Godelieve crossed her legs on the couch. She bent her head at the news on her 25-inch tv. "Stupid asshole."
"...Rottingham is the subject of zombie activity. A man walking into the Sprint store located on Lincoln Green Court. Spoke with the manager who stood behind the counter suspiciously, stated Cyril Ross. He called the police saying he found a body." A man with a grey shirt and brown eyes appears on the screen. She couldn't comment why, but she felt as if she knew him. His neck was colored darker than the rest of his body and his eyes red. "I wanted to get my phone a girlfriend..." his words slow and gurgled. He burps, "I saw... this fella... in the store. He didn't look good..."
"You don't look so good yourself. Are you ok?" questions the reporter. "I just came from hell." Cyril tilts his head to the side, his eyes expanding. "You are all going to die." He straightens his back and puts two fingers to his temple. "Headcount." The corners of Cyril's lips twitch into an ugly grin.
Godelieve shivers, "Fuck." The memory summoned a chill she fought to get off. Vampires that feed on other vampires are defined as Drunk. The DOHRCC in Virginia calls it Wreck Syndrome. A vampire that has not fed in 80 days will become desperate for bone and blood. Vamps in America come from Africa. It keeps the tradition of the tribe.
One of Virginia's biggest regrets was the slave trade.
Putting her feet on the floor. She traveled upstairs and grabbed a thin blue coat from the closet. Going to the garage, she pressed the button on her keychain to unlock her black Aston Martin. Godelieve presses the button on the keychain to retract the roof and slides into the vehicle. "I just need a fucking break."
The garage door parted, allowing her to drive out. She placed a spell on the wheel and let the car drive her as she took out her phone. She logged in to her BRAIN SOCIETY account. Tapping on her messages, she looks at a message to a user named FALLS.
6 months ago
GoldLikesWeed: are you still dealing?
FALLS: Of course I am.
GoldLikesWeed: I thought you were so involved with your daughter being sold.
FALLS: Do you ever shut the fuck up? Maybe it's because you're a goddamn lytch, you don't know-how.
FALLS: Let me teach you, this might be your new body
FALLS: The two fappy pieces below your nose. That's your lips.
GoldLikesWeed: Goddamn I hate you!
GoldLikesWeed: You don't wanna help me so I'm just going to annoy you your whole life.
FALLS: I think you sold her to get at me.
FALLS: And I told your ass
FALLS: Whatever you and Remy got together. I don't want anything to do with it.
GoldLikesWeed: Well he hasn't found my new account.
FALLS: Is that why you deleted MSLEECHES?
GoldLikesWeed: I had to! The fucking zombie won't leave me alone.
FALLS: Well, you did torture his black ass.
GoldLikesWeed: I DIDN'T KNOW HE WAS BLACK
GoldLikesWeed: IT WAS YEARS AGO.
FALLS: By any chance did he whistle at you too?
FALLS: White lady doesn't like being called a bitch?
GoldLikesWeed: GODDAMN IT IM OVER IT
GoldLikesWeed: I did my time in Boulderkeep. And I'm not the fucking reason that nigga keeps coming back.
FALLS: I just saw his soul walk past the window
GoldLikesWeed: Really?
FALLS: He has no fucking eyes.
GoldLikesWeed: He's Torn. He's fighting for life but he isn't together.
FALLS: Should I touch him?
GoldLikesWeed: Fuck no.
GoldLikesWeed: Also, Remy isn't his name.
GoldLikesWeed: Remember the nigga likes confusion
FALLS: What's the worst thing that can happen?
GoldLikesWeed: I'm a scholar in this shit
GoldLikesWeed: He's haunting. Souls that haunt have unfinished business. Or you know, a Linger. Sadly I have no fucking idea what that nigga wants.
FALLS: You've known him for a while.
GoldLikesWeed: I knew his ex-wife. I came back, killed him because he killed her. But I thought he was white.
FALLS: How the fuck you mistake a nigga with extreme vitiligo as white?
GoldLikesWeed: Now you tell me he had vitiligo?
GoldLikesWeed: Jesus Christ
FALLS: You've started a mess of shit. Why do you keep thinking he's white? It's a nigga with issues
GoldLikesWeed: Swear to fucking God...
GoldLikesWeed: HE DOESN'T FUCKING LOOK WHITE
GoldLikesWeed: I MEAN BLACK
FALLS: Really? Cause I see a nigga in my window
FALLS: oh, he left
Godelieve exited out of messages. Her head went back to the tv in the house. "You are all going to die." Those words stung her. Familiar and stirring darkness from the past again. "I need a book and some tea..." she leaned against the wheel. "And some goddamn weed."
BLOSSOMPURE cafe.
As she stood in line. Grass, mud, a worn-down house, and an enormous serpent flashed in her head. It was so long ago, yet felt recent. What was his name again, she thought. A-B-C... that's what Childhood used to do. Say your ABCs and it will trigger a memory.
"Next customer?" requested the barista. She paced forward and placed her order, "Can I have that honey vanilla, sounds good."
"Would you like graham crackers with that?" she asks.
"Crackers... no, I meant the tea."
"Ma'am the vanilla honey mix is an espresso." Godelieve gaped at the menu. The board seems to wave and wiggle in front of her. "Damn." she shook her head to snap out of the illusion. "I'm sorry. Can I have the Green Tea. I'm not feeling well."
The barista grins, "I think the green mint tea would do fine for you. Can I have your name?"
"Goldie" she replies. "Here or to go?"
"To go."
The barista gives the order to the man in the back. He begins making the brew while the barista in front directs her. "Your order will be ready in a moment please rest at the booths."
Godelieve does as suggested and takes a seat in a booth near the window. She pulls out her phone and it buzzes. "Goldie... you have a message." speaks her phone. "from who, Joachim?"
"Don't open it." says the phone.
She goes into her messages and sees a name pop up in the form of question marks. Her head tells her Aleigha but the bumps along her arms said differently. Instead, she opens another message by a dealer on the site.
LOOSEGOOSE: Hey Goldielocks. I got a new shipment of blood in store. You want any?
GoldLikesWeed: You message me to bait me wow...
LOOSEGOOSE: I got red weed
LOOSEGOOSE: New experiment call it Red Moon
GoldLikesWeed: What about pink?
LOOSEGOOSE: vamps don't like pink, had to make a new product
GoldLikesWeed: I need something calm. Nothing new.
LOOSEGOOSE: anxiety?
LOOSEGOOSE: I can check what I can make or got in stock
GoldLikesWeed: don't send it if you do
She lays her phone on the table and takes deep breaths. Putting her hand over her rapid heart, against her head and neck. "Where is this coming from?" She starts looking around the cafe. An old woman in the back taking spoons of soup. Her vision lies to her, shifting to the soup turning into black sludge.
She turns away. Squeezing her eyes shut and mumbling to herself. "I'm fine, I'm fine..." her fist pelted the table. "A... B... C... D... E..." she chants the alphabet but it comes shakey. /Why am I scared? He isn't here. He's gone... I know he's gone./
A gentle tapping against the window sounds. She opens her eyes ignoring the black smoke around her and distorted faces. "₩ⱧɆⱤɆ гРɎØɄ ₲Ø" a shrill voice crackles the glass behind her. She turns, her throat aches as she bounces away from the window in terror. "₳ⱤɆ ɎØɄ ⱤɄ₦₦ł₦₲ ł₦₮Ø ₮ⱧɆ ₩ØØĐ₴ ₳₲₳ł₦?" the figure in the window has a fabric body, that of woven rope. Red stains and a set of wild eyes of a different color. One brown and the other blue, bulging out his sockets. He racks the window with his nails that break off. As one falls to the ground he bends to pick up the small nail and press it against his finger. "₲ØⱠĐłɆⱠØ₵₭₴"
"Miss?" calls the barista. "Your tea is ready."
The smoke clears, her eyes flutter. Godelieve clutches her phone and darts out the front door with the barista calling her back. The buildings on the road changed from stores to trees looming over her.
She crossed the street, forgetting her car. Several vehicles stopping abruptly at her running the street. She runs down an alley, knocking over a trash can. Frequently looking over her shoulder and running into a hard chest.
"REMEBER WHEN YOU BURIED ME SLEEPING"
_________
It seems my mother is a focus to someone's ploy. One of her bibles was torn at Godelieve's house. I recall the day she received that letter from someone named--what was the name?
"Ileoh!" She has to know. Or hold some record of it. "Who sent my mama the invite to the school?"
"On January 9th, Childchool received an invitation from... me."
"You?"
"Me." I'm hearing her but my mind goes somewhere else. My hand is shaking, I swallow. "Ileoh?"
"I'm not Ileoh." they say, the voice has an accent similar to cajun; A gruff tone. "Did you have fun playing my game?"
"Who is this?"
"What's your body count?" the voice chortles. "I got 46."
"Name, nigga!" I can't explain shit. I'm squeezing my phone, the side crack with the pressure.
"I don't know. Pick one. But for now, call me Headcount."
"Headcount?" I'm about to lose my mind. I'm talking to a nigga wanting to be Joker or some shit. "Nigga you named yo' self after Dracula?"
"No."
"Where are you, cut the bullshit. I'm Headcount, Changany is my twin brother. I killed your fucking mother, I wanted her goddamn soul. But the bitch escaped me." This would be the moment I break my phone in half but that is the most foolish thing I could do. I need answers, I'm going in circles. "Motive!" I interrogate. "What did you have against her?"
"Nothing. So, I heard she's in the body of a puppet? So you made her voodoo doll. It feels like home."
"She's not a voodoo doll!" Her body was completely sullied. Uncle Iarius wouldn't dare let her back in her old body. It's tainted with sin! "Good. But enough, she's pretty powerful. I was going to have her get a sex change but then I was like, that's fucking difficult and I just don't have the patience." states Headcount. "What kind of name is Headcount?" It's fucking stupid to me.
He laughs. "I've been listening to everything. Your brother's in Mexico but if you want to see me. I'm in the school. I'll even give your confused ass directions."
Thanks, nigga. "Go down Cowslip Copse, you'll see an alley on left. That's Hexham Alleyway. Once there you'll see a set of steps going down. There is water, don't swim. This is a tunnel into the school."
You aren't supposed to do what the bad guy wants. But what can I really do in this situation? "Once through the tunnel you'll see a bunch of dead people. Don't get scared. Aleigha, if you remember me."
I brace myself against a wall. What is happening? "I've been giving you memory little by little every time you walk by a soul." My head...
"What are you talking about?"
"I think you forgot someone." Yahoska... " And? "I can see through your eyes. Why would a book float away from you? Why would there be a spirit in a GODDAMN LIBRARY? YOU GLUTTONOUS MOTHERFUCKER. You were so busy feeding off your brother you haven't been paying attention? Cajuns? In fucking Maine? Does that make sense?"
What have I been doing this entire time?
"Bring yo' goofy ass to me."
___________
"Now I'm finna give you a long explanation until you get here." I'm trudging through the black liquid below. I'm so confused, what was I trying to do? I found my brother. I came out of my grave because--"You were so angry? That could be it." he says. I want him to stop talking. "Pay attention to me."
"What can I do?" Nothing, there I answered the question. "You fucking right." he says. "So, My name is Headcount. Why? Because I'm a nigga that just plays too much. I got you and your brother plus his wife. Running around in circles. You took souls but they didn't get into you. If you know what I mean."
"Are you possessed?" If I think about it logically or rather, I hope that's the answer. "No. I'm not. Nigga I am dead. If you don't know your history, you are doomed to repeat it."
"Then tell me my history."
"Well, it all started in a little village in Africa. Some dumb ass niggas worshipped a vampire and I'm not talking about Dracula. In this village, they worshipped an Obayifo. Some say it was Gabriel, the messenger. But that's besides the point. The village believed in recycling."
"Fantastic..." Africans saving the environment.
"Life is a beautiful thing. When we die, the soul leaves the body, correct."
I sigh, "Yeah..."
"But the tribe believed that the soul goes into another body." he chuckles. "The Oriaoriya Village in Africa, did not let bodies rot. They didn't believe in growing old, the goal in the tribe was to maintain a life until it was able to carry out everything it needed to do. In simple terms, a nigga didn't know when to give up. You get me?"
I have to be going inside of a sewer. There's graffiti on the walls, shit layered in water. Newspaper scattered and piled with grime. There's little light through here, a few lamps attached to the wall, and my phone giving me some view.
"Yep."
"The Obayifo in this tribe. They say was possessed by an angel and this angel through the obayifo asked for maintenance. He needed blood, so they gave him the blood of a goat. He didn't want that, the Obayifo said, go find me a body and they did 77 motherfucking times."
"Go on..." I pinch the bridge of my nose. I step on a dead body and notice as I look down, the skin is shriveled. "Anyway, the Obayifo began to change. He wasn't this dark and emotionless being. But he stood up straight, they could identify him. That's what I'm doing. You ate your brother and that's killing you."
"What is this black water?"
"Drunk blood. Decaying blood, anemia which all fucking vamps seem to have."
"I'm walking in anemia?" I rise my foot from the water, my shoes are covered in black ink. "Vampires have a disorder. Our blood eats itself, The Immortale Dyaman is the blood cell vampires have unique to them."
This nigga is really getting scientific with me. "Yes nigga, I'm getting scientific!" he sounds through the phone. The blood in the tunnel starts bubbling. "The way the Dyaman works--I don't know if you knew this, of course, you fucking didn't--But the Immortale dyaman gets it's name because of this barrier around the blood cell that keeps it healthy."
"Why is this important?"
"It concerns your fucking health, you ignorant nigga."
"Fuck you."
"You here yet?"