Tonight, I visited Mayuko’s grave, our grave. I tore another button off my dress, kissed it, and placed it on her headstone. There’s five of them there now. Does that make me a shitty best friend that I’ve only been to visit her five times? It’s not easy to visit someplace that brings you close to someone no longer there. I sat with my back upon the headstone. The grass was dry, but still green. Poor Mayuko. Only one night as a vampire. Not even a full night. Mirela killing her to get at me. I’m so sorry, Button.
If things had worked out for me and Mayuko and we had our planned forever together, I wonder what we would have done tonight. Certainly, we wouldn’t have sat in some empty cemetery. (Unless maybe we had a couple bottles.) What would our household have been like with Mayuko, Rosanna, and myself? Mayuko would have been the meekest, but I could see the two of them deferring to the whims of the other in everything we did.
I told Mayuko all about Vance in the way she had always told me about her men when we still lived in Tokyo and would sit in my coffin together. I asked her if I should pursue him or could I dare hope he would pursue me? Of course, there was no answer other than the wind, and even that was quiet.
I took to the air and descended into Hollywood. I walked around a little and then got on the Red Line or B Line, or whatever it’s called now, and rode the train all by myself, wondering if anyone would harass me, but nobody did and I got off when I reached MacArthur Park. I walked around the lake and was told twice that a little girl shouldn’t be out here this late. Hearing it made me feel more unwanted than endangered. Throughout my wanderings I kept checking my phone for messages but there never were any.
Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
While walking around wondering if I really was empress, it happened—I smelled the wheat-like blood scent of Los Angeles de Sangre. There were two vampires coming my way. A woman and a man. They were well dressed, I think in designer clothes. I could sense their strength, they had hundreds of years between them, but when they sensed me, and we made eye contact, I knew they knew they were no match for me. Our paths converged right in front of a street vendor selling elotes.
For some moments, we stood silent before each other until the man finally said, “You are La Ni?ita, the leader.”
The first person to call me that, a scarlet haired vampire named Triana, I had killed, making our war with Los Angeles de Sangre more vehement. “The Little Girl.” Did that name stick? Is that what their coven called me? I didn’t know if I should answer to it or intimidate them and tell them to never call me that again. Was the diminutive insulting? My Spanish isn’t good enough for me to know. I thought of answering, “I’m the Empress Solodnikova,” but that felt like I had something to prove. Maybe I do. I was taking too long to answer and I could feel the tension rising.
“We are at peace,” I said, not addressing the nickname. I extended my hand to them and each of them took it, both bowing their heads as they did. I nodded in return.
In my periphery, I noticed the elote vendor watching us, wondering why these adults were showing so much deference to a little girl. I turned to him and said, “Tres, por favor,” my accent terrible. The Blood Angels tried to pay, but I insisted. And then we stood there on the sidewalk eating elotes together not knowing what to say. All kernels and fangs. When we finished eating, we gestured goodbye and continued on our separate ways. I didn’t even get their names, but I won’t forget their faces. Of course neither of them were Vanessa. If one of them were, this would have been a much different entry. And it would have ruined the solemnity of the moment, if you could call it solemnity, had I asked if they knew her and whether or not she was a bitch.
https://patreon.com/rt! There, you’ll find lots of bonus content not available anywhere else!
https://blackwaxvampire.com!
