The Girl With the Vampires. And Reptiles.: And the Fate of the World. And a Few Other Things. But Not Much Else.

And I most certainly don’t need to tell you that I have a pet snake and she’s the prettiest snake in the world. I’m a big fan of reptiles. I love how cold and unfeeling they are. I love sitting at the edge of my bed and looking through the glass of my snake aquarium. I love feeding her mice. And I love watching the mice move through her long body after she devours them. It gives me a sense of satisfaction and a sense of the round-aboutness of nature. For certainly we are all little mice who are eaten by the Great Snake. I’ve come to terms with it.

I don’t want to die.
But I’m ready for it.
My snake’s name is Iris, because she’s a goddess in her own

right.
She doesn’t love me, and I’m okay with that.
It’s actually what brings us together the most.
That and our shared addiction and love for all things BRUCE

LEE, including the movies and the philosophy and the abs of the man. He stood above the rest: abs-wise. Height-wise, maybe not. Didn’t matter to me.

All that mattered was my Bruce Lee movies, my gladiator video games, my pet snake, my stories, my ten fans, and de“nite‐ ly not the boy in the window.

He didn’t bother to tap the glass.
He knew that wouldn’t move my heart.
He didn’t !inch or shake or indicate that he was cold though I

could see frost gathering on his eyelashes. Long, pretty eyelashes. He didn’t clasp his hands together against the cold. Nor did he make a show of being alone and in the wild of Colorado without a home. He didn’t pull out a writing tablet to make a

play for my emotions.
He didn’t exaggerate his circumstance and neither did he try

to make me laugh.
And all of the things he didn’t do, made me begin to fall in

love with him. With an internal gasp (I didn’t let him see it), I wondered how he knew me so well. He’d shown up at various windows of the house on various occasions, always while my parents were gone. He’d seen me in some serious moods.

Like the time I was watching Gladiator for the hundredth- and-fourth time and he showed up at my bedroom window as the tears streamed down my face. That was embarrassing. And comforting. But I would never tell him that.

Or the time, during a rainstorm, that he knocked on the door

and then moved aside to one of our long windows beside the door. He stood there, drenched, but under the cover of the portico. He didn’t wave, didn’t move. His hair clung to his face —his perfect little face. His perfect tangly hair.

I completely ignored him that day.

Shutting the blinds on him just to show him that I knew how to put my foot down. I mean, you can’t just show up to some‐ one’s house and expect them to let you in because of a little rain.

I mean, it did hail that night and the wind was wild and it tore o$ a section of our roof. Not to worry: my parents have a roof‐ ing contractor on call. And a backup roo“ng contractor in case that guy doesn’t show up. Which just goes to show how amaz‐ ingly perfect and structured and ordered and wonderful my parents are.

Which was my ultimate complaint against my parents.

They were absolutely perfect in every way. There was not a square inch of them that wasn’t perfection. My mother always dazzled: elegant dresses always ‘“t her lines.’ She always went on and on about that. ‘My lines,’ ‘my body archetype,’ ‘my lines.’ In that order. Her speech was seasoned with Himalayan salt. Pink and perfect and my father loved her tone of voice and I loved her tone of voice.

And my father was strong, and he wore tailored suits. He

never skipped a gym session. He never failed to say goodnight to me and kiss me on the forehead. He was a perfect, perfect man.

My mother and father left for work together.
They came home together.
They seemed to be perpetually in love.
The way they looked at each other made me want to gag.
And they spent plenty of quality time with me. We watched

movies and played boardgames. They encouraged me. Corrected me when I deserved it. Asked me about myself. They pursued a relationship with me.

But I was kinda like a snake to them.
Not that I was bad or anything.
I’m just cold to the touch. Not a lot of people know this

about me, but I’m kind of a killer. Not, like, an actual killer. I’ve never killed anything. But for the most part, I feel dead inside, like the vampire boy outside the window.

I rarely smiled, and when I did I didn’t let anyone see.
At school, I had no friends.
No one bothered me either.
I went, I studied (or pretended to), I watched anime during

most of my classes, I have seventeen sketchbooks sketched full of Bruce Lee sketches, I practice martial arts in my bedroom, prac‐ ticing moves I’ve learned from YouTube. My parents made me take years of fencing classes. It’s a thing that upper-middle-class- to-rich teenagers growing up in suburban Colorado are sup‐ posed to do, I guess.

Oh, it just came to me—the time Vampire Boy stood out in the street as a gang of rabid raccoons chased him in circles. They tore at his pantlegs and hissed at him. I shut the curtains on him that night as well. The next morning, I went out to investigate the damage. At “rst, I couldn’t “nd any signs of the raccoons and “gured Vampire Boy was timid. I lost all respect for him.

But then I thought, maybe there was more to him than met the eye.

And that’s why I went on a walk. I often went on walks in Colorado. We lived in a quiet and safe suburb. Gated. One of the safest in the world. My parents were sure of it. According to them, we lived in one of the best places in the world. And they were probably right. I had no reason to doubt them.

When I reached the “rst cross street, I noticed a light bit of red—a streak of it alongside the concrete curb. Then I saw it: Vampire Boy had impaled a raccoon on top of the street sign named: Anderson. That got my attention, not gonna lie.

He’d braided the hair at the top of the raccoon’s head and put a red ribbon in it. That also got my attention. I stared at it curi‐ ously, but I didn’t smile.

I wouldn’t give him that satisfaction.
I continued on my journey.
A peach scent hung in the air, and I looked around for the

origin but saw nothing. The air was cool and clear, mountain air. Colorado air. Closing my eyes, I “lled my small lungs with the air and released slowly, appreciating every breath.

I loved breathing.
It made me feel alive.
Which was a paradox: since I mostly didn’t feel alive nor did I

have any desire to. Except when breathing cool air. It was so nourishing.
Like mice to my snake.
Like Gladiator to my soul.

Like Bruce Lee’s abs to Bruce Lee’s mega sidekicks.

There, ahead, on the tree that bordered the street, another dead raccoon. This one hung from one of the branches. He’d placed a small tiara around the head of this one. I drew near and stood a few feet away from the hanging raccoon. It was so violent. So macabre. Yet, he was trying to dull the truth of it with the tiara and ribbon. It was nice of him, I thought.

I continued down my usual path.
I knew that he knew it.
He’d been watching me for many weeks now.

Perhaps months.
I wasn’t sure.
Eventually I came to the culvert and slid through the opening

in the fence that prevented access. Sliding down the concrete V, I wiped o$ the grime from my pants and powered on the small !ashlight I’d stuck into my pocket. The culvert was just tall enough for a small human girl like myself to walk through. I didn’t have to duck. The top of it was just inches over my head.

A thin layer of water moved through it.
Which was why I’d worn my shoes with the thick soles.
When I came out the other side and into the light, I saw the

third raccoon—this one was posted up next to raccoon four and “ve. He’d set them side by side by side at the base of a rock. On the rock, he’d written something in spray paint: but he’d written it in Elven language and I didn’t understand it. I took out the polaroid camera from the small bag I’d brought and snapped a photo. When it was printed, I tucked it in the bag.

And put the camera back.
And continued my journey.
Yes, I forgot to mention, I love LOTR.
Moving up through the slope of tangled and knotted stu$,

which I had dubbed the ‘Snow White’ section of the wood, I came to the rocky edge of my destination. I had to pull myself through some tight spaces and over the top of some larger rocks to come out on top. With some breath work and some deft movement, I pulled myself to the highest-most rock, which was !at and jutted out over the lip of the !at vista.

From here, I could see the entire valley, marshes and meadows and glades and trees and rocks and homes and the small town in which we lived. I could see the Catholic church, tucked away behind pointed trees, with its tall spires. I could see the Dairy Queen with its purple color scheme. I could see the drive-in theater that people came to from neighboring towns.

I could see the hospital.
Plunking myself down on the rock, I sat.
With my legs hanging o$ the outermost edge.
The sun warmed my pale skin.
And I breathed.
This was the end of my walk, and I didn’t see anymore rac‐

coons. So I “gured the Elven raccoon setup was the last I was meant to see. It was kind of a letdown. I’d expected more from the vampire boy.

Overlooking this place, I wondered about what I actually wanted in life. I really wasn’t sure. This place was all I ever knew. It was nice. It was cold. It was sometimes a little warm. It snowed.

My parents sold real estate here in town but mostly they travelled to the cities that circled our city.

In some ways I felt like I existed within an aquarium, like my snake. I felt like I lived in a separate world from my parents and that they peeked in through a glass.

That was what I appreciated most about vampire boy. He literally peeked in through a glass. Which was why I could never let him in.

If there was one thing in the world I did know about myself, I wanted to be like my snake. I wanted to bask under the warm light of a lamp and eat mice (not literally, of course) while my only friend watched me through a glass.

Other than that, I didn’t know at all what I wanted.
I enjoy a good writing session, if there’s tea involved.
Other than that, everything’s good. Everything’s perfect.

Everything was a little too perfect. Every edge was clean. Every‐ thing was bright. Everyone was happy. It was the best of times, it was the best of times.

Even now.
Right now was a great time.
I looked all around me, trying to spot vampire boy. I knew he

was near. I could feel him. But I couldn’t see him.
That’s when I saw it: a glint of light in the distance. A !ash. A mirror being turned this way and that. Surely, this was vampire boy.

Before I moved, I noticed something in the formation of a particular pu$y white cloud: It resembled a ghost ship. Uncanny —a popular word writers would use to describe such a monu‐ mental event. It really did look like a ghost ship, with sails and a damned crew and bow and a butt (I don’t know ship terminolo‐ gy, sorry).

Finally, with a deep breath, I lowered myself down from the cleft of the rock and started down the uneven hill, sliding and faltering and correcting, towards the !ashing light.

I came to !at ground and moved strictly north by northwest towards where I knew I’d seen vampire boy. Why was he leading me away from the beaten path? He had my interest. As I came nearer the spot I’d seen the light, I removed my polaroid camera from the bag. This was bound to be good.

I had a good feeling.

Which was strange because I wasn’t taking in a breath—in fact, my breath was held—nor was I creating a sketch of Bruce Lee’s perfect abs.

And here I want to hover for a moment before I move on to WHAT I FOUND IN THE EVERGLADE: which could be the title of this story. Or a story. Oh and.

Why do I like Bruce Lee’s abs?

I must clarify: it’s not a lust-driven, base emotion thing. It’s not that I, OH SO ADORE HIS ABS, type of thing. It’s just that they’re perfect and they give me life and hope for the world. They are the thing that the entire corpus of mathematics rests upon. The origin and the “nal cause of math itself. As well as the theory of relativity and why it is that man has been chasing women for centuries piled on other centuries and, moreover, they’re a great thing to sketch.

Not a great conversation starter, though. Not that I’ve tried.
Nor do I have the desire to.

So I pushed through the rougher terrain of the glade. Col‐ orado is known for its terrain. I think. Not sure. Never really inquired or researched. I pushed through green stu$, broad stu$, and stu$ tangled up in other stu$, and stu$ I would never be able to describe and that’s how I came to the wide open glade and the source of the glint that had caught my eye.

Vampire Boy had disappeared. I knew he would.

13

the girl with the vampires and reptiles

It wouldn’t be proper to meet me under such circumstances. I’m only sixteen but I know the vampire rules. I had to invite him into the house. Until then, we would remain unacquainted. Which was “ne by me.

I saw the small structure in the distance but the sun was hitting it in such a way that it looked like a mirage and I couldn’t discern it.

The earth turned soft and squishy out here. Soft roots and plants carried me to my destination: obelisk. Except it wasn’t an obelisk. It was squat. A piling of some things. Couldn’t tell yet.

I blocked out the sun with my hand over my forehead.

Even with the shadows in my eyes I couldn’t see the little thing.

The suspense threatened to kill me. And I invited it to kill me.
I didn’t mind.
I’d lived a decent enough life.

My parents wouldn’t understand my Bruce Lee sketchbook— but I did write an essay that I kept in the top drawer of my desk to try and explain my obsession to them in the advent of my death. So there’s that.

Finally, I came to the THING. And I saw what it was. It was a shrine.

It was a shrine to Hello Kitty.
I nearly gasped, but I contained myself.
I didn’t react.
Didn’t want to give him the satisfaction.
Thank God there were no dead raccoons in the vicinity.
The boy had erected a small structure of ornate wood. He’d

perched Hello Kitty paraphernalia of all colors, shapes and sizes along the top. He’d arranged them magni“cently. Worthy of an award in the Archives (of my mind the bottom drawer of my desk, which is where I kept the archives of my life).

Back in my room.
That night.
I knew he would come again. He would want to be a%rmed

for having set up the trail of dead raccoons as well as the shrine to Hello Kitty, all things perfect and upsetting to my sterile lifestyle.

I shut the curtains in my bedroom because I was !ustered. Because he made me want to let him in the house.
He was speaking to me at a deeper level.
At the level of Bruce Lee’s abs, I would say.

And so I paced and I roundhouse kicked and I all around and all together couldn’t focus.

My parents came into my room at one point in the night. My mom glided, like all the great Korean women. She just seemed to !oat, in her satin black dress with the thin straps. Her skin radiated out from beneath the fabric. I couldn’t help but notice her lines. My father looked dapper and un-dazed.

He looked consequential and powerful.

My mother glided directly for my aquarium and hovered over it, reaching in and petting my snake. She loved my snake too. She was perfect.

Like my snake.
“You’re beautiful, Mother,” I said.
When she turned back to me, she cupped my chin.
I was sitting on my bed.
“And you, darling, are even more beautiful.”
I didn’t believe it and so I couldn’t produce a smile or a reac‐

tion.
“Don’t get into any trouble, tonight,” admonished my father.

“We won’t be back until late. Keep all the doors and windows locked. Don’t let a soul inside, not even an angel.”

He kissed me on the forehead and left.

My mother glided away. I wasn’t even sure if her feet were on the ground (they were. I’m just making a point).

They shut the door to my room.

And I thought to myself, Hell, right, they’re right.
I would not let in anyone tonight.
Not vampire boy, no matter how angelic he appeared.
No matter what, I swore to myself and to Iris, I would not,

not, not let anyone in the house.
Little did I know, that the option wouldn’t be given me that

night in particular.

When I recalled the conversation minutes later, I thought I’d noticed a chink in the armor of my perfect parents. I lay back on my bed and reimagined the interaction. My mother’s speech had faltered just slightly when she’d mentioned my ‘beautiful’ snake. And my father had seemed a bit agitated and under duress when he’d advised my security protocols.

Then again, I’d never seen them falter or slur or make a mis‐ take.

They’d never gone outside of the lines.
And so it was hard to believe they had.
Because if they had, I would have had a hard time noticing.
I decided that it was the fault of my own mental faculties to

think that there’d been a faltering, and I moved on with my life. Alone, the darkness outside pressed in through every crack and “ssure in the house, even through the door locks and the microscopic cracks in the stucco and brickwork. I could feel it, pushing and pressing, like a million pounds times a million pounds of pressure itself. Press, press, press, press, press, press.

I wasn’t scared.
I was cold.
I told myself.
I was cold to the touch. A Korean icicle.

A small Korean icicle.

To this day, I don’t know if the portent had come to me or if I had created the portent and therefore summoned what befell me that night.

But, of course, like Ralph (he comes into the story later) always tells me, the world doesn’t revolve around me. What Ralph never knew was that I never thought it did revolve around me. I always thought it revolved around Iris. And I still do.

The only way to stop the pacing, I decided, was to solve the Elven Language riddle. Propping my Polaroid print against the screen of my laptop I opened up my Elven language translator. It was easy enough to “nd the characters. Wasn’t my “rst time.

The translation came up on the screen, in gothic letters: The Moon Is Forever.

It was so cryptic and odd that I had to remove my snake from its warm nest and drape it around my neck and arms.

Wrapped in my snake, I ventured into the living room.

And crossed it, my toes curling into the soft carpet. Then my feet !attened on the cold tile in the kitchen. I dared not look at the windows. Not yet. I needed to eat “rst.

My mother always kept the kitchen stocked with all of my favorite things. There was never a lack.

Removing a pot pie from its wrappings, I placed it gently in the microwave and pressed the appropriate numbers and sent the thing spinning in circles, circles, circles.

I watched it, snake draped.
Just me and the microwave and my snake.

Eventually, I would need to face my fears, which was the boy in the window. Except it wasn’t so much a fear as it was a com‐ plication.

I didn’t mind complications, usually.
But, if I had it my way, I’d prefer to keep things simple.
That was how I wanted to live my life.
And that was how I wanted it to end.
She started simple, they would say, and she “nished simple.
I don’t know who ‘they’ would be. Only my mother and father would be at my funeral, and God knows, they’d produce the perfect, most perfect words.

I couldn’t wait.
To die.
Not for the words.
I could care less about the words unless they rested on the

bedrock of the abs of my aforementioned hero of abs.

When “nally I approached the window in the living room and darkened the lampshade so that I would be able to see past the re!ections in the clean glass, I drew the curtains across and there stood the boy.

His hair looked darker than ever, drawn across his eyes, a bit of the ends falling into his right eye a little. And he’d painted whiskers on his cheeks and on the part of his temples that I could see. It was a little startling, but in a good way.

I didn’t smile.
Didn’t react.
I just stood there. My snake shifted, slithering and coiling

around one arm in particular. I saw its face near me, tongue !icking. A cute little thing.

The boy was on brand for the day.
Then, suddenly, he raised his arm and placed a top-hat on his head, squishing down his long hair against his temples so that the strands curled up around the brim of the hat. Now he looked like a 1930s comedian.

He didn’t smile, didn’t move other than to place the hat on his head.

A gentle wind tugged at the curly strands of his hair.

My snake hissed into my ear, whispering deep secrets that I dare not understand.

And it was then that the power to my house turned complete‐ ly o$.

One second later, there was a crashing noise, glass breaking.

My heart began to rapidly “re and my snake coiled together around my arms as I realized that someone was breaking into my home.

We had a safe room, and my parents had run me through the protocol time and time again in the event of a home invasion. They’d been so tedious and repetitious about it that I was sure someone were going to break into the home any day now.

And today was that day.

I could only run so fast, barefoot on the tiled !oor, with Iris draped over my small body and weighing me down. But I ran, through the darkness that was dark as Iris’s eyes. I came in nasty contact with the corner of a wall as I found the main hallway that would lead me to safety.

But I saw a door open at the end of that hallway and the bulky frame of a man stepped through. Could barely see him, but he was holding a !ashlight and he played the beam on me. Then, without hesitation, he ran towards me. His gigantic footfalls ringed in the hallway, crashing, crashing towards me.

I turned and dashed away, across the living room, away from the safety of the safe room. My feet came to the padded carpet. I had to slow down because I was afraid of colliding with the glass tabletop near the couches.

Scraping past the ottoman, I found my bearings and aimed myself for the kitchen. I was running for the front door. I need‐ ed to let vampire boy in to protect me. But right then the front door crashed open and impossibly tall men came through and the lights to the house turned on in the same instant.

I stopped dead in my tracks, because I was running out of places to go.

Men began producing themselves in the kitchen—I could hear them behind me. From the main hall. Another window broke open. Which I thought was overkill and really made me mad.

I stood there, just me and my snake as they surrounded us on all sides.

“Stop right there,” said a man with a thick neck and a thick

voice.
“I am stopped,” I said.
“Pretty little snake.”
“She’ll kill you.”
“I’ll kill you. Unless you do as I say.”
I looked past the men and saw my vampire friend and my only

hope standing in the open doorway. He couldn’t come in be‐ cause I hadn’t let him in. I had to let him in. I didn’t know how. I was barricaded by forces beyond me.

Vampire boy looked so sad and helpless. I could see in his eyes, above his drawn-on whiskers, that he wanted more than any‐ thing to come through the door and rescue me. And he could tell, I was sure, that I wanted nothing more than that very thing.

My snake hissed at the men.
And good on her.
“The cops will be here any minute,” I said, making stu$ up.

I’d “gured they’d disabled the alarm systems.
“No they won’t. We’re experts.”
They looked like experts, the way they were dressed. Clad in

black, like they say in the stories. Wearing bulletproof vests and dark headdress (beanies and hats, mostly), and carrying weapons of all kinds.

“Isn’t this a little much just for little old me?” My voice was so

shaky.
They were pressing closer in. Taking their time. They knew it

was all over. I knew it was all over.
When I glanced past them to see the open doorway, vampire

boy was no longer there. They saw my eye movements and looked back.

“No one is coming to save you.”
“That’s exactly what a bad guy would say.”
“Who says we’re bad guys?”
“Why would good guys break into my house at eight pm on a

Friday?” I wasn’t trying to be smart. I was living in the absolute zenith of genuine.

One of the men chuckled.

Seeing out of my peripheral vision, I saw that I technically could make a break for the washroom. The washroom had a door that led to the outside but it was locked by a deadbolt. I wasn’t sure if I’d be able to get to the door and unlock the dead‐ bolt without being caught by the men. Certainly I wouldn’t be able to with Iris on her current perch.

But then something skittered and made a noise and my eyes fell to the !oor near the front door. Two raccoons darted into the foyer. The men saw them too. Some of the men nearest me turned away from me to deal with the raccoons.

Luckily, the raccoons were feisty tonight. The men wore big black boots and closed in fast on the little creatures. As the men put their big boots on the raccoons, I realized this was my “nal and last chance to make a move.

I would say ten Hail Mary’s for what I did next:

I threw Iris o$ of myself, knowing she could handle the ten‐ sion-of-the-circumstance and even rise above it. I threw her at the man nearest. I didn’t stay to see his reaction. Free from my snake, I burst across the white-carpeted !oor and in-between the couch and the glass table. The glass table separated me from the men on the other side of the room. For now.

They reacted fast.
I could see them closing in already.
Bigger than me.
And faster than me.
But I’d had the element of surprise.
I reached the narrow entryway of the washroom and I could

feel the presence of a large man behind me, shadow pressing, energy pressing, about to snatch me from my plan.

Then, somehow, I reached the door.
I grabbed the deadbolt and began to twist it when the man took me by the waist, easily hoisting me onto his shoulders. Vampire boy began banging on the door. I knew it was him even though I couldn’t see him. Who else could it be?

Hopelessly, I let the muscles in my body loose and allowed myself to drape over this man’s shoulder like a ragdoll.

I could feel the awesome power of the man as he headed for the door of the washroom—headed back towards the living room. Thud! Footstep. Thud! Footstep. The man must have been six foot eight. Thud! Footstep.

Then we reached the open doorway that would take us back into the living room and the cadre of black-clad men.

That was about when the most curious and auspicious thing happened. The man had trouble getting back through the door‐ frame, which was probably what had slowed him down in his pursuit of me. Now, with me over his shoulder, he struggled all the more.

Because I’d gone ragdoll, he wasn’t expecting much of me. He lowered me to his side so he could “t us through the doorway. He was basically, like, the size of a couch. And he was trying to “t through the doorway. I had a sudden image of a couch trying to “t a couch through a doorway.

And that was when I acted.
I threw myself loose from his grip and the sudden movement caused him to fall into the doorframe and reach over to catch himself. The movements were all around awkward and bought me precious moments of time.

I bolted for the deadbolt.
I reached it.
I spun it.
I twisted the doorknob as the man came behind. I opened the door.

And there stood my vampire boy. All whiskers and top hat and dark curly hair. He smiled. I’d “nally let him inside, into my life, into my private house. And then his smile, like the sun falling and the moon rising, fell away and his face became stern. He grimaced as he looked past me at the tall man.

And I knew: it was all over for these men.
The wind had changed.
The clouds had appeared on the horizon in an instant. And, for only what seemed like a moment, all was still. Because.
The storm had arrived.