One Last Fang

Notes

Any resemblance to persons living or dead is coincidental. This work is entirely fictional.

"Spark of my life! down, down to the tomb:

Die away in the night, die away in the gloom!"

Gottfried August Burger

(1773)

Epilogue: The Resurrection

Please! Lenore cried a hint of desperation in her voice. She trembled, and turned to him; her eyes were glossy and full of moisture. Please she begged, on the edge of despair, you wouldn’t do it for me. Do it for him! Don’t let him die! He looked down at Sid, who was silently suffering, every breath unimaginable agony. Sid lay crumpled in the street, tire tracks visible on his once lustrous, now dull coat. His eyes began to grow dim, and Lenore became even more frantic, her wails piercing his icy cold and blackened heart.

Finally, he weakened; he could stand her pain no longer. Look away, he commanded in his deep, gravelly voice. I can’t stand you to watch. As he lifted Sid’s broken and battered body, and turned away from Lenore’s tear stained face, he added and if you remember, I stopped refusing months ago.

Then he bent his head and bit gently through the layers of fur, and drank deeply. He felt mildly disgusted and sickened, and didn’t relish the drink as much as usual. After a few moments, Lenore pulled on his sleeve, and he stopped. He tore at his wrist with a sharpened incisor, and placed it into Sid’s mouth. Sid started weakly licking, then quickly closed his mouth, and drew deeply on the torn flesh, his one remaining upper fang, scraping against his pale forearm. After a time, he gently but firmly pushed against Sid’s mouth until Sid released his wrist. He looked briefly at his wrist with repugnance and wiped the rivulets of blood against the leg of his black jeans.

As Sid meowed weakly, he looked sharply at Lenore and said with a snarl of scorn, Are you happy now? That damn cat will live forever

Sid then stood, and stretched before loping off in the night, all the former infirmities of Lenore’s fourteen year old tabby now erased, except for the glaring gap where his left incisor was noticeably absent, from a previous battle with periodontal disease.

Kitty, Lenore called, but it only echoed in the shadows of the street, under the unforgiving, harsh light of the sole streetlamp. He put his arm around Lenore and steered her shivering body into the warmth of their small cottage. Now, Sid must feed, he said, voice heavy.

*****************

Chapter One: Lenore

Most people don’t know it, but the dead are all around us. I didn’t realize it myself until I was 23 and trying to support myself. As an unskilled, former housewife, with minimal work history in a dismal economy, my options were limited to fast food restaurants, the mall, or casinos. As an overweight, self-conscious woman more prone to wearing comfortable clothing over fashionable, the mall wasn’t really an option. I wasn’t quite ready to throw myself into the deep fryer, and casinos paid a bit better; uniforms were provided free. So when I saw the ad for a ‘night auditor’, I applied, even though I wasn’t entirely sure what a night auditor was.

I sweated, literally, my way through my interview with an equally sweaty man named Gus, wearing my polyester ‘church services and funerals’ ankle length skirt and a matching blouse. As I said, I’m no size fourteen fashion-plate. I needed the job, badly, desperately even, but apparently, Gus needed someone who seemed reliable even more. Reliable being ‘polite speak’ for frumpy. As everyone knows, being frumpy is akin to truthfulness in the casino business.

My husband, William had run out on me for a part-time stripper; excuse me, exotic dancer named Daytona, Destiny, Latoya or something ridiculous like that. I didn’t know the woman but William had apparently met her at a classy establishment called the Pink Pussycat. It must have been during one of the evenings I was under the impression he was working overtime to pay back child support to another of his previous wives. Silly me, I was at home in our cramped apartment trying to entertain and educate a toddler and a ten-year-old. Before you start doing math calculations, let me tell you that his previous wife, Tracey had run off with her boss a few months before I met him, so they were my stepkids. Yeah, I know. I should have known that better, but I didn’t know anything about re-bound relationships back then. I was no teenage Lolita but I was so young in so many ways. I was just twenty-one and only too thrilled to be an adult at that point. Even when two days after our marriage, Tracey dropped the kids, one with a very full, very smelly diaper, on our doorstep for an extended visit with daddy, I still thought we had the grand romance of the century.

Ah, the clarity of hindsight; in retrospect, it all seems obvious, but it wasn’t at the time. As I look back, I don’t know why anything William did would surprise me. But at the time, I was a silly young woman; naïve, and just happy that someone wanted to marry me. Not the best combination for a ‘long term committed relationship’ like they talk about on the Dr. Phil re-runs I watched while crashing on my neighbor’s couch, crying and eating pretzels during the very first few days after William left, when it still seemed almost surreal that all my hopes and dreams could unravel so quickly. Since he walked out, it had been a couple of long, depressing months during which the gloom and misery threatened to rise up and choke me. It wasn’t just that he left, it was that he left me, and it felt like all my feelings of self-worth had followed him out the door. I think that it was the loss of self-confidence, and the lost of trust in my own judgment that hurt more than his actual leaving. The unfamiliar feeling of monumental failing and the destruction of hope weighed on, and tethered me like an anchor to my melancholy. But life goes on, and things seemed to be improving, the initial wave of crippling inertia had lifted. Even though I was still trying to pull myself together, and get my life back on track, I no longer felt pinned and immobilized by my grief. Now, I was getting ready for another nightshift behind the hotel desk, compiling receipts. That’s what a night auditor was, I found out; an accountant of sorts, to tabulate and tally all the evening’s income for rooms, dirty movies and other in-room charges. You’d be real surprised how much money the hotel made from dirty movies.

I’d done all my initial training during the day for the first two weeks with a dour, somewhat unpleasant but extremely efficient assistant manager named Ruth. Training was made more tedious by her attitude towards me, even though at this point in my now miserable and pathetic life, I should be just grateful to have a job at all, but instead, I felt irritated by her relentless condescension. I already knew what she thought of me; she’d made that real clear on the first day; when I’d shown up; nervous but neatly pressed in my church skirt (again), as I had limited wardrobe options.

She’d looked me over, and frowned a bit before taking me downstairs to the laundry division to pick up my regulation teal green jacket, and white blouse. A size 18, right? she’d said with the snobbery that comes easily to the naturally thin. To be fair; tall, and thin was about all Ruth really had going for her. She was brittle appearing; her face weathered, and harsh looking with permanent crevices at the sides of her mouth, from years of expressing disapproval. She liked to look down at you with watery blue eyes peering over her thin, slightly hawkish nose. Her thinning reddish brown hair was pulled tightly against the scalp into a perfected manicured bun. Not even a hair dared escape. She appeared a bit like a dispossessed society matron, fallen on hard times, welding her social graces as a weapon to those unfortunate enough to work around her. That’s what she looked like, at least.

I later found out, from Meredith, my shift supervisor and a deliciously gossipy hen, that Ruth was a die hard gambler who worked at the hotel so she could plow all her money right into the endlessly churning tumblers, in hopes of hitting the big one on the Megabucks slot machines. So much for my ability to judge someone’s character! But then, I guess that’s how I ended up here. I certainly misjudged what a crumb William turned out to be.

After working shoulder to shoulder with the not-so-regal Ruth, learning the antiquated computer systems, and dealing with cranky customers, I was thrilled when I finally ‘graduated’ to night shift a few months ago. Those two weeks had lasted an eternity, while the last two months had flown by, I reflected. As I ran the lint brush off my black slacks, and finished preparing for work, I was careful not to let Sid brush against me. What is it about dark clothing that makes cats so eager to deposit their colorful dander? Is it the sparse yet dramatic landscape of clean fabric? Or is it just Murphy’s Law? I finished getting ready and tucked the lint brush into my purse in case I discovered anymore dander once I got to work. I looked around the apartment with distaste as I exited, locking the door on my way out.

I was living is a tiny studio; near the edge of the university campus, along with the gray tabby I had reclaimed from my parent’s house after William left. His name was Sid Vicious, after the punk rocker, not the lame wrestler, thank you very much, but I usually shortened it to Sid, kitty or Snugs. He seemed to respond to all of the above. I know that most people think cats are stupid pets but I find Sid to be exactly the opposite, very intuitive and perceptive of my moods and needs. He seemed to know when I needed him near, or when to tolerate a little extra by the way of human female indulgence.

Now the two of us were as cozy as a couple of canned sardines in my new ‘apartment.’ I use the term apartment with irony; it was incredibly tiny. It was, basically, a 12 by 12 room with an attached bathroom/ walk-in closet but it was just a few streets from Virginia Avenue; practically attached to campus and a straight shot to the community college up the hill. Maybe you would call it spacious luxury in downtown Manhattan but here in Reno, it was a worn, shag-carpeted dump.

I had enrolled in nursing school at Truckee Meadows, our local community college and was taking classes during the day. With my night job at the casino, life was different and much busier than I had envisioned, which kept me from dwelling on the unexpected twists and turns my life had taken.

Fitzgerald’s Hotel and Casino was certainly a second rate operation, worn, shabby and fraying at the edges, but they were willing to work around my class schedule so I could easily overlook the odor of unclean carpets, spilled drinks, sour bile and the lost hope of generations of gamblers. Then too, maybe I was just used to it because it wasn’t too different from the miasma of my childhood. It sure beat worrying about lingering aromas of French fries, especially on the days I had to go straight to class after work. Casinos used to reek of cigarette smoke but new legislation had changed all that. Now the only employees that were really exposed to it were the cocktail servers in the Smoker’s sections of the casino. If you asked my manager, Meredith about it, she just laughed and said that all the servers in that section had other things to worry about besides second-hand smoke. I didn’t know what she meant until way after I’d finished my orientation sessions with Ruth, and became accustomed to the nightshift.

It was working the eleven to seven am shift that really opened my eyes to presence of the dead. These gaming hells bring new meaning to the term ‘graveyard shift’, as casinos are brimming with vampires and zombies. Legions of the dead are attracted to the night hours, retirement benefits and the chance to mingle with hard core gamblers, low lifes, alcoholics, prostitutes, and all those lost souls known as ‘the ones not to be missed." Of course, when I started working at Fitzgerald’s, I certainly could have qualified as zombie fare; I was friendless, isolated, one hundred pounds overweight and a complete drudge.

The zombies themselves were particularly well suited to the tedium of menial tasks, and were secretly prized by upper management as model employees for positions in housekeeping, and the kitchens; mainly as hotel maids, line cooks and wait staff. I think management would be happy if the whole place was staffed with the dead, if they could get away with it.

The only human only areas on the casino floor were places like soft count, and the hotel desk, places where accurate math skills, or prolonged customer contact was required. None of this was out in the open. None of the customers and few of the staff really knew what was going on, or even had an inkling of the existence of the dead despite what I later recognized as unmistakable signs all around the casino, and quite a few other places, once you stopped and actually looked. But I’m not surprised that people were fooled for so long. I mean, expectations were pretty low anyway. Who really expects stimulating conversation from casino employees? As long as employees look reasonably clean, and show up fairly regularly, most managers are pretty happy. The security division prevents most of the typical employee problems, and if the general public can get their 2.99 breakfast, they don’t care who brings it to them.

Ever look at your waitress and wonder about that bored look on her face? Ever wonder about what she is thinking about? No, of course you don’t. You just want to want her to hurry up and bring you your order, refill your coffee and remember to bring the ketchup right away. You forget that she’s a person, but that’s okay; because it turns out she isn’t, at least, not anymore. She’s a flesh-eating monster, and she is hoping you will walk out to your car, in the dark, alone, so she can tear your body to pieces and eat your brains. Luckily, for most customers, casinos know the caliber of their employees and have devised ways to control the carnage during working hours.

All casino ‘uniforms for the carnivorous’ contain ankle bracelet and electronic control devices as part of the costume. Those Greco-Roman style arm bracelets, and dress collars on the cocktail servers aren’t part of the theme; they are purely functional; these modified shock collars to prevent your server from lurching forward to make you the main course.

I learned all of this working behind the counter with another human employee at the hotel desk during that sad, sorry winter in northern Nevada. Meredith was the thirty-eight year-old, the greasy, obese daughter of one of the few human pit bosses, with lank, thinning dark hair and pale skin speckled with acne, a sprinkle of dark, stubbly chin hair, and an almost palpable halitosis from a daily lunch of tuna and onion sandwiches. She had information about all the sullen, silent wait staff, and the more glamorous, ageless cocktail servers. As Meredith pulled her skintight black spandex mini-skirt down over dimpled thighs and an ever-expanding behind, she regaled me, her lowly assistant with stories of the supernatural with gruesome details and unholy glee.

As her hot, fetid breath washed over my face like a wave in a sea of decay, Meredith explained, Daddy says zombies are the best employees, they never complain, they don’t have a union, and they always take out the trash, she said with a snort, and a giggle.

At first, I ignored Meredith’s stories as the imaginative ramblings of a pathetic, socially awkward loner. Later, as I become accustomed to the neon casino environment, of endless noise; drunken shouts, tings, ringing bells and alarms of the slot machines, cheers from the table games, and the sound of thundering hooves from the big screen horse races, I began to pay attention to the small details, almost unnoticeable to outsiders; how starkly pale so many of the employees seemed even under the dim lighting of the casino floor, the empty faces and shuffling gait of the housekeeping staff and the long incisors of the blackjack dealers. Mainly, I noticed, that apart from Meredith, the few other, clearly human individuals, and I; almost no one ever ate in the staff cafeteria despite a free shift meal. I also came to regret my initial impulse to label Meredith. She was a socially awkward loner, but all of us at Fitzgerald’s, myself most of all, were misfits, outcasts and people at the fringes of ‘normal society’. None of us had the storybook family, the cottage home with the white picket fence, and as for happy endings? We would just have to wait and see. But by far, and large, the most ‘normal’ of the night shift employees were the dead. Or maybe, they were just the least damaged, sad as that sounds. Somehow, when I realized that, things started to improve.

Over the course of several months that late summer and early fall, despite an exhausting schedule of classes, studying and working at the casino, I began to open up, relax and make the first friends since my aborted marriage. Away from the endless belittling of my former husband, William, I began to rebuild my long-forgotten confidence. As my hair regained