” he said, and she could imagine that for a moment he feared she'd returned to finish him off.

“I'm back,” she said, and stepped forward. She could see him suppress a flinch, but he didn't move. She reached out slowly to brush his bottom lip with her thumb, something Seth had done earlier that evening, right before sinking his teeth into the youth's throat. He had drank, and drank, and the young had man just let him. Wincing, and occasionally crying out in pain, but not resisting.

“What...” Billy said, in the here and now, “what do you want?”

Mallory lowered her hand and placed that same thumb just between his jeans and his belt buckle. When she leant forward to kiss him, he didn't flinch at all. He wasn't afraid of her any more. She wondered if he could taste his own blood on her as their tongues tentatively met.

She guided him to the bed, just like she and Seth had done earlier, and pushed him down. He fumbled with his belt while she unfastened her dress. His jeans barely made it past his knees before she was on top of him; the skirt of her dress rode up around her waist while the upper half slid down, revealing her pale breasts.

It only lasted a couple of minutes. While Mallory kept her eyes fixed on Billy's tattoos, he stared openly up at her. When he came, she covered his mouth with her own to halt the moans. Then she stood up.

"You're all bloody," he said after she had pulled the dress back up over her shoulders.  He was right; the stains from earlier had already faded to the colour of rust, and something milky had seeped into the hem.  Warm just a moment ago, it grew cold against her leg.

“Yes,” she said quietly. “I am.”

Mallory knew she'd have to get rid of the dress now. She should have known better than to wear white.

~