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But honestly, I don’t mind the occasional snowstorm or the wilderness or the isolation. Even if Camden hadn’t offered me a full ride, I still would’ve fought tooth and nail to go here. Because Camden has something no other campus in America does: the biggest university library of rare books in the country.
I’ve spilled most of my life story to her over half stacks and strawberry shakes.
We both took Dr. Kowalski’s class during our first semester and bonded quickly over our mutual love of books. But it’s more than that. Fiona’s parents are hugely successful lawyers in upstate New York—unlike me, she doesn’t need scholarship money to attend Camden—but being the only Black student in the entire prelaw program doesn’t exactly make it easy to fit in. It’s the unspoken knowledge that neither of us will ever belong in the rich boys’ club that makes us allies.
Instead, I prefer the company of books. It’s a perfect relationship, really. A book will always open and let you in. You can close it anytime you wish. There’s no need for awkward social interactions, and the words inside won’t judge you or ask more of you than you can give.
There’s a sharp grace to his features, like that of a wolf. An untamed wildness that doesn’t belong here, which creates the illusion of movement even though he’s standing still.
At the lectern, Dean Wilkins tests the microphone by tapping it unnecessarily loudly. The resulting shrill makes me wince. “Good afternoon, everyone!” she says cheerfully, satisfied that the microphone is indeed capable of damaging the hearing of the entire school.
I shake my head. Why am I suddenly so excited about the prospect of being in the same room as some guy who caught me staring at him? I tell myself that would be awkward, that it would be best to avoid him. Or I try to, but it doesn’t work because when I recall his gaze, the space-warping intensity of it, I feel a shiver at the nape of my neck.
I sink deeper into my chair. This year was supposed to be different, a new beginning for me. I was supposed to get my foot in the door and get my dream internship and a work-study job at the library. But once again, my plans crumble before I can turn them into reality.
Why am I even surprised? Doesn’t this always happen to me in the end? People I care about just leave.
For reasons I can’t even begin to comprehend, Dacian Bathory positively hates my very existence.
Fiona sighs. “Ever tried having a Nigerian last name?” she deadpans. “Do you know how many people get it wrong or just downright refuse to try and pronounce it? If I assumed they all hated me, my life here would be exponentially more difficult, not to mention miserable.”
I should have known not to debate with Fiona—she always wins. And she doesn’t even have her law degree yet. I’d be terrified to encounter her in the courtroom.
You’ve gotta go talk to him. I promise he isn’t gonna bite you.”
Foreshadowing!!!
Sometimes, I find it difficult to maintain eye contact, especially with strangers. But for some reason, it’s impossible to look away from him. In his eyes, there’s an absence of light that I like. It calls to me.
And what made you wish to preserve books?” he asks, leaning in. Something happens then. Maybe it’s the quiet, overwhelming intensity of his voice. But I feel lightheaded, like the whole room has blurred and slowly begun to spin, all except for him and me, inexplicably tethered to him.
I look at the couples around me—they aren’t all madly in love, are they? So why can’t I be like them and not care? Or be content with caring only a little, just enough not to be alone? But I can’t. I don’t want crumbs that will never satisfy the hunger I feel inside. I’d rather have nothing at all.
For a moment I feel confused, unsure if I’m still seeing things. Deep in the recesses of my mind, I realize that I often feel like this when I’m around Mr. Bathory. Like I’m not quite in control of myself. Like I’m treading on a frozen river and the ice under my feet might crack at any moment, plunging me mercilessly to my death.
He must know “The Raven” by heart, and he recites the stanzas with such a profound sense of loss that I want to weep from the overwhelming sorrow that drenches his words. Like a perfect key cut by an expert locksmith, they unlock the door to my own grief.
But I never got the chance. Because that morning, Clay’d had football practice before first period. He’d come to school and seen the photocopies an hour before I did. By the time I arrived, he’d already gone home and hanged himself in his bathroom.
“What if there’s no way to set them free?” I ask—no, I beg of him. “What if they’re buried so deep that the light never reaches them? What if…” My breath catches as fear seizes me again, used to being the solitary ruler of my soul. I struggle to still myself. “What if I am buried along with those things, and no matter how much I try to dig myself out, to climb up this endless black tunnel, it still feels like I’m only falling deeper into the darkness?” For a moment, Mr. Bathory is silent. My heart echoes in my ears, shuddering in my chest like a caught rabbit, and I’m suddenly worried that he
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It’s easy to say you loved someone when they’re no longer around. After all, the dead can’t speak. They cannot refute your self-serving delusions, and you can ignore the fact that you didn’t stand up for them when it mattered. When they needed you.
Our words to each other are snatched away and destroyed before anyone has a chance to feel them. If our writing is lucky enough to survive, it quietly gathers centuries of dust in archives and rich people’s private collections. It might be naive of me, but I want to save them, to show our words to the world. That’s why I want to work in conservation and why I can never burn Clay’s letters. They are what remains of us, a truth that deserves to be known.
Fiona muses as she chews. “Wouldn’t it be so rad if someday we could just read stuff off a computer screen and say goodbye to hauling those heavy textbooks around?”
If a poem hasn’t ripped apart your soul, you haven’t experienced poetry. Dacian was certainly right
With a quiver in my heart, I finally let myself admit the indisputable truth. I really want Dacian to touch me the way he touched the pages of “The Raven.”
“I’m sorry to hear that,” I say, even though what I truly mean is, I wish I could tell the Camden board to shove it so we could spend the rest of the day together. The rest of eternity.
“No!” I shout again and rise to my feet defiantly. How dare he use his vampire tricks on me? Yes, vampire—I can say it now. I know what he is beyond any doubt. A bloodthirsty, devious vampire who lied to me, who manipulated me. A murdering monster, and I— I liked him. The hurt in my chest splinters into tiny little shards—and then spins into a fury. I liked him. I wanted him. How stupid was I? Led to the slaughter like a gullible lovesick lamb.
The mad thudding of my heart drowns out the blast of panic in my head, leaving only one thought standing: Dacian Bathory doesn’t need to break the window to get to me. For weeks, he has been visiting me in my dreams. And I welcomed him. Gladly.
When the day breaks, I finally work up enough courage to peer out of my window again. I examine the courtyard and the green plaza below. But both are empty. No parked cars, no students milling about. And no vampire literature professor.
I need tangible evidence that doesn’t hinge on me confessing that I had a gay affair with a mist. The cops will never investigate that.
again, his lips nearly brushing the shell of my ear. “But I implore you, my dear Jonathan—until that day, take caution and think things through.”
That night, in his diary, the count wrote: “Help me, great shadows, for today I met my own ruin and invited him in.”
As I park in the driveway, I am overcome with curiosity about the domestic situation and living conditions of the world’s most famous vampire.
But more than anything, I smell him. He smells like a memory, a feeling. Like a frozen, lonely place in faraway mountains, like a thousand desperate words, all unspoken. Like a millennium of yearning.
Unlike Jessi, I’ve never been to the movies with a boyfriend. I’ve never done anything fun with a boyfriend. My only boyfriend had to be a secret.
With unexpected fierceness, that thought wrenches at my heart: I could’ve lived my whole life without knowing that Dacian exists. And that’s a fate much worse than seeing a thousand rotting corpses or being tormented by Clay’s ghost.
A vampire flew me out to the woods, showed me a decomposing corpse, and then asked me to help him uncover a vampire cult right here in Camden. Oh, and by the way, I’m hopelessly pining for him. How was your Friday?
“What do you want me to say, Jonathan?” he demands, panting heavily as though he’s struggling to hold himself back. “That no matter how much I try to resist, I’m unable to keep myself from you? That the instant our eyes met in the theater, I saw our connection? Your heart called out to me, all ten thousand broken shards of it. How could I not answer when suddenly, in a room full of people, I could hear only you?” My eyes widen as Dacian’s hand moves to my face. “Do you have any idea how rare this is?” he asks.
The count’s lips twisted. The chill that had been spreading through his limbs suddenly turned to frost, plunging the temperature around them. He was being left behind after everything he’d done. Again. Used like a tool, not treated as a person. Not treasured. Not loved. Nobody cared about his heart being broken. It was meant to be used up and then forgotten for the rest of eternity.
“I want you,” I whisper against his skin. “All of you. The way you are now and how you used to be. Good and terrible. You know that, right?”
“Please promise me you won’t go looking for satanic cults, Jonathan,” she pleads, exasperated. “If you’ve got time on your hands, spend it hooking up with your secret lover. You look happy. Happy is a good look on you. Good sex does that. Go have more sex.”
Is that why he was gone? Do I give him the munchies?
“A vampire’s blood will suffice if circumstances demand it. They used to be human, after all. But it’s not as nourishing. And Stockton’s tasted like dirt and fear and a desperate obsequious need for peer approval,” he says, with a grimace like he just ate something rancid.
The blood of men runs thin this century. Just like their spirits.”
“Because once I locate my journal and deal with those who stole it, I plan to disappear from this town.”
In this world of shadows, Dacian is my anchor. If he disappears, I will become unmoored. Lost in the darkness without the light of his eyes to guide me, I may never find myself again.
I spend the wee hours of the morning back in my dorm room, hugging my knees in my bed and trying to stop shaking uncontrollably.
Okay damn bitch STAND UP lmfaooo jk so me actually
But how am I going to stroll into their mansion? I am not a welcome guest. Every time they see me, they either try to run me over or punch me.
“Only a privileged jerk like you would think any rights have ever been won by asking nicely,”
“How did you find us?” I ask as the lights of Fiona’s car disappear around the bend. “I will always be able to find you, Jonathan,” he says meaningfully.
