Chapter 8

The Devil Does Wear Prada

March 8, 2005, Miami - 5:26 PM

I opened my eyes, feeling energized, happy, and alive. I jumped out of bed, ready to choose my set of clothes for the night. I went inside the walk-in closet and quickly selected a sports jacket. I grabbed a pair of pants, a shirt, and a pair of Prada men's shoes. Then I went in the Jacuzzi.

My cell phone was vibrating on the night table next to the bathroom door. I looked at the caller ID; it was the old man. I turned on the faucet and set it to Warm water. Then I answered the phone.

"What do you have for me?" I asked.

"This is serious. There's a major commotion among the spirits," he said.

Suddenly, my life turned into a sci-fi drama - a bad one.

"I can't care less about them. I want to know what it is," I told him, watching the Jacuzzi tub fill up.

"You need to understand this is not like talking to a person. I get responses in a spiritual way," Frank barked.

The old man doesn't have any friends, and now he was about to alienate the only person willing to talk to him. It's no secret that I have never learned to appreciate his sense of importance. As a matter of fact, at that exact moment, I would have loved to smash his face, literally, into the back of his skull.

"Frank, what is it?" I asked, making an effort to control my anger.

"Well, here it goes. This is not a presence but the presence," he said.

"You mean, like... , " I asked, fishing for words.

"I mean like the meanest evil living being that you can imagine," he added.

I heard his words, and the overdramatic tone finally made me chuckle.

"¡Oh, me alegro de que te parezca gracioso! " Frank yelled. "Oh, I'm glad that you find it funny!"

I could tell Frank had been drinking.

"Old man, I'm the meanest evil living being that I can imagine," I replied.

"Well, sorry to ruin your ego trip, but this is something like you have never faced before," he said, trying to tone things down.

"What do you know of what I've faced?" I asked.

"You may be right. But then again, this is what I call an apocalyptic event," he added.

I was about to hang up and block his number forever.

"You have been drinking, haven't you?" I asked.

"After last night? Like a pro," he confessed.

Frank was many things but a liar was not one of them.

"You need to come here and read what is inside my mind, to see what I saw. It's the only way you could understand," he proposed.

His suggestion made me think for a moment. I considered the things I wanted to do that night, and whether I was ready to spend more time with him.

"I'II stop by later tonight," I answered.

"No, no, not later! You need to see this as soon as possible," Frank shouted again.

"Take a nap, you old fool. I'll stop by later tonight after I feed," I said in a strong, menacing voice.

"You're impossible!" the old man said, this time timid.

That made me chuckle again.

"Just two things. Do not invite it in," Frank suggested.

The Jacuzzi was almost full.

"You told me that it was the best way," I said, remembering his words.

"Yes, but that was before experiencing the amount of evil anger that this thing carries with it," he said.

"That sounds like my kind of spirit," I added with humor.

"I'm not kidding! Just promise me that you won't do anything until you see me," he demanded.

"What's the other thing?" I asked.

"Something kind of weird. Perhaps it's nothing," he said.

"What?" I insisted.

"The spirits, they were whispering a question—more like a verse," he added.

"A question?" Now I was intrigued.

"Yes, they were asking something like, 'Don't you know the night has a name?' They were repeating it over and over," Frank said.

I heard his words and paused. "I hope you can guess my name," I whispered.

"I hate riddles," Frank said without understanding anything.

"Go to sleep, you drunken bastard," I said, this time with less energy.

"Please promise me you won't do anything until you see me," he begged.

"I don't make promises," I said before hanging up on him and leaving my cell phone on the night desk.

I got in the Jacuzzi, letting the warm water take care of my body. Then I heard the cell phone vibrating again. I lay back and enjoyed the water until the call went to voice mail. I closed my eyes, imagining how infuriated the old man must feel when he heard the voice mail greeting. The notion made me laugh, quietly.

March 8, 2005, Miami, 10:45 PM

"Gnothi seauton," said the Greek back in those warm nights so long lost in Larissa and yet still alive in my memories. Gnothi seauton, or as it is known in modern English; Know thyself.

He taught me that the original inscription in the temple of Apollo was not what the world knows today. This from a man who had actually seen and read the inscription on the temple walls when it was still complete more than 2,500 years ago. He used to go on and on about his history, and I won't deny that sometimes I wanted to stab his heart just to make him stop. In fact, one time, I did stab him with an old Roman dagger that he kept from those ancient nights, but that's a different story. I was different then—an infant immortal always pushing the limits of his maker.

It's funny how things do stick in our subconscious even when we think we will never remember them.

Know thyself - the ideal of understanding the human behavior, the code of morals and thoughts because to understand oneself is to understand the world inside and around us.

What we really are?

Take the old man, for example. He's a man just like any other; but then unlike any other man, he takes pleasure in killing his own kind—not for sports or obligation but for sheer joy.

Is he worse than me? Is he worse than any of the rest?

Humans believe they are superior to anything and everything. They dictate society's rules and guidelines regarding what is acceptable and what's not. However, they kill just like the old man; but unlike him, some of them do it for sports, others for power, and everyone else out of obligation. Every time they feed from a vegetable or an animal, they are supporting a killing industry, because, indeed, vegetables and animals are living organisms too.

Know thyself. I'm a killer, who has to survive just like everyone else and chooses to feed from mankind. Sure, I could easily feed from animals and suffer horrible pains just so I could maintain a false morality, and a few lives safe, but why would I do so when I prefer the blood of my peers? It's as simple as that, just like when a person chooses vanilla over chocolate because of the way it tastes. Just like that, I prefer human blood. I do not think about the feelings of others, just as people don't think about the feelings of the animal whose meat they are eating in their burgers or the feelings of the fish that has been caught, boiled, baked or fried for their meal.

In a nutshell, we all are the same. The only thing that makes us different is our personal necessities.

That's the key word, the force behind conquest and mercy—necessity.

I do not know it all, but the little that I do know comes from that basic principle.

Life is ruled by those with the biggest necessity. Only those strong enough will keep on living. And for as long they do, they will always need something or someone, and will do whatever it takes to get it. Despite financial success and recognition, above love and hate, beyond knowledge and common sense, we all need something. We all do. That's what drove men to discover fire, to rule over every other species. That's what drove the Greeks to study, what motivated the Romans to build roads, the British to conqer the seas and that's what will always bind us, despite our preferences.

Know thyself, said the Greek; and after more than two hundred years and countless aliases, I still know who I am. Born a Gypsy from a father called freedom and a mother called independence—no banner, no crown, no country, no religion. Free before I was truly free and still alive long after everyone who once meant something had died. I'm still Renzo, the son, the man, the thief, the lord, and the vampire. I still want more. I'm still hungry for knowledge, still curious about life; and there's not a night in my existence when I don't miss everyone who were once dear to me.

I exist in the invisible zone between reality and myth, where night is eternal and man is no longer superior.

It is humans who, by necessity, will always fear me, because I do to them what they do to what they consider lesser creatures—making me, in fact, their upgrade. That's the look I see in their eyes when they finally see the real me, when they see something that shouldn't be, because my existence is a testament to the end of their rule of all things.

I'm the one who walks holding his head high among them, before whom they lower their eyes. I'm the teacher, the student, the keeper of the mystery of immortality—because I've defeated death, because I'm truly alive.

It was because of my necessities that I found myself this night among these young creatures laughing and drinking. I saw them lying to themselves while life itself escapes from their bodies every second of every minute of every hour. It was the necessity of that ever-constant fading energy that brought me to them. The truth is that they would never look better than there and then; and I want to steal everything I could from their energy, their beauty, and their youth. Everything!

It is beyond the understanding of most men that every single living creature has its own life tone. From the small bacteria to the biggest of mammals, all of us have a different frequency of energy that comes from within our core. That, together with their scent, is what makes every single one of them unique to my senses. Just as a parent knows who his child is through his distinctive scent. Even if that parent is blind, he or she will recognize the child. That's how I perceive all living creatures.

Still, I don't remember how I got there.

It was just a club like any other, and like in any other club, I was invisible, happy, and completely drunk with the intoxicating energy coming from so many young bodies. A group was talking near me, something about something. I didn't care. The only important thing was the fact that I was among mortals, and they didn't mind that at all.

Then it happened, the numbness, the crawling sensation, but ten times stronger. Finally, it was there, in the same place I was. I turned into my real self while scanning my surroundings, showing my fangs in the darkness. A pretty girl saw me and had an expression of awe on her face.

Women will always be drawn toward evil.

"Come outside, Gitano," the voice inside my head said like an explosion challenging the loud music.

I felt the source, turned, and walked toward it, toward the club's emergency exit.

"Come out. I'm waiting," the voice invited.

It was hard for me not to move as quickly as I knew I could. I walked fast through the exit and beyond, ending up on the sidewalk. I looked all around. I felt the location of the presence, and I followed it.

It didn't take me long.

I walked a couple of blocks until I reached an empty street. There I felt a powerful concentration of energy covering the entire universe around me. Never before had I felt such power. My heart was beating wildly, and my senses were going on overdrive, asking me to be on the defensive. I felt and heard the engine of a car behind me, but I didn't care to turn around, paying more attention to the powerful force around me than the two men inside the car. The vehicle stopped next to me almost silently, and one of the passengers walked out.

"Don't move!" he demanded.

I didn't have to turn to know that the man was holding a gun pointed at my back. He grabbed me by my jacket, forcing me to look at him. He was trying to shake me off, but I refused to move. But his constant movement made my shades fall. My eyes found his, and I could tell he saw a raw fury in them because, as though hit by an invisible fist, he dropped his hands.