Midnight Grinding (20 page)

The one with the pins in his nose began to howl, brandishing his immortality like some garish tattoo. Then he stopped his bestial laughter when he realized the bullets that were entering his body were not cast of ordinary lead. He screamed as a pattern of penetrating silver stitched across his broad chest, sending him back against the wall. He collapsed, smoking and shriveling, until he was only a heap of naked, gunshot humanity.

“Bastard!” snarled the female werewolf with the violet Mohawk. She surged forward, teeth gnashing, breasts bobbing and swaying like furry pendulums.

Stoker unleashed a three-round burst, obliterating the monster’s head. It staggered shakily across the barroom, hands reaching up and feeling for a head, but only finding a smoking neck stump in its place. The werewolf finally slumped against the jukebox with such force that it began blasting out an old Warren Zevon tune with a boom of bass and tickling of ivory.

“How appropriate,” said Stoker. He swept the barroom at a wide angle, holding the Uzi level with the ten remaining werewolves. One by one, they were speared by the substance they loathed most. The beasts dropped to the saloon’s sawdust floor, writhing and twitching in agony, before growing still.

Lycan leaped the bar, ducking for cover as Stoker swung the machine gun in his direction. Slugs chewed up the woodwork, but nothing more. After a few more seconds of continuous fire, the Uzi’s magazine gave out. Stocker shucked the clip and reached inside his jacket for a fresh one.

That was when Lycan, fully transformed now, sprang over the splintered bartop and tore across the tavern for his intended victim, smashing tables and chairs in his path. “You ain’t gonna make it!” rasped Lycan. It came out more as a garbled snarl than an actual threat.

“Quite the contrary,” Stoker said calmly. He drew a serrated combat knife from his boot and thrust it upward just as Lycan came within reach. The sterling silver blade sank to the hilt beneath the werewolf’s breastbone.

Lycan staggered backward, staring dumbly at the smoking knife in his midsection. He looked at Stoker with bewildered eyes, then fell over stone cold dead, the impact of silver-shock shorting out his bestial brain cells.

Stoker walked over and withdrew the dagger from the wolf’s body, wiping the blade on the fur of Lycan’s vanishing coat. He slipped the weapon back into its sheath and looked toward the bartender, who was peeking over the edge of the bar. “How much do I owe you for damages?”

“No charge,” the man said, pale-faced but happy. “I’ve been trying to keep this mangy riff-raff outta my joint for years.”

Stoker left Apocalypse After Dark and stood outside for a long moment, enjoying the crisp night air and the pale circle of the full moon overhead. Then he noticed Lycan’s pet sitting on the back of the Harley. He walked over to the girl and smiled at her softly. He cupped her chin in his hand. “Poor angel,” he said soothingly, then blessed her with a kiss.

“What a glorious night, don’t you think, my dear?” he asked as he swung aboard the big chopper and stamped on the starter, sending it roaring into life. The woman was silent, but she snuggled closer, wrapping her arms around his waist, and laying her weary head upon his shoulders.

Together they winged their way into the dead of night.

***

Chaney parked his van between a black Trans-Am and a rusty Toyota pickup. He left his vehicle and mounted the steps of the Netherworld Café, a local hangout for the natural and unnatural alike.

He walked in and started down the aisle for the rear of the restaurant. A wispy ghost of a waitress took orders, while a couple of zombie fry-cooks slung hash behind the counter. Chaney waved to a few old acquaintances, then headed for the last booth on the right. Stoker was sitting there, poised and princely as usual. There was a girl, too, wearing Stoker’s bomber jacket and nothing else.

Chaney sat down and ordered the usual. Stoker did the same. They regarded each other in silence for a moment, then Chaney spoke up. “Well, is it done?”

“It is,” nodded Stoker. “And what about you?”

“I kept my end of the bargain.”

“Good,” said Stoker. “Then it’s settled. I get the blood.”

“And I the flesh,” replied Chaney.

They shook on their mutual partnership then, Chaney’s hirsute hand emblazoned with the distinctive mark of the pentagram, while Stoker’s possessed the cold and pale bloodlessness of the undead.

BLOOD SUEDE

SHOES

I love rock and roll. Even after all these years, I still listen to classic rock from the ’60s and ’70s (it all sort of fell flat on its face in the ’80’s, in my opinion). I even listen to it while I’m writing. Total silence equals a blank page to a Southern rocker like myself.

This tale takes place in a different era of rock and roll—the rockabilly period of the 1950s. That nostalgic time that gave us the likes of Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins—and a rowdy, young fella by the name of Rockabilly Reb…

Ruby Paquette was walking home from the big show in Baton Rouge, when the headlights of a car cut through the moonless night. The lights blazed like the luminous eyes of a demon cat, casting a pale glow upon the two-lane highway and the swampy thicket to either side. She turned and regarded the approaching vehicle, squinting against the glare. The car sounded like a predator, too; its big eight-cylinder engine seemed to rumble and roar with an appetite for something more than oil and gasoline.

The crimson ’58 Cadillac began to slow when the headlights revealed her short, dumpy form walking along the gravel shoulder. Ruby turned her back to the headlights and kept going. She stared straight ahead, following her own expanding shadow and the whitewashed borderline beside the highway. As the automobile slowed to a creep and prepared to pull alongside her, Ruby chanced a quick glance over her shoulder. The illusion of a ravenous feline was compounded by the Caddy’s front grillwork. It leered at her with a mouthful of polished chrome fangs.

“Hey, sugar!” called a man’s voice from the convertible. “Can I give you a ride somewhere? Kinda late for a beauty like you to be out all by your lonesome.”

Beauty?
Ruby bristled at the word, especially when it was directed at her. She was no beauty and she knew it. She was just a homely Cajun girl; an overweight, acne-ravaged teenager with limp black hair and jelly-jar eyeglasses. How could the driver of the expensive car have made such a stupid mistake? True, he probably hadn’t seen her face yet, but he didn’t really need to. One glimpse of her squat, elephantine body waddling down the road should have told him that she was certainly no beauty.

“No, thanks,” she called back to him. “I don’t have far to go.” She was aware that the Caddy was almost at a standstill now, inching its way beside her. She twisted her face toward the tangle of swamp beyond the road.
Please, God, just let him drive on,
she thought to herself.
I don’t want him to see how much of a dog I really am.

“Aw, come on, darlin’,” urged the driver. He was right alongside her now. “Let ol’ Reb give you a ride home.”

It was the dawning familiarity of the voice, as well as the mention of his name, that made Ruby’s stomach clench with excitement. She looked around and, yes, it
was
him. It was Rockabilly Reb in the flesh!

“You know who I am, don’t you, sugar?” grinned Reb, flashing that pearly smile that was becoming increasingly famous in the South and beyond.

“Yeah,” said Ruby in bewilderment. “You’re Rockabilly Reb. I saw you at the Louisiana Hayride tonight.”

“And I saw you, too.”

Reb winked at her
—
actually winked at
her—
Rumpy Ruby, as her peers at high school were cruelly fond of calling her.

“Third row, fifth girl to the left…right?” Reb asked.

“Right.” Ruby blushed, feeling the heat of embarrassment blossom in her full cheeks. She stopped walking and stood, wondering if her encounter was actually a dream. She crossed her thick arms and pinched herself through her sweater. No, it was really happening. She was actually talking, face-to-face, with a genuine rockabilly singer.

“Well, how about it, sugar? Gonna let me play the Good Samaritan tonight and give you a lift home? I was heading in that direction anyway.” Reb’s immaculate smile hadn’t faltered in the least. It seemed to be a part of his natural charm.

Ruby looked ahead toward the three miles of swamp that stretched between Baton Rouge and her bayou home, then back to the idling Cadillac and the offer of getting there in style and comfort. What was she going to say
—
“No, thanks, but I’d rather walk?” This was the bad boy of rock and roll
—
the potential heir to the heartthrob throne left empty after Elvis Presley had been unexpectedly drafted into the army earlier that year. Her mother was forever drumming the rule of never riding with strangers into her mind, but to pass up such a golden opportunity would be pure madness. It wasn’t every day that a chubby wallflower got the chance to cruise with a certified superstar.

“Okay,” she said. Ruby opened the passenger door of the car and climbed inside. The seats were smooth, crimson leather, as was the rest of the interior. From the rearview mirror dangled a set of fuzzy dice, jet-black with bright red spots like tiny eyes peeking through the dark fur. She settled onto the seat next to the driver, feeling the coolness of the upholstery against the back of her thighs. That, along with the thrumming vibration of the Caddy’s big engine, sparked a naughty sensation deep down inside her—the same sensation of arousal that she got at night, when she lay awake in her bed and thought about Will Knox, the high school quarterback, and the time she had passed the boys’ locker room and caught a fleeting glimpse of him, completely naked, just before the door shut.

“Ready to go?” asked Rockabilly Reb.

“Sure,” said Ruby. “There’s a turnoff about a mile down the road. I live a couple of miles back in the swamp there.”

Reb nodded and sent the big convertible roaring down the highway. The singer flashed a glance at his young passenger. “So, you’re a bobby-soxer, are you?”

Ruby’s face turned beet red. She looked down at her clothes: navy blue sweater and skirt, monogrammed white blouse, white ankle socks, and sneakers. She knew the outfit looked silly, especially on a fat cow like her. “No,” she blurted self-consciously, “I just dress like this when I go to a show.”

Reb flashed another smile that turned her heart to jelly. “So you’re just a rock and roll beauty, eh?”

Again, that twinge of bitter anger. “Why do you keep calling me that? I’m not pretty at all. Are you making fun of me or something?”

The singer shook his head. “Why, I’d never do a thing like that, darlin’. I wouldn’t hurt one of my fans for anything in the world. True, you may not be a Marilyn Monroe or a Jayne Mansfield, but you do have your own inner beauty. You know how a candy bar looks like a dog turd when you tear off the wrapper? It doesn’t look very appetizing at all, does it? But when you bite into it, it’s just as delicious as can be. That’s how some girls are. They ain’t so pretty on the outside, but underneath they’re honest-to-goodness beauties.”

Reb’s simple explanation put Ruby at ease. She pushed her shyness aside for a moment and studied the man sitting next to her. He looked a little different than he did up on that stage surrounded by klieg lights and a blaring sound system. Up there he looked like a wild Adonis, clad in sparkling red, white, and blue. But here in the car, Reb seemed less glamorous and more than a little exhausted. His bleached-blond hair looked frizzled and lank, like corn silk that had withered beneath a hot August sun. His lean face seemed pale and lined with the weariness of long, sleepless miles on the road. Even his trademark costume had seen better days. Up close, the rhinestone coat with a rebel flag emblazoned on the back seemed dull and lackluster. And his red suede shoes
—
the opposite of Carl Perkins’ famed blue ones
—
looked scuffed and rusty, like blood that had congealed and dried to an ugly brown crust.

Thunder rumbled in the dense clouds overhead and a few drops of rain began to hit them. “Looks like we’re in for a real downpour,” Reb said. He pushed a button on the Caddy’s dash and the top began to unfold behind the backseat and rise slowly over them. By the time Reb fastened the clips to the top of the windshield, the bottom fell out. Great sheets of water crashed earthward, drenching southern Louisiana with their wet fury.

Reb turned off where Ruby told him to, but they had gone only a quarter of a mile into the black tangle of the swamp when the rain cut their visibility down to nothing. “I reckon we’d better park for a while and wait out the storm. Wouldn’t want to make a wrong turn and end up in the swamp as some hungry gator’s midnight snack.”

“I reckon not.” Ruby sat there, her bashfulness pushing her to the limits of the seat and pressing her against the passenger door.

“How about a little music to pass the time?” Reb turned on the AM radio. Chuck Berry’s “Johnny B. Goode” was winding down and next up was Rockabilly Reb’s newest single, “Rock and Roll Anatomy Lesson.”

***

“A little bit of heart, a little bit of soul,

A little bit of mind, and a whole lotta rock and roll…”

***

“What a coincidence!” Reb laughed.

Ruby sat listening to the monotonous drumming of rain on the roof and the haunting melody of Reb’s electric guitar. After the song ended and the Everly Brothers’ “Bird Dog” began, Ruby eyed the grinning rocker with wonderment. “I can’t believe that I’m really here…sitting right next to you.”

“Well, you are, Ruby.” Reb’s smile glowed dashboard green in the darkness.

The girl returned his smile, then frowned just as quickly. “How did you know my name was Ruby? I didn’t tell you it was.”

Reb shrugged. “I don’t know. You just look like a Ruby, that’s all.” Smoothly, he changed the subject. “So, how did you like the show tonight?”

“It was great!” Ruby thought back to the three-hour Louisiana Hayride that had featured big names like gravel-voiced Johnny Cash, piano-playing Fats Domino, and, of course, Rockabilly Reb. “You were the best, though.” She smiled demurely. “I think you’re even better than Elvis.”

Reb chuckled. “Well, that’s mighty high praise, darlin’. But I reckon I must have disappointed some folks on those last couple of songs I did. My voice was kinda going out on me and my guitar-picking was a bit off.”

Ruby recalled the last two numbers: “High School Honey” and “Bayou Boogie.” Reb’s voice had been unusually flat and his normally hot guitar licks seemed strangely off-key. She had attributed it to the rigors of being on the road too long, driving from gig to gig without time to rest up.

“Want me to sing you a song, Ruby?”

The bespectacled girl felt her heart leap with joy. “Sure!” Again, she couldn’t quite believe that she was here, stranded in a violent downpour with her idol. And now he was going to sing to her!

Rockabilly Reb reached into the backseat and found his guitar. It was a sunburst Les Paul Special
—
a custom-made model for the left-handed player. He slipped the sparkling rhinestone strap around his neck. The sickly green glow of the dashboard light played upon the taut strings of the instrument and the glittering spangles of his gaudy jacket, illuminating the interior of the car with an eerie light.

“Sorry I can’t hook up my amplifier, but we’ll just have to make do the best we can. So, what would you like to hear? What’s your favorite Rockabilly Reb song?”

Ruby smiled. “Forever Baby,” she said without hesitation.

Reb grinned. “That’s my favorite one, too. Here goes…” He began to strum on the unplugged guitar, producing a series of metallic cords that could scarcely be heard above the rainstorm.

***

“Ruby, Ruby, be my forever baby…

Ruby, Ruby, be my forever lady…

Ruby, baby, tell me you’ll be mine.”

***

The teenager was a little startled. He was using her own name in place of the customary one. Sitting there listening to him, Ruby couldn’t quite remember whose name originally had embellished the lyrics. Sometimes it sounded like Lucy, sometimes like Judy or Trudy. Every time she heard the song on the radio or on the jukebox in the soda shop in town, it seemed as though Reb sang about a different girl. But that was impossible. The record company wouldn’t allow him to cut alternate versions of the same hit, using a different name each time.

After he was finished, he sat back and grinned that country-boy grin of his. “I know, I was a little off-key, but it’s been a long night and I’m kinda tired.”

“It was perfect,” Ruby said. “You know, I always wondered how you got your start. I hadn’t even heard of you until the first of the year, and now here you are a big star and all.”