“What can you buy with money? Does it buy you human blood?”
“Do not be silly. I have Ethan for that.”
“Ah, your pet.”
“My lover. My human lover.”
“And that is why you exist here, among prey.”
A Vampire Clocks Out
A Vampire Meets World short story
By Roehl Sybing
Natalie neatly folded up her apron and tucked it in her cubby, under the training manual she had not needed to refer to in weeks. She was quite proud that she had learned it front to back and could recite it from memory if her boss ever asked her to (though she never did). She was disappointed that her fellow co-workers did not find the same enjoyment, or felt the same sense of achievement from being made responsible for closing up the coffee shop. This was her first night to do so, and for half an hour, she had the place all to herself.
She walked around the front of the store. The last customers had left minutes before, leaving only the whirring of the machines behind the counter and the soft folk music from the store’s portable music player to fill the silence. She put some chairs back in their proper places, but only to allow herself a moment to lock the front door, walk around the tables and enjoy the solitude.
“Wipe down the counter, dispose of the filters, clean the coffee pots,” she rehearsed out loud, quite happy to have been given the responsibility. Somehow, after all the hard work to blend in, humans have come to trust her. And it showed with the paycheck she clutched in her hand. In addition to her regular pay, the boss had credited Natalie with her first two hours of overtime at the end of which she would lock up the place for the evening. She almost felt like dancing, except the light piano and acoustic guitars were too slow to reflect her giddiness. Still, she allowed herself a little bit of a spin on her left foot as her right hand held her paycheck high in the air. What other human wonders would she enjoy next with her weekly pay?
“So, this is where you have been.”
Natalie stopped spinning, and turned around. Everything inside of her turned to ice when she saw who had been watching her.
“Father.”
He was there, and he was not. She could see him and the deep lines on his weathered face, watch him play with the ceramic gnomes on the service counter, feel the air change as he moved about, and observe his long, white hair react to the central air from the ceiling vent. But his true presence was missing. In the ways that mattered, his real self was far away. Father had only projected himself into the coffee shop, unless he would not have been able to enter the locked store without breaking in. He was always about discretion.
Natalie looked around, and behind her. No one was out on the street looking through the storefront window. Father had come to her by himself. They were alone.
“I trust you are well, daughter. You certainly look…happy.”
There was a disappointment in his voice that shook her. He meant “happy” in the human sense. Happy over the trifling, superficial things that did not matter. The sort of happiness that was fleeting and would eventually be swept under the heavier, more important things of this existence. The kind of feeling that was small and disgraceful and embarrassing for their kind to experience. All of a sudden, holding the paycheck in her hand made her feel like she had been caught committing sacrilege. Still, she tried to shake her fear of Father and steel her resolve. A projection, even as powerful as his, could not do anything to her.
“Perhaps I am happy,” she said as she willed her face to brighten.
Father provided a wan smile, either because of his age or the dagger she threw at him. Was it cutting, though? Every one of her own kind certainly did not approve of the life she chose. Certainly Father was of the same mind. She could not be sure, because in all this time, she had never heard him speak of the heresy she committed by repairing to the human world.
He walked up to Natalie and touched her cheek. This close to Father, he looked so imposing, yet was gentle in reality. She felt his thumb run down from the skin under the corner of her eye. She closed her eyes and recalled images of her life before humans, a life spent in the midst of her Father, a powerful man who commanded the loyalty of the entire clan. Everyone including her, until her self-imposed exile. She missed the sensation. Only Ethan had touched her like this, but in a very different manner. Physically, yes – his touch was warm while Father’s was as cold as hers – but, more importantly, this was the sensation of being among family.
As glad as this made her to be gently held in the palm of his hand and not struck with the back of it, Natalie knew this was only because she was his daughter. Already, she could feel Father summoning the will and the words to plead with her.
“I will not go back, Father.” She spoke to him as gently as a daughter could, even if she knew it would not nearly be enough to sway him.
His hand left her cheek. He regarded her for a long moment – Father seemed so tall, especially when he was upset with her. She could feel his breath as he huffed before turning away from her.
“Father, if I embarrass you, I am sorry. But I cannot—”
“Natalie,” he said, which prompted her to stop mid-sentence. Rarely did he ever use her name. “Daughter” was familial, while “Natalie” implied emotional distance.
“Father,” she said, distressed by his word choice.
“I am old,” Father replied, “I have all the power I will ever need. Intrigue among our people does not touch me anymore. I can no longer be shamed from my station.”
A realization came to Natalie. “Marcus did not send you.”
“He does not know I am here. And I am here…because I do not understand why you did this. Why you exist here.” He waved his hand, coincidentally at the coffee shop wall of selfies of customers in their silly poses while holding their paper cups. Following Father’s hand, Natalie’s eyes landed on one of the pictures of a college girl with her tongue sticking out and touching the rim of her coffee cup, with a caption underneath that read, “I LIKE BIG BEANS AND I CANNOT LIE.” Father seemed satisfied that he had made his point.
And perhaps that is what bothered Natalie about how others regarded her. The others cared little about what she thought. Marcus sought only to lecture her about what made a true vampire. And now Father stood before her, confident in his own beliefs without even talking to her, without even looking to see if she shared the least bit of agreement. She did not like it, and it made her angry inside.
“I got my paycheck today,” she said, eager to change the subject. She directed Father to sit across from her while she opened the envelope the boss had given her before he left. Roughly four hundred dollars for two weeks of part-time work, minus deductions for taxes and other expenses.
Father examined the paycheck. “This does not mean anything to me. Nor should it to you.”
He was half right, Natalie thought. Vampires had no need of money.
“What can you buy with money? Does it buy you human blood?”
“Do not be silly,” she said, smiling nervously, “That would draw too much attention. And besides, I have Ethan for that.”
“Ah, your pet.”
“My lover. My human lover.” Natalie made sure to stress the right word to cut at Father again. To his credit, he appeared not the least bit shaken.
“And that is why you exist here, among prey.”
Father leaned back in his chair as silence at the end of the playlist on the music player filled the room. He had a very subtle scowl, the kind that veiled the extent of his disapproval but revealed just enough to let her know it was there.
“You could be capable of so much more, my dear Natalie,” he said, “You are the purest of our kind. I made sure of that. A vampire who had as little human lineage as possible, who was not touched by the human world. You could have easily taken my power and influence and ruled over all of us. But you chose this life out of what I assume could only be spite.”
Natalie looked up, her face pinched. “That is not true.”
“You could have had a life of comfort and ease—”
“That life did not interest me.”
“—coupled with the noblest of our kind—”
“They would not approve of the life I want.”
“—and instead you chose to lie down with prey—”
“He loves me because—”
“—beneath the dignity of a purebreed—”
“I did not want the role you wanted me to play, Father!”
Natalie outburst, as well as the sound her fists made against the table when she stood up, shook the air. She did not have Father’s talent for concealing her true emotions in heated moments, and she knew it when she could feel her lower jaw tremble, when he did nothing. It was all she could do to fight back the tension from building in her upper cheeks and threatening to turn into tears. Natalie would not, dared not show any tears to Father.
“I never got to choose what I wanted to do with my life. Everything had always been decided for me. What to do, where to go, who to be with. No one ever asked me if I thought differently.”
“You need not burden yourself with such choi—”
“I am speaking now, Father!” she said. She had a tinge of regret that she had cut Father off so sharply, but it had been a long time coming. Still, she knew that fiery passion seldom swayed him, so she sat back down. She clutched the paycheck on the table.
“$402.98,” she said, reading the bottom line on the itemized statement. She had returned to her hushed voice that had endeared her to her boss, her co-workers, the customers. To Ethan. “I think I will buy some new clothes with this. Then some new books. I have not read anything new in such a long time.”
Father shook his head. “You are of nobility. You can have all of those things with us.”
“That is true. But I would not have been able to earn it. I would not have had to work for it. And I would not have felt that I had accomplished something.”
“What is the point of all of that?”
Natalie smirked. “Oh, Father. I wish you could understand.”
She stood up and walked behind the counter. She could feel Father’s eyes on her as she turned to her work, going into the machines and removing the used coffee filters, as she had been told to do. She continued talking as she worked.
“I have this job where people depend on me. They gave me a responsibility. I know what they think. It is small and undignified work. I remember this thing that one of them said. ‘Trained monkeys could do this job.'”
“You are making my point.”
“And they could have asked a trained monkey. But they asked me. They asked me. They do not shower me with gifts or praise because of who or what I am. They give me this responsibility because they think I am one of them.”
Father scoffed. It was the loudest noise is a silent coffee shop.
“You wish to be accepted by them? That does not tell me why you want it.”
“Because I could never have that acceptance among our people.”
“That is ridiculous. You are a vampire, you belong with us. Of course you have a place among us.”
“Yes, a place of nobility as a daughter of noble purebreeds.” Natalie stopped when she noticed her words had dripped with sarcasm. She thought to apologize, but she turned to wiping down the counter with a washcloth after dispensing the coffee filters. “No, I wanted to be treated not just as a human being. But just like an equal.” She looked up at Father, his face ever unchanging.
“Ethan talks so much about his job, and he talks about why he is so passionate about it. He says that if you work hard and do right, you can achieve anything you want. You can make more of yourself when you had less before. You can choose the life you want to lead. When he said that to me, it was foreign to me at first. I had never heard anything like that before. But something inside of me found that very appealing. And I found there here. In this coffee shop, of all places. Tell me, Father, could you promise me all the same things?”
He shook his head, but not out of concession. “You are naïve, Natalie. You do not know these humans as I do. They talk much of their upward mobility and individual destinies, but it is a lie. They are petty and cruel and will step over each other to achieve what they desire. And that is no achievement at all.”
“You have a poor view of humanity.”
“They are not us. We know our place in the world, and we respect it. We do not disrupt the order of things just because we are unhappy with our station. These humans will fill you with ideas that are beneath any true vampire.”
“I am sorry, Father, you do not understand,” Natalie said, tossing the washcloth under the counter, “I never wanted to be a true vampire.”
She stopped to gauge Father’s reaction. They had been dancing around what Natalie really felt, not that it was the first time they had broached the subject of what it meant to be true and how far Natalie was from being true. But it was the first time she had said it to Father. It was nearly taboo to say among their people and, even in exile, she still felt a chill run up her spine when she said it aloud, and when she watched the traces of disappointment appear on his face.
A bell rung. The door behind Father had opened. Natalie looked to see who was there.
“Hey, all done?”
Ethan had walked in, fully dressed in office attire after a late night at work. He had promised earlier that evening he would pick Natalie up, even though she would be taking the train home either way. She liked the company, so she hardly put up a protest.
As he put his belongings down on one of the chairs, Natalie observed his movements. He did not see her Father standing in the middle of the coffee shop. She silently wished he could leave, so she could have some privacy with Ethan. Or maybe it was because she did not want him to judge how she interacted with prey. She had enough of his disapproval for one evening.
She brightened her face with a smile for Ethan.
“I am almost finished. I just need to clean up here.”
“No worries, take your time,” he said. He leaned over the counter to kiss her on the cheek. His lips were always warm against her skin, making the whole experience of being with him pleasant. Father glaring over his shoulder at her had dulled the excitement somewhat.
“So, Sally has a business trip tomorrow. Want to take her place on the bowling team Friday?”
“Really? Yes, I would love to!” Natalie was genuinely elated by the invitation and the experience, and it showed when her grin went wide.
“Alright! I’ll email Frank now, tell him it’s on. Seven o’clock, alright?”
Ethan took a seat at the table along the wall. Father’s projection eyed him intently, viewing him as the prey that he was to a true vampire. Oblivious to it all, Ethan scratched at a spot under his suit and typed away on his phone, chuckling at something he was reading on the screen.
“Such small desires. Such a narrow view of the world. What an insignificant human you have chosen,” Father said decisively as he studied him.
Ethan yawned loudly, stretching his arms out in a rather showy fashion. “Sorry,” he said, holding the back of his head while he craned his neck in a lazy circle, “So busy at work. I nearly took a nap at my desk today.”
The look of disgust on Father’s face was never more apparent.
“You could have coupled with any human, let alone any vampire. Someone who was worthy of your attention, who was deserving of a noble purebreed. And you choose this?”
Father’s hand was flung in Ethan’s direction much in the same manner as one would toss garbage away. Natalie could not speak up for herself, not with Ethan in the room. If she could, she would have harsh words for Father. Anything that could make him leave. Instead, she just continued on, tidying the space along the wall opposite the counter. Turning off the machines, putting the supplies back into the pantry, cleaning the coffee pots…
“Ethan?” she said, “Would you like a cup of coffee? There is still some left over.”
“Nah, it’s okay, I need to sleep tonight.”
“I insist,” she said, stealing a glimpse of Father and his reaction, “It is a special blend we have from Ghana. It has been really popular this week.” She looked at Ethan with a pleading smile. Ethan checked his watch in turn.
“Yeah, okay. Uh, half a cup. And only if you’re going to have some with me.”
Her smile turned into a grin again. She took two cups from the stack and poured the leftover coffee that the boss certainly would not miss in the morning. It was still hot and smelled wonderful. One of the few pleasures from human food and drink that she could enjoy. She placed one cup in front of Ethan and sat across from him with the other cup in hand.
“It is in the house,” she said confidently.
“‘On the house,’ you mean,” Ethan said.
“Oops. That would have been embarrassing with customers, would it have not?”
Ethan smiled. “Probably shouldn’t be saying it to customers either.”
She rolled her eyes and smirked. They both took a sip of their coffee, letting their faces show how good it was.
“You are trying to anger me in some way,” Father said. For half a moment, Natalie had almost forgotten he was there. “You may enjoy this coupling now, but one day you will bore of the small existence he can give you.”
Natalie reached out and grabbed Ethan’s hand, and he gladly took hers. The warmth of his fingers covered the back of her hand like a glove.
“With all the power you enjoy, all the influence over our people you could have? He could never give you the life a vampire deserves. And yet you clean tables and serve humans.”
“Tell me, Ethan,” Natalie said, “What do you like about me?” Her voice carried further than it normally would, just in case Father had any trouble hearing.
Ethan’s head tilted. “Is this a test?” he asked playfully.
“Yes, it is.” She laughed slightly. “But there is no wrong answer if you are honest.”
Ethan looked up, making the face he usually did when he searched his memory. “Okay,” he began to say, “Uh, you have this cute accent. And a funny way with words that sounds quaint and refined.”
Natalie’s shoulders slumped. The corners of her mouth turned downward. “That is all?”
But he pulled her closer to him with both hands. He leaned in with intent eyes. A playful grin was replaced with a sincere smile. “You are curious, and notice things that other people don’t. You want more than what you have, and will work hard to get it. And then you still have time at the end of the day to talk. And you definitely love talking. Talking about everything you read about in books or see in the world around you. You are passionate about anything and everything. I can’t remember meeting anyone else who is as excited about the big and small things in life like you are, and I enjoy that the most about you.”
Natalie had not noticed that her hands had wrapped around his more tightly as he spoke. No one, human or vampire, had ever spoke about her in such detail. He spoke words about her nature that she wanted to show the most.
“Plus, when you get excited,” Ethan said, running his hand up her arm, tracing his finger around the spots he thought made her feel sensitive, “Your eyes turn this pale shade of yellow and your fangs start to show. That’s hot.”
She laughed out loud. She leaned in to kiss him, a gentle pressing of lips for a brief moment. She looked up at Father, who had been standing at arm’s length behind Ethan this entire time. Now, unlike before, there was a look of surprise in his eyes.
“That is right,” Natalie wanted to say but could not, “He knows.”
“Okay. This is a fun game. Your turn,” Ethan said, leaning back in his chair and having another sip of coffee.
Natalie nodded. She knew just what to say.
“You know what I am and you do not care. You do not think of me differently because of what I am. Because you are the only person who has ever told me I could do whatever I chose to do. No one has ever accepted me as much as you do.”
Ethan nodded. His hands felt even warmer now than before.
“And you make me laugh.”
“Well, that’s good, because Plan B was to get six-pack abs, and that means giving up pizza, and—”
Natalie took a sip of her coffee as they both laughed again. When she looked up, Father was gone. She eyed the clock and hurriedly drank the rest of her coffee, prompting Ethan to finish his. She took both their cups and stood up.
“I am going to finish up here,” she said. She let Ethan return to his emails while she finished throwing away the last bits of trash as she was told to do. When she had cleaned the last coffee pot and placed it on the rack to dry, she began turning out the lights, signaling Ethan to gather his things for their commute home. She told him to wait outside as she clocked out with her time card in the storage room.
She collected her bag and walked through the front end of the store, toward the light switch to turn off all the lights.
“He will break your heart someday.”
Natalie looked up. Sure enough, Father had returned.
“You do not know that.”
“A vampire must never couple with a human,” he said, “There is little else but sorrow and pain in the end.”
Natalie smirked. She was tired of arguing for the evening.
“Maybe,” she said, “But I must find out for myself.”
It had sounded more of a request than a declaration. And deep down, Natalie wanted Father’s approval to allow her to discover on her own what he and every other vampire had insisted was true.
He reluctantly nodded, if not to accept what she wanted, then to relent and acknowledge he could not change her.
“Then be happy, Daughter.”
In an instant, Father was gone. There was no effect to signal his exit. He simply vanished as if he was never there.
Natalie almost regretted not doing what he commanded of him. To return to her people and fulfill the expectations imposed upon her. But this was the life she wanted, and it meant disappointing Father and everyone else she knew before humans. She had decided it long ago, and knew that moments such as these were bound to be inevitable and painful.
On the street, she locked up behind her. All this time, Ethan remained fixated on his phone, sending messages while he waited for her.
“Everything okay?” he asked.
“Why would you ask that?”
“I don’t know, really. A very deep conversation we just had.”
“It is nothing,” she said as she shuttered the storefront. “I am ready to go.”
Ethan nodded, holding his laptop bag in one hand and Natalie with his free arm.
“Do we have to go home so soon?” she said, knowing it was well past eleven. It was still early for her, but definitely late on a weeknight for him. She pulled him closer as they walked. “I received my paycheck today. We should have a little bit of fun.”
Ethan’s hand bounced around on his shoulders in that look he gave when he reluctantly but willingly conceded a nightcap. “I got some time,” he said.
Natalie smiled, pressing her lips against his cheek one more time. “Where would you like to go?”
“Anywhere you want,” he said, “Surprise me.”
She nodded. She definitely enjoyed being able to choose.