Before The Sunrise

The great Alexei collapsed in a chair staring out at the black sea through the massive half-moon window of his manor. His face was gaunt, vacuum sealed, and his taloned hand supported his tragic head like the skeletal mount of a crystal ball. Far and low on the black horizon, a flicker of sun grayed parts of the eastern sky. He could feel his skin beginning to burn. His phone, that rested on the arm of his big chair, began to ring. He picked it up.

  “Yes?” He answered.

“I have just spoken with Kartlov. He’s told me everything. Draw your curtains and do nothing else until I get there. I am coming up the lane now.”

           “Oh, what’s the point of it, Emily?”

           “Do as I say, Alexei.”

Alexei hung up the phone but made no move to close his curtains. There was now a faint glow in the sky and for the first time since death, he felt heat, like a thousand fire ants on his snowy skin. “Fuck!” he said.

He heard the front door blast open followed by the shrill sounds of a female locomotive. Mrs. Emily Felwood came whirling into the room, screeching at the sight of the open window. She swooped upon on its curtains like a fat and ancient hawk. She proceeded to cover up the blazing wires of sunlight that pierced through the small cracks in the walls. Alexei never looked up but instead remained a tragic statue in the center of the room. When she finished, she plopped herself into the wooden rocking chair across from him.

           “You are lucky I don’t have breath to catch,” she said.  Any woman of her size and age should have been rosy cheeked and heaving, but Emily Felwood was a still, white bubble. “Now,” she said, “what is the meaning of all this nonsense?”

           “It’s all a big nothing,” said Alexei through the palm of his hand.

           “How can you say that? There is so much to go on for.”

           “Would you please come off it, Emily?” Alexei finally craned his vulture head to look at her. She jolted at the sight of him.

           “I’m sure I don’t know what you mean,” she said. Alexei rolled his eyes.

           “You’re telling me you’ve never thought about seeing the sunrise?”

           “Well, sure, from century to century there are times where the taste of blood loses its boldness, but all you need is a new perspective. How old are you again?

           “Two hundred eighty-nine…and seven months.”

           “A young man! Yes, you just need a new perspective. I’m sure of it.”

“And what perspective might that be? We live in the bad half of life, Emily. There is nothing good about the night. There are no laughing children at night, no weddings, no honest happiness.”  Alexei sprawled himself in his big chair. “Oh, how I wish I had blood in my veins so that Prozac could run through them!” Emily Felwood let out an ornithological guffaw.

 Alexei regarded the old hen sourly. “Eternity makes strange bed fellows,” he said.

           “Well, there’s no argument there, but we all agree that eternity would be a lot less bearable without you, Alexei.” She was silent for a moment and then said, “Do not be selfish.”

           “What would you have me do?”

           “I would have you get some rest. Sleep today, and then tonight, take a walk. It always does wonders. But I will have to insist that I stay with you through the day.”

           Alexei grumbled.

           Day passed into night.  Alexie and Emily stood at the front entrance, their silhouettes contrasting in the moonlight. Emily held Alexei’s spidery hands in her own doughy palms.

           “Now,” she said, “take a walk and think about how your eternal absence will affect us all. I simply can’t go through today again.”

           “I am sorry Emily.”

           “I know you are, my dear. Please, enjoy this beautiful night and turn your ashes into rose petals.” She gave a lovely wink and kissed his hand and drifted low across the drive like a three-day old balloon. Her sprawling Rolls Royce ignited and hummed and then wound down the gothic drive out of sight.

           Alexei let out a sigh and plunged his long arms into the deep pockets of his long coat and began to walk. The air was lazy with fog, and it held the scent of wet concrete. The September chill brought with it the promise of dying things.  Alexei reached the end of his drive and turned and walked down the street. He looked into houses as he passed. He could see lobotomized faces glowing blue with television light, some eating take-out, others lying corpselike beside empty bottles of liquor. Alexei shook his head and muttered to himself. He walked through the parkway where childless swings swayed, then over a bridge that he longed to jump from.

His dread had a physical weight to it. Everything was the same; everything was pointless. Even the most trivial task was like a great trial to him, and no one could understand. As he walked, he became convinced that he would watch the sunrise. He would ignite and revel in the nostalgic heat, free himself from the numbness. This determination made him feel more at ease and he continued to walk.  It seemed his feet knew more than his mind where he was heading. At the end of the street, he noticed a quaint nursing home, nestled and neighborly among the houses. He decided he would enjoy one last drink before morning.

Alexei crossed to the building and walked up the stairs. He stood a moment at the entrance. Through the glass doors he could see a small woman sitting at the front desk. He lifted a sharp finger and pecked on the glass. The little woman squinted up at him from behind her horned-framed glasses. Her hand moved somewhere on her desk and then there was an ugly buzz. Alexei opened the door and went in.

           “Good evening,” he said.

           “How can I help you?”

           “I’m looking for your blood bank.”

           “I’m sorry?” She asked. Alexei rolled his eyes and waved his hand across her face. Her eyes went blank.

           “Where is your blood bank?”

           “Second Floor. Room 213A. In the hospice wing,” said the woman robotically.

           Alexei made his way through the building like a shadow. The hallways were dim and beige, and the smell of chemicals and oxidized skin hung in his hooked nostrils. He could see room 213A at the end of the hall. He glided past an open door, and as he did, he heard a faint voice caked in sawdust. “Excuse me,” it said. Alexei didn’t think it was meant for him and kept walking. “You, in the black.” Alexei stopped. He turned and walked slowly back. He stood in the open doorway like a specter.

           “Yes?” Alexei asked.

           “Are you a priest?” The voice came from a fragile hump under the blankets. Alexei stared down at his black robe He thought for a moment.

           “Yes,” he said, “I am.”

           “Can you sit with me father?”

           “I really must—”

           “Please.” Whistled breath and arhythmic beeping filled the silence. Alexei signed and stepped in. He did not know why.

           He sat down next to the bed.  Two eyes peered out at him from under the covers, set deep in an ancient face. Alexei thought about what a priest might say.

           “Tell me your troubles, my son.”

           “I don’t want to die.”

 Alexei almost asked him why not.

           “There are worse things than death.”

           “I know it, and I’ve lived a good life and I am grateful.” The man closed his eyes and tears pressed out down his cheeks. “But I would do anything to live for just a little longer.”  

           “You will walk with god.”

           “Well, father, I’m not I’ve ever believed that.”

           “Oh?”

           “I’ve always thought the promise of afterlife took away from, well, life.”

           Alexei leaned forward in his chair. “Go on,” he said. The man’s lower jaw trembled as he forced the words out.

           “It is the finality of life that gives it it’s richness, I think. If we think there is something better around the corner, we won’t fully appreciate the miracle of being here.” Alexei didn’t disagree. The man was quiet, his eyes reflective. “I served in the pacific, was a prisoner of war in Taiwan towards the end. They fed us beans and kelp. We were starved…” The man smiled. “My body looked about the same as it does now.”

 Alexei couldn’t help a faint smile in return.

The man continued. “Anyway, even though I was a man of science then, and still am now, I prayed to God to give me just one more day. If he did that, I told him I would be grateful. Well, I got years more of life and here I am still hoping for more.” The man stared longingly out the black window. “What I wouldn’t do to run up a hill with my daughter again or hold the next grandchild. Hell, even if they weren’t around, I suppose anything is better than a big dark nothing.”

           “I must ask,” said Alexei, “if you don’t believe in god and heaven, what need did you have for a priest?”

           “I was hoping you could convince me otherwise.” The old man’s murky eyes stared up at the ceiling and he sighed. He raised his hand to wipe his tears. His arms were exploded pens on brown leather. “But” he said, “I know that this is all there is, and I suppose that even if a man had ten lifetimes it wouldn’t be enough.” He turned his wrinkled neck to look directly at Alexei. “You’re a young man.  Live everyday as if you’re gonna end up in this bed…because son, eventually you will. Everyone will.” There was silence, then the man asked, “have you seen the northern lights?” Alexei shook his head. “Have you ever slept in the jungle under a universe of stars?”

           Alexei thought about his 300 years on earth. “No,” he said.

           The man sighed. “I always told myself I would but never did. Never did a lot of things.”

           For the first time Alexei wasn’t thinking about his own sadness. The man reached out and took Alexei’s hand. Alexei recoiled at first, but then let the man take it. He did not know why. When the man touched Alexei’s cold skin he said, “I must be burning up.”

 The two men held hands in silence, one much older than the other, both young in the life of the world. They talked for hours, telling stories of the good times they had and the good times they had hoped to have.

The old man eventually drifted into sleep. Alexei sat for a while longer listening to his peaceful snores.  Alexei unlinked his fingers and left the room. He walked down the hall to the blood bank. He opened the door and went in. He ripped open a bag of AB negative and drank deep. There was a beautiful warmth, cascading vitalization, and bloody tears of joy. Blood regained his flavor.

 He made his way toward the exit, but then stopped. He took one last look into the sleeping man’s room and bowed. He left the nursing home and walked out into a new night: he heard singing nightingales, saw lovers in the night, and basked in the beautiful glow of the blood moon. Alexei decided that the sunrise was too final.