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And so what do I do with them, my two innocent human charges... my children? I watch them every night when I awake. We put them to bed at eight thirty, an hour late by mortal standards. They wake up at seven thirty or perhaps an hour more. So they see me for perhaps three and a half hours now, in the winter time. In the summer, when dawn comes so early and dusk so late they might not see me at all. The boy, the five year old, doesn't say much and his three year old sister looks to him for guidance. So far they ask few questions. Why should they. Edith, our mortal housekeeper sees to their meals. A familiar, a man who oversees our financial affairs, arranged for clothes from the best children's shops, toys from the most inviting toy shops. We subscribe to all the popular children's television networks. Edith or Billy, the mortal who curates this blog for us, takes them out on walks all the time. They get treats and story books, but only if the shop has a special window installed in their front door for safe ease of purchase during this time of pestilence. They have an small ten gallon tropical fish aquarium all done up like a cozy undersea fish village. Conrad, another night-folk who lives here, had tropical fish before his transformation and knows all about them, so he takes care of the tank. It's set up in a room downstairs made to look like a pre-school or kindergarten classroom... all the colorful wall charts, a chalk board, bright tables and chairs, digital tablets... everything. A teacher came two and a half hours every morning. Then lunch. In the afternoons Billy took over. Afternoons were easy... a story... a nap... arts and crafts... Zoom time with a few other home schooled children... a kiddie TV movie before dinner. This time of year Sarah (my consort) and I get to join them. Conrad looks in from time to time. Annie the by now maybe ten year old child vampire in a body not much older than the five year old boy's when it happened. I did not do it. None of us did. None of us would. 'Papa' did that. You'll see him. He's around. I don't know where, but he's around. Annie visits with the children... never alone... always supervised. Sometimes she's a mean little kid, besides being a vampire.. The mortal children call her 'that mean girl.' She's skinny. Her hair just hangs there. Likes magazines and coloring books from the CVS. Sneaks out by herself at night. She's a vampire. What's going to happen to her. Sometimes she sneaks into the vast Penn Museum on 34th Street to commune with the spirits of the mummies. That place is mummy central. She steals things for some homeless guys she's friends with... cigarettes... plastic containers of these big wet napkins like baby wipes, but these are made for old people with like arthritis and all. Homeless people love them. Annie has money to pay for these things, but she likes stealing. The mortal children sense she's 'something' they just don't know what.
Jonathon worries about the mortal boy and girl. Only been a few nights, but he thinks about things. They're going to want a normal family. Right now he figures one of his 'familiars' a lawyer with a huge condo and a house down the shore, actually not too far from where Baylah's mortal boyfriend lives. You'll meet her.
Bet you never thought vampires had problems like this, but think about it. Why wouldn't they. People say they're 'not human.' But they are. What they're not is mortal. He doesn't want to see these children grow old. There was a woman, a vampire woman in town years ago who took in two mortal children too. She had money. All vampires have money. I'll explain how later, but it's very obvious. You'll get it right away. You'll figure it out. A flamboyant Auntie Mame character. The children never left her. She lived in The Drake, a legendary Center City pre war apartment building... thirty two stories tall... terra cotta Spanish type towers on top. She lived up there... private elevator. You know how often other people in the building saw her? Hardly ever. Mr. Dawson delivered groceries for 'the children' and Denise, her 'French girl' kept house. Mrs. Hopps came before breakfast and left just before dinner to cook all the meals plus a few snack items. Things were fine, until the 'children' got old. Then she brought in nurses. They never needed doctors. The tiniest drops of her night-folk blood banished every ailment. But as with all humans the clockwork mechanism reaches its end and the tiny drops of vampire blood are useless. They were too old to transform. Aged vampires don't do well. They live like ghouls. The vampire woman stayed with them to the end. We don't know where she went.
Jonathon didn't want that to happen. Neither did Sarah. When it was time the children would go to that 'familiar.'
The night he decided, he sat in the middle of Washington Square park. No one noticed him. It was dark. The place was a military grave yard during the War for Independence. They claimed the bodies were moved when the area took on a residential tone, first with town houses, later with the high rise condominiums we see today. The truth is they never moved most of the bodies... a few dozen. They made a token attempt, but two thousand still remain, packed in tight as slats in a hardwood floor. Jonathon liked the ghosts. He'd talk with them. Did they all remain there? No. Most went on to The World To Come, but a few, perhaps a dozen, never left. They'd rise up from their rest and make their way to the bench. Jonathon had his favorite bench. That's where they'd sit. Oh, the ghosts weren't tied to the site. They'd wander through the district... watching people... passing through dark and gloomy department stores shuttered for the night. Once in a while they'd come across a newly 'freed' spirit pacing about in the dark, still warm empty body laying abandoned in some nearby bedroom. They'd whisper some words of encouragement and go on their way. Not like they were family...
Jonathon liked their matter of fact manner. Most, by today's standards were still kids, boys in their late teens... maybe as old as Twenty one or twenty two. But, then again, Jonathon was only eighteen when he transformed... Not 'dead,' just not mortal.
Look, who knows when the children might leave? Might be a fortnight. Might be a year. Might be ten years... The 'Black Parade' goes on and on and he's been marching for more than a thousand years.
On his way back to the town house he picked up a bottle of Sarah's favorite scent... just a casual thing from the CVS... even got a Barbie coloring book for Annie.
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