The Beat (PG-13) chapters 1-5
Posted: Wed Apr 01, 2009 10:56 pm
Author: Penina Spinka
Subject: The Beat – PG-13 – Posted March 30, 2009 - First 5 Chapters
Disclaimer: This is fan fiction. I do not own any part of Moonlight or its characters, but Sam Birchtree is mine. I hope you’ll like him as much as Mick does. The second 5 chapters will come with a new post.
Comments: Completed story of what happened to Mick St. John after Beth left him alone outside Josef’s Brownstone in New York City. Feeling alone, abandoned and unloved, he wants to do ‘something’ to take his mind off what he and Beth just learned. This is it.
***********
Chapter 1
Beth had cleaned up the glass shards from the assassin’s break-in, right through the brownstone’s bedroom window. She was now dumping them in the kitchen trash and probably taking it to the curb. Too bad we couldn’t do the same with the assassin. He was lying against the far wall where I’d dragged him after I broke his neck. Josef would have had access to the local NY contingent of Cleaners.
I removed the last slug from my friend’s back and plunked it down in a convenient ashtray on the dresser. I supposed it was decorative since no one smoked anymore, especially around here. Polly, Sarah’s day nurse, would never have smoked in a sick room if she smoked at all, which I doubted. Neither would any of the others. The woman on the bed was comatose. We certainly wouldn’t have need of an ashtray. Vampires didn’t get much out of smoking. We have a different addiction.
I handed my friend a glass of fresh blood to help heal his stake wound. He took it, and began to drink. His stab wound healed while he drank and some color returned to his face. He had looked more like a corpse than usual. The color was an improvement. Vamps try to look human most of the time. It’s easier to mix with the public. Josef set down his glass and said “Thanks.”
“You’re welcome,” I replied.
“You ought to drink some yourself, Mick. You don’t look too good. When’s the last time you fed?”
“This morning before we got on the plane in Los Angeles,” I admitted. That was nearly 20 hours ago. He didn’t have to argue; he knew what I needed. He emptied a bag of blood into a tall whiskey glass. I took it and sipped slowly to keep from gulping. I guess I really needed it by then. I could have held out longer, but I wasn’t trying to prove anything. It was O+. I prefer A+ but beggars can’t be choosers. Even while he was here in New York, Josef managed to get the best, and by the best, I meant fresh blood. Of course, it would have come directly from the blood bank for Sarah. It tasted far better than the morgue blood I was used to.
For his beloved Sarah who lay on the bed as beautiful and youthful appearing as she had been when she slipped into her coma in 1955, nothing was too good. Too bad she couldn’t appreciate it. Josef had tried to turn her, but it didn’t work. She got stuck somewhere in-between. He had not wanted to share his failure with me, or his heartbreak over it, but circumstances left him no choice since Beth and I managed to track him down. If we hadn’t, I’d have a dead friend to mourn instead of a dead assassin to dispose of. While I drank, Josef tapped a number into his cell-phone. I nodded toward the body, raising my brow to ask the question. “Taken care of,” he said. “The Cleaners are on their way.” No one would find the body.
Beth returned to the bedroom, neat and clean, and smelling of lilac soap. She had scratched her arm on one of the shards. Her shower had washed it off, but her wound was still fresh. The smell of blood in the room was no longer a problem. Neither of us was tempted now. “It’s still seeping a little,” she said. “Do you have band-aids?”
Josef went to get one from the nurses’ first aid supplies. While he opened and applied it over her scratch, she looked at me. I knew what she was thinking. Josef’s beloved on the bed had written of their short affair and her love for him in a diary. I nodded to her unspoken question.
When he was done, Beth retrieved her coat and removed the book from its pocket. She held it out. “You should have this,” she said, pressing it to him. “She really loved you.” Josef couldn’t speak to thank her for it, but tears slid down his cheeks.
She asked if he was returning to L.A. with us. He told us he intended to remain in New York for a few more days, and then turned back to the bed and Sarah. We were no longer there as far as he was concerned. I wondered if their love was great enough that it allowed them silent communion. I hoped so.
Beth and I walked down Waverly Place looking for a cab to bring us back to Kennedy Airport for our flight home. I called out to attract a taxi. When the cabbie stopped to let us in, an idea popped into my head. What we had seen was so depressing; we both felt it like a weight. Beth might be thinking if she continued on with me, the same thing might happen to her as what happened to Sarah. I’m sure that’s what I was thinking. If all we had was this small moment in time, maybe we could make the most of this unexpected time in New York City. “Let’s do something.”
“Like what?”
“Something quintessentially New York.” I mentioned the Village Vanguard, suggested that we might listen to a few sets, have drinks, order a steak for Beth. Jazz reminded me of happier days. I’d spent time in New York, never to live, but to visit, to meet with friends, to see shows on Broadway and listen to jazz. It never failed to remind me of my living days to hear classical jazz. I was born in the ‘20s, grown up in the ‘30s, went to war in the ‘40s, and died in the ‘50s. I hoped the Vanguard hadn’t changed too much and it would have still have something that would speak to me.
“I didn’t leave things well with Josh,” Beth said. “I think I need to get home.”
I gave her a half smile. “Of course,” I said. How could I forget Beth was in love with someone else and that I was just her friend? I actually knew how I could forget. It was because I loved Beth more than life, or un-death in my case. Sadly, I could never tell her. Love is putting the other person first, isn’t it?
“But I’ll drop you,” she invited.
“I’ll walk,” I said. “This is a good town for it.” I couldn’t bear to be so close to her feeling the way I did, knowing she was walking away from me to another man. I got her situated in the cab and closed the door. I couldn’t help touching the window. She covered my hand with the window glass between us and gave me a sad goodbye smile.
Before the cab left the street, I began to walk through the night. They call us ‘night walkers’, don’t they? It seemed apropos the way the slight evening breeze picked up. That and my stride caused my long coat to flow behind me like a cape.
The Chrysler Building towered into the midtown sky a few blocks west of the Brownstone. I knew my way around New York as I walked downtown by the old skyscrapers. The Empire State Building came into view. Ten years ago, I could have guided my steps by the World Trade Towers, but they’re gone now. They were supposed to last forever like me, but you never know what tomorrow will bring, even for supposed immortals. I never liked their design, all steel and glass. Los Angeles is like that, always looking new. The old classics landmarks of New York remained. Buildings had character in the 1930s. They had a special meaning for me. I was young and alive when they were being built. I nodded to them briefly and kept walking.
I suppose it wasn’t very late for New York. After all, this is the ‘city that never sleeps.’ Things were always happening. I walked past a record store. Do they call them that anymore? Records are antiques like me now, and kids don’t know what they are. They ought to call them CD stores. Anyway, the store piped music out into the street. I would have been glad to listen to something light. Instead, they played Tom Jones singing that cheesy song, “Without love, I have nothing. Nothing at all.” I walked fast, trying to put the sound of that song behind me. I didn’t need reminding.
Greenwich Village came into view. It looked the same, but not. The old coffee houses were tourist attractions now, even more than they were in the 1950s when I first walked these streets. Tourists of every color and eye-shape wandered the sidewalks, pointing the sights out to each other when they saw something they had read about, or someone. Maybe they thought they’d see Woody Allen. It reminded me that I was alone and out of my time.
I turned into 7th Avenue and there it stood on the corner, the Village Vanguard. A crowd was lined up at the door. I had no other destination in mind, just a place where I could forget about life for a few hours. I had no life to speak of anyway, so I got on the line. This is where Miles Davis, Hank Mobley, and Thelonious Monk played, where Pete Seeger and Ella Fitzgerald sang. Spirits of the greats hung around. I could almost feel them in the air. My vampire hearing picked up a sax inside that sounded like Joe Lovano. I could do without Bluesy lyrics tonight and relaxed into the cool jazz that floated up from the small room downstairs.
Some of the people around me were smoking joints. This was the place for it. I concentrated and listened, allowing my extra senses to pick up the flavor of the place. It was still real inside, a Mecca of the jazz world, not just a memory. The instrumental ended and a new band took the stage. A different sound began to emerge. This one had a beat that sounded kind of primal, like a wild heartbeat. Well, Vanguard is at the leading edge of change. It’s what the name means. It was still jazz, improvisation on a theme. Between the drumming sections, a singer came on. He had a great voice, smooth and melodic with a great range. I did not understand the words and wondered what language he had been using. The song ended with drums, powerful. I hoped I’d see the singer and the drum man when and if I finally got inside the club. They went on to another song and then another. I let the sound of the drums and that voice roll over me until it stopped.
When a different group took over, it was like wakening slowly from a dream. The beat continued in my head even when it was gone. I looked around and found my attention settling on a young man leaning against the building. He took in my expression and gave me a nod. I couldn’t help but notice his long brown hair combed back from his high forehead. He looked Native American and was dressed casually in jeans and leather. I might not be a connoisseur of male beauty, but he had it. I wondered fleetingly if he was a male prostitute out to score a rich patron for half an hour or so, and how much it would cost. What had made me think that? I wasn’t that lonely. I think I just wanted to connect with someone. I shook my head to regain my equilibrium.
He took a deep drag off his joint and held the smoke inside a while before letting it drift away. The sweet smell made me think of burning rope. He turned his cig and offered me a drag. “No. Thank you, though,” I said.
“You here for the music?” he asked. His voice was good, melodic, the kind that ought to be singing. I wanted to hear more of it.
“What else?”
“That was me singing inside and handling the sticks. I’m ready to go home, but I wanted to see how much of a crowd was left. Some friends are coming over to my place. You play don’t you?”
“That was you?” I gave him a small bow and he grinned. “Yeah, I used to play, but that was a long time ago.” How did he know? “Trumpet and guitar.”
“We’re gonna’ jam a little. Interested?” My watch said it was after one in the morning, but I wasn’t tired and his offer intrigued me. My long walk had worked off some of my excess tension and so had the mellow jazz from downstairs. The beat of the drums gave me new energy.
“Well, if you’re not inside, what’s the point of going in? Sure. Why not?”
We walked. I vaguely wondered if there would have been any danger to me walking through the dark, narrow streets with a complete stranger, if I had been human. As I was of course, that didn’t seem likely. That reminded me, he had not yet told me his name. “I’m Mick,” I said to start.
“Sam,” he returned and looked at me. “I’m Mohawk.”
“Oh,” I said, and decided against saying Vampire. “I’m from L.A.”
“Nice to know you,” he said, and we continued to walk together quite comfortably. I wondered what I was getting myself into. If I caught a cab before dawn, I could be at the airport during the worst of the daylight, awaiting my plane in the cool air-conditioning. I took another look at Sam, and decided going home could wait.
His friends were already inside when he opened the door. I hadn’t asked if he lived alone so any number of these men could be his apartment-mates. I heard the rents in New York City are as bad as in Los Angles or worse, and he wasn’t a headliner. He introduced me to his buddies as his new friend. It reminded me of when I played in a band myself, scoring gigs at the clubs and dives along Sunset Boulevard back in the late ‘40s, after the war, and the early ‘50s. Everyone was casual. Music and gigs, the occasional girl, whiskey and drugs were all that mattered. They asked me what I played, whom I liked, and I told them. Someone lent me a guitar, not too badly out of tune. I tightened the pegs a bit until it sounded better and joined in. It felt good and sounded good. I felt as relaxed as I had felt in a long while.
We were still playing when I felt the sky beyond the curtains began to lighten. That reminder of what I was made me think. I had to make arrangements and soon. Sam brought me aside, into the smoky kitchen. “Stay with me. You don’t have anywhere to go for the next few days, do you?”
I didn’t know how to take that, or why he should think so. “Stay with you?” I gestured to the apartment. “Where? Here?”
“No. I’m going up to the rez to see my folks. Some of the others don’t like me with my New York ways much, so it’s easier when I bring a friend. I tried to talk the council into making innovations – paving the roads, putting air-conditioning into the All Clans Longhouse, those kinds of things. They don’t know what to make of me, but some of them don’t like my ideas. They say if I want to play White, to go live with them.” Kind of like playing human, I thought.
“So why me?” I looked meaningfully into the other room where his multiple friends were still playing. “I’m a stranger.”
“That’s a good thing,” he said. “I’d like to show you my home. Besides, I have a few other quirks. They know about it at home and it makes them feel funny.”
Curiosity was going to do me in if I wasn’t careful. “Quirks? Like what?”
“Oh.” He said the next few words casually, but he watched for my reaction. “I was born into a family that passed down shaman gifts in their blood. It skips some, but I got a full dose. Mind-hearing is one of my gifts.”
I backed away from him, trying to think of an excuse to be on my way. “I don’t think staying with you is a good idea,” I said. “I’d better call a cab.”
He laid a hand on my arm. “Musicians sleep days just like you. We’ll all have to get to bed soon. We can leave by late afternoon, if you can take that much sun. The village is just a little over the Canada border. My car has reservation plates. They won’t ask for your passport.” I was staring at him. He had heard things I never said out loud and it was freaking me out. “I’ll drive you to Montreal Airport after our visit. In the meanwhile, I have a freezer you can use for your nap. We’ll turn it on it’s back.”
“What did you say?” Oh God, I thought. What do I do now? He’s been reading my mind. He knew what I was. Should I leave before he tells anyone else? How safe was I?
“Don’t worry. I have another friend. He explained his requirements. You’re safe here.” He pulled down a corner of his shirt to show me healed fang marks. Damn! A mind-reading Freshie Mohawk?!
I was rendered speechless. After that mental outburst, my thought processes probably stopped as well. He knew what I was and wasn’t running for the torches. I was grateful for that, but I still didn’t know what to do.
“It’ll be fine,” he added, still trying to convince me. “We can hunt together.”
“I don’t eat meat,” I said.
“Not a problem. I can provide what you need, or you can take it from whatever I bring down with my little bow & arrow.” He made a little motion of drawing back a bowstring and I wondered if he was joking. “You’re not opposed to deer blood, are you?”
I had to smile at that. I think the tips of my fangs showed, but since he could read my mind, what was the use of pretending to be human? “I don’t know. I never tried it.”
“My grandmother always saved some for the family when she butchered the kill. She added a little vinegar, but you’d probably like yours best straight up. There’s still my other offer,” he reminded me.
It became harder to hide the points of my teeth when I thought of that, but I told him the truth. “Better not tempt me. I’m out of practice feeding fresh. I might kill you.”
“You’d never get to meet my grandmother that way,” Sam said. “Let’s do the hunting thing. The drapes are opaque, but you let me know when you’re tired and I’ll show you where the freezer is. I think we’re going to be friends. Maybe, if I can talk my other friend into turning me, you can introduce me to the Los Angeles community. It would be nice to see another city. What’d’ya say?”
How could he be so calm? I didn’t feel any warning signals that he was luring me into danger. “Let me give that some thought,” I said. “Anytime you come for a visit, even if you haven’t been turned yet, I’ll be glad to show you around. We have some decent clubs too, but nothing like the Vanguard.” I shook my head at the strangeness of our conversation. “Deer blood,” I said, and exhaled sharply with a little laugh. “Your friends here, are they like you?”
“Indians?”
“Mind-hearers?”
“No. There aren’t that many of us. Of course, my grandmother will know, but she knows how to keep a secret.” He smiled.
I made my decision and wondered if I’d be sorry for it later. “You’re right that I don’t have anything more pressing to do at the moment. I was looking for something different to take my mind off other things, and this is really different.” I wonder if he knew what I was thinking if I wasn’t specific, or if it even mattered. “Should I just think at you or do you prefer your conversations out loud.”
“Out loud. It gives my head a rest. I think we have time for one more set before everybody’s too tired to play. I’ll draw the drapes. You take the guitar and I’ll take the drums, okay?” We went back to join his friends.
Subject: The Beat – PG-13 – Posted March 30, 2009 - First 5 Chapters
Disclaimer: This is fan fiction. I do not own any part of Moonlight or its characters, but Sam Birchtree is mine. I hope you’ll like him as much as Mick does. The second 5 chapters will come with a new post.
Comments: Completed story of what happened to Mick St. John after Beth left him alone outside Josef’s Brownstone in New York City. Feeling alone, abandoned and unloved, he wants to do ‘something’ to take his mind off what he and Beth just learned. This is it.
***********
Chapter 1
Beth had cleaned up the glass shards from the assassin’s break-in, right through the brownstone’s bedroom window. She was now dumping them in the kitchen trash and probably taking it to the curb. Too bad we couldn’t do the same with the assassin. He was lying against the far wall where I’d dragged him after I broke his neck. Josef would have had access to the local NY contingent of Cleaners.
I removed the last slug from my friend’s back and plunked it down in a convenient ashtray on the dresser. I supposed it was decorative since no one smoked anymore, especially around here. Polly, Sarah’s day nurse, would never have smoked in a sick room if she smoked at all, which I doubted. Neither would any of the others. The woman on the bed was comatose. We certainly wouldn’t have need of an ashtray. Vampires didn’t get much out of smoking. We have a different addiction.
I handed my friend a glass of fresh blood to help heal his stake wound. He took it, and began to drink. His stab wound healed while he drank and some color returned to his face. He had looked more like a corpse than usual. The color was an improvement. Vamps try to look human most of the time. It’s easier to mix with the public. Josef set down his glass and said “Thanks.”
“You’re welcome,” I replied.
“You ought to drink some yourself, Mick. You don’t look too good. When’s the last time you fed?”
“This morning before we got on the plane in Los Angeles,” I admitted. That was nearly 20 hours ago. He didn’t have to argue; he knew what I needed. He emptied a bag of blood into a tall whiskey glass. I took it and sipped slowly to keep from gulping. I guess I really needed it by then. I could have held out longer, but I wasn’t trying to prove anything. It was O+. I prefer A+ but beggars can’t be choosers. Even while he was here in New York, Josef managed to get the best, and by the best, I meant fresh blood. Of course, it would have come directly from the blood bank for Sarah. It tasted far better than the morgue blood I was used to.
For his beloved Sarah who lay on the bed as beautiful and youthful appearing as she had been when she slipped into her coma in 1955, nothing was too good. Too bad she couldn’t appreciate it. Josef had tried to turn her, but it didn’t work. She got stuck somewhere in-between. He had not wanted to share his failure with me, or his heartbreak over it, but circumstances left him no choice since Beth and I managed to track him down. If we hadn’t, I’d have a dead friend to mourn instead of a dead assassin to dispose of. While I drank, Josef tapped a number into his cell-phone. I nodded toward the body, raising my brow to ask the question. “Taken care of,” he said. “The Cleaners are on their way.” No one would find the body.
Beth returned to the bedroom, neat and clean, and smelling of lilac soap. She had scratched her arm on one of the shards. Her shower had washed it off, but her wound was still fresh. The smell of blood in the room was no longer a problem. Neither of us was tempted now. “It’s still seeping a little,” she said. “Do you have band-aids?”
Josef went to get one from the nurses’ first aid supplies. While he opened and applied it over her scratch, she looked at me. I knew what she was thinking. Josef’s beloved on the bed had written of their short affair and her love for him in a diary. I nodded to her unspoken question.
When he was done, Beth retrieved her coat and removed the book from its pocket. She held it out. “You should have this,” she said, pressing it to him. “She really loved you.” Josef couldn’t speak to thank her for it, but tears slid down his cheeks.
She asked if he was returning to L.A. with us. He told us he intended to remain in New York for a few more days, and then turned back to the bed and Sarah. We were no longer there as far as he was concerned. I wondered if their love was great enough that it allowed them silent communion. I hoped so.
Beth and I walked down Waverly Place looking for a cab to bring us back to Kennedy Airport for our flight home. I called out to attract a taxi. When the cabbie stopped to let us in, an idea popped into my head. What we had seen was so depressing; we both felt it like a weight. Beth might be thinking if she continued on with me, the same thing might happen to her as what happened to Sarah. I’m sure that’s what I was thinking. If all we had was this small moment in time, maybe we could make the most of this unexpected time in New York City. “Let’s do something.”
“Like what?”
“Something quintessentially New York.” I mentioned the Village Vanguard, suggested that we might listen to a few sets, have drinks, order a steak for Beth. Jazz reminded me of happier days. I’d spent time in New York, never to live, but to visit, to meet with friends, to see shows on Broadway and listen to jazz. It never failed to remind me of my living days to hear classical jazz. I was born in the ‘20s, grown up in the ‘30s, went to war in the ‘40s, and died in the ‘50s. I hoped the Vanguard hadn’t changed too much and it would have still have something that would speak to me.
“I didn’t leave things well with Josh,” Beth said. “I think I need to get home.”
I gave her a half smile. “Of course,” I said. How could I forget Beth was in love with someone else and that I was just her friend? I actually knew how I could forget. It was because I loved Beth more than life, or un-death in my case. Sadly, I could never tell her. Love is putting the other person first, isn’t it?
“But I’ll drop you,” she invited.
“I’ll walk,” I said. “This is a good town for it.” I couldn’t bear to be so close to her feeling the way I did, knowing she was walking away from me to another man. I got her situated in the cab and closed the door. I couldn’t help touching the window. She covered my hand with the window glass between us and gave me a sad goodbye smile.
Before the cab left the street, I began to walk through the night. They call us ‘night walkers’, don’t they? It seemed apropos the way the slight evening breeze picked up. That and my stride caused my long coat to flow behind me like a cape.
The Chrysler Building towered into the midtown sky a few blocks west of the Brownstone. I knew my way around New York as I walked downtown by the old skyscrapers. The Empire State Building came into view. Ten years ago, I could have guided my steps by the World Trade Towers, but they’re gone now. They were supposed to last forever like me, but you never know what tomorrow will bring, even for supposed immortals. I never liked their design, all steel and glass. Los Angeles is like that, always looking new. The old classics landmarks of New York remained. Buildings had character in the 1930s. They had a special meaning for me. I was young and alive when they were being built. I nodded to them briefly and kept walking.
I suppose it wasn’t very late for New York. After all, this is the ‘city that never sleeps.’ Things were always happening. I walked past a record store. Do they call them that anymore? Records are antiques like me now, and kids don’t know what they are. They ought to call them CD stores. Anyway, the store piped music out into the street. I would have been glad to listen to something light. Instead, they played Tom Jones singing that cheesy song, “Without love, I have nothing. Nothing at all.” I walked fast, trying to put the sound of that song behind me. I didn’t need reminding.
Greenwich Village came into view. It looked the same, but not. The old coffee houses were tourist attractions now, even more than they were in the 1950s when I first walked these streets. Tourists of every color and eye-shape wandered the sidewalks, pointing the sights out to each other when they saw something they had read about, or someone. Maybe they thought they’d see Woody Allen. It reminded me that I was alone and out of my time.
I turned into 7th Avenue and there it stood on the corner, the Village Vanguard. A crowd was lined up at the door. I had no other destination in mind, just a place where I could forget about life for a few hours. I had no life to speak of anyway, so I got on the line. This is where Miles Davis, Hank Mobley, and Thelonious Monk played, where Pete Seeger and Ella Fitzgerald sang. Spirits of the greats hung around. I could almost feel them in the air. My vampire hearing picked up a sax inside that sounded like Joe Lovano. I could do without Bluesy lyrics tonight and relaxed into the cool jazz that floated up from the small room downstairs.
Some of the people around me were smoking joints. This was the place for it. I concentrated and listened, allowing my extra senses to pick up the flavor of the place. It was still real inside, a Mecca of the jazz world, not just a memory. The instrumental ended and a new band took the stage. A different sound began to emerge. This one had a beat that sounded kind of primal, like a wild heartbeat. Well, Vanguard is at the leading edge of change. It’s what the name means. It was still jazz, improvisation on a theme. Between the drumming sections, a singer came on. He had a great voice, smooth and melodic with a great range. I did not understand the words and wondered what language he had been using. The song ended with drums, powerful. I hoped I’d see the singer and the drum man when and if I finally got inside the club. They went on to another song and then another. I let the sound of the drums and that voice roll over me until it stopped.
When a different group took over, it was like wakening slowly from a dream. The beat continued in my head even when it was gone. I looked around and found my attention settling on a young man leaning against the building. He took in my expression and gave me a nod. I couldn’t help but notice his long brown hair combed back from his high forehead. He looked Native American and was dressed casually in jeans and leather. I might not be a connoisseur of male beauty, but he had it. I wondered fleetingly if he was a male prostitute out to score a rich patron for half an hour or so, and how much it would cost. What had made me think that? I wasn’t that lonely. I think I just wanted to connect with someone. I shook my head to regain my equilibrium.
He took a deep drag off his joint and held the smoke inside a while before letting it drift away. The sweet smell made me think of burning rope. He turned his cig and offered me a drag. “No. Thank you, though,” I said.
“You here for the music?” he asked. His voice was good, melodic, the kind that ought to be singing. I wanted to hear more of it.
“What else?”
“That was me singing inside and handling the sticks. I’m ready to go home, but I wanted to see how much of a crowd was left. Some friends are coming over to my place. You play don’t you?”
“That was you?” I gave him a small bow and he grinned. “Yeah, I used to play, but that was a long time ago.” How did he know? “Trumpet and guitar.”
“We’re gonna’ jam a little. Interested?” My watch said it was after one in the morning, but I wasn’t tired and his offer intrigued me. My long walk had worked off some of my excess tension and so had the mellow jazz from downstairs. The beat of the drums gave me new energy.
“Well, if you’re not inside, what’s the point of going in? Sure. Why not?”
We walked. I vaguely wondered if there would have been any danger to me walking through the dark, narrow streets with a complete stranger, if I had been human. As I was of course, that didn’t seem likely. That reminded me, he had not yet told me his name. “I’m Mick,” I said to start.
“Sam,” he returned and looked at me. “I’m Mohawk.”
“Oh,” I said, and decided against saying Vampire. “I’m from L.A.”
“Nice to know you,” he said, and we continued to walk together quite comfortably. I wondered what I was getting myself into. If I caught a cab before dawn, I could be at the airport during the worst of the daylight, awaiting my plane in the cool air-conditioning. I took another look at Sam, and decided going home could wait.
His friends were already inside when he opened the door. I hadn’t asked if he lived alone so any number of these men could be his apartment-mates. I heard the rents in New York City are as bad as in Los Angles or worse, and he wasn’t a headliner. He introduced me to his buddies as his new friend. It reminded me of when I played in a band myself, scoring gigs at the clubs and dives along Sunset Boulevard back in the late ‘40s, after the war, and the early ‘50s. Everyone was casual. Music and gigs, the occasional girl, whiskey and drugs were all that mattered. They asked me what I played, whom I liked, and I told them. Someone lent me a guitar, not too badly out of tune. I tightened the pegs a bit until it sounded better and joined in. It felt good and sounded good. I felt as relaxed as I had felt in a long while.
We were still playing when I felt the sky beyond the curtains began to lighten. That reminder of what I was made me think. I had to make arrangements and soon. Sam brought me aside, into the smoky kitchen. “Stay with me. You don’t have anywhere to go for the next few days, do you?”
I didn’t know how to take that, or why he should think so. “Stay with you?” I gestured to the apartment. “Where? Here?”
“No. I’m going up to the rez to see my folks. Some of the others don’t like me with my New York ways much, so it’s easier when I bring a friend. I tried to talk the council into making innovations – paving the roads, putting air-conditioning into the All Clans Longhouse, those kinds of things. They don’t know what to make of me, but some of them don’t like my ideas. They say if I want to play White, to go live with them.” Kind of like playing human, I thought.
“So why me?” I looked meaningfully into the other room where his multiple friends were still playing. “I’m a stranger.”
“That’s a good thing,” he said. “I’d like to show you my home. Besides, I have a few other quirks. They know about it at home and it makes them feel funny.”
Curiosity was going to do me in if I wasn’t careful. “Quirks? Like what?”
“Oh.” He said the next few words casually, but he watched for my reaction. “I was born into a family that passed down shaman gifts in their blood. It skips some, but I got a full dose. Mind-hearing is one of my gifts.”
I backed away from him, trying to think of an excuse to be on my way. “I don’t think staying with you is a good idea,” I said. “I’d better call a cab.”
He laid a hand on my arm. “Musicians sleep days just like you. We’ll all have to get to bed soon. We can leave by late afternoon, if you can take that much sun. The village is just a little over the Canada border. My car has reservation plates. They won’t ask for your passport.” I was staring at him. He had heard things I never said out loud and it was freaking me out. “I’ll drive you to Montreal Airport after our visit. In the meanwhile, I have a freezer you can use for your nap. We’ll turn it on it’s back.”
“What did you say?” Oh God, I thought. What do I do now? He’s been reading my mind. He knew what I was. Should I leave before he tells anyone else? How safe was I?
“Don’t worry. I have another friend. He explained his requirements. You’re safe here.” He pulled down a corner of his shirt to show me healed fang marks. Damn! A mind-reading Freshie Mohawk?!
I was rendered speechless. After that mental outburst, my thought processes probably stopped as well. He knew what I was and wasn’t running for the torches. I was grateful for that, but I still didn’t know what to do.
“It’ll be fine,” he added, still trying to convince me. “We can hunt together.”
“I don’t eat meat,” I said.
“Not a problem. I can provide what you need, or you can take it from whatever I bring down with my little bow & arrow.” He made a little motion of drawing back a bowstring and I wondered if he was joking. “You’re not opposed to deer blood, are you?”
I had to smile at that. I think the tips of my fangs showed, but since he could read my mind, what was the use of pretending to be human? “I don’t know. I never tried it.”
“My grandmother always saved some for the family when she butchered the kill. She added a little vinegar, but you’d probably like yours best straight up. There’s still my other offer,” he reminded me.
It became harder to hide the points of my teeth when I thought of that, but I told him the truth. “Better not tempt me. I’m out of practice feeding fresh. I might kill you.”
“You’d never get to meet my grandmother that way,” Sam said. “Let’s do the hunting thing. The drapes are opaque, but you let me know when you’re tired and I’ll show you where the freezer is. I think we’re going to be friends. Maybe, if I can talk my other friend into turning me, you can introduce me to the Los Angeles community. It would be nice to see another city. What’d’ya say?”
How could he be so calm? I didn’t feel any warning signals that he was luring me into danger. “Let me give that some thought,” I said. “Anytime you come for a visit, even if you haven’t been turned yet, I’ll be glad to show you around. We have some decent clubs too, but nothing like the Vanguard.” I shook my head at the strangeness of our conversation. “Deer blood,” I said, and exhaled sharply with a little laugh. “Your friends here, are they like you?”
“Indians?”
“Mind-hearers?”
“No. There aren’t that many of us. Of course, my grandmother will know, but she knows how to keep a secret.” He smiled.
I made my decision and wondered if I’d be sorry for it later. “You’re right that I don’t have anything more pressing to do at the moment. I was looking for something different to take my mind off other things, and this is really different.” I wonder if he knew what I was thinking if I wasn’t specific, or if it even mattered. “Should I just think at you or do you prefer your conversations out loud.”
“Out loud. It gives my head a rest. I think we have time for one more set before everybody’s too tired to play. I’ll draw the drapes. You take the guitar and I’ll take the drums, okay?” We went back to join his friends.