Nothing At All

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"You were a vampire, and now I am nothing at all."
Concrete Blonde - Bloodletting

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How could this night get any worse? Her date had been going well right up until she came back out of the restroom. It had only taken just a few minutes, but when she came back out he was gone. He had been a jerk anyway. All he did throughout dinner was sit there bragging about himself. While she stood there looking at his empty chair, the waiter showed up with the check!

She’d been glad that she had driven her own car to the restaurant. But now on the way home her car decided to break down! It also didn’t help that it was on the most deserted stretch of road along the way. Isn’t that the way it always happens?

On top of all that, when she reached into her purse for her cellphone, she discovered that it was nowhere to be found! What was she going to do now! This just obviously wasn’t her night. She decided she had no choice but to just walk through this dark, deserted road in the woods to the nearest house to ask to use their phone.

She felt completely miserable having to be in this place. The old rotted leaves on the ground of a forest always smelled like a sewer to her, especially on a hot summer night like this one. It was one of those nights where it was so hot that every stitch of clothing you had on became instantly glued to your body. And there was no sound except the occasional skritching of little rodents under the leaves of the forest. And soon, even they became eerily silent.

Soon after the sounds of the forest died away, she saw something odd up ahead by the side of the road. At first glance it looked like the shadow of just another tree. But as her mind focused more closely on the figure standing there beside the road, it appeared to look more like a tall thin man in dark clothes. She called out to him, but there was no answer, only the soft whisper of the distant wind. Was this silent figure really a person? The small bit of moonlight passing down through the treetops to the darkness of the forest must be playing tricks on her.

But then she began to hear a sound. Coming from the direction of the dark figure was a slow, drawn out, hissing whisper that cut through the night like the sharp edge of a sword, "Come to meeee..."

She began to move forward before she even knew it. She knew she was somehow being compelled by that voice. She didn't want to go, but she didn't know how to stop. It was as if her body was being controlled by that voice and not her own thoughts. The dark figure began to come into view more clearly as she stepped ever closer. She could now see that it was a man. Or at least, it looked like a man.

His skin had a pale white sheen like the belly of a soggy dead fish. His eyes were like two red-hot coals, burning into her where she stood. His lips were like two big, writhing leeches pressed against each other. And on each side of his mouth there were two long, pointed white teeth sticking out and down. They reminded her of the fangs of a spider. The man-thing had on dark clothing that hung from his body as if it were wet. The material looked almost like the rotted old wet leaves from the bottom of the forest floor. And the smell. The smell coming from him was like the stink of a rotting dead animal.

As she was involuntarily drawn right up to him, she now understood what he really was. This horrible creature was a vampire. But this was obviously no romance novel vampire. This was the real thing. A real vampire! How could the story tellers have turned these evil, disgusting things into the pretty boys that they show in the movies? This evil beast was an abomination from hell! And she was totally and helplessly at his mercy.

Then as the vampire leaned in and bit into the jugular vein in her neck there was an intense, searing pain. Why was there so much pain! She struggled to break free, but he only gripped her harder! So hard that she felt one of her ribs snap. The thing now seemed to be trying to squeeze the blood out of her. After what seemed like an eternity she began to lose consciousness. She wondered… would she dream of better things?

But it was not just her blood that was draining out of her body; it was also her soul that was torn out. The vampire was eating her soul away! What many people don’t know is that it is not exactly blood that a vampire craves. The vampire’s real hunger is for the human soul. We always wonder where the soul is located in our bodies. It originates in our heart, and is pumped throughout our bodies along with our blood. Heart and soul, that’s the old saying. Drinking the living blood is the only way a vampire may consume a human soul.

So, for the dying woman, there would be no heaven, or even hell. It’s only the human soul that goes to one of those places. After death there is only the soul, but not if it has been devoured by an evil creature such as this vampire.

As the last of the woman’s blood and soul were drained out of her, the body slumped down out of the grip of the vampire. She was not just dead. Death would have been much better for her. And no, she was not going to be turned into a vampire like him so she could live forever in a fairy tale of darkness. That was a romance novel myth. She would not go to heaven, or even to hell. For her, there would be no afterlife. You had to have the consciousness of a soul to even exist. The empty husk of a body that she used to inhabit wasn't her either anymore. She was not even a disembodied spirit. She was once a living, breathing person.

Now she is nothing at all.

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