Darkness Until Dawn

 I had never been so lost, and of all the places to be lost… the suburbs? A true forest, a true city, either would do. You can prowl urban sprawl as easily as the wild. But this? Far too civilized. Leave it to that crazy cousin Vinny to give me bad information. I couldn’t even get a good view of the moon. One night I even caught myself howling at a street lamp. If anyone saw me I’d never live it down.  I got bitten almost a year ago, and I’ve been on the run since. Me and my buddies were out drinking outside of a small town where I grew up. Someone came up with the fool idea of tryin’ to put down the crazy old mutt that the Rileys owned, but we were all scared of old man Riley and his shotgun. For good reason too. The old man was nearly blind but he was so trigger happy that the Sheriff’s office had been up there maybe half a dozen times to tell him to lay off. The mutt was mean as the devil to everyone but him. So we took it upon ourselves to do a public service, drunk as we ...

They think I did not know. Yet even an old bat with a hangover could hear them. My father always told Vlad, verk that sonar, my boy, that’s what makes the Drakuls who we are, our famous (sometimes infamous) listening skills. You never know what you might catch. Yes, yes, I knew the girl was there. The why escaped me at first. Yet even with that blabbering dolt carrying on below, even without twitching, Vlad got the gist of the conversation. Strange, they were to me. Strangers that seemed stranger then Vlad himself, which of course I found impressive. Perhaps my arrival was vell timed, if a bit undignified. Zee legged one was more irritating in his oddness. Vlad tried to give him the benefit of the mortality. Life can be rough, I don’t know how they do it. It mystified me how anyone could choose to live here. It vasn’t dark enough, cold enough, and was made entirely from wood and fiber. Verse, it was a long fly from zee nearest cave or castle.  Vhile the little crazy one fumed, I ma...

 The Nerbe of dat bat. Spidey scrub and scrub and di floor is still stained. He had been fussing about Vlad for what seemed like hours, scrubbing, stopping, crawling back and forth fuming, and on and on. You’d think with eight legs he could scrub faster.  Sunlight was streaming through the window and vlad hung from a rafter, fast asleep ever since Spider chased him off the floor. The critter was so in a tizzy that he didn’t even notice me slip out the window. My name is Jess, though they sometimes call me Dust. I’m almost 16, but I left home years ago. Even before my fading, when I became invisible, people didn’t notice me much. I can be very quiet. I saw on the roof for a few minutes, looking out towards the Southern horizon. It was beautiful, all blue Skye, wisps of clouds, and sunlight above trees, houses, and streets. The people of the world were coming out.  “Almost time.” A shingle said. Gradually the outlines of a lizard became greener. Jess smiled. Below, she coul...

 Somewhere in the Carolinas Spidey found this attick on my own, I'll hab you kno. Then came the others, much to Spidey's chagrin. Yees, dey can be useful, but an arachnid needs his space. Cobwebs to hang, wardrobe to store.  A Spider's werk is nebber done. Deese humans... clumsy, but big. They built a house and did nuttin wit di attick! Spidey fix.  All Spidey wanted was to bring the attick to its full glory, arachnid style. It was going just fine, tank you berry dutch, but den one night Spidey woke to a fluttering, and there he was, lying on the floor...      Vlad take it from here. You tell it wrong. Peter Vladimir Drakul II, Prince of the Northern Wood, Wallachia. Yes, yes, I know your question. Drakul, like Dracula? He's my father's father's second cousin. Why he mutilated the name, I do not know. Vanity, Vlad suspects. He also likes to mutilate, on occasion. My family was considered a bit odd by local standards as we dislike the human form. Zee Batty D...

Where does your mind go in your moments of doubt? When fear runs wild, you run and hide behind a wall of ignorance So eager to find someone to blame You fail to stop to consider if you should. And so you wrap yourself in false righteousness pridefully creating narratives to preserve That ignorance that grants you your superiority While unleashing primal fury on anyone who fails to acknowledge it. The mind, like a vine, it sprouts its passions The mouth, like a chute, fires off its venom You call it love as if that makes it so. You’re lost within the biggo tree. In your frantic desperation to be right You blind yourself to your own actions Do you see, within you, your own perversion? No, you’re lost within the biggo tree. You know you’re right because you tell yourself so pronouncing it as often and loudly as you can You feed on your hatred and lust for its power So you can look down on your fellow man You’ll always hate because there is evil, Not in others but in yourself. Your obstina...

Hope in God. If you have good hope and faith in Him, you shall be delivered from your enemies. Diamond opened her eyes to darkness. The dream I had been chasing was a soft one, of a past that never was. Sweet, the flickers of something warm and heartening. I dreamt of the life I thought was mine, until my nemesis opened my eyes. Sometimes I can feel him whispering into my thoughts, and like a warrior in mortal combat I rage against him with all my strength, and yet I cannot expel him. He is insidious. He is everywhere. But He will not defeat me. The dream was so vivid, and for a few moments I hold fiercely to the fading images. If only I could dream whilst awake, I would never let that vision pass. But my eyes began to adjust, bringing me back to a place familiar and comforting in the strange way that prison walls are comforting to someone too long behind locked doors. The room is small and dark, and sparsely furnished. There are no pictures on the walls, no knickknacks. The sheets of ...

I don ’t know you You’re not my friend Nor family, nor lover To me you’re nothing at all. Yet I open my world to you. You listen to my secrets. They play in the shadows of your mind And I wonder what you’re not telling me You seem to exist in another dimension In a place I simply cannot go Yet I struggle to reach you nonetheless never understanding why I try. Sometimes I want to tear you down, To belittle you and say hard truths To break your façade and draw your tears In a clumsy attempt to make you real. You’ve done to me not a single crime but I easily pretend you’ve done everything. I try to believe that hurting you is justice Yet I am powerless to pursue such righteousness I don’t want to feel anything when I look at you. I pursue complete apathy, though I fail every time. You’re not a part of my life so why are you in it? The simple truth is that you aren’t. I don’t deny that the adversary lies within me I know that you are more than a reflection I can warp my concept of you minu...