Interview with a… well…

From an interview with a vampire that never happened:


The classroom was getting darker. It would be night soon. Safety not guaranteed.

The two vampires in the back, ripped jeans, scrappy patched denim jackets, ratted hair, were keeping an eye on the time and me. Didn’t want anything to happen to the one I was interviewing. After all, he was the important one though he looked barely older than my son. Teen, at best, but no baby face there. Weathered expression, bald head, greyed skin. Just jeans like the others and a ratty brown hoody. Ears were slightly pointed, canines felt more pronounced but maybe that was just me and my eye for detail.

He hopped down off the table he’d been perched on and I turned off the recorder. Hours of interview to go over with no promises I’d be able to use any of it if I didn’t leave about now. Then, he went over to the corner and crouched in it, pulling the hood up over his head. I backed up, starting to leave when he said something. Soft at first. I craned my head to listen.

“Can we die?” He turned to look at me and then got up. After that, he walked calmy to the window he’d been avoiding all day, ran his fingers across the venetian blinds. Stray bits of sunlit were striking him, causing him to smoke.

“Do you want to die?”

His head came up and his gaze met mine. And meeting those ancient eyes set in so young a face was always startling. “No. Can we die?” He rubbed the ash off his burned fingertips. “I know we can be turned to ash. But what if then we still lived? A thousand, thousand memories, devouring. Floating on the wind. Forever hungry. Never at peace.”

I didn’t have an answer. But I could see the horror in his expression. And I wondered what if the same applied to us?

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Back to Top

Discover more from William Thomas Bucclan

Subscribe now to keep reading and get access to the full archive.

Continue reading