The Nightlife: New York - Chapter 16

He arose without a word to Michelle. He had been sleeping on the floor in silent protest. She remained in bed. She didn’t say a word when he left, exiting via the fire escape.

He had to get out. Just go, walk, somewhere, anywhere away from her. Every second of every minute, every waking moment she was there. In his thoughts, in his face, the smell of her saturated every corner of the apartment. He couldn’t get rid of her scent on his clothes, on his skin, in his blood. You are blood of my blood. She owned him. He was marked. He couldn’t go anywhere or do anything without her being there, holding his fucking hand.

He marched down the alley way, hoping to burn off some steam, put some distance between them. His temper flared to the point that he burned to lash out in violence. Every word and gesture from her over the past four nights seemed to have double meanings, mocking him and his subservience to her.

This need for violence and confrontation was new to him. He’d never felt such fury and frustration. It was a raging passionate fire threatening to overtake him. He had to cool off before he ended up going after Michelle. He had no illusions about how that would turn out. She’d kill him.

He jogged down the alley moving through the back streets. He stayed to the dark recesses of the city, purposely avoiding people. Wandering aimlessly, he passed into one of the seedier areas of New York. This was a place he would never normally walk, especially not in the darkness of night. The new and improved Aaron was unconcerned. He feared no one––apart from Michelle.

He tried to stop dwelling on the negative, but his mind continued to find things to make him angry, worsening his mood. His problem stemmed from one inescapable source: Michelle. No matter how far he walked she was there at the edge of his mind, connected, waiting, judging him unjustly.

After some introspection he recognized what the true problem was. Her power over him governed not only his physical body, but his soul as well. No matter that she treated him like a dog to be punished, he still loved her. His heart wouldn’t listen to reason. He needed to be near her like he needed air to breathe.

Deep in his soul search, meandering through the night, he landed himself in the middle of a group that didn’t want to let him pass. They were big, black, tattooed, and not the least bit happy to see him in their neighborhood. A quick scan of their minds revealed they were looking forward to some entertainment at his expense.

By the time he came to his senses, he was surrounded by five men who looked like they spent more time in jail than out on the street. Their pants hung low at the waist, boxer shorts exposed. He read their immediate interest in him. They saw him as an easy mark with cash, credit cards, or something of value.

The one on his right in a NY Jets hat yelled loudly to his companions, “This 8 Mile motherfucker must be lost.” He turned to Aaron, up in his face, pointing at him. “Take a wrong turn at the Nascar races? Don’t you know where the fuck you at?” Dark laughter spread all around him––not a happy sound.

Aaron glanced at his surroundings. An old newspaper blew across the filthy street to land up against the abandoned remains of what once was a diner. The roof of the building was mostly gone, windows boarded up. Across the street, another group of shady-looking dudes hugged the shadows outside a strip club advertising dancers every night. Farther down the street stood a liquor store with barred doors and windows. He recognized the neighborhood from news reports of gangland violence. He was near the Bronx River in the industrial wasteland of Hunt’s Point. Walls covered in graffiti, he’d walked into the middle of one of the worst areas of NYC Nightlife.

Shit.

He knew he was facing the men who ruled this street. “Fuck!” Aaron cursed under his breath as they closed in around him, cutting off his escape.

The guy directly in front wore a black hoodie––the biggest of the lot at three hundred plus pounds of muscle and bad attitude. He stepped towards Aaron with a wicked scowl that left no doubt of his intentions. The thug growled down at Aaron from his six-foot height. “What you got in your pockets?” The guy had the attitude of one who took what he wanted, when he wanted, from whoever.

Aaron stepped back. “Hey, I’ll go my way, you go yours. I don’t want any problems.” He looked around, but no one moved to let him pass. “You really don’t want to do this.” Aggression built in his bones and he started to growl.

The guy to the left in a NY Giants coat grabbed Aaron by his arm. “You getting salty, bitch? You the only problem here!”

Aaron reacted instinctively, snapping his arm out to break the hold. He connected hard against the man’s chest, a crack-crunch sound. The gangster’s entire body flew backwards several feet, and he landed on his butt, wheezing in pain. The excessive force of Aaron’s whip-like reaction surprised him as much as it did the guy he hit.

“Get that motherfucker!” yelled the guy with French-braided hair. Aaron’s unchecked aggression triggered a free-for-all.

The call to attack punched an adrenaline surge through Aaron. A wildly exhilarating sense of power filled him, a limitless strength and energy. He easily evaded several blows, his movements much faster by magnitudes. He now understood what Michelle meant, people will be like slow motion, turtles.

As they closed in on him, he had no space left to dodge their strikes, and two of them grabbed his arms. A solid blow struck him in the back of the head and his frustration mounted. His desire to lash out and smash these frail meatsacks caught hold, and he roared in rage, whipping in a full circle. He broke their grip on him and jerked two of the men off balance. They flew through the air, then scraped and tumbled across the ground.

Cool. He took a moment to watch their bodies roll to a complete stop.

He instinctively sensed the others coming back at him from all directions. He spun again and lashed out with his fists in wild haymaker swings, connecting with three men in a split second. His blows seemed to have an exaggerated effect. Each thug was sent tumbling away, one flipping end over end through the air. They were rag dolls, tossed aside with no real effort.

The two remaining thugs that escaped his spin move came in from the front and right simultaneously. The man on the right reached him first. With an open-handed shove, Aaron sent him flying back through the air. The man sprawled on his back across the pavement, back of his skull cracked on the asphalt. Not getting up any time soon.

Aaron stared in fascination at the powerful effect of a one-handed push. As he gawked, the man in front of him dropped low and hit Aaron squarely in a wrestler’s tackle. His attention snapped into focus. He instinctively twisted with his legs splayed out wide for balance. Then he pivoted, flung the attacker out to his side, and shoved hard with both hands. The man went flying through the air to land on the pavement face first with a crunchy thud.

He looked around him to find five men down on the pavement, hurting. Instinct drove him to fight to the death, to crush and slash their feeble bodies to pieces. Drink them all dry. He tasted the scents of their blood, fear, and adrenaline. They smelled like food.

He shook his head in attempt to break the powerful bloodlust desire surging through him. His fangs extended fully, mouth wet with venom, ready to feast. He could kill them all right now. Drain liters of blood in seconds. He’d be gone before one of the men outside the strip club could finish dialing 911. So tempting. So easy. No one would know who did it. No one could identify him in this dark, shadowy corner of the street. Perfect opportunity for a few quick kills.

He fought with himself, an internal battle of wills against an urge so powerful he could barely contain it. He growled and snarled, looking back and forth at these slow moving cattle, struggling with the compulsion to rend and tear something meaty. He made the snap decision and redirected his energy into flight, racing back towards home. In his hurry to escape before he killed someone, he knocked down a man in his path who’d just regained his feet. He bowled the man over and heard the crackle-snap of bones breaking. They were limp flesh against Aaron’s charging force. Five of them had been no match.

He sped down the streets, heading in the direction of home. His powerful bloodlust burned, calling him to smash and rip flesh. He began hunting new prey. Several heartbeats thumped nearby, ripe for tapping. He sensed all that wonderful juicy goodness begging to be slurped down. Reason reasserted in his mind, and he realized what he was doing as he stalked a man and woman crouched in the alley with their smoking crack pipe. He barely stopped himself at the last moment, running off down the alley in the other direction.

Though he wanted to go home, get off the streets for a few minutes, away from the food stench of people, he couldn’t return to Michelle with this tension singing through his body. He stopped in the alley two blocks from home seeking a target for his aggression. The only thing he found was a steel dumpster sitting against the concrete wall of the alley.

He glanced around to verify there were no witnesses. Alone and burning with a need to destroy something, someone, he funneled all his aggression into that ugly, squatting steel dumpster. He hit it full bore, holding nothing back. He smashed it over and over with his fists, screaming in rage, frustration, and unfulfilled hunger. Each strike left behind a crumpled mess of indentations. As he collapsed the front side of the dumpster, he moved to the left, smashing inward with a barrage of hook punches on each side of the corner until it was so misshapen it no longer resembled a rectangle. The lid popped up at a twisted angle. The steel box had caved inward like a crushed beer can. The mangled dumpster testified to the intensity of his frustration. The green-painted metal absorbed Aaron’s force far better than the unfortunate men he’d left broken on the streets.

Knuckles abraded and raw, sliced open, he watched the damage to his hands knit back together right before his eyes. He stared in creeped-out fascination as his knuckles healed up to little pink welts in a matter of minutes. A few minutes more and the flesh had completely rejoined over the cuts, leaving only a slight raw spot as evidence of his tantrum. The miracle of vampiric regeneration captured his attention long enough to calm him down. He regained some badly needed serenity. Finally, he headed home to spend another night under his master’s control.

The dumpster workout session satisfied his desires to lash out. Mostly. His concern now was that Michelle might learn of his misadventures in the streets, become a new point of contention between them. He focused on slowing down his breathing and closed his mind securely within his vault prior to entering the apartment. As he slipped through the window from the fire escape, he knew Michelle sensed his tension, but wasn’t aware of the new reason.

“Are you ready to talk about this problème?” She attempted to make an opening.

He kept his mouth shut, not wanting to betray his actions to her, but a sliver of irritation slipped through his mental vault. Bullshit, she knew exactly what was wrong … her. Despite this spike of emotion he answered coldly, “I’m fine. Everything’s fine … are we going to feed soon?”

He was hungry for blood. The sooner they fed the better.

He monitored her thoughts closely as Michelle considered pressuring him to draw out the unspoken issues between them. He read her concern, she worried he was too edgy, volatile. She let it go, for now. “Oui, another night club. You need more practice with control. Get dressed. I will be ready soon.”

He didn’t respond. Instead he sat at the table and surfed through web pages on Michelle’s laptop, trying to fill the empty spaces until she was ready to leave. Beyond the need to feed, he had no excitement or anticipation for their outing. Another evening of nightlife tethered to his master.