Woman King Page 13

  William greeted a security guard sitting on the other side of the doorway and then guided me along a short hallway to another door. He continued to hold my hand as he led us into a small dressing room. Inside I found his band mates lounging on a couch. They were both smoking; a bottle of Jack Daniel’s with three glasses stacked next to it sat on the table in front of them.

  “Cat and Jack, this is Olivia,” William said, pouring whisky into a glass. His band mates both nodded and said hello as if they had been expecting me to show up at anytime. In fact, I could tell from their emotions that they were not the least bit surprised to see me. I was flattered, but unsure if their feelings meant he wanted to see or me, or knew eventually I’d come looking for him. William passed the bottle to Cat and then took a sip from the glass in his hand. I must have looked surprised, because William turned to me and said, “I can drink alcohol and have been known to eat lightly from time to time.”

  I nodded, taking the glass from him when he offered. I took a sip of the bourbon and immediately began to cough. I don’t usually drink hard alcohol without something mixed in. William laughed.

  “A tenderfoot, I see. We’ll go find you a girl drink at the bar.” He grabbed my hand again and we retraced our steps through the same set of hallways and doors. When we arrived at the bar, William was greeted by name and I soon had a rum and diet coke with lime in my hand. We were standing side-by-side at the bar. He’d ordered another shot of Jack and was slowly sipping his drink while gazing out at the stage.

  “I have to go on in a few minutes,” he said. “Will you stay until I’m finished?”

  I turned and laughed. “I think the better question is, will you? You have a habit of disappearing.”

  William took my hand and focused his dark green eyes on mine. “I don’t plan on disappearing again.” And with that, he bowed slightly at the waist, and turned to walk onto the stage. Not long after, Cat and Jack joined him and, gracefully, they launched into a set similar to the one I had heard in the park. This time, though, I really listened to the lyrics.

  I was born more than 100 years ago.

  I am one of the oldest souls you’ll ever come to know.

  It turned out that William was also a songwriter. Who knew vampires had so many talents? It was one of the few details I knew about him. He, on the other hand, knew a great deal more about me. I guessed that was probably not an accident. When you live so long, you have to keep yourself hidden from view. At some point people must notice you never grow old, or that you never eat food.

  Yet after everything I had seen and done during the last few weeks, I was beginning to realize that most humans noticed very little. As long as their paychecks arrived and their cable television worked, they were happy to live very limited lives. It worried me that I lived in a country full of people who could be made content so easily. I suppose that’s why the Council exists, because humans are content with their ignorance.

  I managed to drift off, lost in my thoughts. After a few moments I caught myself and when I glanced up, I saw that William was watching me. For the remainder of his set I focused on his performance, appreciating his skill with a guitar. He seemed to be able to make his instrument ache with sadness, and I knew without a doubt that William Ferrell had seen his share of misery. Twenty minutes later, they finished their set and were quickly besieged by friends and fans. I stayed back at the bar, unsure of my place, but it wasn’t long before William separated himself from the crowd and walked over to me.

  “Don’t you want to stay with your friends?” I asked.

  He shook his head. “They’re not my friends.”

  “So what should we do now?” I asked, feeling a little like I was back in junior high.

  “Now we get out of here,” he said, grabbing my hand. We packed up his guitar and banjo and said goodnight to his band. Once again, they did not seem at all surprised to see me leave with him.

  “Did you know you would see me again?” I asked, hating myself for needing to know.

  “Yes.”

  “Did you expect me to come find you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why didn’t you come find me?” I asked, feeling like I was doing all the work.

  “How do you know I didn’t?” he said.

  “Did you stay away because of Elsa?”

  “I know enough to stay out of her way. Let’s put it like that.”

  “So what changed your mind?”

  “Nothing. I am playing with fire, just like you are.” He said. “I wanted to make sure you had the courage to try. This life is not for the faint of heart.”

  We walked outside with his gear and strolled round the block. There, parked on a nearby street, was a brand new black Subaru wagon. I laughed.

  “You were expecting a black horse maybe,” he said sharply. “I’m not a character in a novel, Olivia. I live in this world, just as you do.”

  “Ouch,” I said, laying my hand over my heart. “I laughed because it seems like such a practical car. I was expecting something more rebellious. Like a motorcycle.”

  “A motorcycle,” he said. “Darlin, those things will kill you.”

  I laughed, once again reminded of how much I liked his sense of humor. He unlocked the car and opened the passenger door so I could climb in. I realized I had no idea where we were going, but I could wait to find out.

  Moments later, after passing through the Castro and past Dolores Park, we were pulling into the driveway of a lovely Victorian home on the edge of the Mission. William pressed the button on an opener fastened to the sunshade of his wagon and pulled inside the garage. From there he led me up a set of stairs.

  William lived in a very old, well-restored two-story home. As we reached the top of the stairs, we faced a small living room with a fireplace. The room was decorated just the way I would have done it myself: a combination of old and new, a bohemian mix of deer antlers, wooden antique furniture, and a smidgen of modern touches that respected the age of the house.

  “Can I have a tour?”

  William nodded and walked me from room to room. Next door to the living room was another small room that had been converted into a library. Floor-to-ceiling bookshelves lined the walls. A brilliant red-and-orange antique Afghan carpet covered the wooden floors, which looked to be the home’s original planks. In one corner of the library sat a chocolate brown leather chair with a brass library lamp leaning over its arm. The shelves were neatly arranged, but I could see that William had been collecting books for decades.

  There were first editions of Hemingway and Fitzgerald. I spied several biographies of Winston Churchill as well as an entire section of poetry by T.S. Elliott. For a reader like myself, it was mesmerizing, and I must have looked intrigued because William broke the silence with an offer to let me borrow anything that interested me.

  From there, we toured the rest of the house. There were two bedrooms on the main level, both decorated to look like guest rooms. On the floor above, there was a large loft space with an enormous round bay window in the center of the room, and surprisingly, several skylights had been cut into the ceiling. There were lovely blackout shades made from a rich fabric bolted into the skylights. But for now, because it was evening, the blinds were open, leaving us a clear view of the full moon in the night sky. There was no bed in the room, just an old drafting table that had been converted to a desk. There were more bold rugs on the floor, and a set of leather chairs that looked to be companions to the one in the library.

  The most striking aspect of the room was the collection of guitars and banjos on display. He had at least five acoustic guitars sitting on stands in the room, as well as three or four more banjos, also on stands. A brand new Denon turntable on a small table sat next to the instruments. A series of storage racks with hundreds of vinyl albums was nearby. Like his library, William’s taste in music looked to be varied and wide-ranging. John Coltrane, Zeppelin, and Willie Nelson were sitting side-by-side, along with Serge Gainsbourg, the Jam, and the Cla
sh. I smiled inwardly at the depth and variety. This was clearly the room where William spent most of his time. The space was full of his calm energy and it was obvious to see from the design that he did everything in his power to create and maintain that sense of peace.

  We walked back downstairs and into a kitchen that could have passed muster with any editor at Sunset magazine. The sunken white porcelain sink and 6-burner Wolf range complemented the large stainless steel refrigerator, which most likely would be empty.

  “Cook many big meals?” I teased.

  “As you know, I am not much of an eater,” he drawled back. “I have a small property management business, and over the years, I have acquired a few investment properties in San Francisco and other cities. One day I might sell or rent this house. It will be more valuable with a working kitchen.”

  “I can’t imagine ever wanting to leave here,” I said, thinking of the beautiful home my grandmother had given me. “I have a nice old house, too. My grandmother left it to me in her will. I hope to live in it until I …” I was about to say more, but then I stopped.

  “It’s OK,” William coaxed. “You want to stay in the house until you die. You are human, Olivia. You can discuss your life in a normal way.”

  “I didn’t want to seem insensitive. I have no idea how you feel about being a vampire.”

  “Living forever has many advantages,” William remarked thoughtfully. “I have amassed a lot of interesting objects and wealth. But there are moments when time does drag on.”

  “Are you going to tell me how you became a vampire?” I asked, hoping there was a bottle of wine and a fireplace in my future. I must have pushed that wish out very strongly because William immediately followed up with “red or white?” I chose red, a lovely 2008 Pinot Noir from the Russian River, and we went back to the living room to sit down.

  “The fireplace doesn’t work,” William said. “And now there are so many laws about when you can burn wood that I have not bothered to have it repaired. The last thing I need is someone knocking on my door to cite me for burning wood.”

  We sat down on a very comfortable chocolate brown leather couch—I was beginning to detect a theme in his tastes—and he poured us both a glass of wine. I was using all of my self-control not to blurt out the long list of questions I had for him: How old are you? Where are you from? How did you come to live in San Francisco?

  I was sitting at one end of the couch, using the corner as a sort of brace. I had no idea what to do. Should I sit closer to him? Should I stay away? Was it hard for him to be around a human and not want to drink their blood? My mind, I was beginning to realize, gave off strong signals to those who knew enough to pay attention. I was hoping he would say something before I burst with pent up anticipation.

  “My goodness, you are having a go of it over there,” he said. “Try to relax, Olivia. I promise to tell you everything you want to know, but first I want something from you. If we’re going to do this, share our secrets, then I want something from you in return.”

  “What do you want?”

  “I want a kiss,” he said smiling. “You and I, we’re making a deal of sorts…and I want a kiss to seal the bargain that we will keep each other’s secrets.”

  A kiss? How dangerous could that be? In my short but intense training in magic 101, I’d never heard of a kiss being any sort of binding contract. If you discounted the fact that I was agreeing to kiss a man who appeared to have been dead for more than a century, while sitting alone in his living room, with no way to get myself out, or drive myself home, then yes, the request seemed rather harmless.

  “OK,” I said.

  “OK?” William replied.

  “What do you want me to say?”

  He looked slightly wounded. “Madam, I have kissed other women before and usually they have shown a little more enthusiasm.”

  It turned out that even the undead have egos, but I was more willing to ease his mind. “I have not stopped thinking about you since the moment you kissed me in the park,” I said, taking a sip of wine for courage. “It’s possible that I am being quite irresponsible, but of course I want to kiss you. I want to do much more than that. But at the same time, I feel that I’m completely out of my depth. You have to admit this is all a little out of the ordinary.”

  “No, darlin. I don’t think so,” he said. “That’s not the way I see it. I am a man who wants to kiss a pretty woman, and that is something that hasn’t changed since the dawn of time.”

  And then in a blink of an eye he was right next to me, kissing me again in that way that made my lips feel like they would catch fire. This time, though, I was prepared and I kissed him back with equal intensity. His lips were cool to the touch, which was initially a bit disconcerting, but as I grew hotter, the coolness was soothing.

  As we continued kissing, his hands explored my back and made tentative advances toward the front. I felt more than ready for him to slip his hand under my shirt. I had been exploring his body, marveling it how lean and hard it felt. I was certain he could pick up on my thoughts and I reached to unbutton his flannel shirt.

  William pulled back from my advance. “Olivia, you are a handful,” he said, making a noise that almost sounded like the exhaling of breath. “There is no rush. I haven’t even told you my story yet. There will be plenty of time for us to get to know each other better. Besides, taking a vampire lover is a complicated business, and you may want to know more before you sign up for that responsibility.”

  Honestly, I would have signed over the deed to my house at that point. I was so aroused, it took a few moments for his words to even register in my brain. I have never much good at delayed gratification; it is one of my weaknesses.

  Still, he had a point. I didn’t know anything about taking a vampire as a lover, but honest to God, at that moment, nothing sounded better. Then I thought of Elsa and her reaction if she believed I’d slept with William. Reluctantly, I came back to Earth.

  “OK,” I said, taking his hand. “You’re right. And I do want to hear your story.” William poured us both more wine and began to speak.

  “You know my name is William Ferrell. My full name is William Aubrey Ferrell. I was born in Tullahoma, Tennessee in 1830. My father was a farmer who left South Carolina and took work with the railroad. I was one of six brothers and sisters. As you can imagine, we were pretty poor. We had some land to grow our food and raise a few chickens, but it was a difficult life. I was born in the house we lived in. When I grew older, I trained as a carpenter and made decent money for the family making furniture and repairing things for the people in our village.

  “I started playing music when I was a child,” he continued. “There was a man in town with a guitar and he taught me how to play in the spare moments when I wasn’t helping my mother tend to my brothers and sisters. I made my first guitar myself out of some extra wood I was given for a job. I carried that guitar with me everywhere. In fact, it was with me in Louisiana when I died.”

  Once again I heard William make a noise that sounded similar to breathing. He was occupied with the past now, and I could feel his emotions becoming more intense. “When the war broke out, there was no question whose side I would be on. I served in the nineteenth Tennessee Infantry. By then, I had moved to Knoxville, where there was more work. I joined in the spring of 1861.”

  While I found his story captivating, I was also doing the math in my head. We were sitting in William’s living room in late September of 2011, which meant I was sharing a couch with a 181 year-old vampire. There was no doubt, I mused silently, that I was making the moves on a much older man.

  “One year later I was dead,” William continued. “I died in Louisiana at the Battle of Baton Rouge.”

  “You don’t have to tell me any more,” I said taking his hand in mine. “At least not tonight.”

  “Actually I’m fine,” he said, looking intently at me with his mossy green eyes. “I haven’t told anyone the story of my life for a very long time. Truthf
ully, it’s nice that you want to know.”

  “I do, very much,” I said.

  “So, we were in Baton Rouge. We had started with 1,000 strong men, but by the time we arrived, there were barely 100 healthy souls remaining in the division. We arrived with no tents and little gear. Many of the men had neither coat nor shoes. Imagine, walking for days on end, your feet bloody and raw. There was no food, and our bellies ached with hunger. Many were ill with dysentery. The filth and disease were overwhelming. The horror of watching your brothers, cousins and friends killed or maimed. I think for some it was probably a blessing to be killed.

  “Did you feel that way?”

  William shook his head. “No. After all the death and destruction I’d seen, I didn’t care much about winning or honor, but I didn’t want to die. I wanted to survive and go back home to my family.”

  “Did you? Survive the war?”

  “Sadly, no,” William replied. “I remember the day of the battle very clearly. It was very humid and also foggy. The air was heavy and wet and I couldn’t make out the landscape beyond my feet. It was a bloodbath; almost five hundred men were killed on the battlefield, out of two thousand, maybe three thousand soldiers. I remember lying on the ground, listening to the screams of the wounded, while civilians from town ran their hands through my pockets looking for valuables. There I was, 32 years old, miles away from my family, and I had never even kissed a girl.”

  “Wait. What do you mean, you’d never kissed a girl?”

  William chuckled. “Women were not quite so fast as they are today. And I was too shy to say anything. And then there was the fact that I was too poor to offer for a lady’s hand anyway. What would I have given her? I had barely enough money for the roof over my head. In those days there were few women from good families who would have consented to marry me.”

  It was a shocking story, but did make sense. It also made my kisses all the more intriguing. “I guess you learned to kiss after you became a vampire,” I said, hoping for more of his story.