It was mid-Monday morning when Kenneth and Sarah Price arrived at the home Beau Stratham shared with his mother, Kimberly Stratham. Kimberly was in her late fifties, but she looked to be in her seventies due to a health issue: she was dying of cancer. Beau moved back into his childhood home 19 months earlier to care for his mother. The house they shared was a two-story, four-bedroom single-family home in Brooklyn. A narrow driveway led to the garage in the backyard. Beau parked his van in the driveway and next to the back door at the side of the house.
“Okay, we’re here,” Beau reported as he turned with an expression of curiosity and concern to face his guest in the back of his van. “Are you sure you guys are okay?” he asked.
“Yes, Beau, we’re okay,” Kenneth returned with insistence.
“You sure?” Beau tossed out again. “Because I can’t bring an illness into the house. My mother can’t handle it.”
“Kimberly will be fine,” Kenneth responded with exasperation. “We’re not contagious.”
Despite Sarah’s slimmer appearance, Beau was concerned about the gauntness of her physique. Sarah’s disheveled appearance along with their strange behavior added to his concern that something unhealthy was amiss.
“We need your help,” Sarah softly pleaded. “That’s all we’re asking for. It’s temporary, I promise.”
Beau had no defense against the pleas of Sarah Price. His fondness for her went back to their first meeting years ago, and her present condition produced a protective feeling within him. After a brief hesitation, Beau climbed out of his van and instructed Kenneth and Sarah to follow. Kenneth quickly countermanded Beau’s direction and instructed him to go open the door to the house. Beau did as he was instructed without question, and then he ushered Sarah and Kenneth into the house and down into the basement.
After descending the basement stairs, Kenneth and Sarah found themselves in a cozy little family room complete with a well-furnished sitting area—sofa, coffee table, two armchairs and colorful area rug beneath it all—just to the right of the stairs. An entertainment center with a large flat screen TV was situated beside staircase facing the sofa. A narrow laundry room with a sliding door was located at the bottom and just left of the stairs, extending back toward the rear wall. There were two sets of four small rectangular windows set high on both sides of the room with decorative little curtains that ran the length of each wall. The curtains were closed, which diffused most of the light coming into the room, but two of the curtains inside the laundry and its sliding door were open, which caused extreme irritation to Kenneth and Sarah’s eyes.
“What’s wrong?” Beau questioned in response to their obvious expressions of discomfort.
“Close the curtains,” Kenneth commanded as he looked down and away from the left wall.
Beau quickly followed the instruction he was given and closed all the curtains and the sliding door to the laundry. He then stood in front of Kenneth and Sarah on the opposite side of the coffee table with his hands on his hips.
“You know, I can’t help you guys if you don’t tell me what’s wrong,” Beau exclaimed.
“I’m not sure I know what happened,” Kenneth returned with a disbelieving shake of his head.
“Well, I think you should go to an emergency room,” Beau declared with a knowing look.
“No!” Sarah quickly contested.
“You really do look ill, Mrs. Price,” Beau nearly pleaded.
“We’re not sick, Beau,” Kenneth disputed. “We’re hungry,” he asserted.
“You want something to eat?” Beau asked with a surprised inflection.
“Yes,” Sarah quickly supported.
Beau needed no more convincing than Sarah’s plaintive request for food to put him into motion. He promptly went back up the basement stairs to search for something for them to eat. As Kenneth and Sarah listened to his moving around in the kitchen, they soon heard Kimberly Stratham come down from her bedroom to the kitchen. She inquired who was in the house, and Beau reported that he had friends in the basement and that he was getting them something to eat. Kimberly promptly shooed him away from the chore that he was undertaking and assumed the task. In ten minutes time, Beau came back down into the basement with a platter containing two sandwiches, chips and two glasses of tea.
“My mom put this together for you,” Beau acknowledged as he approached the coffee table with the food.
Just as he was setting the platter down, Kimberly came halfway down the basement stairs dressed in a robe, a nightgown and slippers. She showed no visible signs of her illness, but everyone who knew her two years earlier could see how much older she looked.
“Would you like some macaroni and cheese?” Kimberly asked just as she stopped two-thirds of the way down the stairs. “It won’t take me long to heat it up,” she added with a look of intrigue.
“That’s okay, mom,” Beau quickly countered. “We’re okay.”
Kimberly ignored her son’s dismissal. The sight of Kenneth sitting on the sofa caught her attention. She saw nothing different or peculiar about him from a distance, but she was curious to know who her son was feeding at that time of day. The act of entertaining guests with food and drink were usually planned and commonly centered around a televised sports event. Kimberly’s inclination toward being a busybody was behind her every action. She was particularly interested in the young woman sitting on the sofa with Kenneth. She was someone that Kimberly had never seen before.
“Hi, Kenneth,” Kimberly greeted with a smile.
Beau had just set the platter down on the table when Kimberly spoke. Kenneth ignored Kimberly’s greeting. He and Sarah were busy looking at the food before them as though it was something alien to them. As they peeked around the edges of the sandwiches, Beau and Kimberly were noticing their peculiar behavior.
“Is there something wrong with the sandwiches?” Kimberly asked with a confused expression.
Kenneth and Sarah continued to ignore their hosts as they examined the food by sight and smell. Soon they began to pick the sandwiches apart to get to the roast beef. Beau and Kimberly watched in surprise as Kenneth and Sarah devoured the beef the moment it was separated out of the sandwiches. They were even more surprised when Sarah doubled over as though she had eaten something extremely distasteful.
“Was there something wrong with the sandwich, Mrs. Price?” Beau quickly asked as he hurried to Sarah’s side.
Sarah suddenly grabbed Beau by the shirt and pulled him to within inches of her face with a powerful jerk.
“I need meat,” Sarah grumbled into Beau’s startled face.
“Okay,” Beau agreed as he tried to pull away.
Sarah maintained her hold onto Beau’s shirt after she spoke, and slowly she began to pull him in closer until the side of his neck was nearly touching the tip of her nose. The smell of blood coursing through his veins began to whet Sarah’s appetite, and she savored his scent. Her eyes began to glow from the light reflecting off them. Beau was too close to notice the illumination in Sarah’s eyes, but Kimberly saw it all and was amazed.
“Is there something wrong, Mrs. Price,” Beau nervously asked.
Sarah suddenly awakened from her fascination with Beau’s smell and shoved him away with a powerful push. Beau was lifted off his feet by the strength of the shove before stumbling backwards to the other side of the room.
“Oh my,” Kimberly acknowledged with a look of shock.
“I’m sorry,” Sarah quickly responded while looking away in embarrassment.
“We need meat,” Kenneth insisted with a pleading look at Beau.
“Okay, I’ve got some steaks in the refrigerator,” Beau agreed with a dismayed shake of his head. “I’ll cook them for you.”
“No!” Kenneth and Sarah yelled in unison.
“Just bring them,” Kenneth insisted.
Beau agreed to Kenneth and Sarah’s request and ushered his mother back up the stairs when he set off to retrieve the steaks.
“Is that Kenneth’s mother?” Kimberly asked in disbelief.
“Yeah,” Beau answered while taking the steaks from the refrigerator.
“But she doesn’t look old enough to be his mother,” Kimberly challenged in a hushed voice.
“She didn’t look that way when I saw her a few days ago,” Beau returned. “She lost a lot of weight,” he emphasized. “Ken lost weight too,” he finished with an intonation of disbelief.
“What’s wrong with them?” Kimberly asked in a voice heavily laced with concern.
“I don’t know, mom. I don’t know,” Beau responded as he started toward the basement stairs. “Stay here,” he instructed his mother just before stepping through the basement doorway.
Beau did not bother to unwrap the steaks. His guess was that Kenneth and Sarah wanted to see the steaks before he cooked them. By the time he reached the basement floor, he heard his mother coming down behind him. He stopped to give her a look of admonishment, but she ignored him and continued down the stairs as if he had said nothing to her. Kimberly’s inquisitive nature was a trait that Beau was familiar with, and he noticed that propensity intensifying during her virtual confinement to the house due to her illness. Beau quickly conceded that Kimberly was going to be a part of this no matter what he said, and then he turned his attention back to Kenneth and Sarah. With the package of steaks in hand, Beau walked over to the coffee table.
“Here are the steaks,” Beau announced as he held them up for Kenneth and Sarah to see.
Kenneth and Sarah stood and instantly snatched the steaks out of Beau’s hands. Without hesitation, they ripped the packaging off and began devouring the raw meat as Beau and Kimberly watched in astonishment. Within seconds of their first bites, their eyes began to shine from the light that was reflecting off them, and after a few seconds fangs began appearing inside their mouths. Beau was frightened by the visible change that was happening to Kenneth and Sarah. Instinctively he began moving backwards as his fear grew. The only thing that was stopping him from running was the presence of his mother in the basement, and she was not going anywhere. Kimberly was intrigued by what she was seeing. As Beau was moving back, she was moving forward.
“What’s wrong with you, man?” Beau asked with a suggestion of hysteria in his voice.
Kenneth had no ready reply to the question. He merely paused from his eating to shrug and shake his head. After a moment of silence, Sarah looked up from her steak and began filling in the details.
“I have a friend,” Sarah commenced to explain in a somber tone. “Her name is Mary, and she did something to us. It changed us. It’s changing us somehow.”
“What are you?” Kimberly nearly whispered as she leaned in to stare at Kenneth and Sarah.
“We don’t know,” Sarah answered while shaking her head.
Kimberly took a seat on the edge of the sofa chair nearest to Kenneth.
“Are you vampires?” Kimberly asked in a whisper.
“Yes,” Sarah answered as if she was amazed to be saying it. “I think we are.”
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and then Add to home screen.