vampire jane

“I want to die,” she whispered, looking up into his cloudy grey eyes, taking note of the careful, cautious way his firm hands were holding her up. She whispered it again. “This is what I want.”
He shook his head so slightly it was almost imperceptible. “Jane,” he spoke her name for the millionth time, still savoring the way it tasted on his tongue. If he could assign it a color, it would be pale lavender. It would disappear like cotton candy and leave a lingering sweetness on the lips. “If you go, I go. I don’t think I’m ready.”
Her soft carnation lips tugged into a subtle, amused smile. “But . . .” she paused to gasp for air. He held her tighter. “But you did this to me.”
He cast his storm cloud eyes to the impossibly large cavern in her chest. It looked like a meteor had landed violently above her left breast. In its wake he could see shards of her thin ribs, pieces of tendons hanging like electrical wires across the gaping hole in her body. If he allowed himself to think logically, he would realize with painful clarity that there was no way to bring her back from this place.
“Please, Jane.” A traitorous tear trickled down the slope of his creased cheek. He blinked furiously.
It was Jane’s turn to shake her head. The gesture was slight, but undeniable. “I am going now. This is on your head, my love. This is on your head. You took my heart. You took . . .”
Before the sentence was completed, her eyes clouded over. The honey sparkle was gone from them, and the glisten of moisture that had been present since her first day on earth was suddenly gone. Her eyeballs took on a matte finish that caused Jared’s stomach to tighten and twist. Her body was small in his arms, but heavy with the weight of blood and bones and muscles that no longer have a soul to carry them.
For hours, he knelt there, holding her limp form in his strong, shaking arms. For hours, he relived every moment of their life together. For hours, he sobbed as he felt the heat leave her body, until the words “corpse” and “carcass” and “stiff” were personified by this shell that used to be his Jane. It was well after two a.m. when there was a cautious knock on the bedroom door.
His usually strong voice betrayed him as it hitched and cracked halfway through his call of, “Who is it?”
“Jared,” she began. “It’s time.”
He hung his heavy head over the remains of Jane. He squeezed out one final tear, and watched in sorrow as it fell through the gap in her chest and landed on the back of her ribcage. The bloody surface glistened with the memory of moisture before it dried a crusty, scabbed maroon once more.
“I am ready,” he croaked. He twisted his legs from beneath her form, and slid his arms out from under the solid, icy casing of her once-welcoming back. He couldn’t help but remember the countless times he’d run his broad hands over the sinews and muscles of that back. How he’d counted the vertebrae affectionately, and pointed out the places where she had tension knots. He shook, as if racked again with sobs. But his eyes were dry now. There would be no more tears.
He stood tersely and looked once more at the great hollow hole in the chest of the body that once belonged to Jane. In two great steps he was at the dresser with the vanity mirror. He wouldn’t allow himself to lift his eyes to his reflection, but he pulled open the top drawer and quickly extracted what he was looking for.
He lifted the oak jewelry box in both his hands, not risking letting it tip or fall. He admired for the hundredth time the intricate etchings on the top of the little case. He was not alarmed to find that the wood was still warm against his palms, as if it had been sitting out in the August sun, rather than tucked away in an attic room for several months. He lowered his nose to the hinged lid, and breathed in the cherry scent of the velvet fabric that lined the box. With his hip, he scooted the vanity drawer closed, and still avoiding his shameful reflection, he stepped over Jane’s body, and left the room.
In the living room, an alarming amount of candles were glittering and glowing, casting their flickering light over the somber faces of all those gathered for the ceremony. Jared considered briefly the likelihood of this great amount of candles setting off those new-fangled smoke alarms Jane had insisted they install in the house. He decided there were far more pressing matters at hand, and he turned to his mother at the head of the table.
“You have it?” she asked, the excitement dancing in her diamond eyes. When Jared nodded, she reached her arms over the table, letting the drooping, gossamer sleeves of her dress drift dangerously close to the countless open flames. She wiggled her fingers as an over-eager child might do when being presented with a much-anticipated birthday gift.
Jared sighed to himself, and handed his mother the jewelry box. She reacted in much the same way he had, bringing the intricate trunk to her nose, breathing in the fragrant scent of the contents. His mother was far more interested than what the box held than what it was lined with. He watched, along with the rest of those gathered, as a smile split her ruby lips.
His mother pushed a few candles from the middle of the table, and rested the box in the center of the cleared space. With her long, ruby-tipped fingers she unclasped the latch, and carefully lifted the lid. She held her breath as she exposed the contents of the box. Jared felt a swell of energy in the room about them as the heart was exposed.
It was a beautiful thing, really. Everything about Jane had been beautiful. But especially this most vital organ of hers. It was a vibrant red, marbled with deep spots of brick red, and swells of pale pink tissue. It was a beautiful shape, as well. He watched with a very tangible pain as the organ continued beating within the confines of the oaken craftwork.
“Yah, tumah li mio loh tunandrah. Calumi, mio alloh cara,” his mother chanted in a voice so haunting and deep, Jared had to study her face to make sure she was emitting the dark, ominous sounds. Her lips curved and connected to create the words of the spell. He swallowed thickly.
The people gathered around him began to chant along with his mother, their voices not emulating quite the same emotions, but matching word-for-word, nonetheless. Jared moved his lips, but could not allow any sound to escape. His heart, all irony aside, was simply not in it.
To Jared’s left sat a man so old his skin had taken on a grey tone, along with his hair and eyes, which were watery and rimmed in an uncomfortable red. His nose was bulbous and hung remarkably close to his thin lips, which were moving to create the words Vie was speaking at the head of the table. His sun-spotted hands were clasped desperately and resting on the edge of the coffee table. Jared eyed them darkly, remembering all the times he had admired the high arches on Jane’s feet as she rested them in that very spot while she watched the evening news.
His mind ached with the memory of the way she’d looked at him hours before, as the life drifted from her. He felt the burn rising in his throat as her words flitted through his ears again. This is on your head. You took my heart. There was no denying he had done that. But he had asked her, first. He had asked and she had consented. But still, it didn’t take away the pain. Jared knew the tears would come again if he didn’t change the course of thoughts. His mother must have known the same thing, because just as a pool threatened to well over the rim of his eye, she called his name.
“Jared, Son of Vie, giver of Darkness,” she breathed in the same low, haunting voice. “Remove the organ from its tomb.”
Jared did as he was directed, and lifted Jane’s still-beating heart from the box. It was heavier than it looked, soaking his broad, capable hands with deep, cherry-red blood. He knew what was coming, and he doubted very much that he’d be able to go through with it.
“Now, Jared, lift the organ to thy lips and partake of the flesh of the Lover.” His stomach clenched as he saw the light in his mother’s diamond eyes. She nodded eagerly, as if this were the prompting a normal mother would make to her heart-broken son.
Jared swallowed thickly and ran his tongue over his lips. Maybe it would taste like Jane, he reasoned. Maybe it would taste like home. He opened his mouth and pressed his sharp teeth into the merciless surface of the heart. He applied pressure, and felt his pearly teeth break through the skin. His mouth filled with the hot, living flesh and blood of his late lover. His tongue was stained red. He closed his eyes and savored the flavor of her. He had been right. It was undoubtedly Jane. Had he not been surrounded by the dark creatures that had filled his nightmares as a youth, he probably would have gotten an erection at the vivid memory of all the times he’d tasted her so intimately before.
He opened his eyes and looked at his mother. She was radiantly beautiful when she sparkled that way, in the candlelight. Her auburn hair moved like water over her shoulders as she raised her hands, palms-up. “My Son,” she crooned, “Thou hast tasted of the flesh of the Lover. Pass the organ to Demetri, so that he, too, may relish the essence of the Heart.”
Reluctantly, Jared passed Jane’s now-still heart to the old, cryptic man to his left. He watched with something like jealousy as the man sunk his yellowed teeth into the beet flesh of the organ. Jared could feel Jane slipping from him all over again. He watched as the heart was passed from Demetri to Alonso, and from him to Mari and so on, until there was but a single bite of the heart left. Everyone’s hands were stained a glistening red, except for Vie’s. She smiled at her friends and family as she took the final bite between her long thumb and forefinger.
“And with this swallow, we shall make Him whole again,” she bellowed before tilting her swanlike neck back, and dropping the juicy red flesh between her juicy red lips. She chewed with almost theatrical relish. Her eyes closed in ecstasy as the blood ran down her throat, heating her icy stomach from the inside. “Join hands,” she commanded, eyes still closed.
Those gathered around the table followed her command and clasped hands one with another. Jared was alarmed at how strong Demetri’s fragile-seeming hands were. He closed his eyes and listened sadly as his mother chanted another string of dark magic.