The Book of Sarah

I make myself known to her now. She does not fully understand just what I am. But she is open to new things. I suppose that comes from being the child of teachers. One of my helpers (I have them too, just like Santa) showed her how to put all of her new assets into a business account. So what with all the rolls of bills and assorted precious stones, she should be all right for the foreseeable future. I sit with her in the bookshop. We discuss the classics. The Age of Innocence is a particular favorite of ours. Sometimes I even help her straighten up the shelves. She takes her 'lunch' break at one or two o'clock in the morning. Such is the schedule in an 'all night' bookshop. I bring her takeout from a little twentyfour hour coffee shop. She likes a grilled chicken breast sandwich with lettuce and tomato, a small order of fried sweet potato crisps and a diet iced tea. I of course am never hungry. But it is good for people around the neighborhood to see me buying food. It makes me seem more normal. She asks me how I came to be and how I got here. I tell  her that I came on the wind. She says - Oh, like Mary Poppins? But that is really the truth, for it was the good ship Welcome, a seventeenth century sailing craft that brought me here. And so we sit, a vampire named Tomas and his many, many, many times (mortal) great granddaughter named Sarah. I gave her a tiny vial of my blood. I did not tell her it was blood and it does not taste like blood, at least not like mortal blood. She did not want to drink it at first . I told her it was a type of absinth. We had been discussing the works of Proust so she was open to such things. It will preserve her well-being. It is better than the strongest flu shot. It is better than the most over priced vitamin capsules. She mixed it into her coffee and drank. Instantly the cancer which I knew to be inside her disappeared. You cannot know how much that meant to me. I pressed a few more vials into her hand. She asked me if I would not like some of the 'absinth' for myself. I think she was feeling a bit unnerved and wanted to see me ingest something. I took one of the vials, opened it and shot it back neat. It was my own blood, so I could do that. It satisfied her and she relaxed. But she feels a bit telepathic to me. I am sure she knows more than she lets on. I do not know if it is my imagination or not, but she seems to favor my mother. There is something about the cast of her features. Yet how could that be? There are so many generations between us. Geneticly we are not much more than total strangers. But a creature such as I knows there's more to life than genetics. Where am I now? I am standing over the body of my monthly victim, watching  as it ignites into a cold, blue flame. This one was a bad one, a very bad one. And the dancing, windblown ashes cannot disappear fast enough. When it is over, I step out from behind the bushes of a favorite vest pocket park, examining my new, gold Rolex and whistling The Teddy Bears' Picnic. When you go out on the streets tonight you're in for a big surprize. But the Enemy has not left us. He is till here. I can feel him.