Long Enough

​

Dimitri knew that he wasn’t being paranoid. He was sure of it. For the past three weeks, he had felt someone’s eyes whenever he turned his head. Someone was watching him.

​

He was sure of it.

​

Tybalt was of no help. “I dunno, man,” he had said, smashing a button on his keyboard in a frenzy. “I mean, you’re attractive, for sure. But nobody would stalk you, or anything. Who has that kind of time?”

​

Dimitri heaved another frustrated sigh, rubbing his brow. “I understand that, thank you very much, but I can’t get rid of this… feeling. I know that it’s unreasonable, but knowing that doesn’t alleviate my concerns.”

​

“Don’t know what to tell you,” Tybalt said, and turned his attention back to his video game. “Besides, even if someone is out to get you, it’s not like you can die, right? No harm— ” he made one last aggressive pound on his keyboard, and turned his blank stare to Dimitri. “— no harm done."

​

“Unlike you, if I want to stay alive, I have to not get killed.”

​

After a few moments of pressing silence, Dimitri stood and made for the door.

​

“I’m going out.”

 

***

​

Anxiety gnawed at Dimitri’s stomach, setting him on edge. Although it had been several years since last it happened, he caved.

​

The girl at the counter was as polite as she could be, but she looked exhausted, as though she would rather be anywhere other than working at a run-down drugstore on a chilly Sunday night. “Can I see your ID, please?” she said, and he passed it over silently. After checking the year, she looked at him in askance. “Looking pretty good for what, forty-three? Forty-four?”

​

Dimitri gave a withering smile. “I get that a lot.”

​

The girl passed the ID back over, moving to unlock the plexiglass case behind her. “Man, I’d kill to have skin like that. But ‘m kinda surprised you’d have such nice skin, with smoking, ‘n all.”

​

“I don’t smoke, really.” He was quiet for a few moments. “It’s been more than a decade since I quit.”

​

The girl hesitated, turning back around. “Do you really want me to… Since you quit ‘n all, do you really wanna get started again? I can tell you not to, if you want. There’s a couple of guys— well, people, who come in once in a while and I grab ‘em something different like a magazine or—”

 

“No, thank you. I just—” Dimitri’s voice had begun shaking; he took a breath to compose himself. “I don’t think it’ll become a habit.”

 

The girl studied his face for a few seconds, then shrugged. “Next time. You got a brand you like?”

 

“Do they still make Lucky Strikes?”

 

She raised an eyebrow. “Never heard of those.”

 

“What about Viceroy? Wings?” The girl shook her head. “That one on the end, then. In the blue box. One of those lighters, too.”

​

The rest of the exchange was silent, save the girl’s reading of the price. When he pushed the door open, she called from the counter, “See you ‘round.”

​

***

​

I’m getting back into all of my old habits, Dimitri thought as he made his way towards the docks.

 

The paranoid feeling was back again, prickling at the back of his neck. He hoped whatever was following him had left the girl at the drugstore alone; she seemed kind, if chatty. He couldn’t feel the cold, but still, he shivered.

 

He sat at the edge of an old dock that had undoubtedly seen better days; it was green, and pieces of wood had rotted and fallen through to the murky water below. The end of it had almost entirely given way, with only the posts still standing tall, the rest having sagged and broken over time.

 

Dimitri couldn’t help but think about the last few times he had been to this exact same dock— when it had been new, he recalled, it had been painted dark blue. In some areas, he could still see the barest flecks of blue mixed in with algae and other bits of sea debris. If he hadn’t been there, he thought, he probably wouldn’t be able to tell that it had been a different color at all.

​

He had seen so many different eras, so many different lifetimes. When he fished in his pocket for his newly bought pack of cigarettes, all he could think about was the young woman he had met at a speakeasy, a glass of heaven in her fingers, a cigarette between her lips. She would die from lung cancer before she turned forty. When he found his newly bought lighter, he thought of the young pyrotechnician adding color to fireworks; he was caught in a brilliant, multi-colored explosion that killed him instantly.

​

He put the cigarette to his lips, letting it hang between his teeth as he lit the end. He took a long, slow drag, letting the fumes fill his lungs— it wasn’t like he needed oxygen, after all.

​

The tendrils of smoke billowed and curled around him when he exhaled, blending into the fog rolling along the surface of the water below his feet. Everything was cold, bleak, and bleary, just as it had been when a luxury ship, famed for its impenetrability, had run into an iceberg. The next morning, he had fished the dead body of a little boy, no more than twelve, out of the water. When they reached land again, he was buried without a name.

​

So many lives had passed before his eyes, and though he almost felt selfish for thinking it, he hoped he would see many more before his life came to an end.

​

He had lived for hundreds of years already, hadn’t he? Wouldn’t most people want to die after having lost everyone important to them over and over again? He wasn’t sure if his desire to live was cowardice or something— someone— different.

​

He had first met Tybalt centuries ago, before he had been turned. He had been a child, no more than ten, and he hadn’t known that his parents’ new gardener would be so… Pushy.

​

“I would always rather be happy than dignified,” Tybalt had said with a smile. He stood underneath the marble balcony, the light of the setting sun casting an orange glow on his face.

​

“If keeping your dignity means you can’t have fun, then what is the point in keeping your dignity about you?” Tybalt restated his point. “Even if it’s for commoners, I think you would enjoy the festival.”

“It’s not that simple,” Dimitri told him. “My mother would be so upset if she found out I went, and my father would be furious.”

​

“Why?”

“Because—” Dimitri burst. “It’s just not done! If I did, and someone knew, I would shame my entire family! The hooligan son of the Kashin family!”
“Shouldn’t a child be a hooligan every once in a while? Let loose, learn a little?”

​

At the time, Dimitri was sure that Tybalt was the strangest person he had ever met— how could a grown man possibly forsake proper decorum? While the thought of sneaking out was tempting, Dimitri understood that some things just weren’t done.

​

He hadn’t gone out that night. Tybalt kept trying for years and years until he left the Kashin family’s estate, for fear others would notice his lack of age. The next time their paths crossed was long after Dimitri had all but forgotten Tybalt— but even then, “The Pushy Gardener” wasn’t Tybalt until they sorted things out much later and had a good laugh.

​

The next time they met, Dimitri found Tybalt sprawled over the jagged rocks lining the bottom of a cliff, sobbing miserably after another failed suicide attempt.

​

Dimitri knew that Tybalt had tried to take his life again and again over the centuries— millennia?— that he had been living. He had said that there were times where he felt as though he didn’t exist, that his whole life had just been one great dream. He said that there were times where even though he was surrounded by people, he had never felt so impossibly lonely.

​

He said that when he finally found Dimitri, his life could have a purpose again, now that he had found someone who could understand him.

​

How ironic that that is precisely the reason I am so utterly terrified.

​

Dimitri was midway through his third cigarette when a familiar voice broke him out of his thoughts.

​

“Listen,” the voice said. “You’re not human, are you?”

​

He seized up in shock, his breath catching in his throat.  Slowly, Dimitri turned his head; the girl from the drugstore was standing not far off, her hands stuffed in the pockets of her hoodie.

​

“What makes you think that?” Was this where his paranoia was coming from?

​

“I’ve been keeping an eye on you.” Was she the source of his anxiety?

​

“If not human, then what could I be?” Dimitri fought to keep his voice steady.

​

“I’m a slayer, so… I guess that makes you a vampire.”

​

He tried to take another drag from the cigarette, but when he tried to bring it to his mouth, his hand was trembling so badly he had to give up, letting it rest between his shaking fingers while he struggled to calm down.

​

The girl took a few steps forward until she was within arm’s reach.

​

“Tell me,” she said. “What about that roommate of yours? Is he a vampire too?”

​

Dimitri couldn’t move. “Please don’t kill me,” he whispered.

​

“Why not? ’m a slayer, it’s what I do. I hunt killers. Are you a killer?”

​

“Please,” he whispered again.

​

“I need more than that.” The girl grabbed the back of his jacket, flinging him back towards the land, and he went skidding along the concrete. He eased himself upright, tenderly rubbing where the concrete left a massive scrape against his cheek. Before he could locate where the girl went, her hand was wrapped in the front of his shirt. “You’re not a fighter. I wanna know why. ’m still human— sorry, bad choice of word. I’m not inhumane. ’m not above showing mercy, even to a vampire. So long as you’re not hurting nobody.”

​

Her words were nothing but noise to the panicked stream of oh god, oh god, oh god running through his head. Dimitri reached up to protect his face, but his arm was snapped back against the ground. He let out a small whimper when he heard the crunch of his fingers.

​

“Ah— whoops.” Dimitri squirmed away from the girl, cradling his hand to his chest. His vision was hazy, distorted by the tears building in his eyes.

 

“Sorry. That one was reflex.” The girl approached again. “Look, man, I can kill you. I want to know why I shouldn’t. You don’t want to die, right?”

​

Please, please, please, please—

​

Dimitri surged forward weakly, flailing his good arm at the girl. She grabbed his outstretched limb and flipped him easily, pinning him to the ground with her knee on his back.

​

“Jesus— just tell me!” She yanked back an arm and pressed her knee further into his back, his ribs bending and creaking under the added force.

​

“If you’re going to kill me, then do it!” His voice cracked and his lips trembled. He was dizzy, and he could feel with the dull throbbing in his body that several bones were broken. “Why must you draw out my suffering? Is it not enough that I’m going to die at the end of it?” He broke down into weak sobs that wracked his already aching chest. “I’m going to die and he’s going to be alone again.”

​

“Who is?” The girl came closer to him again and he flinched, but she didn’t move to hurt him again. “Who’s gonna be alone?” She knelt beside him. “Your roommate? If I kill you, I’ll probably just kill him too, y’know.”

​

Dimitri shook his head. “He—” He choked on his words, but tried again to speak; “He cannot die. I don’t know how or why, but that is what he told me when I first met him, and I spent hundreds of years seeing if it was true. I tried to kill him so many times for nothing but entertainment, and still, every time we met, he would greet me with open arms. I haven’t taken a single life since he took me in; he has let me drink from him for centuries— no matter how desperate I am, he is always willing to provide blood and comfort. He let me live again, and now I am to die and leave him all alone.” Dimitri’s shoulders shook with sobs.

​

The girl looked pensive for a moment, her brows furrowed and lips pressed tight. There was silence between them for a long while before she took one of his hands, ensuring she did not further harm his fractured fingers, and cradled it between hers. “I’m sorry. I think I understand, now. I won’t kill you.” She started at the sound of boisterous, drunken voices nearby. “I’ll find you again. Soon. I'll make this up to you.” Like that, as quickly as she had shown up, she vanished into the mist.

​

It took Dimitri a few long moments for him to realize that she truly was going to let him live, and frantically, as fast as he could considering his injuries, he sought to find his cell phone. Though it was still secure, zipped in an inside pocket of his jacket, there was a long crack that extended the length of the screen— at least, he thought it was one crack. He was dizzy, and to his eyes, there could have been sixteen cracks and it would have appeared just the same. Unfortunately, he didn’t trust his hands to do the work he needed.

​

“C—” he swallowed the blood pooling in his mouth. “Call Tybalt,” he told the phone. After a few rings, Tybalt picked up.

​

“Yeah?” He sounded bored.

​

“Tybalt? Could you please come pick me up?”

​

“Right now?” he was exasperated already. “I’m kind of busy…”

​

“Please, Tybalt, I ran into a slayer. She said she wouldn’t kill me, but I nearly died, so please—”

​

“I think you’re being a bit dramatic, Dimitri.” He could hear the irritation in Tybalt’s voice. “The paranoia thing and now this— not everything is out to get you. Is this an attention thing? Is that what you want?”

​

“No, I—”

​

“If it’s not about attention, then why do you keep harassing me about every little thing?”

​

Dimitri closed his eyes, forcing the wails that clawed at his throat back down into his chest, letting out only a heavy, shuddering breath; he grimaced at the stab of pain it brought to his ribs. He dabbed at the dark, almost violet streak of blood dribbling down his chin.  “I think may be dying.”

​

“Then go die.” Tybalt snapped. “At least you can.”

​

Dimitri felt his heart break.

​