Dinner is Prompt-ly at Eight - 20. Chapter 20 The Taste of Emotion

The Taste of Emotion

With a new outlook on life, a 400-year-old vampire becomes obsessed with a neighbor.

Girard opened the lid, taking note of the heavy draperies lining the chamber. Not a single ray of light could find its way inside, becoming a danger to his master. The shadows from flickering torches set into sconces on the walls gave the room an ominous feel. Please, he thought, like this night was different than other nights.

It was the same, always, just the same. Girard would get up around noon, do his necessary functions, eat a sensible breakfast, then dinner, and when the sun set, he’d get ready for his master to emerge from his coffin. After twenty years of this, he was more bored than anything. He sighed.

After securing the lid in an upright position, Girard reached in and parted the veil and swept aside the shroud, finally revealing his master, Sullivan, who preferred to be called, Sully.

Sighing again, Girard watched as his master opened his large, liquid-y eyes, bright red and glowing with preternatural light.

“Good evening,” Sully the vampire said, his voice a low growl.

“Master, it is time to awake,” the servant said, exactly as he had for the past two decades. “Come, feed.”

Sully rose from the coffin, his back straight, his posture wooden, and a presence which overflowed the room. “You sound different today.”

“It’s nothing. I probably didn’t sleep well. I’ve been a little tired today,” Girard answered, and he could hear the tedium in his own voice. Sully was glaring at him now, and he felt his skin prickle at the attention. Yet, it wasn’t enough to alarm him. His master was a reasonable creature.

Though he should have been.

Sully rose from the coffin, alit on the shadows from the torches, and floated over the head of his servant. The vampire breathed in deeply, smelling the man’s ennui, reeking of boredom. Once in the air, he glided to the thick, heavy draperies and pulled a corner aside. The night was complete, dark and overcast, without a glimmer of light from the sky.

There were sodium arc lights across the street, at large house he’d never really noticed before. In it, he supposed, were more ordinary humans, but tonight something was different. Next to the house, was a man, banging on the door, and yelling something at those inside. It piqued Sully’s interest.

He honed in on the man’s fury, feeling his rage and his fear. Both were delicious and he tasted them from afar.

“Master, it’s time to feed,” Girard said, again, his intonation flat and his interest flagging. Sully reached out and tasted the flat, dry emotions of his servant. How long had Girard felt so … indifferent? It seemed like just a few days ago, his faithful servant’s blood was resplendent with terror, awe, and subservience. Now, all Sully could sense was the dull, dusty taste of apathy. Nothing tasted as off, in his experience.

Sully looked back at the angry young man. Transposing his sight, he took in the man’s outrage at being rejected, tossed from his lover’s abode, and now ignored. It seemed so wrong, given what Sully could sense. What he felt and saw excited him.

The young man was beautiful, with blond locks the would glow in the firelight. His skin was tanned and clear, his scent had a masculine bite. The emotions were the kind Sully loved to feast on, rich in exuberant content, anger, fury, sadness, sorrow, lust, hate, and even a soupcon of despair. These were all flavors Sully had been lacking in his diet of late. Girard was like a bland potato without salt or butter. His servant was a glass of lukewarm water compared with the young man now throwing a rock at a window on the second floor.

Sully had to taste the angry blond man. He had to have him, devour him, and savor all the delicious emotional expressions.

“Master, I’m ready for you.”

Sully paused, closed the drapery, and tapped a finger to the corner of his mouth. He smiled, thinking, deciding, planning. The vampire’s mind raced as it hadn’t for years, thinking of all that needed to be done.

“Master?”

Sully felt his nails grow, his teeth receded, his face elongated. His hands clenched, once, twice, then thrice, and he could feel them dig into his flesh. They were sharp as knives, and he knew what he had to do.

Sully turned and saw Girard was yawning. Yawning in his presence. With anger and frustration, he didn’t know he could experience, he finished his servant, ripping the skin from his muscles and tearing the flesh from his bones. He didn’t devour the man, but liquified and scattered him throughout the city. He didn’t care what the sad residents thought of the splatters of red spread here and there. All he knew was Girard was gone, and good riddance.

After finishing Girard in a few moments, Sully returned to his house, and saw the young man’s anger had faded. Now the blond was holding his head in his hands sitting on the front stoop, his shoulders drooping. Feasting from afar, now on the lovely young man’s depression, Sully began to plan.