He struggled, with a confused face. "Pumpkin, is everything alright?"
"Stormie, what do you mean by that? Try to be nice." Jessica warned.
"Where did you take Adrian?!" She fired at Jerry, scratching his nape confusedly.
"Gosh, I have no idea what you're talking about." He faked an innocent face. "This is ridiculous."
"Yes, he's been here with me all night. Stormie, what's wrong?"
"Try to control your breath girl." He touched her cheek and she slapped his hand off.
"Don't touch me, you want me to talk?!"
"Stop it, Stormie. It's no longer funny." Jessica warned.
"You know what else isn't funny! Jerry is a vampire!" Stormie pointed.
"Ahh..." Everyone dining stopped and turned to her. Jerry batted his eyes as if being embarrassed. They stared at him with curious eyes but later laughed hard. Stormie and Jessica looked around, puzzled.
"I'm telling you mum. He is not who you think he is. He isn't human. Yeah... Garlic! I need garlic! Who has Garlic!" Stormie turned back and realized the waiter was on of the vampires she saw earlier.
"I'm sorry, we do not have garlic here." The server spelled it out to her. His green eyes gave a devil's stare and his thick black eyebrows almost pulled out of his Alabaster toned face.
"Why wouldn't you have a garlic? Isn't this a restaurant?" She snapped, looking around at the others. "Oh, I don't know! Maybe because this is a vampire restaurant!"
"Alright, let's go." Jessica grabbed Stormie's hand. "You've said enough now, lets go home."
"No mum..."
"I'm so sorry about this, she usually have vivid imagination about weird things." Jessica apologized on her behalf.
"No, I'm not imagining things." Stormie gasped in defense. "He killed Aunt Magdalena! He's going to send out the signal."
"I said that's enough!" Jessica cut in, facing Jerry with a small smile. "I'm... I'm really sorry she's like this, Jerry."
"It's fine, don't worry. It's okay." His plastic grin ended up in a wrathful grimace.
"Oh, my head!" Stormie held her head painfully.
"Little bug, are you okay?" Jerry hesitated to Stormie.
Worried.
Jessica cupped her face into her palms and noticed how much Stormie's body was burning up.
"Oh no, you're having fever. I should take you home." She told her and turned towards Jerry.
"Stormie gets like this sometimes. I'm so sorry for ruining tonight. I'd have to leave now."
"Yeah, I have to leave as well." Jerry walked to the table and grabbed his jacket. "That reminds me, I have a lot of work to do in the office."
Watching him place some cash from his wallet on their table, Jessica pressed her lips together. She'd wanted them to spend the night but Stormie spoiled the plan.
"You know me. I work all night." He walked up to Jessica and planted a soft hiss on her forehead. "I would see you later, Jess! Good night." A Botox smirk formed on Jerry's lips before he left.
"Come on, you've ruined everything. Let's go!" Jessica grabbed Stormie by the arm and she pulled back. Trying to explain everything to her mum but Jessica won't listen.
"I said let's go." As they walked out, someone stopped Stormie. It was the old man from the airport.
"I believe you, girl. They're everywhere! " Stormie looked at his front and he was with a young girl of her age.
'That must be his granddaughter.' She guessed.
"Don't worry, I believe you!" Paul told Stormie as Jessica dragged her out.
"You're hurting me mum." Stormie panicked but she paid deaf ears.
"This ends now!" Jessica let go of her hand. "Get this into your head because the earlier you understand this, the better for you! No more vampires, no more monsters! No more aliens till we get home. I'm getting rid of all your toys, masks, costumes and movies. Every thing to wake you up from this stupid fantasy... Do I make myself clear?"
"Yeah, mum. Get rid of me if you want but just listen!-"
"Not another word!" Jessica put in before Stormie could complete the sentence. "Not another word from you until we get home."
Stormie scratched her eyed confused. "Adrian is a werewolf!"
An exasperated sigh escaped Jessica as she placed a hand in her forehead, puzzled. She just walked away, leaving Stormie in the middle of the crowded market.
"Mum! Stormie ran after Jessica. Wait up, mum. I know you're angry with me right now. And there's no reason for you to believe me. I know. I know I'm a freak. I love Gothic and horror. I take pictures of people I scare. You don't have to believe anything I say anymore... Just hear me out, mum!"
Jessica turned to her, wiping the tears in her eyes. "Stormie, I don't think you ever want to see me happy. Don't I deserve this? Don't I deserve happiness? But you ruined it. You know what? We are going home!"
Stormie stopped, staring blankly at Jessica.
"What's wrong?!"
"I'm not going home. If you can't handle the truth, then don't ask me to be honest, mum! You can leave if you want to. You never believe me anyway! I would find Adrian and save him from those vampires! I would save my brother no matter what!" An ache started deep in Stormie's stomach. She ran as fast as a shooting star while her eyes welled up with tears.
Jessica pursed her lips, clenching her fist into a tight ball. Trying as she might, but couldn't contain herself. "Stormie!" Jessica erupted like a volcano after her daughter. While she ran toward Jerry's pub house.
Stormie peeped by the gate, hitting it aggressively but it was dark all through. Jessica turned her back, trying to control her breath.
"Why are you so stubborn?"
"Dad would have believed me if he were alive. He never doubted me for once." a single tear rolled off Stormie's eyes. She left it to flow freely while Jessica wiped it off her daughter's cheek.
With guilt in her eyes.
"Where do you say Adrian is?" Concern laced in her voice. Going to the backyard, Jessica tried climbing, but the building was too tall. Stormie threw a pebble at the window, thinking it was open. But they locked it with black tinted glasses.
"How the hell do we get in?" Jessica emphasized, looking around but she barely saw anything because of the dimness of the night.
Stormie walked to the other side of the building to check. "Hey, over here! There's a passage." She alerted.
There was a secret door that leads to an underground floor. Jessica rushed to her daughter as they both broke its padlock looking at how deep it is.
"Woah! After you, mum."
Jessica, with her red velvet ball gown, climbed the stairs that lead into a room as deep as a well.
Looking down, insects crawled in the perpendicular corners of the passage. Jessica was prey to the horrors of the incubus. From afar, she discerned a stoned door, crystallised with ornaments made of steel. Upon entering the vastness beyond the gate, it greeted them with the expense of the hanging chandeliers enclosed with a flame flambeau inked with black damp.
Bones were scattered, they encompassed the girth of the lectern. The emptiness displayed solitude; Jessica couldn't help but feel aggravated. So they walked on, straight to the house of death.
As they walked deeper, Stormie's eyes caught cupboards and bags stained in human blood. The smell of fresh blood crept into their nostrils. The corridor looked like the scene of so many murderous alleys; cold and humid. The night air bites at their skin, and a sudden breeze blew at them like saying, welcome.
The room was pitch back except for the natural light from the moon that radiated and low, burning candles from a corner.
"I think we are in the cemetery." Stormie told her mum.
"No, I don't think-"
"Krrrr!"
Jessica couldn't help herself. Her jaw dropped to the floor. Her eyebrows shot towards the ceiling that was leaking with thick, fresh blood.
Looking down were shredded human legs, arms and exposed organs, such as their ripped intestines and overflowing enzyme liquid and the blood pool left at their feet.
"Yeah.. I agree with you. We're definitely in the cemetery." She gulped down the words like hot coffee.
Anyone who enters the premises, without permission and constantly, gets strangled, ravaged and brutally ripped by the scythe of the vampire's termination.
"Owwwwoooooo!!!!"
"What was that?" jessica frowned.
"Adrian! He's calling for help!" Stormie ran towards where the howl was coming from while Jessica followed. Lifting up her red, her Cinderella gown that was now stained with blood.
"You invaded my sorrowful heart
Like the sudden stroke of a blade;
Bold as a lunatic troupe
Of demons in drunken parade
You in my mortified soul,
Made your bed and your domain;
Abhorrence to whom I am bound
As the convict is to the chain."
Jerry recited his favorite poem lines from Allen poe while his fingers stirred a drum of liquid wolfsbane, filled with silver bullets.
"As the drunker is to the jug,
As the gambler is to the game;
As for the vermin corpse,
-I damn you, out of my shame!"
A Botox smirk formed on Jerry's lips, then he handpicked one. Fixing it into a short gun.
"Grrrr!"
"What is that? Jessica whispered as they hid by the side of the entrance.
"That's your son, mum. We need to take him out of here before sunrise else. He would be like that forever."
"No, he will not be like that." Jessica promised as they watched Jerry. The fangs stood out of his clean set of teeth and Jessica was petrified.
"Crrrrr!"
"Ugh!"
Jerry's bodyguards hit them from beside and they grunt. Falling to the ground like bags of cement.
"Hahaha!" The vampires let out a roar of laughter. Jerry signaled they tie them up against the wall. They did as instructed.
"Plink!" A loud splash of water rang in her ears.
Jerry threw a bucket of water on Jessica, and she jerked up from her unconsciousness. Realizing that they tied her up with both arms and Stormie was in the same position, too.