“My next door neighbor is vampire,” Rivi tells me.
“Keeps late hours?” I ask.
“No,” Rivi says. “She’s an actual vampire.”
We are sitting on the front porch of the house Rivi shares with Boone and Tina. The sun is out today for what feels like the first time in weeks, which is a welcome change from the endless gray we’ve been caught up in as winter refuses to go away. If there’s such a thing as vampire weather, I doubt that today would be what I would classify it as.
“I know that I’m going to regret asking you this,” I say, “but how do you know she’s a vampire?”
“She told me,” Rivi says. “Duh.”
“Duh. Of course.”
She points across the street at a small green house that sits just alongside the river that flows through the center of town. “That’s her place there. Her name is Miette. She’s a hundred and fifty-six years old.”
“A hundred and fifty-six? She must look like a shriveled apple person.”
Rivi punches me in the arm. “She’s a vampire, dumbass. She looks young and hot.”
“Duh,” I say, rubbing my arm.
“Duh.”
“So how did you meet this vampire?” I ask.
“I was sitting out here night before last eating Skittles, and she was out digging in her garden.”
“Gardening at night. How very R.E.M. of her.”
“That’s what I said! So of course I had to go over and see what she was doing.”
“Very brave of you,” I say. “Going into the vampire’s lair to check out her vegetable garden.”
“I didn’t know she was a vampire then,” Rivi says. “I mean, that wouldn’t have stopped me going over, obviously.”
“Obviously,” I agree. I peer at the green house—the vampire house—and find
nothing unusual about it. It’s very well kept, and looks very inviting. Just what a vampire house would look like, I think. Lure you right in with all of its hominess and cuteness.
“So I say hi and introduce myself. She says her name is Miette, and that she’s trying to get the rest of her garlic bulbs in the ground, even though it’s probably too late for them to come up this year.”
“Garlic,” I say. “In a vampire’s garden.”
“Hey, just because she’s a vampire doesn’t mean she doesn’t like garlic.”
“I don’t know, Rivi. I’m pretty sure all the vampire literature says that vamps hate garlic.”
“Don’t believe everything you read on the internet, Sebastian,” she says.
“It’s a hundred and fifty years of literature, but whatever. Go on.”
“So we get to talking, and pretty soon I’m helping her dig in the dirt, because you know me. Always helpful.”
“That is not the you that I am familiar with, but please continue.”
“She’s from Quebec originally, she says, but she moved to Maine about fifty years ago. Lived on the coast for a while, but felt it was a little too stereotypical being on a cliff overlooking the sea. Too goth, but not in a cool way. So she moved here in 2015, bought her house from an old couple looking to relocate to Florida, and the rest is vampire history.”
“About that,” I say. “How exactly did the whole vampire thing come up in the line of conversation? You didn’t cut your finger on a trowel and let her suck on it, did you?”
“There was no sucking of anything involved, thank you very much. You’re such a pig.”
“Vampires are known for sucking, Rivi,” I say. “Also, I am not a pig.”
“Oink oink,” she says. “Miette just brought it up in conversation. Said that I seemed cool and she figured that if I was going to be living across the street from a vampire, I probably should know what the deal is. So I don’t think she’s rude if she’s turning down invitations for brunch or afternoon dips in the kiddie pool in the yard.”
“She’d need a lot of SPF in her sunscreen.”
“It’s cool. I’m a night owl. I’m sure we’ll get a lot of hanging out time together once the sun goes down. About time I made a friend in this town anyway.”
“A friend who is a vampire.”
“Don’t be racist, Sebastian.”
“I am not being racist, Rivi. I just don’t believe in vampires.”
“Well they believe in you.”
“Do they.”
“Of course they do,” she says. “I told Miette all about you. She’s looking forward to having you for dinner.”
I lean back in my chair. “Sometimes I can’t tell if you’re making a joke or not.”
Rivi pats me on the knee. “It’s just a little nibble, Sebastian.”
“I’m not being nibbled on by your vampire Québécoise, Rivi.”
“Just a little nibble,” she says. “It doesn’t hurt.”
“Wait, did she nibble on you?”
“None of your beeswax,” Rivi says. “But maybe. She didn’t break the skin, though, so she says I’m not going to turn into a vampire or anything.”
“Oh, good,” I say. “I was worried there a second.”
“You were?” she asks.
“Of course not. There’s no such thing as vampires.”
“Yes, there is.” She points across at the green house. “There’s one living right in there right now.”
“I’ll believe it when I see it,” I say.
“Totally racist,” Rivi says, leaning back and folding her arms over her chest.
“It’s not racist to not believe in vampires.”
“That’s just what a racist would say.”
I look up at the vampire house (because now I’m going to be calling it that forever), and for just a second I think I see a curtain in a window on the top floor crack open, and then fall closed again. Because someone lives in that house, I think. And it’s not a vampire.
“If anybody in this town has a friend who is a vampire,” I say, staring at the window, “it would have to be you.”
“S’what I said,” Rivi tells me. “You’ll see. You’ll meet her pretty soon.”
“Can’t wait. I can ask her all about her time in Canada. How she became a vampire. It’ll be a real interview. With. A. Vampire.”
Rivi punches me in the arm again. “Racist.”
“Shut it.”
About seven hours until sunset.
Guess I need to keep track of these things now.