You Can Not Script a Hurricane

by thename_of_annabellelee

Summary:

Post Season 2 Bliss, but at what cost?
​​We stand for a moment, so close but not moving. “I have missed you.”
“And I you, mon cher.”
“I didn’t come here to bed you, Lestat.”
“Of course, what kind of girl do you think I am? Handing out her wares to the first good-looking vampire who comes her way?”
*****
Author's note-
Did I say the rest would fly by? Yes. Did it take me 2 months to EDIT the last 10k words? Also yes. Might I had a few snoballs during that time? It's been hot in New Orleans, y'all. Chapter 23 is done. Let's see what damage has been done. Enjoy!

Notes:

Told from alternating points of view between the end of season 2 and a hopeful beginning of 3.
They got some shit to work out, yeah.
Will eventually get to smut, but let's take it slow, shall we? We have all the time in the world...............

Chapter 1: What's a little storm got on me?

Summary:

I still had no plan, none. I always had a plan. Lestat, Lestat was the one who had no plan, who would just push right in and, and give me that coy look. Say something witty and charming and ruin everything I had carefully plotted and laid out. But since that script was put in my hand, I’d had enough of plots. I just knew I had to… to see him. To say something. I had been so intent on confronting him, why, why didn’t in the last 77 years you reach out and tell me it was you! Why didn’t You….!
But why did I?

I hated it the moment Armand said it. Hated when he said anything about Lestat to Daniel. He had no right…. But my anger at Armand had to wait. That was not what was important now.
You always remember your first hurricane.
I had just turned 10 and it was not unusual for it to storm in New Orleans, sometimes for days. Rain we were used to, but the winds? We rarely got more than a breeze, but our shutters rattled, our trees shook. There were times when the gusts were so strong, felt like our whole roof was goin’ to blow right off. I’d never seen anything like it. The wildness, the unpredictability. The outer bans started two days before and our domèstik Octavie said that now was the worst of it. Then, without any warning, it got real quiet. The winds died down at once to a light breeze, the rain stopped. Through the shutters, we could see the sun coming out. Mawma and Octavie fussed not to open the door, but Paul and I scrambled out while Gracie stood on the door sill crying.
The eye. The calm is erie. It is quiet, you don’t hear birds or bugs, no noise from the street. Seems like there was never a storm at all. Except when you use your eyes- the destruction of the branches, the slate tiles on the ground instead of on your roof. Leaves all over, hell, one of our neighbors' wicker chairs was in our yard! I told Mawma “See! It’s over!” But Octavie snatched me up by my collar, pulling me inside.
“Gason! To Popa va bien bat sô chi vini bæk la mézon!”
“Octavie!” But when I looked to my mother, she stood there glaring at me. Paul just turned back and followed.
“Octavie!”
Less than an hour later, it was like a switch was flipped, suddenly raging on again. Like, like nature just hit a pause button and took itself a lil break. The destruction after was, it doesn't even make sense. Big oak trees upturned, but a skinny crepe myrtle still standing right next to it. If your house wasn’t raised enough, you got water in it, but two blocks away- high and dry. Some buildings looked like a good breath could knock em over with no damage, but a house further down the block just…. decimated. Took a week to drain the city, remove the trees and the debris. But things are never the same. Houses destroyed, businesses never came back, people up and moved. Crops destroyed, too. I was too young to know the damage to the Big House in Arabi where my Popa was that night, watching the winds twist and break the canes. We had to replant everything. And again in 1893. But in 1901, the levees broke. And for the 3rd time in 13 years, we lost everything including the Big House.
No, after a hurricane, nothing is the same.
Two nights ago, I threw Armand into a wall and walked out of a crypt I had thought was a home. 14 hour flight. Had Rashed book a hotel and send belongings. See, back in 1888, you didn’t know when or where the storm was going to hit. You knew that it had hit Môle-Saint-Nicolas because men along the warf reported it when they got back to port. Then two days later you felt those hot humid winds. Sometimes you got a little rain and that was it; sometimes you got a lot because things were imprecise. Days later you’d know it was a little one that hit Port Arthur or a big one that slammed Pensacola. Today, we know Wednesday where it’s gonna hit on Friday at 3 in the afternoon. Two nights ago, driving to the tarmac, I knew there was a storm. Knew home was in what they now call “the cone of uncertainly.” But what’s a little storm got on me?
I left the penthouse with no thoughts, leaving Daniel and 77 years of what I used to call a life with nothing but a passport and the cash I had in my wallet. That’s not true. I had one single thought. The same thought I had been having over and over those last two weeks.
When I landed I could feel those winds. There’s a difference in the hot Gulf winds of a storm and the light north breeze of early October. This is late for hurricane season, but those tropical winds and the smell…. You get off of the plane and that wall of humidity hits you; walk outside and the magnolia and jasmine wash over you. I have been all over the world and when I tell you, no place, no place anywhere….
It’s home. Always was, always will be. There’s a reason Armand never let me come here. Gets under your skin, in your bones. Hard to remove. Takes root. You can leave New Orleans, but she never really leaves you. And he was here, somewhere. Armand knew better than to lie about that. And maybe he warned Lestat, maybe he called out to him again like he had almost 50 years ago. Gave him time to hide or flee.
Didn’t matter. I would search the world if I had to…but I knew I didn’t have to. He would be here.
I saw some young fledgling, too stupid to hide his thoughts, catching rats last night.
“Asshole. Motherfucker should catch them himself. Fucking “Loooooouis lived on rats.” Yeah, well fuck that guy, too.”
It was too easy. I finished my Ghosts of New Orleans tour (Voodoo Creole bride shit! Outside of my house!) and but I could not find him. Not at the dive bars or strip clubs, the late-night restaurants. I walked the Quarter for hours until I saw him on Burgundy, smoking a cigarette, talking to what would end up being his dinner. I followed him to Ursaline when he was done, slipped past the iron gate of a run-down pink cottage. I couldn’t feel Lestat, but the fledgling’s thoughts were loud. Mad about being a rat catcher. Mad about the stupid music he kept listening to. Mad about living under the shadow of my ghost. It was just past four, only a few hours until dawn. I wouldn’t say I chickened out but, now that I was here, what do I say?
I still had no plan, none. I always had a plan. Lestat, Lestat was the one who had no plan, who would just push right in and, and give me that coy look. Say something witty and charming and ruin everything I had carefully plotted and laid out. But since that script was put in my hand, I’d had enough of plots. I just knew I had to… to see him. To say something. I had been so intent on confronting him, why, why didn’t in the last 77 years you reach out and tell me it was you! Why didn’t You….!
But why did I?
Maybe because I could no longer hear him call Come to Me like I had all those years ago.
Maybe I had forgotten what his voice sounded like until I heard him sing to me again a few days ago from that old '78.
Maybe because retelling my story right, or, as right as I could, made me see it with new eyes.
See him with new eyes. See it with the right eyes. See me with …
Or listen to what I know now was Armand's version of Lestat saying at the trial that I had made it up, there were my thoughts calling to him.
Maybe in 1973, when I told Daniel the angry, victimized version, all I was doing was trying to call out to him.
Tell my story, knowing he couldn’t resist. Would have to come and- what. Fight with me? Fight for me? Save me from myself again? From Armand, from all of it?
Maybe I couldn’t deal with this until I was ready.
Maybe I had been calling out to him all along, wishing he would waltz in, wishing when I saw him, it would be real, and…
What if, what if I hadn’t heard it because after all this time, he didn’t want me to come?
Maybe he didn’t want me at all…
Maybe it was too long and too late, I messed it up again.
What did he say, the last time I saw him? “Let’s see how long it lasts?” Maybe it had lasted too long and he had forgotten….
But the fledgling had mentioned my name, “Loooooouis lived on rats,” in a horrible mock-up of Lestat’s accent. He had talked about me, said my name to this fledgling. I closed my eyes and could hear him, just as I had a few blocks ago, just as I have for all those years in my thought “Louis, you are a vampire!” “Embrace what you are! You are a killer, Louis!” But also, “ I love you, Louis. You are loved. I send my love to you, and you send it back round to me. And this circle, this home we've barely had a glimpse of, know it frightens me as much as it does you.”And here he was reduced to entertaining a lackey fledgling rat-catcher in a rundown hovel, blocks away from the beautiful townhouse we had lived in. Blocks away from our home. From our former life.
What had I done?
I saw lights flicker in an upstairs bedroom. He was right there. I could go and, and…
And what?
I needed to see him, but, but what did he need? If I didn’t think about that, was I just as bad as he had been? Had I learned nothing in all these years?
A rain band from the storm began, the eye would be upon us by tomorrow night. If I waited until then, he might flee. But I had less than two hours now before sunrise. So I hid and watched. I could make the 17-minute walk back to The Saint in time. I waited and thought and watched what little light came from that window as the ban of rain swept past and the sky grew lighter. At fifteen to 6, I left. Sleeping would be hard, but I managed the next 12 hours.

Notes:

“Gason! To Popa va bien bat sô chi vini bæk la mézon!”

As close to NOLA Creole as I can.
"Boy, Your Father is going to beat you good when he comes home."

An '78 is a single vinyl record.

Chapter 2: The eye of Odette

Summary:

Valise and portmanteau. Since I walked into his house it has been hard to control my face, to not look at him and sink deeply in his eyes. To control that smile. So I opt not to fight it.
“I decided to pack both,” he purrs.
“Staying that long?” He is delicious as always.
“Or I can keep one packed in case I need to make a quick exit.” It is measured. All of this is. His guard might be lowered but it is not gone.

The doors of the hotel had been boarded up, City had a 5pm curfew, so I had to be creative. I had been in this very building in 1908 for the Grand opening of Maison Blance, visited so many times in the years after and I knew the place pretty well. Getting the side door was not hard, pushing it open against the winds was something else. They had picked up in the last few hours and I walked as much as I was pushed down Bourbon. Even closed with a curfew, bars were still open and drinks were still being poured, just like old Storyville was when the 1915 storm devastated New Orleans. I waited for the fledgling to come back before I slipped past the iron gate behind him. The courtyard was a mess, no incinerator, overgrown. The back door was swollen from the rain and I just had to bump it with my hip- no vampire strength required.
I had been in Creole Cottages in the Quarter, Treme, and Storyville hundreds of times. This was the worse of them. Exposed brick and beams and not in an architectural way, in a neglect way, in a plaster on the floor sort of way. In a you can smell rotting wood and water dripping from the slate tiles way. I made it up the stairs to where I knew that light was coming from. There he sat. Candles and… and an iPad? He looked pale and thin, the death I condemned him with 7 decades ago hung all around him.
What do you say? Hello? What words are there….
So I ask about saving me in Paris, and his smart ass says “I gave you to Armand, was that really saving?”
Honestly, even if he told me it was him all those years ago, at that moment it wouldn’t have mattered. I’dda been angry he only saved me. Back then, I was so enraged and hurt, so full of fury at him and me and the whole world. She was gone and it was easier then to blame him than to take any responsibility myself. And it might not have mattered in 1973 either, but by then all that anger became self-destruction, years of stuffing it all down….I punished him and ended up hurting myself. I punished me and hurt him.
So I thank him because the last two weeks have let me reflect differently. I have lived in those two weeks more than I had in some decades. Hearing myself say those words, having Daniel throw them back at me. I had buried, covered up,... disassociated from everything. I was lost and angry and scared and wreckless and hurt and,.... But I wanted to tell it. I knew in the explaining of it, I would be forced to think, to examine him and me, to be precise in my words. How much of the last two weeks was for a book? How much was it… something else? For the first time in years, I looked at those events far enough away that I could be more objective, not just about what happened, but the role I played in it. The anger was there, but I knew why. The hurt was there and I knew why. But the love was still there, more love than I had felt in all the years in between. And I knew why.
I wanted to hurt him in 1942. I was hurting in 1973. Today, I could see the gift. The Dark Gift yes, but the gift of Lestat himself. He loved me, he never intended it as a curse. I had done that myself. I could see my contribution, how I pulled away and used his love as a weapon to hurt him on purpose and hurt him because I was hurting or…. Denied him because I was denying myself.
He knew Armand would show his colors sooner or later.
There were other things he knew.
He put down his, his keyboard, which he had been using as a shield against the pain he thought I was going to inflict. Then he realized I wasn’t there for that. He was living in a hovel, plants grown on the inside, plaster gone to the barge board. I got closer, it was all I could from taking him up in my arms right there even though I knew I shouldn’t. This was how he was living, my Lestat. My pompous, prissy, perfect little lion. He had let it all go, the grand piano even. This was what I put him through. And he never left home. Stayed in New Orleans, the home we made, the life we had. That was his home now.
Home.
Paris was never home.
San Francisco was never home.
Dubai was never home.
New Orleans gets under your skin, in your bones. No place like it.
His home was our home. All this time.
And I couldn’t wait any longer. I had to get it out. I had to explain all that I learned in the last 77 years, all that I unlearned, things I had relearned in the last 2 weeks. It was a gift, even if it took me years to see it that way. I have years to get it right, years to love and laugh; the gift of immortality and he picked me. Picked me to share it with, picked me to share his life with. Picked me to gift his love to. And I had wasted it by denying it, denying myself, hating him because he knew me, he saw me. He loved what he saw and yet I lothed myself. I could have died a closeted pimp alone in a New Orleans I no longer recognize. I could have been killed by any number of people who felt I wronged them or shorted them. I lived like a reckless man in a dangerous town- wasn’t I calling out for death every night? Could have died without ever realizing who I really was, conforming to all those roles he talked about? Never knowing my true nature. He gave me the greatest gift and instead of it taking away my sorrow, I let my sorrows consume me and in the process, consume him.
Then he asked me about San Francisco. I…what I know today, what I lived through then. I wanted him to find me, I wanted to rage at him for my stupid choice, for my hurt, for her being gone and not being able to save her. For surviving with that pain and guilt. But I also wanted him to find me so we could grieve. Because we lost a daughter who we both loved. Because I shouldn’t have let her…. I shouldn’t have done to him what I did.
I am not blameless. I had projected my selfishness, my suffering. This is mine as much as it is his, if not more so.
Armand was right about one thing, I talked trash to Daniel to make Lestat mad. So that I could feel something, anything, beyond grief and numbness. So I could lash out- spread my sorrow and anger around- and, and see him. See his angular face, his angelic hair. Fall deeply into his eyes. Be seduced. Even in 1973 I knew…
He told me she looked at him, in those last few minutes. Looked at him like a child. His child. Our child. “Like a father...” His anguish could not be contained, he couldn’t even get the words out before I did what I came to New Orleans to do.
I held him in my arms like I never had, like he deserved. I held him with sorrow and grief, with regret and guilt, with love. It was so easy, once he was there, a kiss to his neck, his temple, to soothe his trembling and mine. I told him that he was not alone, that she was just as much his child as mine- just as much my responsibility as his. It was time we get through this, to miss her and the little family we were, to grieve it. We never have to let her go, but we can’t let it do this to us. That we can honor her but live. Really live.
He shook his head and I grabbed him again. I held him hard as I could, storm ragin, windows blown out. The tempest outside let the fury in us dissipate. It was the worst of it. We had survived. Part of the plaster fell off the ceiling near us, breaking our spell.
“We’re almost to the eye.”
“This is worse than 1909?” he mused.
“No, not really. So, not worse than Katrina?”
“Please, nothing like Katrina. This will be over by morning.”
“Lestat, your walls are falling in.”
“Mon cher, my walls have been caving for years.”
“When the eye comes, let’s go back to my hotel. Get you dry, let you rest.”
“This is my home, I can not leave her.” I sighed. This was not safe, but I needed to get him fed and cleaned.
“You aren’t leaving, we are just calling on my hotel room, a quick visit.” I kissed his temple again and smiled. He coyly smiled back. Even after all of this time, he will still dance this dance with me. He will never tell me no. But now it has to be different. It can’t be manipulative, to get my way to hurt him. “Why don’t you grab what you need, by the sound of things the eye can’t be far off.” We stood for a second, him not wanting to leave the safety of my arms. As if by moving away the magic would be released and this would all be over.
“I do have a valise and a portmanteau….”
There it was.
I was here, unattached, no companion. And he was here the same. I told him I came to see him, not passing through, not just for a few hours. And I meant that. We had years to discuss, decades to figure out. But also, what did it all imply? I rushed here, rushed to him, rushed to get him into my arms. But to what end? I would be lying if I said this was just about Claudia because the first things out of our mouths were inquiries about me having a companion and asking why did’t he tell me he saved me?
Was this about Claudia? Or was this always about us?
“Whatever you are comfortable with. Might be a few days power is out, you know. Look at it like a mini evac-u-cation, just down the street. I have a two-bedroom suite with a generator, plenty of towels.” He smiled and my heart broke. It was the sweet smile, the fragile vulnerable one. The one I was sure was only ever shown to me. The one I saw on the balcony just a few blocks away at Latrobe’s. The one that we shared on quiet nights, happy nights. The one I pretended never happened the first time I talked to Daniel. The one I admitted to reliving the second time I told him my story. The one that has haunted me for all of these years. But this was not a dream. It was him, in my arms. I wanted to kiss him right then and there. Forget the storm and the ceiling and everything. That pull, being drawn to him. In less than five minutes I was already falling under as I had so many times.
“Of course, mon couer.” But he did not move. The wind from the broken window was whipping his hair all around, shutters slamming, roof leaking and we stood there, looking at each other like it was the first time we had ever seen each other. Really seen each other. His smile spread. “I’ll just, grab some
articles de toilette, personal affects…” but his eyes never left mine. I knew that if I reached my hand out, his heart’s pace would match mine.
“I’ll grab your iPad? Maybe move your speaker?”
“Mmmmh. Maybe…” I was not sure he had heard a word I said. But somewhere a big crash happened, startling us.
“Sounds like a tree hitting a car.”
“Or my idiot neighbor’s garbage can. Honestly, carpetbaggers have no idea how we hunker down.”
“Carpetbaggers?!? How we hunker down?” He huffed and spun out of my arms, rolling his eyes. He wandered around picking things up and putting them down somewhere else. This would take longer than we had.
“Oui, after Katrina they came in by the thousands. Here to save us from ourselves, like we had no idea how to survive in our fierce wilderness.”
“Spoken like a true New Orleanian who is not a true New Orleanian….” I had to laugh. He snapped his head around and glared daggers at me with the slightest smile.
“I’ve lived here longer than you have. The moment you come home you buy ce chapeau ridicule. Have you ever seen a Saints game, Ste Louis? Do you know how hard it was to be a fan in the early ‘80s? Humm? With a bag on our heads?” I know I am smiling like an idiot because here is my Lestat, arguing with me about something so stupid as a New Orleans Saint’s hat. About who is more New Orleans than the other. This is our chess game. My next move can be to get mad, which a younger me would have done. “You better shut your fuckin mouth ‘bout my city, ya heard me?” The Louis of a few months ago would have calmly reassured him that the city is large and unique enough to allow all that love her to share equally and uniquely without harming others. But I was somehow different from other Louises. I wasn’t numb, or full of rage or shamed. I was light, I was happy. I was finally free.
“If you love this city so much, ‘I am she, she is me,’ then why do you still speak avec cet accent ridicule, mon petit Français?”
His eyes widened. It’s not what I said, he knows we are playing, it was the last bit, the mon petit. I could have called him anything. But the mon so easily slips out. After all of these years, he is still mine. His eyes began to sparkle.
“Because you find it so charming, mon Sainte Louis.” He whipped around and instead of just moving things, he began gathering them in his arms. He floated around the room and before I am able to move his speaker to an interior wall, he declared that he is packed and ready to go.
Valise and portmanteau. Since I walked into his house it has been hard to control my face, to not look at him and sink deeply in his eyes. To control that smile. So I opt not to fight it.
“I decided to pack both,” he purrs.
“Staying that long?” He is delicious as always.
“Or I can keep one packed in case I need to make a quick exit.” It is measured. All of this is. His guard might be lowered but it is not gone. It’s in the form of two suitcases instead of a hand-drawn keyboard. I move towards him with my hand out to take one and then, and without warning the raging storm outside totally stops. No rain, light wind.
The Eye of the Odette is suddenly upon us.

Notes:

Maison Blance was an old department store founded in New Orleans 1897. It was rebuilt on Canal St in 1908. It gave us Mr. Bingle. That site is currently the location of The Ritz and The Saint Hotel.

ce chapeau ridicule

the ridiculous hat

parle avec cet accent ridicule, mon petit Français?

speak with that ridiculous accent, my little Frenchmen?"

Chapter 3: L'Elixir de Longue Vie

Summary:

“This is a very strange way to not bed someone, mon cher. You are doing a horrible job of it.”
Suddenly he seems daringly close, smiling at me with luminous green eyes. My breath hitches as it tumbles out of me.
“Tell me how thin the veil that separates us is,” he whispers.

I felt someone before I knew who it was. I could not hear thoughts, but I knew when there was another one of us near. This one was not one of the ancients, not Armand who was never quiet when he traveled through New Orleans.
I could sense this one was confident, aware of his surroundings, proud almost. The following night the creature got closer. Elegant and fearless, as if they owned this city. I stood and watched out of the window as the heartbeat grew stronger, closer. I knew that rhythm. I knew that exact beat.
Which steps of the dance shall we do this time? Which cards to place down?
Royal flush? Full House? A pair?
Am I to be Lestat the Wolfkiller? The Actor? The abandoned Son? The vicious killer? The abused fledgling? The violent lover, the spurned ex-husband, the grieving father? Has he come to gloat about his companion, how wonderful his life is- like Armand does when he comes, showing me pictures? But Armand is not here and Louis is hiding behind garbage cans. His heart is beating fast, as mine is.
He is proud, but he is cautious. He is confident, but I feel a haunted skip because mine is just as haunted.
I meant every word of apology I said to him in Paris. Clearly it wasn’t enough because I have waited seven decades to finish that conversation.
I stand the next night in his suites at the Saint Hotel during a raging hurricane. The interior is red and black leather. There is a black marble bath and a stripper pole. The windows are covered with suggestive screens. The Lucifer Suite it’s called. A little joke by his staff, he says, shrugging and smiling that beautiful smile. The one I first saw on a park bench in Jackson Square.
I stand under the disco light as he nervously takes my luggage. There are two bedrooms, two robes. One coffin. Within moments I have downed two bags of fox blood and find myself soaking in a black and white claw foot bath behind a glass door. I can hear him on the other side of the door, shuffling and moving things. He could walk in at any moment and watch me.
But he does not.
Companion enough for himself and yet, in less than 2 hours, I am in a robe on his bed.
We talk about how he got here- his interview, how he found out the truth, about finally tossing the Gremlin and walking out. But the big things linger unsaid.
The storm makes dawn difficult to discern time which has flown by since I have heard his voice.
“I didn’t get you a coffin, the sheers do cover the windows pretty well…. Do you want to…sleep… with me?” I cock my left eye up and tilt my head. “I mean, sleep in my coffin, with me, sleeping, also sleeping in the coffin, just… just sleeping.” I smile. He is so uneasy as if this is the first time we have been so close. I walk over to him and lift the lid.
“You can be on top, ” I whisper as I place my hand next to his.
I have wanted this for so long, for him to walk back into my life. I would have settled for anything, any crumb or speck. But for him to come like this- alone, wanting, honest, open- all night while we have talked of those early years in Paris.
Yes, he went along with Claudia’s plan to protect her. No, he ultimately did not do that. Yes, he did make her a companion. No, he did not feel a pull of maker to this Madelaine that he thought he would.
“The pull between maker and fledgling?”
“Yes, I, I just thought that she and I would be connected somehow, bonded to me like I felt to,... you… like, like you must to Magnus, like Armand did with Marius…” It is no less easy to get lost in those green eyes today as it was over a 100 years ago.
“The only thing I felt for Magnus was fear,...disgust. I felt a connection with Nicki before I made him but not more after. Nor the others, but…” Louis has leaned closer to me, his eyes never leaving mine.
“But what? What is it?” I look down at the floor. How do I explain this, tiptoe on this tightrope and not shake it, plummeting me to a certain death before I reach the other side? I am committing this crime in reality, the irony of my peril? Don’t I deserve it and more now?
“The feeling you felt, the bond, the cord that connects us,...I know it. I feel it. But that I do not feel, have not ever felt, with any other being. I feel a responsibility, a relation to them, oui, mais....” but what I feel for you, mon cher, mon amour, c’est au-delà… what we shared is a life and an eternity. A connection unlike any other. A heartbeat, birth, and death over and over. How do I say this?
“ …I do not know if what I feel for you, the pull as you say, des liens qui défient toute explication rationnelle, transcender le temps et l’espace… I do not think that has anything to do with being a maker or a fledgling. Or even with being a vampire.” I risk looking up. I see his Adam’s apple as he swallows, as he shakes his head and rolls it to the right looking off into the distance- an expression I have seen slide across his beautiful face a thousand times. When he hears something heavy, glaring beyond as if all of the answers to his existential existence lie just beyond the horizon. He turns his head back to me with his chin tilted down, shaking his head again slowly at first and then nodding yes in agreement.
“Ok, ok… yeah…I thought that it might,... that maybe…but it’s…” He swallows again, sighs, and looks to the right again before he looks back in my eyes. I can hardly breathe. “It’s something between, …just,... it’s only us.”
When he is vulnerable, Louis looks smaller. Fragile. Like he could burst into tears and wither away. But this version of him is stronger. This Louis, who talks about his emotions so much more freely, vibrantly, does not shrink like a violet. This Louis accepted my words now. He understands, finally. This is the Louis who I invited to lay on top, the Louis who accepts that not only was I giving him the Dark Gift, but also the gift of my love.
My companionship. Eternally for eternity.
“I think tonight I wouldn’t mind being on bottom if that’s alright.” He slid his hand over mine as I held open the lid to the coffin we would share for the first time in three-quarters of a century. We stand for a moment, so close but not moving. “I have missed you.”
“And I you, mon cher.”
“I didn’t come here to bed you, Lestat.”
“Of course, what kind of girl do you think I am? Handing out her wares to the first good-looking vampire who comes her way?” I toss my hair back and give him a coquettish smile. What blossoms across his face, that look, that beautiful look. And to know that he is looking at me that way. It was worth three-quarters of a century if it means I can still illicit that look. It is everything I can do to not let him see how he takes my breath away.
“But I have missed you.”
“You just told me that, mon cher, you are repeating yourself in your old age….”
“I mean,” he nervously lifted a hand to my heart, before sliding it up to my face, making every breath shatter. “I mean I have missed you, Lestat. I have missed your hardheadedness, your arrogance, your cruelty-”
“These are terrible compliments, Louis.”
“Your caring, your playfulness, your joie de vie. You were a challenge every sunset, Lestat de Lioncourt, and I have missed that.” I remember exactly the words he is playing upon. My Louis.
“This is a very strange way to not bed someone, mon cher. You are doing a horrible job of it.”
Suddenly he seems daringly close, smiling at me with luminous green eyes. My breath hitches as it tumbles out of me.
“Tell me how thin the veil is that separates us,” he whispers.
The letter! The one I wrote all of those years ago and gave to Roget. I had written it as we made plans to go to a Rome I knew we would never get to. Suddenly I understand. I know what he means when he says he misses me.
“It is thinner than the shirt you wore when I carried you up those stairs the night you became my companion. It is thinner than the sleet you called a snowstorm in 1940. It was thinner than that awful chiffon skirt you bought our daughter.”
“Is it thinner than that robe you got on right now?” I am being seduced and it has nothing to do with being a maker, or a fledgling, or a vampire. He is hard to resist with his eyebrows arched up. I am close enough to smell him.
“Oh mon cher, parts of me long to be pressed against your longing.” He throws his head back and laughs. His smile is radiant and wild.
“Goddamn, I have missed you.” I lean in to kiss his cheek quickly.
“Good! Now get in, the daylight is coming at some point and it would be ridiculous to get caught in it standing here as you try your hardest not to bed me.” I smacked at his ass and he laughed again.
“Now just cus' I traveled halfway 'round the world to see you doesn’t mean you get to go telling me what to do!” His accent has gotten thicker with every moment he has shared with me. He began to take his shoes off.
“In that case, please, please do not take all of your clothes off and take me in the coffin.” He walks to his suitcase, shoes now in hand. I watched as he put them down and grabbed a pair of pajama pants. How long could I take his being playful? How long would it last? We will sleep next to each other, but how long will we dance this dance? He changes out of his pants with his back to me, slipping on the pajama bottoms. No shirt. I can play the virgin or the tart. He walks back to me and goes for the lid. “Are you going to cha-” but I turn away, drop the robe as I do, and sashay to my trunk, bending over to find a pair of pajama pants. I hear an audible breath. Two can play at this game.
“Yes, I was just waiting for you to hold the lid for me.” I know I do not look my best, but I also know mon mari. And he is back. And he is mine. I slip into my sleep pants, turn, and fix him with a look.
“Entres à l'intérieur!!”
“Demanding…” but his smile is magnificent.
“I just know what I want.” I roll my eyes to keep them from falling deeply into his. He lays down in his very comfortable coffin. “And what is it that Madame wants?”
It is too late. I have already fallen. I fell the moment he said my name, the moment he smiled. I fell 114 years ago. I have never stopped falling for my Louis.
“My beauty rest.” I step in between his legs.
“And…?”
“To lay next to the most beautiful man in the world.” He chuckled as I lowered myself.
“And…?” I was quiet. This new landscape of honesty was difficult to navigate, so filled with vulnerability and rawness. Do I say what I want, what haunts me in my dreams, comme l'impossible?
“To live again, Louis.” I lowered my head on his chest, hearing his heart beating synchronously with mine, a heart I have belonged to for all of these years. My exhaustions did not so much overtake me, but feeling safe for the first time in decades was the L'Elixir de Longue Vie I so desperately needed.

Notes:

Because New Orleans- The Lucifer Suite at The Saint Hotel https://thesaintnola.com/stay/

c’est au-delà…

It is beyound

des liens qui défient toute explication rationnelle, transcender le temps et l’espace

connections that defy all rational explanation, transcending time and space

Entres à l'intérieur!

Get inside!

Chapter 4: Fuckin' Rue de Saturn and back.

Summary:

"I wanted every thought you had and was willing to do anything to make it come true. Why, in which variation of the universe, would I not do everything in my power to allow you to seduce me?”
The noise did stop then. Silence. Just he and I in a coffeeshop on Royale and Hospital. No, not any more. Gov Nicholls Streeet now. Fuck, they could have renamed it 62 times til Tuesday, called it the Moon Street. Fuckin' Rue de Saturn and Back.
Shit.
I was in love again.

I had no plans to stay in New Orleans, nor did I have plans to leave. My dealings could be carried out anywhere there was decent internet and cell service. In the days that followed Odette, there was not a lot of either and I was not a damn bit upset for it.
Waking up surrounded by Lestat was a drug that I became addicted to after years of sobriety. Just one hit, I told myself. I can handle it. His smell overwhelmed me. His silly expressions, the cocking of his head, his smile, the look of utter adoration he gave when he listened to me. There were changes in this Lestat and try as I might I fell harder for him every moment.
How many times had I succumbed in new and more intricate ways over the years? More than I ever would have admitted before. Let the story seduce you as I was seduced, I told Daniel. As if I wasn’t still being seduced every moment of every day, a world without end, Amen.
He was guarded except when we lay down to sleep. Then and only then did I get the vulnerable flayed open Lestat. The Lestat who cried for our daughter, who held on to me and apologized for a thousand transgressions both real and imagined. Falling for Lestat had been easy when he was charming. But the new Lestat, I needed to protect, needed to care for- I was unprepared for this new madness I felt for him. I had no idea I was capable of it. The tables seemed to have turned in this new version of us.
It took time for us to open up, apologize and eulogize, especially the last few years.
It was easier than to talk about Claudia. To postulate what she would think of social media or today’s fashions or music. She was always a subject that, while heart-wrenching, was what we needed to share, to discuss. To grieve.
“It is catchy but insipid and I simply think Claudia had too much depth for Taylor Swift.” I laughed at Lestat’s dismissiveness.
“I think,” as I held my cafe au lait at a small table inside of CC’s Coffeehouse, “she would have grown into a Bee Fan after she was a Swifty. No way the little girl in the sailor skirt and pigtails would have understood Beyonce; back then, Taylor would have made sense.”
“HA!” he yelled loudly enough for the patrons around to look at us more than they already had, “you underestimate the nuanced taste of our daughter, her delicate pallet, her-” I reached my hand out to cover Lestat’s.
“Honey, are we projecting? Are you sure Claudia is who we are talking about, and not… not you?” There was a struggle on his face. He so wanted to argue with me, to toss a table and yell in a French that no one spoke anymore. I squeezed his hand and scrunched up my nose as he took a deep and measured sigh. This new Lestat, the one who stopped and thought, who quelled his rage, who conceded… he was just as enthralling to be around.
“I just think that, like me, she could decipher real talent from pop culture.” He cleared his throat but did not move his hand from under mine.
The last few weeks had been a delicate balancing act. We were not companions, per say, but we were not, not companions. In the coffin, we held each other as we had in the past, tangled and linked in an intricate knot. Once night hit, we were much more cautious, tentative.
This night, however, for the first time ever in public, we sat there hand in hand.
“Do you think she would be more of an Olivia or a Lizzo fan? Or the Chappell is more to her liking?
“I find it funny,” I moved my chair just a little closer to him, “that whatever you like, she would like.” I can’t help but smile. He is radiant when he talks about Claudia.
“What do you expect? She is my daughter!” I brush a lock of hair out of his face and he glances shyly. The first few days he froze when I did this, as if he were afraid my touch would sting. The closer it got to dawn, the more he warmed up to me, the longer I stayed the longer I could linger. “Of course we are alike! Why do you think we fought so much?” He risks turning his hand over to catch mine. We sit for a moment in comfortable, companionable silence.
I want to tell him I have her diaries, but I am not sure he is ready for the vitriol the later ones contain. In the early days, when she is laughing at our fussing or talking about how sweet we are with one another, I think he can handle those. It might take him years to face the real consequences of our actions, not just the thousand permutations he had created in his mind.
“I think,” I gently rub my thumb on his hand, “that you both liked to fuss.” The look of faux shock on his face makes my heart skip a beat.
“Louis de Pointe du Lac! I do not like to fuss, I like to be right. You, mon cher, like to fuss, as you say.”
“Well, you know what they say, fussin’ is love. If I fuss, it’s because I care enough to notice.” He shuffles his feet nervously at that and fidgets. The implications of that statement are not lost on him.
Where are we? Where do we stand? How long will I stay in New Orleans? My old Lestat would have romanced me, gifts, dinners and … would the new Lestat?
I sit there as lost as he is. “Can I ask you a question? Honest, not, not trying for you to read anything or to make it,... weird.”
“Louis, we are beyond weird.”
“Speak for yourself….” I so missed the million micro-expressions of haught he produced. “Armand, removed memories for me, he… interfered, those about the trial, about what happened in Paris and after. But…there, when you were telling your version of things, did you hunt me or did I hunt you?” Lestat’s eyes grew wide and his hand went slightly limp in mine. “Because as I remember it, you pursued me. But at the trial, in front of Claudia, you made it sound like -”
“ ‘-I, a vampire, was being hunted….’ ” He repeated, refusing to meet my eye.
“Yeah, exactly.” I could tell he wanted to both pull away and hold on to me. “If you don’t want to talk about this, I, I get it. I just… I just don’t know what is mine and what is, not-.”
“Yes.” He does not bat an eye when he looks at me finally.
“Yes?”
“Yes.”
“Lestat, I’m confused, how can-” He sighs and pulls his hand away. Mine felt colder suddenly than it had in weeks. His bright blue eyes looked out of the window, watching a young man and his very small dog turn the corner and walk down Royal. I catch the small sigh that slips out of him.
“I was bewitched the moment I saw you with Paul on the street. I pursued you. However, I,... I could read your thoughts.”
Oh.
Oh.
I never considered...
Oh.
Suddenly the din in the coffee shop seemed a million miles away. Lestat didn’t have to stop time, not that I thought that he was strong enough too then. Being with him meant, even like this, even as not companions, just as friends, that the world seemed to slide away into silence around him. That somehow, in a crowded restaurant, on a busy street, over the loud live music of a ragtime band, all these years later he was still the only one thing I saw, the only thing I heard. He glanced at me reticently.
“It’s not that I was trying to intrude, but the spell you wove on me… I…I wanted to make sure that I was not, what is the expression, barking up the wrong tree.”
“And what were those thoughts?” He flinched in his seat, eyes flicking away again, flushing for a second.
“The first time, you were angry with your brother but you loved him. You didn’t want to do what you did and you were mad that he forced your hand. You wondered did he knew how far you would go to prove yourself in front of those men on the street. You wondered if he knew how much you loved him, how deeply you wished he was able to be your partner every day like you had imagined when you were children.
“Then, your fear of what everyone around thought of you, of who you really were, if they knew about you. Of Paul never understanding the depths of your love, nor the depth of your shame…” He shifted, sitting up more, wrapping his hands around a drink he would never ingest before he continued.
“You were mad, mad because I was talking to Lily because she seemed interested in me the way she paid you attention. Mad that I was occupying her which meant you would not be. But also that she was occupying me. People might talk. Mad because you thought I slighted you. Instantly on guard and thinking I insulted you. And even though you never wanted her to touch you, you were mad at how I caressed her in front of you. You wanted to feel special to her, but you wanted to feel that from me, too. I knew instantly that you were protective of her, but also jealous of her, how I touched her and not you.” He refused to meet my eyes and I knew why.
“You knew I was… attracted to you.” There was no use in hiding it now.
“I think the first thought was along the lines of “damn, fuck me,” ah then something like “Getcha hands offa her!” But immediately wishing my hands were on you. Trying to figure out if I was a “wolf” or a “punk” and oh, yes it was ‘what I’m destined for is to get some face.’ ” It was my turn to blush. I told Daniel I wanted to beat the man and be the man. Nah, I also wanted to take him right there. And he knew it all those years. Even two weeks ago, reliving that moment with Daniel, I couldn’t be honest with myself. Lestat chuckled. “That look on your face now is the same look you gave me then- disgust, disappointment? You were upset at yourself that you felt that way about me? Or are you upset now?” He still knew me better than I knew myself. I took a sip of coffee that tasted like paste, but cafe au lait was a paste from home that I missed terribly.
“I was talking to the interviewer about that, about meeting you and I… you are right, mostly right, and for some reason I couldn’t tell him all those things.”
“Tell him what, Louis?”
“I said I wanted to ‘be the man and beat the man’. That I was upset at how you treated Lily but also that I was in awe of you. That you held my chest, my lungs, my heart in your grip and I couldn’t breathe. But that you hunted me and I was under your spell.” That made him laugh again. He pushed a lock of hair behind his ear and shook his head back.
“Well, that is true. But you also wanted to be with the man, so to speak. I did pursue you, Louis, but it was not unwelcomed.” He put his hand back out on the table towards me, as if he wanted me to take it again. Still tempting me all these years later. “You weren’t throwing down money because you wanted to take Lily to the room and what, talk to her? About me? You were throwing it down because you wanted to impress me. Show me all that you had, that you could win, dominate me. That you could take me. That is why I had to let you beat me at cards. I had to let you seduce me.” I took his hand and laced our fingers together, laughing at the memory of that night as well.
I remember the dirty thoughts I had about him when we played cards that first time. Slide the chips off the table and bend him over right then and there. How I wanted to pull his hair from behind, how I would be his master. But I also knew that he would put up a fight. I had been the wolf up until that point, allowing others to service me. But Lestat was different. Just thinking about that night stirred something in me.
“You let me win at cards because so I would seduce you?”
“I let you win at cards so we could seduce each other, mon petit, so you could show me how big of a man you were. But also so that you understood that I was willing to give you everything I had, to lose everything for you, to help you, to be on your side against them, against anyone.” He moved his chair, angling it towards me, and leaned over. We had not shown this much affection towards each other this early in the night, sober, in public, ever. Whatever he had stirred in me, kept stirring, whorling with each blink and head tile, each smile, laugh, and blush. “And the look you gave me as you slid that first pile of chips towards yourself, the ‘yeahhh’ that you thought as you looked me in the eye, as you bit your lip, shook your head yes. I wanted to watch you do that as you took your shirt off, as you stalked over to me, as you pushed the chips off of the table, as you sat on my lap, as you grabbed me by the hair, as you pushed me back, as you kissed my neck and my jaw and took my mouth. I wanted every thought you had and was willing to do anything to make it come true. Why, in which variation of the universe, would I not do everything in my power to allow you to seduce me?”
The noise did stop then. Silence. Just he and I in a coffee shop on Royale and Hospital. No, not anymore. Gov Nicholls Street now. Fuck, they could have renamed it 62 times til Tuesday, called it the Moon Street. Fuckin' Rue de Saturn and Back.
Shit.
I was in love again.
The spinning and whorling in my chest. His free hand had come up on my face and I leaned into it, turned my head to kiss his palm. Drugged and high on the best there ever was. And all he ever needed were that smile and some pretty words. I was a goner.
I had a plan, alright.
I had come to New Orleans to ask why he didn’t tell me it was him all of those years ago. Why he let me go to someone who lied to me and manipulated me? Why he had been my hero on a stallion but left himself stranded in the tower as the damsel walked away. But there was a greater truth that I had not uncovered in these first weeks of my new honest life.
Let the tale seduce you.
I talked tough about being the victim to his want, but I had wanted him from the start. I wanted his hands on me, his mouth on mine. And then once we became friends, I wanted to be around him every moment I could: sit on a bench in the Square, walk the streets of Treme. Shit, I went to the Opera with this man. I fell willingly over and over. The moment those eyes looked at me, I was his but I ran to them every time. I wanted to be the man, I wanted to be with the man, I wanted him bent over that card table, I wanted to be quivering on his cock, I wanted to awaken every morning next to him, but I had been lying to myself and to everyone else if that was all.
Why did I need to hurt him, for him to see me with an Armand he must have known I would never love like him?
Why was I not able to burn his body? Fought her just like he had.
Why had I taken him back after that night?
After he cheated?
Why did I beg him to give us a daughter? ‘I’ll never leave you?’
Why did I move in with him?
Why did he haunt me for 77 years?
“Mon Sainte Louis…”
I didn’t shake my head yes because I was scared or hunted. I felt captive alright, but he was captivated all the same and I knew it. I shook my head yes because for the first time, I could love and be loved. I wanted that circle but was not capable of living in it then. And I had come back to New Orleans to find it again, to mend it, to try to live it honestly. Not where I was hiding from him or me, not disgusted at myself how utterly out of control he made me feel. Not where I was ashamed I lived with him, created a daughter with him, talked to the ghost of him for years after I hurt him and myself and her. Not where I created a narrative 50 years ago that I stayed because I had no choice, that I was weak, or was under his control. Not even a few weeks ago where I couldn’t be honest with a complete stranger.
Or, mostly a complete stranger.
I came home to remove the veil, to feel his face pressed against mine. To claim him and be claimed. To fall, over and over, in ever-increasing arabesque ways with the most beautiful man I had ever laid eyes on.
With the man I had fallen in love with and never gave a real honest go with.
With the man I never stopped loving even if I felt horrible and ashamed because I thought he had condemned our daughter to death.
The noise suddenly returned and it jolted me out of the reverly of him. He wasn’t a ghost in my mind. He wasn’t the specter I told Armand, or Daniel or myself he was. He was there, flesh and blood, my face in one hand, my hand in the other and my heart beating as wildy in time with his as it ever has.
“Let’s get out of here,” he whispered, a twinkle in his eyes, smiling at me as if I were the only thing in his universe. All I could do was shake the head he still held in his hand.
Just like I shook it on the altar.
What had I told Daniel all of those years ago? ‘What would Christ need have done to make me follow Him like Matthew or Peter? Dress well, to begin with. And have a luxurious head of pampered yellow hair.’ Nothing had changed since 1910.
I would have it no different.

Notes:

“wolf” and “punk” are early slang 1900s terms. Wolf would be one who pursued the relations, a punk would be younger and more passive.

Legitimately can not get decent cafe au lait north of Baton Rouge, west of Lake Charles or east of Biloxi. And it is NOT the burnt stuff the sell at Cafe du Monde... I wish a real au lait for each of you. WITH chicory.

The current Gov Nicholls, where this CC's has s
tood for a hot minute, used to be called Hospital. Few of the names have changed in the Quarter itself, but the numbering system way has which makes research even for a native painful.

'What would Christ need have done to make me follow Him like Matthew or Peter? Dress well, to begin with. And have a luxurious head of pampered yellow hair.’- one of my favorite lines from Interview.

Chapter 5: Qu'est-ce qui se passe, bordel?

Summary:

I had willingly fallen for someone incapable of loving me, who could not see me as I was, making my imperfections for choosing those more imperfect all the more pronounced. They had, over and over, been my downfall and so, moving forward in whatever life I had, I would live alone, like Magnus or Marius. I would rely on myself and I would be hap- I would survive. That is what I did best. Survived.
Certainly not for love.
Or happiness.

I had sat in the tower for days after they left. Who am I? What am I? Why me? Why do I do what I do; create and destroy, control and push away and hold on to again and again? Why did I choose those to love who could not love me? Would not love me. And even those that did love me could not stand to stay with me for long. I was too much, my whole human life I had been too much and in the interceding years, nothing had changed. Not my Mother- she needed her own life away from mine, one that did not involve me. Not Nikki- who let his madness surpass whatever he felt for me. Not Claudia- whose love was replaced with resentment and loathing. Not Louis. Not Louis.
As I sat there, awake for days, feeling pity for myself, I thought of Magnus. Magnus, who picked hundreds and starved and tortured and hurt, and yet, I survived. Maybe that was my fault. I was looking for someone to share my life with, to stop this loneliness. Magnus was looking for an heir, not a lover, not a partner, not a companion. I had not been made from love but survival, and yet love was the only thing I sought.
I had not been content with myself. And so, against Marius' words- go and make a life for myself- I did the opposite. I went and made an existence for myself. Sleeping for years in the earth. Awakening only to endure. I decided I was not made to love. I could not be. I had mistaken my intention for all of these years. I was made to endure, to survive, to go on day after day, to bear witness to something I must not yet understand. I had mistaken my purpose and my power based on my desire to fill a want that I was never meant for.
Lestat was not created to love.
Not for love.
And the irony was that I loved more deeply, more wildly, more vibrantly than anyone I had ever known. My family did not have the depth of feeling I had, except the depth of hatred. Nikki, Armand, Eleni. Marius. Akasha.
Why were we filled with rage, with hatred, but never let… it was desire and no more. I left Paris knowing only this- the love that I contained was my downfall, it was my greatest weakness. It would destroy me faster than a fire or the sun if I let it and I had let it. I had willingly fallen for someone who was incapable of loving me, who could not see me as I was which made my imperfections for choosing those more imperfect all the more pronounced. They had over and over been my downfall and so, moving forward, in whatever life I had, I would live alone, like Magnus or Marius. I would rely on myself and I would be hap- I would survive. That is what I did best. Survived.
Certainly not for love. Or happiness.
“It looks like they have restored power to all of Jefferson Parish. There are still homes out in northern St Tammany and a few in St Bernard.” We were sitting on our bench in Jackson Square for the first cool front of our New Orleans fall. It was time for the smells of sweet olive to take over from that of jasmine and magnolia. The memory of years past with Louis stirred things that should not be stirred. Feeling I knew better than to think on.
“The last time I was out there was when Claudia was hiding all of those bodies in Chalmette…” He shrugged, sitting with his legs straight out and his hands in his pockets. I had gotten him to take off the Saint's ballcap. I suppose this was his modern replacement for a pork pie or the straw boater hat I so loved to see him wear. Tomorrow we must visit Meyer’s and purchase him a stingy brim. Or a driving cap. “It was devastated after Katrina, entire neighborhoods sat in 12 feet of stench, over roofs and cars for weeks. Even now it is much smaller than before.”
“Barely had anybody when my family bought land in 1832.” I looked at him in surprise. His face was placid, tranquil. He had not a single care in this whole wide world.
Hmmm. Maybe a fedora would work. No… stop it Lestat. Let all of it go. He is…he’s not…
“ I had no idea your family-owned land then.”
“Where do you think the money came from for my father to lose!” he laughed, not as mad about his father or the loss all these years later. This Louis was so much lighter, full of so much peace. These things rolled off of him where before he stumbled under the weight of all of expectation. This Louis was not moody or cross, things no longer vexed or paralyzed him. This new Louis no longer wore the heavy cloke of shame and supposition. What remained was the confidence and swagger, the determination, the wit and keen intelligence. The sweetness. The tenderness. The kindness and generosity.
In so many ways this was the Louis that I fell in love with, not the Louis who ran hot and cold. Nor the man who acted out of fear or shame. Who starved me for love and manipulated me to get his way. Finally the man that I had caught glimpses of so many years ago sat before me, and there was such an ache in my heart; I had seen throught that man who was dragging under his burden. I had been right all along yet so many years had been lost that my victory was shallow.
“Well, you said you owned sugar and your father had left you desolate….”
“In 1832, the Chalmette Plantation was sold to the St Amant brothers who were technically related to us somehow, through a marriage or something, but they sold part of it a few years later to the du Lacs. It grew sugar for the better part of a century but the levee break in 1901 destroyed the big house and the fields for the last time. It was worth only the value of the land when I sold it right after my Popa died in 1905 to Dominos’s Sugar.” He rearranged his jacket tighter around himself as if he needed to ward off the crisp breeze before he shoved his hands back in his pockets.
I laughed.
“What’s funny?” Maybe I should not have laugher. Tonight I should be the funny Lestat? The teasing Lestat? The Harraquin? The Flirt? No. No, I had to stop this. I knew better than to hope. Those first few days I was so surprised, so taken aback, so lightheaded that I had forgotten about the despair of loneliness, my purpose was to survive. No matter how broken I had been, I had repaired myself. An every day since he had returned I have left myself to fall and crumble.
“In the 1830, the west tower of our chateau was falling. It was in such pathic shape that the Jacobians rode up, took one look, thought it was already abandoned, and rode off.” It was Louis’ turn to laugh. I turned to see his smile as he looked off to the left at the slurred voices that began to raise. On the other side of the fence where there was someone drunkenly yelling that yes, Camille, she was fine to drive home.
“Audrey, give Camille your keys!” Louis yelled. “ Man, that shit literally only happens in New Orleans.” He turned to look at me, his eyes dancing. His brown jacket was far too big on him, not tailored the way that I like. But it made his eyes seem all the greener. “I missed how loud New Orleans is. How drunk and wild. How vibrant, singularly original,...alive…” his voice was nearly a whisper as he said words that felt latent with meaning. I could not look away, trapped in the beauty of his glare.
Every night that we have spent together over this month I lost my resistance to never love again. Every night was simply another opportunity to lose myself more to him. And each night remembering the line between desiring him and loving him, surviving and throwing myself on the bonfire of devotion became an impossibility He says sweet things to me, holds the door open, caters to my every whim, smiles those kind smiles…smiles that I had lived for and so desperately missed in the interceding years. Smiles that once meant something. I know that he feels awful for how things ended in Paris, for how they ended in New Orleans. And although I have affirmed that we have both made mistakes, that my actions were just if not more responsible than his, and that we both have things we have repented these last 7 decades for, I must tell myself over and over that this is all there is.
Smiles.
Kindness to make up for lost years.
Guilt.
Louis has always been a creature of guilt, but this smile is not one of penance.
I dare not ask when he is leaving. Would you rather know the day your world will end, or just live every moment in perfect, blissful happiness until then?
Because no matter how lovely tonight is, or the next, or the next, the shoe will drop. The hang fire is coming, if you will. He will pack, he will make excuses and return to Dubai. And with each passing day, I long to hold him closer, to keep him nearer to me, to grasp until he can not leave me.
Even though I know this will only bring my ruination.
Even though I know this is exactly what I decided against in Magnus’ tower 7 decades ago.
Even though I know that is the very thing that will make him run from me. Again.
Camille and Audrey yell again and the spell is broken.
“What did you laugh at? I told you my chateau was in such shambles the Jacobites didn’t even bother to knock on our door. Did I… was I funny?”
“No, no, Lestat… it’s just that… you had a chateau and a title; you grew up poor but privileged. I grew up with money but brown skin, lived way more than comfortable but was “disadvantaged”. Just… funny, I guess, how juxtaposed we were.”
“But still, it is as if our very dichotomies were destined to intersect.” He laughed again, took his hands out of his pockets, and sat up.
“That’s a really complicated way to say ‘to fuck’.”
This is territory that we rarely wade into. A discussion about his thoughts on me before he turned, a mention of that one time Claudia almost walked in on us. But no more had we dipped our toes into these waters.
“It wasn’t complicated, it was… poetic. We both grew up as people who were walking contradictions. It makes sense that we were drawn to each other, fated almost… even if we didn’t know it.” I was trying so very hard to keep myself together. To not relive every moment that we had shared. To not begin think, not to hope.
“We were meant to hook up, then, is what you are saying,” he laughed again.
On second thought, thinking was a perfectly fine task for us to indulge in. Yes, thinking was good. Reminiscing is important for old friends with a very specific shared past. Certainly no harm can come from it, no? We had a truth to flush out and in that we can see our folly, the silliness of thinking two creatures like us are meant for more than destruction or desire. Perfectly fine, of course, all of it.
What the hell were we doing?
“Yes Louis. I should have looked you in the eye at the Fair Play and said, ‘destined to explore every inch of each other’s bodies with our tounges.’ Or, would you have preferred ‘destined to wear out four beds and stain two coffins so thoroughly we had to have them re-lined.” How about “destined to give each other rug burns while ruining our throats?”
“I mean damn Lestat, I said fucking, not all, I didn’t say all that,” he chuckled. There is nothing about his posture, his expression, how he is leaning forward suddenly, his hands rubbing up and down his thighs that screamed he hadn’t, in fact, minded that it was all that at all.
I laugh nervously and look out towards Jax Brewery. My heart is racing. What am I doing? Sitting this close, full of remembrance. The more I am near him, the more intoxicated I become and the less I recall the lessons I have learned.
“You say ‘fucking’. So vulgar. I would say destined to bring you to our home, gift you your call girl, let my staff have the night off, put her to sleep, and give you the very opportunity to live out what had so loudly been replaying over in your pretty little head- so I can taste you while my cock throbbed pressed against you?”
Louis stopped moving his hands, closed his eyes, his breath shuttered.
Now you have done it, Lestat. Somehow, as it always is, I have crossed the line, pushed too far. I can say broad, sweeping things, I can laugh about ruining mattress. But I should not have given that specific of a detail, not that instance. I instantly regret what I have said because I have no idea what Louis wants except to thank me and not to bed me.
To hold my hand.
To cuddle.
To cry on each other.
To kiss my wrist.
To flirt mercilessly.
To be so close that I can smell him, hear his heat beat as mine does.
To hold me as I sleep and in the tender hours when we wake.
To soothe me when I cry.
To purchase a cute little dishcloth that he saw at a shop on Dumaine that reminded him of me.
I have no idea what I am doing or saying except that I am utterly under his spell. He takes another deep breath before a smirk begins to bloom on his face.
“Well, yeah, when you put it that way, I guess we were destined for that.” He giggled and raised his beautiful green eyes to look at me. The breeze rustled through oak trees that had stood behind our bench since we last graced it.
I exhaled all of the breath I had held for weeks.
“Destine to be my fledgling…?”
“Well, you made a really good case for it.”
“Destined to move in with me…?”
“I mean, where the hell else was I going to go? Move in the tomb with Paul?”
“Destined to be my lover?” I chanced. He bit his lip. He bit it in the same manner that he had at the Fair Play. What am I doing? Why can’t I be content with the apology and the last month and the friendship?
Why is it that no matter what, how many years, how much heartbreak and solitude, that I still want?
That I can not ever stop hoping and needing.
I was meant to survive, no more.
No More.
“Yeah, yeah that was just a matter of time before I let you…before we… became…lovers.” I could see the heat rise to his cheeks and feel it in my own.
“Destined to have a family…?” I whisper. He is quiet for a moment, his brow crossed, he shakes his head several times before turning back to me.
“There is no scenario where we do not have a family. Where we do not become parents. If it wasn’t Claudia, it would have been…maybe not as young or not…” his eyes are huge. I lean closer to him as he does me. Our heads instinctually tilt to slot together. We have not shared a kiss in decades, but we are instinctually drawn to each other.
It is an old habit I tell myself. A learned behavior that does not die so easily. Just another step in the dance we do. Nothing more. But that is not what my mouth says.
“I, I would have done it again and again, for you…” I sigh, moving closer to his mouth. His breath catches. We stare at each other, washed in the artificial lights now, the sounds of cars and electric music. So different than when we sat on this very bench 100 years ago.
But not so different at all.
“I was cruel to you, before,” he confesses in a hushed tone.
“I was cruel to you, before as well,” I retort.
“I was scared as hell, Lestat.”
“I was, too, Louis.”
“Yeah, but I was scared of people finding out about me. Scared of who I was, of what I wanted, of my family looking down on me, of losing everything.”
“I was scared different, mon cheri. Of losing you. Of you leaving me. What I felt for you was nothing I had felt before and I wanted to get lost in you. You, you did not want to get lost in me and I thought, with her… we could be the family I never had. The parents we both wanted. We could be… complete.”
There was a tear in his eye. He whiped it away, leaned back, looking away from me.
Withdrawing.
Retreating.
As he should.
I turn away, too, fearful I have said too much that, as usual, I have been too much. This was not…. Desire is fine. But love is not. Love had been, but it is over. It can not ever be again.
“But we were never going to be complete. We wanted the same thing, just... different.” We sat there in silence, listening to Audrey cry and apologize to Camile. She was never, ever going to do it again.
“Did we, did we want the same thing then?”
He turned back from the direction of Audrey and Camile, lost in a moment, in the thought.
“Yeah. Yeah we did. We just didn’t,.. couldn’t.” He shook his head, unable to say more.
The same thing.
Qu'est-ce qui se passe, bordel?

Notes:

Qu'est-ce qui se passe, bordel?

What the hell is going on?

I have live my whole life in NOLA, so any reference to place and things is correct. The Chalmette Plantation (near where the Battle of New Orleans took place) was sold to the St Amant Brothers, who were gens de couleur, and the current Domino's Sugar sits on that very land. I assume that Louis was a Creole, a gens de couleur, which has a long rich history here. Anne wrote Feast of All Saints about a Creole folks and Merrick and Quinn are Creoles.

Audrey and Camille were two of the worst hurricane's to hit the area and I use those names all the time because I find it funny.

Chapter 6: my heart would always ache for him more than any other part of me

Summary:

“Would you have kissed me? Would you have held my head in your hand, as I am doing now, and embarrassed me with all of the passion and love that we felt?” We were daringly close. Did he want that now? For me to lean in and slowly brush my lips against his? To taste him again.
Was the need to kiss him now greater than it had been then because I knew exactly how extraordinary he felt pressed against me? Every day that we spent together felt like another day closer to the inevitable, just like it had back then.

Notes:

Just a possible trigger warning or two. Louis refers to himself as a "a sissy" - "lose my Mother, prove my father right" It is an offensive term from the late 1890s and probably the term most likely used by his father in that time period, which is why he would have used it here.

By week six it was as if I had never left. As if our daughter had moved out to her dorm room and was too busy to visit us.
By week six we snuggled in the mornings, we planned out our days. We lounged and walked, we went to the movies once they reopened. We drank beer at Oktoberfest, we watched the Krewe of Boo. We read to each other at night. We held hands in cafes and danced at the clubs.
As if we were lovers again, except, we weren’t, were we?
In every regard, it looked like we… could have been.
Except one.
As if Armand and Dubai never existed. But Rashid called me, insisting I return, that I had to deal with Daniel, that Armand had abandoned them. I had clients, sales. I gave him a raise, told him to let me talk to Daniel and that he needed a week off.
Maybe two.
Maybe a whole month.
Dubai and Daniel and Armand were not real too me. Only home, only this moment. As if all of the others were the hallucination and not the other way around.
The man that haunted me for years was now my reality.
____
Before dawn, we dressed as we had centuries ago, in tandem, while talking or discussing or reminiscing. I handed him a shirt, he placed my shoes by his. We discussed a play we saw, the 1926 Momus Parade, Claudia's first Christmas with us. We had space in each other’s life, a place for clothes and shoes in my stylish 2 bedroom suite.
We still only had one coffin. I had just gotten him back in my arms, I was not ready to let him go. Nor was he me. Would I ever be? What exactly did I come to New Orleans for?
Once we were down for the morning, that was when the real began. Honest talk. Raw talk. What had I called it so many years ago to Claudia? Soft words and hard words?
Hard words- we were two very imperfect beings who looked to the other to fill holes created by trauma that existed in our lives before we met. We never were open with communication, we didn’t trust the other with our truth. Hell, we didn’t really trust ourselves with it. We let our insecurities allow hurt and jealousy to take root and destroy so much. We both were guilty- manipulative, hidden, damaged, dishonest. As awful as the last few decades had been, we needed them to gain perspective, to have the gift of distance and time that allows all the shit to slip away and have the truth staring right at you- a truth that is undeniable, even if we haven’t really voiced whatever that truth is, exactly. That we had regrets about our actions and the pain that it caused each other and her.
Soft words- we loved our daughter even if we did it differently. We cherished the time the three of us spent then even when it was rough. Falling in love had been easy, it was funny how we both tried so hard. Mon cher. Mon ami. Mon coeur. How drawn to the other we were. How hopeless each was even if the other never saw it. The small silly thoughts we had about a million different instances that back then we could never have shared. How we dealt with the other’s absence in the interceding years-living, enduring, whatever it was. The harm we caused ourselves as penance. The things we wished we would have known, could have said, and should have taken back
Oddly, the hard words were still easier than the soft.
“I hadn’t thought of Karnofsy’s in years. I still love that maroon suit they made for you.” I turned to see Lestat’s hand held out anticipating my shirt before I had done unbuttoning it.
“I liked the one that I wore to your mother’s house that first time, meeting the in-laws….” We exchanged my shirt for his shoes, placing them by our others. “Can we have a brief moment for our matching green ties? It is possible that I might have used a little trick for that.” Lestat turned, shirtless, chest bare with his head tilted to the side. Devilish smile, a twinkle in his eyes.
Resisting Lestat, all of him, had always been hard, even in the worst throws of depression when I barely wanted to eat. He has always been the most attractive…nah… that doesn’t do him justice. Simply put, Lestat is physical perfection for me. His broad shoulders, his muscular stomach, petit waist. Armand used to try so hard to be as cut as Lestat. The thought of that factoid brings a smirk to my face. But my attraction to the physical man in front of me was impossible to hide. He tossed both of our shirts on the chair next to him.
“I ‘ow know, is almost like, like, one of us could read the other’s mind. Put thoughts in it, even. Manipulatin’ people, like, like a whole company of soldiers or something, or entire theater of people.…” His smile grew more animated and dazzling as I fumbled to put on my sleep shirt. He puts his hands on his hips and shifts his weight to the left.
“Well, in my defense, your thoughts were very loud, mon loulou. Even if I tried hard to not hear them, they were always there. ‘Damn, look at those pants’, ‘I want to take out that hair tie and grab his hair’, ‘Fuck, I need him between my legs.’ ” I could feel my face redden. I hadn’t thought about that night in years. Bringing Lestat home to meet my mother, my family. When Gracie told me to invite him, she knew exactly what that was- that I was bringing home my boo for my family to meet. She knew it and I knew it and we couldn’t say a word. If he hadn’t ended up being a vampire, he would have ended up being my “business partner.” That lived together. In a house with only one master bedroom. He looked so charmingly smug at that moment, with his head tilted. I wanted to walk up to him in that moment and wrap my hands around that waist. His face brightened and mischief danced across it.
“ ‘I’d suck him like a crawfish head if he let me…’ ” he took a step closer to me shaking his head side to side.
“Ok, true, true I do remember thinkin' that one once.”
“Once? ‘You could push me up against that…’ Was it wall or table? or car or whatever object was near you?”
“Ok, also that, yeah, I thought that one a lot, lots of different places, too.” He picked up my shirt and quickly folded it, looking away from me.
“ ‘I ain’t never fucked a white man before…’ ” I turn my head quick.
“Damn, really Lestat?”
“What? I just wanted to give you the opportunity to decide for yourself, what was it you kept thinking, if I was as thick as you imagined me to be.” He picked up his shirt before laying mine down.
In these moments, he was everything I remembered and more. I felt heat rising to the surface. He could take me here half-dressed as we were, I tell myself. Push me against the wall. Or the other way around. He would probably let me. It’s a good thing he can’t read my mind now because those thoughts are more than fleeting.
But I tell myself we don’t do that. Not here, not even in the dark, where we don’t have to see the faces of those feelings. That it not who we are. It’s not like that between us, that wild animalistic need. It can’t be like that.
I’m not here to bed him.
Right?
“Actually, I do have a question.” How any cohesive thought had blossomed in my mind was beyond me. He tossed his shirt on top of mine and walked over to me while undoing his belt. Honestly, this might be the night I lose all resistance.
What am I even resisting again?
“About that night with Lily. Had you planned-” I watch his hands as they unfasten and remove his belt, then begin on his pants. Thoughts, Louis, have some thoughts. Lestat fucked with those, too, but not like Armand did. Lestat fucked with my thoughts in completely different ways. “ -for her to be there that night all along? Did you plan it in all the months we had spent from the first time we spoke at the Fair Play?” Lestat began to shimmy out of his pants with his gaze down.
No underwear. Of course no underwear. Why,... how…I was Satan’s strongest soldier as I tore my eyes away from the crease of his Michaelangelo muscle.
“As I told you before, I had watched you. I knew you visited her. I decided that was where I would introduce myself to you. When I went back with her, all she wanted to do was talk about you. Talk about how beautiful you were, how all the girls wanted you. How some of the men probably wanted you, too. How you never wanted to have made love to her, but sometimes you would let her suck you off. She wanted you so badly…”
I thought she had, of course. She would try to sweet talk me into more, how good it would be. My levels of concentration were exceeding my expectations as he removed his pants and turned, walking across the room towards his pajama pants.
With. Not. A. Stitch. On.
“She told me that more than anything, you wanted to talk to her. A beautiful woman like that and all you wanted to do was talk. When we came later that night, your name was on both of our lips as I took her from behind.” He placed his pants down and picked up the others, grabbing them and walking to where I am lamely buttoned my nightshirt. He must have been delighting in telling me this, stark naked. My pulse raced as I felt the fire grow in my stomach.
“ Louis, I could have forced myself on you at any point. The night after we played cards. When we went to the Oprea, the Eagle Saloon, New Year’s Eve. As we shivered watching the Twelfth Night Revelers. That night when I first took Le Petit drink, I could have spun you and bent you over and had my way with you, could have mind tricked you into doing the dirtiest things to me. Or…” He was standing there, our sleep pants in his hand, waiting for me to finish fumbling instead of putting them on. And there became less need for him to do so the longer he waited. “I could have attacked you like you saw me do with countless others.” The truth is, he could have. And he wouldn’t have had to force anything, really that I wasn’t already completely willing to give up to him.
“Louis, I was in love.” Words he should never say this close to me completely undressed. “I wanted you to kiss me as bad as I wanted to kiss you. For months we danced and stepped, we spun and twisted. I was enthralled by you, but you were equally enthralled by me. I had felt one-sided infatuation, one-sided lust before. I had felt pure desire and nothing more. But with you?” He exchanged his night shirt in my hand with my pants in his hand and slipped it on, keeping his bottom bare. “It was more than sexual. You were a wolf-killer every night on the streets in Treme and just like me, you wanted nothing more than a quiet night in, cuddled in front of the fire. Tell me, mon cher, if I had let you win, and take Ms Lily back that night, bowed my head politely and exited, what would you have done, hum?” He began to slip his pajama pants on, but not soon enough for me to see how effected he was talking about this.
I tried to look down before he caught me staring at him. I probably moved too slowly. I fumbled removing my own pants, my member stirring knowing exactly what his body would feel like next to mine in our coffin.
“I would have talked to her, let her suck me off, think about….”
“About?” His eyebrows arched up and his pert smile danced across his face. I focused on my feet as I stepped in to my pajamas.
“You. Wishin’ it was you and not her.” He shook his head and slowly closed the little gap I had tried to create by putting on my pants. The light was coming and we didn’t have much time left.
“Or, if I beat you at cards, if I stared you in those beautiful brown eyes,” he slid his hand along my cheek to my ear, “and beat you every hand with a smile on my face. I could hear every card in their hands, Louis! What then, hum? If I would have undressed you with my eyes in front of all of those men and taken all of your money?” He could have undressed me with more than his eyes right now and I would let him.
“I would have been mad, held a grudge, come at you.”
“Would you have fucked me then?”
Shit. I may well fuck him right now.
“Maybe. Eventually. But it would have been angry and rough.” I could give it to him rough. Hell, I would take it rough for the first time in… how many years?
“Would you have kissed me? Would you have held my head in your hand, as I am doing now, and embarrassed me with all of the passion and love that we felt?” We were daringly close. Did he want that now? For me to lean in and slowly brush my lips against his? To taste him again.
Was the need to kiss him now greater than it had been then because I knew exactly how extraordinary he felt pressed against me? Every day that we spent together felt like another day closer to the inevitable, just like it had back then.
“I did what I did knowing everything that I knew,” he whispered. “I could have pounced and drained you, could have had my way with you and tossed you aside. Or, sipped off of you for weeks, making you my human buffet, my familiar. But you were so much more to me.” He slid his hand down my jaw and wrapped it around the base of my head. I missed the weight of his touch, how his hands knew me intimately.
“I did seduce you, took you to plays, speakeasys, walked and talked to you for hours. And then took myself in hand when I got home thinking about you. I watched you, and knew where you were going so I could run into you. Spent money on new clothes to impress you. I ate food at your mother’s house! For you, I would have done anything. And here is the secret- even if I could not read your thoughts and if I didn’t know how badly you wanted to take me and be taken, I would have fallen for you and romanced you the same. I hoped I would have been able to have you fall for me so naturally that one night, I could invite you to the townhouse and you would understand what that mean because you would feel for me as I felt for you.” At some point, unknown to me, my hands had found his waist. I held on to him for the first time in years, held him as if I would snatch him up in a second. His hand messaged my head.
“I wanted you so desperately, Louis, but I wanted you to want me. After a few weeks, I knew that you would not make that move unprompted. And if I needed to use Lily to get you to act on your desire, well, so be it. So now I ask you, Louis, to be honest. With me and with you. If I never invited you into our home, never had her there to ease you into our trist, would you have ever tried to have your way with me?” His eyes traced down to my lips.
I could kiss him right here. I could pull him to me. I could close the gap. Just I did last time; the moment Lily was out of the way I jumped at him. He had done it again, hadn’t he? Let me know exactly what he wanted but let me choose without forcing me.
But I didn’t come here to bed Lestat, right?
Right?
And that was what this was, just lust, it was...
But if I hadn’t come here to bed him, then what exactly had I come here To do? To apologize? To question him? For clarification? Admission of guilt, acknowledgment of offenses, confession of sin? I had done those things and yet, I was still here. So if I had not come here to bed him, then why did I lay with him every night, breathing him deeper and deeper? Why were my hands singing because they had been itching to hold on to him here? I could slip them under his shirt in a second. And he would let me. No matter what he said, after all this time, he was still presenting me with the opportunity but letting me choose.
Presenting me with him and wanting me to choose him.
What the hell was I doing?
Because if I didn’t come here to hit and run, then there must only be one other reason I came here.
“I was attracted to you the moment I saw you but I was disgusted by it.” I messaged my thumbs in circles that made him suck in his breath. “Mad at myself. Wantin you to desire me knowing I was too chicken to start a thing with you. Longer you sat and talked, you touched her but looked at me, I wanted you more and it infuriated me. I wanted to punish you for making me feel that way. I thought everyone would know I was a sissy” I dug in with my other fingers “and I would lose everything I built, lose my Mother, prove my father right-” His eyes were roaming all over my face, taking every bit in.
“Well, fathers are the worst of it, trust me.” His smirk was so playful I couldn’t register he might be talking about us.
“And I was trying to prove I was a bigger man.. I had never been,...I had slept with a woman before and I knew I didn’t like it. Gettin your cock sucked is gettin your cock sucked.” I moved my hands up on his back and moved closer. We were nearly pressed together. His left arm hung over my shoulder, so like it had that very night. “I had never let another man fuck me and I was terrified. As long I was in charge, I wasn’t gay. But, I knew, I knew with you I-” I swallowed hard. I had never confessed this, been this vulnerable with him.
We were not in the coffin. This was a different kind of rawness. I was on fire, but I had to finally say the things I meant.
“I knew with you I would let you do anything you desired because for the first time, it was what I desired, regardless of what it made me.” His face was bright and alive. We might be fully clothed, but he undressed me all over again with his eyes. And I was drowning in those eyes.
“If I had never brought Lily to my house and presented you with the opportunity, would you have tried?”
“No. Maybe? I wanted to. I wanted to bad. But I had hated myself for wantin' you.” He smiled coyly, the tip of his tongue hitting his upper lip.
“Why? You thought about it all of the time. Vividly. In great detail. As I said before, your thoughts were loud, mon cher.” I released him and took a step back. It was not because I didn’t want to take him. Goddamn, I was on fire for him and he was for me. There had always been something electric between us, but hadn’t we always let that get in the way of everything else?
“Because maybe we were friends. Maybe it shouldn’t be about sex. Or, maybe it was more than just sex. Maybe you told me no and I embarrassed myself and you would tell people. People liked you, they listened to you. Maybe gettin' my dick sucked didn’t make me gay but lettin' you fuck me did. Maybe I was gay and you weren’t. I wanted you to think the world of me but feared you weren’t like me. Maybe you would let me suck your dick like some desperate whore and laugh at me, just like I had with other guys. Maybe I misread you all along. Feared I would ruin our friendship if you knew what I really thought about after you walked me home.” Just because I had taken a step back, didn’t mean he had. His hand still cradled my head. He took a step closer to me.
“We were friends, truly, but I wanted to be so much more. I hadn’t planned it until I saw Lily one night after I had walked you home. She asked about you, said you hadn’t seen her in weeks. Smiled at me and said she guessed you didn’t need her anymore since you had me to… occupy your time.” He slid his left hand down my chest. “ I told her that we spent a lot of time talking. She smiled and said, ‘Oh Mr. Lioncourt, all he wants from me is talking, but he wants so much more from you than words.’ She offered to help, ease the tension, open you up. And so I took her up on the offer.” He tilted his head sideways and brushed his nose against my cheek on the way to my ear. “She had no idea that I would be the only one opening you up that night, mon petit.” He moved slowly and kissed my cheek.
“You trying to seduce me now?” I swallowed hard but made no move away from him.
“Are you?” A second kiss.
“No.”
“You lie to yourself the same today as you did 114 years ago. No matter. I intend to invite no call girls, or boys, over… this time.”
“This time?” My breath caught.
I did not come to just have sex. There was just one problem. With Lestat, it was never just sex. I needed to be honest with myself. If I had not come here to bed him, then there was only one thing had I come to do.
“If you want me, this time you have to come get me all by yourself.” He pulled away and walked towards the coffin. And there. He had said it. The whole while I had repeated that I had not come here to sleep with him and instead, I lay down every night and shared more intimacy than any other man I had been with up until him. The very act of those soft and hard words- our honesty about life then had to bleed into whatever it was that was going on now. I might not have come to bed Lestat, but it didn’t mean that I hadn’t come to be honest about my feelings for him. Or to explain the revelations of my confessions to Daniel. Or to finally explain things I could not. Bedding Lestat would have been easy. But loving Lestat was something I made no promises about- to him or myself. “Come on, the sun is almost up, I want you to put your head on my chest so you can fall asleep knowing that it will always ache for you more than any other part of me.” With no urgency or direction, he simply got into my coffin and made himself comfortable.
We lay there for what seemed like an eternity, silently wrapped around each other. I listened to his heart as it kept in time with my own. Each beat reminded me of the drum, reminding me of other things.
Bedding Lestat was not my main priority. Neither was apologizing or furthering revelations or solely grieving. I wasn’t even sure that it had been a guise.
And while I asked myself what exactly had been my main priority, I still couldn’t quite say the words. Soft ones or hard ones.
“Les?”
“Hummm?”
“Our hearts beat at the same time.”
“Mmmmm, and so they do.”
Fuck, I couldn’t say it, could not yet say what I had needed to say all of those years. Because even though I hoped in a plane with no money and no plan, even though I spent an indulgent few weeks here, weeks I should have been taking care of work and cleaning up the mess in Dubai, I had not yet allowed myself to say exactly why I had come here.
That my heart would always ache for him more than any other part of me, too.

Notes:

Oktoberfest- NOLA has had a vibrant German population since the early 1700s. They came in fewer waves than the French and Spanish and are often overlooked. And yes, they were Catholic Germans.
Krewe of Boo- because our asses can not only parade once a year.... It's our Halloween parade in the Quarter.
The Knights of Momus- second oldest Krewe in the City, but no longer parade after a desegregation lawsuit. They do still have a ball.
Karnofsy’s - 427 South Rampart, the place to tailor in the 1910's. Also Louis Armstrong's first job.
Yes sucking crawfish heads is a real thing. Go look at a picture- those hollowed cheeks....
Eagle Saloon- where Buddy Bolden Played
Twelfth Night Revelers- the start of Mardi Gras is Jan 6 and the 12th Night Revelers kick off the season. YOU DO NOT EAT KING CAKE BEFORE THE 6th. I don't care that they sell it, I don't care that it is good, the 6th is little Christmas and we get the baby Jesus his King Cake! They mark the official beginning of the Carnival Season

Chapter 7: Loneliness is the worst thing a vampire can experience

Summary:

“No. No we are not here.” There is such resoluteness in his tone. I smile at the sorrow of him. I have missed this Louis so.
“And why not, mon chere?” He looks away from me again.
“Well, I… I wouldn’t have believed you. I would have thought it was a trick or you were being cruel.” I wipe a tear away from his face and he gives me his sad smile. This is the first time since he has arrive that the Sad Louis is here. My heart lurches.
I must not be Lestat.
I must not be Lestat.

Notes:

Thank you for the kuddos and the comments! It feeds my soul almost as much as Cafe au lait. Or Gumbo. Maybe close to a shrimp Po-Boy.... maybe....
Thank you!!!

Loneliness is the worst thing a vampire can experience. It seeps into every part of your existence and can span decades. If finding someone out of the millions of people on Earth to share a human life with is difficult, think of the impossibility of doing that with the few of us who walk this tortuous earth for eternity.
But Marius advised me to go do that very thing. To live a human lifetime, to create fledglings, to fall in love.
To live a life.
I moved to New Orleans to do that, leaving behind what I knew of my human existence, of my vampiric childhood, away from my past burdens and creating something new. There was only one bit of advice that our Sage neglected to bestow upon me. And so, in doing just that, I made the worst mistake I could, I brought the same old Lestat with me to the New World. And for the success of that new life, I needed a new me, this must happen for the needle of my life to change. Instead, I was in the process of creating a far worse past in every moment of it.
Not only did I repeat the worst of my sins—my need for constant attention and love, my need to keep my loved ones safe, my need to love those who could not possibly love me in return—but I created new ones. I lied, I raged, I controlled, and I withheld. I became my father, my mother, my brother, and Magnus all in one.
And so, in the interceding years by myself, I have had time to think. Think about how I let my fear create rage, let it control instead of trust, let it push those away because they would eventually leave no matter what I did, correct? I had the gift of years to watch people grow old and relationships play out. Had Armand changed? Or was he, 500 years older, no better than he had been the night he was made? Was he, and was I for that matter, in some ways worse? How is it, with the gift of time, we have devolved into the worst of us instead of evolving into the best of us?
What was the best of me?
Had there ever been a best of me?
Who was I when no one was around to perform for? Had I become the very broken thing that I had tried to make Louis? Louis, who was living with the very creature that caused more injury than I had, but hid it in lies. I burned so bright you saw the mistakes as they flamed in front of you. Armand froze you so that the frostbite crept up over years.
Every night I have laid down with Louis, he has seeped into my existence. I can feel his skin next to mine, smell his scent, his heat. It takes every ounce of restraint that I have to not allow myself the happiness that is right in front of me.
He will leave.
He will go home.
He will remember who and what I am.
I will say the wrong thing.
He will get tired of me.
I will awake alone.
For no matter how much I have reflected and changed, the old Lestat remains. He may well be dormant after years of self-pity and solitude, but he is always there. Always wanting no matter how much he should not.
When evening dawns, I do not move. Some evenings, he is still asleep, breathing lightly, and I can pretend it is 1912 all over again, pretend we will hunt along the wharfs, ride in his Rolls Royce, walk along Rampart, go back home, and make love.
Some nights, he is already awake, watching over me, waiting. He has a serene look upon his face. I have no idea what he is waiting for and my mind races trying to fulfill some form or idea that I am no longer able to.
Some, he is slowly tracing patterns on my back or shoulder with his fingers. He looks lost in a though as if he is somewhere a thousand miles away from me. As if I am a place holder in his deft hands for something or someone else.
Some evenings he inhales deeply, taking me in. He is so close his mouth nearly misses my skin and I can feel the tiny hair along my neck or arm stand up at his attention.
Some evening he is completely hard and pressed against me. I shutter to hold back. To not slowly move myself so that I do not press further or give him friction, to guide my hand from his waist to gently brush over his length. To caress him, to give myself to him.
Some evenings his cheeks are tear-stained. On those evenings, I try not to move, to pretend to still be asleep, to breathe slowly so that his heart matches mine.
“Fuck, Louis, why you so stupid,” he whispers. I take a few more measured breaths before I “wake up.”
“Oh, mon pauvre bébé, did you have a nightmare?” He shakes his head no. I wait. It is my instinct to make light of it because I do not understand. But I am trying to be better so I stay silent.
Besides, my mind is racing with all the ways he would tell me this had all been a mistake and he is leaving me. Again.
“We’ve just, there has been so much wasted time.”
“Has there been?” Each word is measured.
“Yes. I have been so miserable for so long. Decades I wasted when I could have been…” a new set of tears rolls down his face.
The coffin is a tight fit although roomier than the last we have shared. It is unreasonable that, while both inside, we are not pressed together in some way. I lift my left hand to caress his shoulder. He tries to smile at me through his tears.
“We have not wasted a second so get that thought right out of your silly head.” He shifts, wiping his nose and eyes with the back of his hand. “If all of these things had happened differently, would we be here now?”
“No. Maybe? Shit, I don’t know…”
“You tell your story to that interviewer 50 years ago and he lives to print it in some torrid magazine. I read it then and - are we here now? Hmm?”
“No, probably you come and try to take my head…”
“So that is a no. I follow Armand when he comes to New Orleans to gloat about how wonderful your life is together, back to New York or Dubai or Cairo or wherever you are. Are we here now?”
“Wait, Armand you used to come and gloat about us being together?”
“Yes, and it was a lie every time and I knew it and he knew it and he knew that I knew and I knew he knew and I was being gracious to the Gremlin buying my time because at some point you were bound to figure it out for yourself- are we here?”
“No…wait, damn, really? I’m still not over the fact that he would come and gloat…”
“Have you met Armand? You lived with him for how long? He is full of gloat. Not the point. I go to New York, I follow him, I declare my love or ask for you back or some other very grand Lestat gesture. Are we here?”
“No. I mean, we fuss and I pretend. We orbit around each other, but….”
“I confess in Magnus’ tower, yes, yes, it was I, Lestat, savior of his husband, condemner of his daughter, it was me all along. Leave the Gremlin, I say, he is not capable of the levels of love and adoration that we share. Are we here?”
“Husband?”
“ ‘In the Church, on the altar.’ I wore a ring for years. Are we here?” He stills. Have I said too much? Was that not who and what we were - a family? But he sniffles and looks away for a moment, thinking. He looks to the right when he does this, always, as if the answer is floating out just beyond the horizon. He sighs a deep breath before he looks me in the eye.
“No. No we are not here.” There is such resoluteness in his tone. I smile at the sorrow of him. I have missed this Louis so.
“And why not, mon chere?” He looks away from me again.
“Well, I… I wouldn’t have believed you. I would have thought it was a trick or you were being cruel.” I wipe a tear away from his face and he gives me his sad smile. This is the first time since he has arrive that the Sad Louis is here. My heart lurches.
I must not be Lestat.
I must not be Lestat.
“Because you were not ready to. And I was not ready to. We had just lost our daughter. You blamed me, you blamed you, I blamed myself, you blamed yourself, I blamed Armand, you pretended to absolve him. We needed the time, Louis. I needed time to think on what I had done, and how my actions ruined our life. You needed time to realize who you were, how that affected us, and what role your actions played in our lives. I needed time by myself to heal and you needed time with someone else to grow.” But he is shaking his head and tears threaten to spill over.
“What about…” his lip trembles.
“About what, Louis?”
“If I had never helped her? If I had never…If I had stopped her If I let her go or I never let her plan it in the first place.” And here are his tears. He carries the guilt of killing me all of those years ago.
“Oh my Louis, but you had to. She had to. She needed to find someone to love her the way we could not. She needed to rise against the father. She needed to win. You needed to be there with her to tell he it was ok. And you needed to understand.” I was holding him as best I could in our little space.
“Understand what?”
“Understand that the only way you could see who you were was to leave your family. To sleep with other men, to see how they saw you, to learn to love that part of who you were so that you could love the other parts of you. To have power over someone else, to be dominant because then you could see how different things were with us.” He sniffles and cuddles up close to me.
“I felt so powerless sometimes, Lestat. You held all the cards, you were stronger and knew, like…”
“I did. I am. But you were not ever powerless. I gave myself to you, to be equals. And losing yourself in another person is the most terrifying thing you can do.” I kissed his temple lightly. “I had lived with Nikki, I had known companionship. You had not- had nothing to compare this to. I knew how deeply, how unique this was and I ran to it with abandon. I gave myself to you whole over and over and you shrank from it. You had never known any other love and it overwhelmed you. And so you ran from it. I did not realize why then, but in retrospect, as I might have done over these past years, our reactions to such strong emotions are clearer.”
For the first time since he has returned to me, he shrank back. I had done it.
I must not be Lestat.
I must not be Lestat.
“Lestat, there was no day where you wanted to be equals.” He laughed and I was hurt. How had he misunderstood me still, after all of this time. I looked into his eyes as deeply as I had since he had come back.
Do I risk pushing him away if I confess my feelings? I thought I made those clear with the letter that I left for him, the one I know he read- ‘All my love belongs to you. You are its keeper.’ But he rejected it. And so, if I confess, if I explain it in great detail, should I do it in the passe compose- I had loved you more than anyone in the world-not the imparfait that it is- I did love you, I do love you, I shall forever love you more than any one thing in this whole wretched world.
I must not be Lestat.
But who then shall I be?
Should I lay myself bare and risk him leaving sooner, or prolong the inevitable, push off the reality of eventual egress?
“I gave you my heart. You have all of my love. You have no idea the control you have over me. If you think for a second, Louis, that I hold all of the power…if it were up to me, y--” but I stop. If were up to me you would have come home with me from Paris. The unpleasantness with Claudia would never have taken place. You would never have run from me in the first place. You would have proudly walked the streets as my companion, you would have given all of your love to me instead of denying it and burying it. You would have….but it was never up to me.
He still had no idea.
“-if it were up to me, things would have been… different. This would be different. But This is what we have today. And I will take this even if it means that we have spent time apart.”
He is holding me tight now, shaking his head yes in agreement, a lone tear trickling down his face and onto my neck. I kiss his forehead, just as he had kissed mine when he first returned. For a moment, I can believe in the delusion that I will awaken every morning and watch his beautiful face, hear his soft breathing. That I will never say the wrong thing, that he will never tire of me. That he will never go back and we will never fight. That he understands the depths of my love and that he stops holding back and loves me in return. That I have truly given him my whole self. That I would sleep for a thousand years or walk the jungles of the earth if that is what I had to do to make him happy. It is not that Louis had underestimated me, I think, it is that he has underestimated the power that he has over me. That when I gave up myself, I gave him everything. It is his to do with as he wishes.
He has not done that for me. Probably, he never will. I have to remind myself of this over and over, so when he leaves, I can say see Lestat, we told you so the whole time. Remember what you were made for. Or, rather, remember what you were not made for.
Not for him.
Once I have started to kiss his forehead it takes everything in me to stop and not kiss him for hours. I pull back and rest the side of my head against his.
If we turn towards each other, our lips would meet.
But I do not want it like this. Not with sadness or desperation. So I do what I always do when I don’t know what else to do.
“A great philosopher once said ‘I'm very aware and very conscious of the path I chose in life, and very aware of the path I didn't choose.’”
“Which great philosopher?”
“I… I don’t seem to recall right now.” He chuckles.
“That’s Taylor Swift, Lestat.” I can feel his face smile next to mine. That will do for today. “So it is. What are our plans for today?”
“Caroling in Jackson Square? Maybe going to see Celebration in the Oaks?” I can feel him nuzzle against my neck, smelling me and sighing. I stretch to expose more of it. He rubs his cheek against mine and for a moment, I think I hear a small whine catch in the back of his throat. His leg is thrown over mine and I can feel him on me. As he moves to resettle himself in my arms, I can feel the slight press against me. A tiny brush of his knee, grazing my lust.
Since Louis had returned home, it has taken a considerable amount of strength to restrain myself. Old Lestat would not have withheld 24 hours- sitting in a robe, sharing a coffin. But Old Lestat needs to be kept at bay. He has not come here for simple pleasures of the flesh.
Which I would have gladly given him every day of the week with no promise of cessation.
And so I flirt. I flirt and smile and bat my eyelashes because that makes him laugh and he seems to enjoy it, even reciprocate it. Now that he will hold my hand freely, I find excuses to touch his chest, to brush past him, to make shy comments. And he has let me, usually flirting back. But he has made the line clear and I have only pushed as far as he will let me. Or, as far as I dare.
If I give up my considerable gifts, will he leave sooner?
Or is it withholding that will seal my fate?
“Hmmm, so you want to go Caroling or looking at lights?” That sweet voice, the voice of Mon Mari on nights when we made love tenderly. His hand is splayed on my chest. The ring that I purchased so long ago would look lovely on it. But I shake my head. Old Lestat bought that particular Emerald. Old Lestat would focus on the performance of Louis wearing it. I am trying to be a better Lestat. Trying. “Why do I know that you really want to go caroling?”
“My voice is not what it used to be. I should practice more, for the tour.” He chuckles and hugs me tightly. Tighter than he has since he has been here. He rubs his face on my cheek before he kisses it.
“Well, bess get your ass up. No time better than now to practice. I know you are dying to tear into ‘Oh Holy Night.’ ” He pushes up the coffin and stretches. Then he turns and smiles at me. A brilliant, dazzling smile. My heart catches, and so must his. My mind is blank and I can think of no words to say. He is, he is everything. He is my whole universe and how do I not let down all of my guards? How do I not sit up and take his head in my hand and kiss him, love him with everything I feel? Everything he must feel.
He must.
Doesn’t he?
“Uh, I much prefer ‘O Come, O Come Emmanuel.’ I sit up and sing my favorite childhood hymn, the one that stirred my heart as a child.
“‘Réjouis-toi ! Réjouis-toi ! Emmanuel. À toi viendra Ô Israël.’”
I was not sure if this is ecstasy or rapture, ardor or endearment. Maybe adoration. Probably just fondness.
We sat there looking at each other as if it were the first time we had ever seen each other. Again, I could kiss him here. I could kiss him every day, constantly. I could caress him and never release him. I could consume him, I could meld us together until there was no discernation between him and me. Is this what he is waiting for? His smile turns into the smirk I am so familiar with, into a laugh that clutches my heart and makes me question everything.
“Not sure you should start the tour with that rocking hit. Best to save it for your Christmas album.” He stands and kisses the top of my head. “Come on, you, we need to eat before I let Maestro blow the crowd away.” He offers me his hand to stand and I take it.
When he pulls me up there are mear inches between us. He smiles and laughs again, his eyes crinkling. No matter how hard I have tried. No matter what decisions I have made, what pact I struck with myself it is over the moment I see his face look as it had a million times when he cared for me, when he looked at me as if I had meaning and worth to him. When he looked at me as if he loved me.
He steps out of the coffin and stretches, walking towards our clothes. He turns and the smile is there now. After all of these years, he looks at me that very same way.
Maybe he will not tire of me.
Maybe he will not leave.
Maybe this time, we are different, he and I.
It is in this very moment when I realised I had been wrong all along. Loneliness is not the worst thing a vampire can experience.
Hope is.

Notes:

I exist in a world where Louis would never have believed or accepted it was Lestat who saved him in Paris.

passe compose- a completed past tense in French. I had eaten- it's over, I'm not still eating.

imparfait- Imperfect tense, it happened the past but still going on. 'He was living with Claudia when Louis was kidnapped by the Theater.'

Celebration in the Oaks- https://celebrationintheoaks.com/

Caroling in Jackson Square-
https://www.neworleans.com/event/caroling-in-jackson-square/3230/

Chapter 8: Who Dat said They Gon Beat Them Saints

Summary:

“And he always gets what he wants.”
“And what is it exactly that he wants?” Because I sure as hell know what I want.
The crowd erupts around us again as Mathieu’s interception yields a touchdown. But there could be a war going on around us because in my arms, it is only ever Lestat.
“To win,” he whispers, in his most intimate and devastating way.
Lestat was, is, and always will be the love of my life. No matter what happens, what we do to destroy each other, how we abandon each other, the mounds of denial, the years spent apart- his is my reality.

Notes:

This was inspired by Louis wearing the New Orleans Saints baseball hat while on tour in the Quarter. There is no way Lestat lives in New Orleans and isn't a Saint's fan.
Sorry if you are not a huge football fan, it's more of a setting than anything else.
If you don't know a thing about Tyrann Matthieu, I'm sorry. Also, the Kardaisha bit is 100000% real, I knew the mover that was called.
Carry on!!

Rashid was plenty pissed off and I guess he had every right to be.
“It has been 8 weeks now, Sir.”
“Yes.”
“I have made excuses.”
“Ok. And?” I am sitting on the edge of the completely unused King bed putting my shoes on. Rashid is on speaker for the first time since I have been to New Orleans. I have not returned his calls in over 6 days now.
“What others do you want me to make now?” I shrug as if he can see me over the phone.
“Family business. Sudden. Had to come home, taking care of things-”
“I’ve already used that one, Sir.”
“Fine, send a gift, I’ll start responding to emails…”
“Sir…”
“Yes, Rashid.”
“Are you taking care of things?” I sit up and exhale. What exactly am I taking care of again?
I hear Lestat humming a tune to himself in the bathroom that I do not recognize. He has been on cloud nine all day, telling me he will finally give me an excuse to wear mon chapeau ridicule. I had tried to convince myself of a thousand reasons why I was still in New Orleans and everyone is as pallid as the last. And even if I can’t quite put it into words yet, I damn well know why my stupid ass tossed my ex, a script, and my shit before storming out of that crypt I called a home and flying thousands of miles to run right back to… well, to this.
But if I was in fact taking care of it, that was yet to be seen.
“Yes, Rashid.” I want to sound more declarative. I want to sound assured. I fear I do not.
“How many more weeks should I extend your hotel room?” The question he is asking is not really the question he is asking. Am I coming back? How much longer am I going to do this?
“Actually, I have been looking at condos.” I try really hard to say this matter of fact, to pass it off like it’s not a big deal. Like I need him to buy me socks. Or new undershirts.
“Condos, Sir?” Rashid however is not going to let me gloss over this. Not for the first time, I am glad he is not Octavie. At least I am being questioned and not bossed around.
“Yes, condos. Rue Royale is Lestat’s, I sold my New Orleans properties when they built the interstate. Can you look into #2 Canal Place? Or One River Place?” There is a defining silence coming from Rashid. Either he is writing down notes or glowering at me from thousands of miles away and I am pretty sure I know which is happening right now. It’s best I ignored that video chat earlier in the week. Last week, too.
Or should I have just texted him instead? Would have been easier to dodge this line of questioning.
Lestat turns from the mirror in the bathroom to face me.
“Reggie Bush used to live there. Opened the door and tossed all of Kim Kardashian’s belongings out onto the landing when they broke up. Called the moving company to come it get it. Chris Paul lived across from him and walked out of his penthouse when he heard the ruckus, saw the landing they shared strewn with Kardashian trash, and slowly closed the door as the movers boxed her things.” Lestat shrugs and resumes applying black eyeliner.
“Is that, is that him, Sir?” Rashid whispers as if his ass doesn’t know damn good and well he is on speaker.
“Rashiidddd.” I have no idea why I am so on edge. Why I feel like I have to justify or explain myself?
“I am just inquiring, Sir.” I have known Rashid since he was five. This is not an inquiry. This is judgment. So I can fess up and face the consequences of whatever the hell it is I’m doing, or not doing, or not doing…. yet… or I can lie and pretend or get angry….So I choose the best possible alternative- I change the subject.
“Have you had the bookshelves lowered?”
“Yes, and the dress has been hung.”
“What dress?” Lestat asks, dusting a light layer of body glitter on his cheeks. I lean over and speak more directly to him than the cell phone lying next to me on the bed.
“S’nothing, baby. You gone be ready in 10? I don wanna be fightin tha crowd gettin in.”
“Baby?” the voice on the phone asks incredulously.
“Raashiiiidddd.”
“Gone be ready??”
“Rashid!” I feel my face get flush. For what? Why? I’m a grown-ass man, why do I feel like I’m on the phone with Gracie and she’s asking me what I’m doing with that white man.
Like I’ve been found out. Which…fine… which I probably have been.
“Sir, it is my job to make sure you are taken care of. I take my job seriously. I am not exactly sure if this is-” I pick up the phone an attempt to take it off of speaker but I am fumbling this phone about the same as I am fumbling my life right now.
“Rashid, I am doing well. I am eating well, I am really, really well-”
“You sound… different.” I still can’t get it off speaker.
“He sounds like he is home! Meanwhile, I am Dome Ready, mon cher! Who Dat!” I turned to see Lestat. He stands in the doorway in jeans too tight and a Saint’s Jersey too small.
“Number 32?”
“What? You do not know?! The Honey Badger! St Augustine’s very own, Tyrann Mathieu.” His smile is entirely too mischievous.
“Matthieu, like Henirette Matthieu, use to run that illegal house on Esplanade?”
“There might be a relation. He’s had a storied career since he played PeeWee ball at Willie Hall Park. Attended LSU, Heisman trophy finalist, he’s a team captain!” But that smile tells me there is more to this. I can feel my face start to heat up, my heart beat faster.
“He’s a light-skinned Creole’s what he is, ain’t he. He’s Red, hun? Freckles? Got light eyes? Big yella curls?” I had utterly forgotten that Rashid was on the phone. I had, in fact, completely forgotten the phone existed because all I see it that smile, those clever eyes sparkling at me. And those incredibly tight pants.
“Ohhh, mon cher est jaloux comme un pou?”
“He favors the Matthieus or the Spellmens?” I can’t stay still any longer, I am advancing on him like I’ve just found him in bed with this guy. I don’t even remember that he’s not mine to be jealous over. That it’s not like that with us, I am companion enough for myself. Or some bullshit I keep selling.
“Louis Alcée Francis du Pointe du Lac! Jealousy is not a pretty look on you. He favors his grandmother, who was a lovely lady. And possibly there is a small resemblance to her grandmother, who might have been tied to a certain house on Esplanade. It’s the cheekbones, actually. Maybe the smile, too. But you have nothing to worry your pretty little head about. His eyes are not as bright as yours,... his curls nowhere near as soft.” He closes the gap between us with mischief in his eyes.
“D’fuck you said?” And I know that my face has flushed a color I can not control. My breath is heavy, heart racing. I could push him against that wall and remind him-
Of what, Louis, what exactly could you remind him of? Because whatever it is, you best remind your own damned self first. Say those fucking words. Admit it all. His hand goes to my chest and the world stops.
“Mon Mari! I play, I play. I have no idea how soft his curls are but you blush so beautifully when you are hot! Here, put this on.” He hands me a jersey before he takes a step back, but I can’t take my eyes off him. It’s hard to… to slow my breath, to calm myself. I have such tunnel vision when it comes to Lestat and his dalliances that I totally miss what he has referred to me as.
Mon Mari.
“Kamara?”
“Yes, he’s a Wide Reciever.”
“Nah I know you didn’t jus say what da fuck I think you said!”
“I do have a Taysom jersey,... he’s a Tight End…”
“LESTAT!” He is overcome with laughter now and I forget we are not alone. I turn around at the sound of the voice, murderous, not recognizing my own stupidity.
“Sir? Sir!” the phone is still on speaker.
“WHAT RASHID!”
“Sir,... I just wanted to say that, that maybe I was wrong. You,... take your time. You know best. I will take care of it. Look into the condo.” I slid the jersey over my bare chest before I grabbed the phone. The jersey is tight and I realize Lestat’s done this on purpose. His face lit up when I turned around. He moves back towards me, puts his hands on my chest, and shakes his head. The spark in his eyes had grown more in these past eight weeks, reminding me of the same spark I had seen nearly 11 decades before. We stand there, looking at each other, daringly close.
“Thank you, Rashid,” I can not take my eyes off of Lestat. “I shall call you back soon.” I don’t wait for his response before I hang up and shove the phone in my back pocket. As the days have clicked on, the barrier has washed away. He had never put his hand on me like this before I was turned. Or…well… except that night.
“Let’s go, mon ami.” Now he found every excuse to touch me and I found every excuse to not move away.
The walk to the Dome is quick and full of tourists in red jerseys.
“We playin’ San Fran?”
“Oui, it is a perennial rivalry.” He smiles and turns around, walking backward land ooking at me, reminding me of so many walks we have taken before.
“Really, Lestat?” I am feigning upset and he knows it.
“I do my best with what materials I am given.” He spins back and slides his hand into mine. We are walking the streets of my birth hand in hand and nobody cares.
***
“Do you see the large man there in the Vaughn Johnson jersey?” We are walking down the narrowest flight of stairs known to man to get to seats Lestat has evidently owned for decades. Somehow he has acquired a boa from what feels like the thousands of people we have talked to on our way in.
“Number 53?” I look in the direction a few rows down where Lestat is pointing.
“Yes, that’s Earl, he is our section leader.”
“Our what?” Lestat, stops and smiles politely at the middle-aged white lady sitting at the end of the row.
“Excuse me, Ms. Donna.” She turned and joy danced over her face as she moved her legs to the side to allow us entrance to the row.
“Oh Lestat! I was hoping I saw you tonight!” He leans to kiss her on the cheek before he walks passed.
“I do not miss a night game! Is Mr Mike here? The girls?”
“Yes Mike is getting us some nachos and Melissa is in from Baton Rouge, but Megan is taking a class for her Masters at Tulane and couldn’t make it.” The woman is bright and animated. Clearly, Lestat has…friends.
“Well, tell her I am sorry to miss her, but I will try to make it to the last game and she must come to see me!”
“And your pretty man friend, too! Hello!” Suddenly the woman blushed, pursed her lips together, and raised her shoulders. Lestat put his hand on my chest again; I suppose this is where we are now. I feigned a smile and waved back before I felt Lestat’s hand in mine. He pulls me to our seats as he pulls me back down to earth.
“When Earl tells us to yell, we yell. And when he tells us to be quiet because we are on offense, we are quiet.” Lestat point to number 53 again. He is an overweight 67-year-old former Postman who had been a season ticket holder for years. It seems everyone knows Earl.
“I remember when Earl first bought these tickets in 1985. The years have flown by!” Lestat beamed as he waved to an Earl who yella a loud “Who Dat!” to us.
“Who Dat!” Lestat yells in response. He is radiant, so full of life and happiness. I couldn’t help but smirk as he explained how all of this worked.
“When the captain is in the middle of the circle, he will give us the signal and we shall chant!” His body glitter is sparkling and his eyeliner is stage-perfect. I want to rip this boa off of him and clamp down on his neck so hard- but we are surrounded by 83,000 of our closest friends. I have not calmed down from earlier, and there is no way that Lestat has not summarized this. He turns around and waves to several people he knows. Suddenly, the lights go out and a video goes up on the screens. The fans erupt. An announcer says we are to welcome our New Orleans Saints. The Dome is lit up by cellphones and a firework show coming from the sidelines. Then men run through a blow-up tunnel that looks to be on fire. The sound is deafening, like nothing I’ve heard before. Lestat, caught up in the crowd and the excitement of it all, is screaming and jumping with the rest of them. He is, what’s the word he used…luminous? He has crafted another magical moment where time and space respond differently. They call the starters, Lestat cheers wildly when #32 is called. He turns and looks at me and this time I know he slows times.
He puts his hand up to my face, pulling me in, and pretends to whisper something in my ear- but he kisses the side of my face. Slowly. My eyes close, my heart lurches. He pulls back and holds my face and even if he doesn’t effect time, this kiss has.
He knows damned well what he is doing. Every touch, the more frequent kisses- before we go to sleep when we first wake up. On top of my forehead when he gets up off of the sofa, on my hand as he reaches across the table. He has to know, even if I have said nothing concrete, that it is working, all of it. Even if my words aren’t completely saying it, my actions sure as hell are. Again, why am I still here?
Before long the whole of 83000 people are yelling “Who Dat” and the air feels electric, the whole stadium is alive and I am more so than I have been since Paris. 114 years later and Lestat has cast his spell on me so completely that I am yelling and calling plays bullshit and making friends with the young couple next to me.
How is it? Years we can spend separated. Tell myself a thousand tales. And yet, the truth is standing in front of me.
And then Tyrann Mathieu intercepts a ball that he should never be able to. A ball that seeks him out and lands so perfectly in his hands. The Dome erupts. Lestat screams, throws his hands up and I have picked him up. He slides down me slowly and we stand intertwined. My arms have been itching to be around his waist all night and his arms are draped over my shoulders. He knows something I do not.
“Did you, did you do that?”
“Hmmm Mon cher?” Is he as lost in my eyes as I am his?
“Did you help him catch that ball?” He looks down coquettishly and shakes his head.
“Of course not, the Honey Badger, he doesn’t care….” his eyes drift back up to mine.
“He doesn’t?” and I shake my head just as he has shaken his.
“Mmmm, no, he takes what he wants.” Will Lestat, this time?
“Does he now?” I think I lick my lips. Hell, at this point, I have no idea what I’m doing.
“And he always gets what he wants.”
“And what is it exactly that he wants?” Because I sure as hell know what I want.
The crowd erupts around us again as Mathieu’s interception yields a touchdown. But there could be a war going on around us because, in my arms, it is only ever Lestat.
“To win,” he whispers, in his most intimate and devastating way.
Lestat was, is, and always will be the love of my life. No matter what happens, what we do to destroy each other, how we abandon each other, the mounds of denial, the years spent apart- his is my reality.
And it dawns on me that he has lived in this reality for years and I am just putting it into words today, at a football game, deafened by loud, drunken fans. That this feels more right, him in my arms, shining, than anything I have done in decades. And that he has known and, again, given me the choice. No matter what he has not taken what he wants, he keeps presenting me with the option to choose.
And I have only once chosen him.
I have been a fool and a coward and now that I know, that I understand things more clearly than I had since I was a mortal man meeting this striking Frenchmen so many years ago, I am paralyzed again. I can not put it in words, I can not give it a name and yet it has been here with me for the ages. My heart and my lungs have been tied up once again and I was immobilized, unable to say the thing I now knew.

Notes:

1 River Place- where Reggie Bush and Chris Paul shared the 13th floor 2009. The Kardashian story is totally true. They broke up, the movers were called to come "get her shit." Chris Paul opened the door to his condo to see what all the noise was and saw the movers packing all of her things into boxes. It hit the news a day or so later that they broke up.
So 2 River Place is for sale. Just to give you an idea, it's about as Dubai penthouse as we do here.- https://www.nolalivingrealty.com/idx/listing/LA-NOMAR/2415199/2-Canal-Street-3002-New-Orleans-LA-70130
Tyrann- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyrann_Mathieu.
Henriette Matthieu was arrested several times in the early 1900s for running an illegal house on Esplanade, I could not prove they were related, but knowing New Orleans, there is some sort of relationship.
Red- from the Redbone community, used to denote fair-skinned Creoles.
mon cher est jaloux comme un pou- My dear is jealous as hell.
In New Orleans you call anyone who you show a sign of respect to Ms or Mr. and their first name. Even if they are your age, even if they are younger. We call our friend's parents this, too. We NEVER call anyone we know by their last name.

Chapter 9: New Year's Eve

Summary:

“Did you mean that?” he turned to me and fastened his jacket against the breeze as if it affected him as it did mortals.

“What that I need to stop condemning myself like the Gremlin did for centuries and enjoy all that life has provided to me? I suppose.” I placed my hand in his and thanked my defenders, I led the way to where I did not know. But Louis’ hand felt perfect in mine. “I suppose I can be both Brat and Aristocrat. The Actor and the Wolf Killer. The Virgin and the Tart.”

“You said it, not me. All I said was we needed to get you out huntin’ again.” He laughed.

Notes:

*****
Tragedy in New Orleans

On November 18th, I wrote a chapter where Louis and Lestat pick up 2 evildoers during the Sugar Bowl on New Year's Eve. I was beating myself up for not posting it on New Year's Eve, but I caught a nasty stomach bug when I visited NYC over the weekend and gave myself some grace saying I could post it on the 1st.
I am both glad and sad that I did not post it.
I have been in the Quarter on New Year's before, it is crowded and fun, packed with fans and locals. I had friends who were working a block off of Bourbon that night, others who I knew had gone down there. In 2001, we were told New Orleans could be a terrorist site for many reasons- one of the biggest ports in the US, tourism, oil refineries. You just don't think 24 years later it will still be.
I felt compelled to rework this chapter. It is Lestat's Stella gets her groove back and Louis' returns to Rue Royal. I shifted what I could without losing the integrity of the meaning.
In the meantime, send up a silent prayer for us. I thought for about 4 seconds "maybe I should move to a place where a whole lot less happens", then I realized we get King Cake and parades on the 6th and that thought went out of my head.
We will hold a second-line parade, or several, for the victims, which people won't understand or will think is horrible. But we do not mourn the dead, they never leave us. We celebrate their life.
Thank you for reading, hope each of you has a great New Year.

When I first walked the streets of New Orleans, I was dazzled by how different she was than Rome or Paris. She was far rougher and brutish, wilder and more unpredictable than her proper older sister. Her people more savage and unappologetic. Today the people are no different; it is not hard to find a rouge to kill or a murder to seduce. Louis has gotten me to agree to kill again, even though he admitted himself that he had stopped hunting years ago.

There is something about finding a victim, something about feeling that heart beat slowly cease. Tonight he has convinced me to go out amongst the crowd, to gather a lost, drunken wandering soul, and to give myself over “to my nature”.

The irony of this moment.

He has changed. I do not mean since we last lived here together, it is understood that living for some 115 years has an effect on someone. But since he first came back, since our talks in those early weeks, even since the football game. I have teasted and tested my boundaries, reaching for his hand, kissing his shoulder as we watch The Queen’s Gambit, and placing my hand on his chest as we talk and he had not turned me away. But these last two weeks, it has been he who has grabbed for my hand, placed his on my lower back. He has laid his head on my shoulder and let his lips grace my neck as I busy myself in the kitchen, layed together longer than was necessary in coffin. In response, I have simply let my affections be a return of his.

I presented him with the opportunity, created a space for him to express his wants and desires over 100 years ago. This time, I have been honest but not acting, again, allowing him to set the pace. I have not, and will not, create such a space for him today. Today, he must use his words. Today, base desire and want is not enough. 

Who have I become?

And surely he must know that if his words were spoken, if the moment presented itself, if he has come to the conclusion that I am worthy of more than the very close relationship we share, I would never say no. I could never say no.

 A lesser Lestat would have pounced at the first chance. But it was never just about base needs with Louis. I could have a thousand lovers, but only one husband.

We had moved into his condo at 2 Canal Place. Of course they had designed it to look like every other grey bland modern wasteland, so I hired Shawn Smith to make it look like a penthouse in New Orleans and not New York or Tokyo or Kula Lumpur or Berlin. Or Dubai.

  He slid his hand into mine as we exited the elevator.

“You can do this, honey. Just like riding a bike.” He squeezed my hand and let it go as he opened the door for me. He placed his hand on my lower back to guide me out. We walked this way, amongst the crowd until it become too thick and makes for my hand again.

I had never ridden a bike before.

He led me to up Canal St to North Peters. People flooded the city as the river had a century ago. To spend time with their families, to watch the Fleur de Lis drop, to catch a football game, to visit friends, because they lived there. And as always, it was easy to find those with ill intentions amoungs the throng.

“We can walk them back to Rue Royal, tell them it’s where we are staying. Let them think they are robbing us…” he whispers to me as he walks closer than is strictly necessary.

“Who are you and where is my Louis?” I laughed. There was the fine line between playing the virgin and playing the tart. For so many nights I had played the virgin hoping that my Sainte Louis would whisk me off of my feet. I could smell his need now but I had held off of playing the tart thus far.

“Me? I’m just little Louis du Lac, trying to get my friend to remember who he is.” he laughed as we drifted through the crowd. A lump formed at the word ‘friend.’

“To remember who I am?” 

“Absolutely. I think you’ve forgotten.” He stops on the corner of Bienville and pulls me close to him. “You are the Vampire Lestat. You are a ruthless killer, a charismatic, reckless, fiendish devil. You hunt and stalk and kill, you make people fall in love with you because you can. You are Lelio, self-assured, bold, and dangerous. It’s time you act like it again.”

“What are you trying to tell me, mon ami?” My flesh is so hot where his hands are on my shoulder. I could kiss him, right here on the street. Is that it? Is that the bold, dangerous Lestat he misses?

“That you have suffered and starved yourself long enough. That whatever penance you had to have is over. The Brat needs to return.” The dazzle of his smirt is undeniable. It is the look he used to give me when he was amused by my renditions of the movies we had seen when he was happy or pleased by me.

“I thought you hated the Brat…” The noise from the tourist and the cars make this considerably less intimate than I would have liked. But his smile widens and he shakes his head. 

“Oh there were nights when I plenty hated the Brat. Hated it when you brought a whole troupe of soldiers to our house. Hated it when I had to watch you flirt miraculously with your dinner. But there were…I, guess what I’m saying is I miss the Brat. You are the Brat. It is…. It is just part of who you are and it’s time you start to heal.” As quickly as the smirk of adoration appeared it vanished, replaced by the lip purse of concern. 

“And what if the Brat is gone, hmm? What if he flirted too much, cheated when he should not have? Was it overly dramatic in a way that pushed some very important people away? What if the Brat gives way to the less desirable Aristocrat, what then? The Prince who gets angered and yells, who is not satisfied when things do not go his way, and tries to control everyone and everything? Missing the Brat is one thing, but Brat is not the only thing, mon ami. You can not pick the parts of me that are desirable and pretend like the rest is not who I am.” The slight breeze blows the few whisps of hair that I did not put back. It is a typical mild winter night, cold by New Orleans standards, but warm for the rest of the nation.

We stand there staring at each other while the crowd behind us is unaware of the impass of two immortal creatures is playing out so very close to them. Louis’ hands are still holding my shoulders, his eyes are not breaking mine. I see the tenderness in them, the love. They still dazzle me all these years later.

“Excuse me, is he giving you a problem?” A very large man with a maroon Ohio sweatshirt steps up to us. He could have been Alderman Fenwick’s twin. His group of friends stands by, ready to defend my honor against a slight Louis du Point de Lac.

“No sir, he is trying to get me to go out and be the party boy that I was before.” I turn to face this man and his impossible mustache, the likes of which I had not seen for decades. Was this fashionable again? What did they say, what is old is again new? Louis’ arm slides around my shoulder in a gesture that he would never have made in front of the real Alderman.

“Well, you look a little to grown and mature to be a party boy to me. Just wanted to make sure you were alright.” There was a sweet smile that broke out under his immense facial hair.

“Thank you, kind sir.”

“He just needs to have fun again, is all.” Louis looks to me and then back to the neveaux Alderman. “He’s been grievin too long and needs to get his groove back. Needs to smile more, enjoy himself, and get back in the world again.” He pats my chest with his other hand and smiles back. The tender sweet Louis of a few minutes ago had vanished and the mask of the pimp I had not seen for decades had returned. But I realized, it was no longer a mask- had it ever been? Had it become part of who my Louis is now? Manly, strong, in control of the situation, protective. But non-differential, no longer shackled or exiled. Maybe I was wrong. Maybe that part of Louis had never been a mask, just a part of him that existed as the Brat and the Prince existed. He had, in my absence, become the person who was both sweet, delicate, soulful, and in charge and protective. Louis no longer had to bow and prove himself, that was not what this was. Gone was the shame and hurt. But just as I had many facets sewn together as the very fabrique of Lestat, so had Louis’ personages woven themselves into the beautiful tapestry that stood before me. I smiled at him before I turned back.

“He is right. Far too long I have let the cloak of grief weigh me down. I need to get out and live again.” This satisfied the man who so quickly came to my aid and Louis as well.

“Did you mean that?” he turned to me and fastened his jacket against the breeze as if it affected him as it did mortals.

“What that I need to stop condemning myself like the Gremlin did for centuries and enjoy all that life has provided to me? I suppose.” I placed my hand in his and thanked my defenders, I led the way to where I did not know. But Louis’ hand felt perfect in mine. “I suppose I can be both Brat and Aristocrat. The Actor and the Wolf Killer. The Virgin and the Tart.”

“You said it, not me. All I said was we needed to get you out huntin’ again.” He laughed.

We walked up Bienville and entered the old Absinth House with its loud music and drunken guests. There against the wall was a young man and woman of a devious nature. They would never come home with us, not this version of Louis and Lestat. 

“Follow my lead,” I whispered as I turned to stop Louis. I pretended to slip and let him catch me. I laughed and he did the same before I pretended to bat him away and say I was fine and not that drunk and didn’t need the help. We made our way to the end of the bar where our soon-to-be dinner stood eyeing us. Louis ordered two drinks, I have no idea what I slam down before my brain registers how it tastes. But I laugh and pretend to slip off of my barstool. Louis gets too close to me and pretends to fuss at me. But I grab him kiss him and ask the bartender for another. It takes 2 more rounds before we convince them we are old college roommates in town to party for the New Year and would they like to come back to ours for a little more of a party? We led them to the townhouse on Royal, which has stood with lights on for years. I had returned once since my trip to Paris, retrieving only items and walking away from the life I had so spectacularly ruined. 

They do not make it past our living room before we are feasting. Louis’ eyes are on me as he watches me quickly dispose of the girl. He motions for me to join him. He has been draining the man slowly, and I realize, he has been waiting to share this with me. He laces his hands in mine as we work together to finish the man. He drops from Louis’ grip and we stand there, hands interlocked, blood dripping down my face. 

Louis is beautiful. He smiles and steps over the body, wiping the blood off of my face with the back of his hand. He takes me in his arms and holds me. He holds me like we do in the coffin but do not dare speak of. He holds me like he did on the first night he was here. He holds me as if I belong to him as if our bodies slotting together so perfectly is not an accident but something that is destined to be. I fall into him because there has never been a time or a place where I have felt as safe, as comforted. This is where I belong.

“Been a long time since I’ve been home,” he whispers. I can hear his voice catching. Ah. He is not holding me because he belongs with me. It is because of the ghosts he just asked me to release. I layed my head on his shoulder as he lifts his to take in the room.

“Mon cher, you have been home for weeks.” It is everything I can do to not nuzzle into his neck, to not lick it and bite it to feel the hot blood we have both just taken.

“I have, but… I meant…” but he could not finish. “I’m sorry. I’m… this….” I felt the first hot tear hit my nose as it slid off of his cheek. I lifted my face to look at him.

“No! No, none of this! You just told me that I needed to release my penance and return to the world and it is time you did the same. Yes, this was our home. Yes, we had a life here, there are wonderful memories, mon cher,” I wiped his tears away. He was so incredibly beautiful when he cried. “But there were also mistakes that we both made. This is who we were, but not where we are.” How was my Louis so confident just a few minutes before going for the Louis that so haunted these halls?

“Did we make a mistake, coming here?” I shook my head no.

“I have only returned once. This is part of my life, just as my chateau, my apartment with Nikki, Magnus’ tower, and my house on Ursaline, but, but these are part of who I am. Pieces of what make me. Not myself.”

“I know, but, but this is Us, Lestat. It’s-.”

“No, this was us. A younger us, an us who was new and scared and hurt, this is not the us we are today. It is ok to be sad for this us, but we must not let it control us, define who we become.” He looks past me, at the dust that lays on our mantel, at the sheets that cover the furniture in the room where we were first entwined like this. I lift my finger to his chin and turn him to face me again.

“Weren’t you just telling me a few moments ago I had to let the shame and penance go and get, what did you say, my groove back?”

“Yeah, I said somptin like that.”

“Well, you are grieving too, and that is ok. You are grieving for the Louis that was, the Louis that never was, and the Louis that could have been, just as I am. You are grieving the father you were and the one you wished you were. I am grieving the lover I was and the one I wish I was. We are grieving for our shared life but there was so much beauty, Louis. Let the beauty of it lift you. Let it fill you. You said you wanted to live honestly, then live that honesty. See what was and what could have been and let it go. We need not list the ways we hurt each other or ourselves. We shared years together, for thier faults and flaws, but let us look at how we can build on these memories instead of dwell in them.”

“I was supposed to be helping you out.” He smiled his sad, crooked smile.

“Yes well, as usual, we help each other out and I take the credit and you let me until we are fussing as you say and then you bring it back up and then that fuels the fussing and-” but he stopped me with a kiss to my cheek. 

Earlier, I kissed him when I was pretending to be drunk in a large and exaggerated way and we laughed. I was Lelio. But this kiss is not a staged kiss. It is not the few that he shared when he was trying to comfort me. It is not friendly. But it is not sexual. It is something different

“Let’s not do that this time. Let’s try something different. Where I say thank you for helping me and you say, ‘It’s what friends do, mon ami then you thank me for pushing you to hunt tonight and I say “But what are friends for, mon amour?” and we don’t fuss.” 

I can not breathe. Are we mon ami? Mon amour? Mon cher? Mon petit? 

I wait for the rest, for the bottom to fall out, for the next term of affection. But none comes and he is smiling sadly at me and I know I must look confused. So I nod of course, just like I had when he asked me if he too could see other people. Of course, we are friends, my love. Of course, we will not fight. If we are never more than friends, we can not. We did not before we were companions and we are not fighting now. So… so that must mean…

“It’s what friends do, mon ami. Thank you for helping me hunt tonight.”

“It’s what friends are for, Lestat.”

Friends do not cuddle and kiss and hug and hold hands while they feed and walk with hands on their lower backs and nuzzle each other's necks and sleep in the same coffin after months.

But maybe, maybe, we are something different. More than friends, less than companions. Maybe we are beyond friends but not yet the next step. Maybe it is a comfortable holdover from all of those years ago, a muscle memory. Whatever it is, we both know that it is more than just friends. But for the sake of biding my time, I agree. 

“Yes, what friends are for.”

Chapter 10: There is never a version where I say no

Summary:

How many times did I tell Armand, meaninglessly, that I loved him? That he was my life mate? My companion? Meaningless. Lies. I could say it because it meant nothing to me, it wasn’t real. It never mattered.

But those words about Lestat? To Lestat? They were everything, they laid me out bare and vulnerable and made me lose control and fall all over again.

Notes:

We are headed for a change in rating next chapter...

*** trigger for the use of two early 1900's lgbtq slurs- nothing awful, just a heads up. I just feel like Louis would have heard what people called him and it would have affected him more than Lestat.

We walk the Quarter every night now that the weather has cooled in what New Orleans considered mid-winter. He loves to hear me talk about Claudia and Madeleine, asking me a million little questions like a proud Papa. About how she found happiness and romance. About how they complimented each other, what Claudia was like in love. Inevitably the conversation swung to how we could have been better parents and, even if not directly, how we could have been better partners to each other. 

“A child is the direct result of the trauma she grows up in,” he says as if he had been reading self-help books. Shit, maybe he had.

“And we were a lot, but there were good times, Lestat. Times when we danced, when we went to the movies, when we drove around, when you played piano and we sang.” If you looked around the Quarter, it operated as if nothing had happened, no Cat 2 storm thrashed the city 3 months ago. People in St John’s Parish had no roofs. But life carried on here like Odette was a distant memory. Just like the old times. We walk hand in hand along Charters in the glow of the t-shirt shops and daiquiri stores. 

“So you agree now, hmmm? The good times outweighed the bad?” He turns his head, his eyes boring into mine, challenging me. The Brat was slowly making his return and I was here for it.

“It just wasn’t all bad’s what I’m saying. If it was, I wouldn’t be walking around holding your hand still.” He smirked at me. That sly one, the one that says he is up to something.

“Really? And see all this time I thought you were holding my hand because I am devilishly handsome.” The twinkle in his eyes was much more frequent now that he was filled with something other than rat blood. His complexion is warmer, his hair is golden locked in the three weeks I had pushed him to hunt again. And he is devilishly handsome, there is no denying that. Why couldn’t I tell Daniel the truth about the first time I saw Lestat, I didn’t just want to be the man, I wanted to be with the man. I was immediately addicted. I was seduced and I know without a shadow of a doubt I invited it, openly seducing him back. I was not able to be honest about it 1973, not a few months ago when I told him my story again, not even a few weeks ago when I first got here. But I could be now, at least to myself.

And maybe I was openly seducing him.

“Well, then how lucky for me that I got to make a family with such a devilishly handsome man, a family that had some bad times, but mostly good times. One that was happy. A lot. ” I squeeze his hand and he leans to rest his head on my shoulder. 

I longed to walk along the streets of New Orleans like this with him all those years ago. In the last few weeks, I had grabbed his hand, held him by the waist, openly caressed him in public, and lavished him with praise, and he deserved it, hell, still does. And he gives me plenty in return. Not just that smile that he so often showed, the one that I knew meant more. The Brat has respected my boundary, that I hadn’t come here to bed him. But I also didn’t come here to dance around these truths again neither, hinting at more. I’m sure he knows this but I said I wanted to live honestly. I had not yet come clean with my truth. Yet.

“There was a part of me that wanted nothing more than this-” I held up our interlaced finger- “back then. To stroll with you, with your hand in mine. For me to be so proud to be with you and for no one to give us a second thought. I lived with you, I made a family and behind those doors, I could be who I wanted to be. But out on the streets, I still had to sit behind you in the streetcar, still had to listen to the whispers, to being called a fairy boy.”  He kisses the back of our interlaced hands.

“I am sorry, my love. I cared much less about those repercussions, but then, I was not a Creole man from the South. I,... I did not understand it then. In Paris, none of that mattered. We could have lived as we did with none of the hatred or racism.” His smile was sorrowful. The wind whipped a piece of his long flowing hair. Tonight he walks with it down, longer than I had ever seen it. “ When first I fell under your spell, I was so very enamored that I did not see the reality of what this life could mean for you. To me, you were my everything; I did not understand that your world became more complicated with me in it. I am sorry for my ignorance. And my insensitivity once I knew. I thought you would shake this off this mortal coil and live like the Prince that you were. I saw a devilishly handsome man too, strong, smart, who had to swallow down his hatred and his rage, choking on your sorrow, at not being allowed at a table you so gravely deserved to rule over. I wanted to take away that sorrow, give you the ability to live unafraid, unashamed, to be all the beautiful things you were, and to be them without apology. ” I remembered where I had heard that. We turn right on St. Ann by the Pontabla Buildings.

“You’ve told me those words before….in a church…on an altar.” I tilt my head to the side, mocking him. He smiles, releasing my hand, and does his little pirouette turn to stand before me. His hands find their way to my hips.

“I wanted to be with you so desperately, Louis. To take away the blame and hurt you felt that night. I wanted to fill your broken heart so that it would never break again.” We stand there looking at each other as the city, flush with life, races around us. He didn’t stop time. He didn’t have to. We were the only two people in each other's eyes for miles around.

“No one had ever said anything like that to me before. I had no idea what it would mean and how I would feel.” My arms dangle over his shoulders.

“I had never felt like that before.” I had not yet kissed him, really kissed him since I was back in the city. Was this, no matter what I told him or me, what I came here to do? To leave Armand to jump right back into Lestat’s arms?

Was I lying when I said I was not trying to bed him? Did I mean it at that moment? Because I was pretty sure I did not mean it now and hadn’t for a few weeks.

Nothing would have been easier at this moment. 

I could never, ever begin to explain this. This pull, this connection. We were the only two beings alive at that moment, our hearts beating as one. Claudia was right, I carried him all of those years. He never left me.  I had not been honest with myself, or with him.

“And since?” I could have said anything, but if I had said nothing, I would be tearing off his clothes in front of The 1850 House.

“No, there has been, no one-”

“Not even Antoinette?” I didn’t mean to be mean, the smile slid off of his face, and he backs away.

“I, never… I wanted you to love me, completely, so hopelessly. But you pulled away from me and” His eyes were no longer on mine.

“I couldn’t make out with you in public, Lestat.”

“I know, I know. I just wanted you to be jealous-”

“Oh I was plenty jealous-” I move my face down to look into his eyes. There were tears.

“I was so afraid you would leave me-”

“That you pushed me away with someone else?” He says nothing as the tears slide down his face. I let go of him to wipe them away but he turns from me. I circle him, grasping his chin and dry his face.

“I, I’m sorry. I, I’m not trying to be mean or make you cry, honey.” He sniffles and shakes his head before he takes a big breath and looks at me.

“I loved you more than anyone I have ever, ever encountered. I did stupid things, I was afraid and sad and jealous and confused and-” The tears threatened to flow again.

“And not communicated with by the person who evoked all of those feelings. I did a shit job back then of telling you what I thought and what was going on with me. I pulled away and never told you why. Sometimes I did it to hurt you, to get my way. But lots of times it was just me not working out what was going on with me. I cared for you so much, but I couldn’t be who I wanted to be, who you wanted me to be.” He shook his head and didn’t look me in the eye.

“No Louis, you are wrong. You are exactly who I wanted you to be. I just wanted you to love me.”

“Then I wasn’t the person you wanted me to be because I was too scared to love you the way you needed me to, the way you deserved to be loved. Because I used it against you.” Pain slid over his face. He was hurting and I hated that I was the one that was doing it. “You loved me in a way no one else ever had and it was a lot . And I didn’t know what to do with it, or how to respond to it. Or how to return it. And all I heard when I walked out of our door is about how I was some Frenchmen’s boy, people I knew my whole life and who I fought to make a name before, who had finally started to respect me, and now some of them only did because I had a white master. And some of them never did because I was living with a man. Lestat, baby, it had nothing to do with you .”

“It had everything to do with me!” Jesus, he was beautiful when he was tear-stained, too. The wind blew his hair just lightly, making him look like an angel instead of the devil he was.

“No, I mean, it wasn’t you, Lestat, it wasn’t who you were, it was what we were. There was nothing you could have said or done. I was a gay black man in the 1900s. And even as accepting as New Orleans has always been, it wasn’t Paris. I still had to follow the rules. I would have married someone I liked but didn’t love, or loved good enough, had a baby or two, but that would have been the only time we would have been together. I would have messed around on the side with any man I could find, live some sort of double life.  I would have been miserable.”  I put my hand on his jaw and rubbed my thumb on his cheek. His lips trembled. “Instead, I found someone who meant so much that I was willing to go against my family and my society to live with.” He shakes his head but drops his eyes.

“But you were still miserable.” The agony danced across his face. He loved me more than I was worthy of and thought that he was the one who didn’t deserve it. I put my other hand on his jaw and took a step towards him.

“Lestat, I was not miserable with you or because of you. I tried to tell myself it was you, I tried to hurt you because of it. I was miserable with myself. Me, my shame at who I was and what I wanted. It was because of a Catholic society. It was my Mother who I was never good enough for, my Daddy who always called me a sissy. It was me embarrassed by how owned I felt by love I was too chickenshit to return. But all you did was love me. All you ever wanted was for me to love you wildly and without abandon and even though I loved you madly, I let who I had been as a human, that life I just couldn’t let go of, control me.  And I hurt us both of us in the process.” 

He looks up at me suddenly as if he was a dog who had just heard a whistle. His eyes fill again.

“Lestat? Lestat baby, what’s wrong, what is it?” He starts to tremble.

“You…you loved me madly?” he whispers and I should be upset or concerned or… or something. But I can’t help but smile.

“I did.”  The anguish on his face was palpable. This was not the reaction I thought I would get.

“ Did? ” and his voice cracks, cracked like it had when he had asked me if I hurt myself and it hit me. In all of my shame and self-loathing, in trying to be anything other than what I was, I had failed at convincing him of my feelings. My actions were mixed and my words had not ever been straightforward. A thousand little gestures, I wanted him, I lived with him, we had a child, we owned a business, I had kissed him in the middle of the dance floor. But the only words he ever needed to hear, the only one that had ever mattered, I was too scared to say. I could fight, I could let vitriol flow from my mouth the way it did my mother’s and let him feel my hurt. But love? 

How many times did I tell Armand, meaninglessly, that I loved him? That he was my life mate? My companion? Meaningless. Lies. I could say it because it meant nothing to me, it wasn’t real. It never mattered.

But those words about Lestat? To Lestat ? They were everything, they laid me out bare and vulnerable, made me lose control and fall all over again. And somehow in my confession,  I had hurt him again.

“Oh Lestat. No, no I meant I did but- ” His face crumpled, “wait, baby, I do love you! I mean, not did as in only the past tense. I do! I always have!  I carried you all throughout Europe. I would, I would see you and talk to you all of the time. You, you were everywhere, in the museums, sitting next to me on a bench, walking by my side. My constant companion. My… my real companion.” His eyes are as big as saucers. I need to tell him. This was the confession I should have gotten off my chest so many years ago. 

I grab his hand and tare down St Ann to Pere Antoine’s Alley. The gate at the North entrance was easy enough to hop over, and he simply reaches for a suddenly unlocked knob.

I don’t let go of his hand as I drag him along the transept to the steps of the altar. The Cathedral was dark at this hour, closed with no one in it. Suddenly there were candles everywhere. Candles that I didn’t know the Cathedral still had, probably ones that were only there in Lestat’s mind. So lit them up. I turn to face him, my hands on his shoulders to anchor myself in a truth that had been staring me in my face for years.

“From the first moment I laid eyes on you, I felt something inside. Something I couldn’t explain. I tried for years to deny it or pretend, to myself, to you, to the world, that it wasn’t real, that it wasn’t what it was because it scared me.” His face is somber with streaks from the tears running down his cheeks. “And I ran. I ran to the books and bed, ran to Claudia, ran to Europe, ran all over the world because I was too much of a coward to do what I shouldda done. I tried to blame you, tried to drink it away, hell I even tried to fuck it away, but it changed nothing. Nothing. Not one damned thing.” I was breathing as heavily as I did when I was with him on that other altar. “That night you said you could give me the death I wanted in turn for being your companion for eternity and you kept your end of the bargain, but I did not. So now I’m gonna say what I shouldda said to you then, what I couldda said a thousand nights in between, what you deserved to know.”

I honestly have no idea what words were tumbling out of my mouth. There was no plan. I had come to New Orleans with no other thought than Lestat. I had spent days in New Orleans with no other thought than Lestat. And suddenly, I find myself back on an altar, looking into eyes that disarmed me as much today as they did 115 years ago and the only thought I have is Lestat.

Lestat.

Because in the end, for me, there is only ever Lestat. I know now what I had suspected all along. The pull has nothing to do with the maker or blood. If we were both human, if he was a woman or if we both were, if I had worn a different suit, if it had been a different city, never took the candy, a different century, if either of us were married, if I had never gone to the Fair Play that night- there is never a version where we don’t end up together. Where I say no to Lestat. Where I don’t long for him, where I feel complete without him.

And it’s my turn to take away his sorrow. So that is where I start. I let go of his shoulders and take a single step back. I take a big breath and swallow hard. And I look the love of my life in his eyes and confess all of my sins. 

“You are the first thought I have when I open my eyes every night. You are the last thought I have when I close ‘em the next morning. There has not been one single decision I have made without thinking what you would do, or what you would think about it. I have longed for your touch, longed to look into your eyes, to smell you, to taste you. I long for the weight of your head on my chest, how your hair tickles my nose, the silly little sound you make when you get hungry-” he wrinkles his nose.

“I do not make a silly little-”

“Yes you do and it is fuckin’ adorable. You also are possessive and overly dramatic and you love little projects that keep you busy and you’re catty and mean and thoughtful and loving and wild and soft and impulsive and charming and lucky and witty and acerbic and uncontrollable, unpredictable, incorrigible and damn it if I don’t absolutely love every fuckin’ irritating thing about you. You are a vain motherfucker and I get so fuckin’ turned on when you look impeccable and strut around. The more you get under my skin the more I want to tear you up and mesh every part of you to me until there is no difference between us.”

“That is just weird, Louis.” He makes a face.

“You want the exact same thing, Lestat de Lioncourt, so don’t even play. My heart beats at the same time as yours. No matter how far away, it’s the same. I bet if I-” it’s Lestat who closes the gap, takes my hand and puts it on his chest and I place the other on mine. “In time. Over a century and from the moment you put your mouth on me, in time. From that moment I have been yours. No, no before that. At some indeterminate moment- walking down Royal, talking about something or nothing or everything, sitting on a park bench, when you looked at me but rubbed all over Lily at the Fair Play- at a moment as amazing as the next moment and the one after that I became yours and will never be anything else. I didn’t tell you enough then and I sure as shit still haven’t said it yet, even though I have babbled and said a lotta of damned things.” He smiles at me finally, a soft smile, content with something. 

“You are nervous, mon cher.”

“Of course I’m nervous.” I let go of his chest and twist my hand into his. I begin to pull him up the steps of the ambo towards the altar. “It’s not every day you get married.” 

“Again…. When did we divorce?”

“I’m Catholic, we don’t believe in divorce. Look,” I am now in front of the altar and turn to look at him. He is radiant.  The candlelight dances around him, illuminating his hair, softening his brilliant face. The tear stains are still there but so is the look of adoration that he has shown me a million times. I can’t help but have the stupidest smile on my face as I take his hands in mine. “I, Louis de Point du Lac, love you, Lestat de Lioncourt. No matter how much I have wanted to deny it, pretend I don’t, no matter how aggravating you are-”

“These are surely vows for the ages…”

“ ‘ I can give you that death you begged your feeble, blind, degenerate, non-existent God, and I can do it, joyfully in his house of worship just like that?’ Nothing hotter or more heartfelt than saying I can kill you better than God with a smile on my face?” He rolled his eyes and shook his head.

“It worked…” he shrugs. I love that fucking shrug.

“Of course it worked, you idiot! I was in love with you! I also let you turn me after I watched you kill my parish priest! You probably could have read me a list of items you needed to buy from the market and I would have swooned like a schoolgirl-” His smile is teasing now, playful.

“You can swoon like a schoolgirl now. I would love to see you in a plaid skirt…” He licks his lips. 

“Focus Lestat! I love you! I have for a long time and I probably will no matter what bullshit you pull! I didn’t tell you before because I was scared shitless and caught up in my own mind but after a two-week-long epiphany, I pulled my head out of my ass, threw Armand into a wall, and flew 14 hours into a hurricane to come tell you. Then I waited 14 weeks because I am a chicken…”

“You are a deadly, killer chicken, mon amour.” Oh the Brat is completely back.

“Yeah, a scared shitless bringer of death, great. I can kill thousands but can’t tell the only person that matters that I love them. So, there, yeah… I love you.” I nod my head for good measure. He is still smiling, like he couldn’t believe any of this was real. He doesn’t say anything and just stares.

“ What? ” I wrinkle my nose and give him a look that would have made my sister Grace proud.

“Louis de Lioncourt. Louis de Point du Lac de Lioncourt. The Marquis and Marquise d'Auvergne.”

“The Marquis d’Auvergne? Really?” Then he fixes me with that look, that final blow. The one that disarmed me in Rue Royale so many years ago. The one I had been waiting to see these past few weeks. The one I dreamed about for years. So hungry, so possessive, so very mine.

“Is this when you kiss your bride?”  

There is never a version that I say no.

Notes:

transept- the arms, or the side part of the Church. Catholic Churches back in the day were built in the shape of the cross and there is a door here that leads out to Pere Antoine Alley. You can see it in the picture, but it is taken looking at the Square whereas here, the Square would have been behind them.
https://assets.simpleviewinc.com/simpleview/image/upload/c_fill,f_jpg,h_675,q_65,w_1200/v1/clients/neworleans/NOTMC_13983_fa9e651e-c2d6-4f15-b653-031ef86ccf49.jpg
ambo-- the lectern or podium on the altar. At the Cathedral there is usually one but can be two as seen in this picture-
https://www.averysweetblog.com/2020/08/st-louis-cathedral-french-quarter-new.html

Pontalba buildings- the oldest US apartments... https://www.hnoc.org/publications/first-draft/woman-behind-new-orleanss-famous-pontalba-buildings

Chapter 11: Slowly Slide Home

Summary:

“What about being companion enough for yourself, um?” I ask barely breaking the kiss, only long enough to remove my shirt and reconnect with him.

“I was wrong.” He nods confidently, working on his pants.

“Maybe you were not wrong, maybe this is too fast?” his hands were pushing his pants down as I kick my shoes off.

“I don’t see you stoppin'.” He steps out of them and begins working on my belt.

“No, of course not, how can I ever say no to you?” His mouth meets mine again as he releases my button and unzips me. I pray he puts his hand on me, but he only drags his nails along my stomach before slowly pushing my pants down. He whispers.

“Then say yes,” I was stepping out of my pants before I could stop myself. “Just nod that beautiful head of yours and be my companion.”

Notes:

Whew.... finally, some of that E rating we been waiting on! the next two are way more...
A continuation of last chapter from Lestat's POV.

Everything moves so suddenly that I feel like the whirlwind of Louis’ first night home is upon us again.  His hand in mine as we walked past what was once Fernandez’s Wine Cellar, my hands around his waist on the cobblestone streets we used to prowl. Him pulling me into the Cathedral.

-I am companion enough for myself.

I didn’t come here to bed you.

I have missed you.

Sleep in my coffin, with me.

Is it thinner than that robe you got on right now?

I was too scared to love you the way you needed me to, the way you deserved to be loved.

My… my real companion

Focus Lestat! I love you!-

Louis had looked at me with adoration before, as well as want. But this time... on the altar, surrounded by candlelight, when he holds my jaw and carefully draws me in, there is only love and reverence. And delight. Gone is the unsure, the timid, the aloof Louis. He is ecstatic.

I am companion enough for myself…..

It is true that I am nothing if not a glutton for pain and anguish. Louis tells me upon returning home, almost immediately, that he meant to be by himself. He had just exercised that Gremlin and wants to “figure it all out”, which he deserves. Time to be by himself, not the influence of another. To please one’s self alone without having to consider or compromise. Not two days later we are cuddled up like the last 80 years had not existed as it has, as if it were some terrible dream we shared. 

If I was his only companion, then what of being enough for himself? What of the Gremlin? How do all of these things, very mutually exclusive concepts, exist at the same time, overlap, and disappear?

This time on the altar, I am the one who is tentative. Afraid of opening myself too soon, too much, too unsettled, impulsive. Just over 14 weeks and he confesses his love and I am kissing him in a church. It took me almost 27 weeks to get him in the same position, this time we did not even make it until Valentine’s Day. Should I hold out? Wait longer before I allow myself the pleasure of his velvet skin pressing against mine? Slowly we connect as if we have all the time in the world. I am stunned as if the feeling of his lips had not been constantly replayed thousands of times in these interceding years.

We breathe into the other, reticently those first few moments, but we do not stop. Whose tears fell first I do not know, but we are both weeping with, joy? Sorrow? The kiss does not end, it just transforms the longer we are together and then passion overtakes us. I could be consumed, there, with him, and it would be the greatest moment of my undead experience. We hold on to each other as if our very existence depended on it, our eternity intertwined as I had imagined when I saw him on the streets of our wilderness.  His hand moves to my hair and he tugs on it, finally breaking away from my mouth to kiss down my neck. I could not shed my jacket fast enough to allow him all of the access he needed. 

“Ahhh, Louis,” I whine. Generally speaking, it takes very little for him to illicit such sounds from me but this I have let slip too quickly. Even though I have told myself to stay an infinitesimal number of times, I can not heed my own warning. I did not need to read his thoughts to know. My heart sings it and so must his.  He stops kissing me suddenly and lets go to take off his own sweatshirt and what lies underneath. 

“I, Louis de Pointe du Lac, take you, Lestat de Lioncourt, as my eternal companion.”  His hands are back on me as he kisses me so deeply, so hungrily, I feel like we entered another realm of existence.

“What about being companion enough for yourself, um?” I ask barely breaking the kiss, only long enough to remove my shirt and reconnect with him.

“I was wrong.” He nods confidently, working on his pants.

“Maybe you were not wrong, maybe this is too fast?” his hands were pushing his pants down as I kick my shoes off.

“I don’t see you stoppin'.” He steps out of them and begins working on my belt.

“No, of course not, how can I ever say no to you?” His mouth meets mine again as he releases my button and unzips me. I pray he puts his hand on me, but he only drags his nails along my stomach before slowly pushing my pants down. He whispers.

“Then say yes,” I was stepping out of my pants before I could stop myself. “Just nod that beautiful head of yours and be my companion.” He slides his hands around me and I can feel the heat coming off of him. I do not try to remove myself but create a small amount of space between us.

“This is sudden, Louis.” His hands feel electric as they move freely over me, running their familiar routes, visiting their favorite places. 

“This has been 114 years, Lestat.”

“No, I mean, you here, like this now, it is sudden for me.” My eyes swelled. I had asked for a kiss, but now that I had it, the doubt came roaring back. I put my arms on his shoulder to stay him. He looks at me hard and I wait for the argument, but none comes, only is there sincerity in his voice.

“For the last few weeks, I have been honest with myself, been open, letting my emotions guide me, and looking for truths of why this felt so right. I did this for the first time in my life, instead of just pushin’ all of it down. And in every moment, you have been my truth.” He steps back, not upset, and his mouth does the little purse that it does when he admits the hard things. He holds out his hands for mine. “You are my destiny, as I have always been yours.” I offered him my hand and he steps back closer to me. He embraces me, his warm hands holding me now. His mouth finds mine again, or is it the other way around? We slide into each other as two haves of a whole and the years we have spent apart have not changed how perfectly we fit together. 

“You knew then what took me years to admit. I feel, the world feels, more vibrant with you. More intense, larger, more out of control and it is scary as hell, but also more amazing than anything. I kept letting myself get in my way, but not anymore.” He covers me in his mouth, his hands. “The truth is,” he kisses my cheek, my jaw, behind my ear, down my neck, “this was inevitable, we were destined for each other. It will never not be you.” He licked up to my ear and my resistance and doubt crumbled. “I should have said this years ago, and I’m sorry my head was up my ass.”

“You have a perrrfect ass,” I purred. There was no denying how his words affected me, how they reached to the depths of my soul. These are all of the things I had longed to hear. Why, why was I fighting this? He stopped at looked at me.

“I am a perfect ass. But I am your ass, if you’ll take me.” But I stayed and didn’t say a word. “God Damn, Lestat. I am buck-naked on the altar of St Louis Cathedral and you are hesitant?”

“I thought, playing coy….”

“Do you want this?” He steps away from me. There is hurt in his voice, apprehension, anguish. Perhaps anger.

“You naked on the altar of the Cathedral? Louis! You have no idea how many times I have dreamed of this moment, vividly, with your leg here….” I sigh lost in the reverie of it. He shakes his head.

“No, I mean, yeah, obviously that, I’m not denying…, but this. Me? Us? You don’t…”

“I do, I do more than you understand… it’s just.” I break away from his brilliant chartreuse eyes, eyes that I have been enamored with for years, ones I dreamt of for decades. How do I explain this? Even in this new era of honesty, can I ever be truthful about my feelings, the depth of my affection, the width of my obsession? “I’m scared, Louis. I am scared of losing you, of opening myself up and having it all fall out. Of me doing the exact same stupid things I did a century ago in new and more enchanting ways. Of you being in love with who I was and not, not what I’ve become…”

“What you’ve become?”

“Louis, I love you more than anything or anyone. But if I lose you again, I, I won’t make it. I’ll… I can’t take that.” He moves closer and holds me as all of the fears of these last few weeks tumbled out with the tears on his shoulder. I am a wreck, a total emotional useless wreck, again. How could he possibly want any of this?

“Shhhh….I just, I just should have told you. You should have known all of these years how I really felt. I feel like…like I wasted so much time. And I want to live it right from now on. I want to live it with you.” I grab at him. I finally have the one thing I have wanted, ever, to be loved, and I am fumbling it. He holds me and pets my head until I had finished, a mess of hair and blood-stained cheeks.

“So, I guess this means we get dressed and go find dinner?” He wipes the tears from my cheeks and kisses my head.

“Mon cher, are you mad? Do you know how long I have fantasized about taking you on the communion table?” I am jesting. Maybe I am jesting. Probably jesting. 

“Taking me, who said I was going to let you take me?”  His hand is rubbing circles larger and larger on my back, sliding closer and closer to my ass.

“ Mon cher, you literally just said that exact thing.‘I am a perfect ass, but I am your ass, if you’ll take me.’”  I mocked in my best Louis voice. “Besides, in the fantasy, I take you before I ride you…” I kiss his neck. The smell of him, the softness of his skin, oh how I have I survived in these past decades? I breathe him in again and the idea of ridding him, of biting down here as I lower myself on him again and again overwhelms me. I should not be doing this, should not be thinking these thoughts this close to him, this bare. I am scared, I am afraid of being left. But I am so, very, incredibly hard. And so is he.

“Ohhhh, bratty bottom and a smooth-talking top?” His eyes are closed as I move up to his ear. The smell of his hair, I can not help myself as I lick his ear and pull on it slowly with my lips. His smile is electric and he grinds into me in response. This confident Louis will be the death of me. 

“I prefer insatiable bottom and a king top.” I can feel his longing pressing very firmly into mine. He leans in, whispers into my ear. 

“Oh my King, how insatiable?” I feel each puff of breath as it hits my skin and I have no guards left to put up. Yes, this is moving fast, but, surely, surely satisfying both of us physically won’t interfere with us taking other things slowly.

“Fuck, Louis.” His hands are all over me and one slides around my ass and up through the clef.

“Can you go for 4 hours? 6? It’s only 10, sunrise at 7…is 9 hours too much?” He slowly grinds himself into me, rubbing himself against my cock. I can feel his wetness.

“Fuuuuck, Louis.” I have not felt, there has been no one since him. I will not be able to hold out much longer.

“Is that a request, Monsieur de Lioncourt?” His hands squeeze my hipbone hard, making me buck into him and now there is no mistaking what he is doing, how our bodies are moving perfectly together. 

“Maybe….” and I let the moan that has been building go as I finally grab his ass.

“Maybe?” 

“Maybe it is a foreshadow.” I pick him up simply because I can. Because I haven’t in all these years and I am starving for him. He is warm and hard and soft and perfect and in my arms again. I place him on the communion table before spitting on my hand and finally seizing his cock. My nails slide over his pelvis, down his thighs, grazing his most tender places.

“Fuuuuuck, Lestat!” his hips buck up to meet me. How beautiful he looks fucking my hand. How have I held out all these weeks laying next to him, knowing what he feels like, what he smells like when he is aroused, knowing exactly the faces and sounds he would make?? I drop down, spreading his legs so I can lick him open. I can not help but kiss and suck on his thighs. These are my thighs, thighs that I have spread and kissed thousands of times, that I have lavished and loved, that I have sucked and bitten. These are mine and I have missed them so. 

They will never, never escape my attention again. Louis grinds into my hand and tries to find purchase while I enjoy these thighs before they are wrapped around my waist.

“Is that a request, Monsieur de Pointe du Lac?” but I finally give him what he wants, what I want, and release his cock to spread him wide. The taste of him on my tongue as I slowly explore him. I have waited so long for this and I know I will not last, but I want to make love to every inch of him, to give him the adoration and attention I know he has not had and so desperately needs. 

“It’s a command, Monsieur de Lioncourt.” I have missed the sound of his voice as I fuck him, how deep it can get, how loud he is, how high he can scream. Louis opens on my tongue, that tight ring loosening for me, pulsing on me. 

“Please, please,” his begging is so very pretty, but there is time to see just how desperate I can make him. I moan into him as I probe him wide, holding his testicles and tearing my nails down his inner thigh. 

“Je t'en prie, Lestate, pleasssse,” he is shaking now, needing so badly to be filled. To be taken, to have me love him as no one else can. I move my mouth away to slide two fingers in as I stand back up. His eyes are so wide, bottom lip pouty and trembling. His cock has leaked so beautifully on his stomach. I want to taste him there, too, but my need to fill him is overwhelming.

“De quoi mon mari a-t-il besoin?” He is bucking so hard on my fingers, oh he request to be replete is obvious. “Mon belle mari désespéré? Ma bouche ? Mes doigts ? Ma bite? Hmmm? être rempli et baisé?”

“Wé, sitoplé Mo bézwin twa, m'olé twa, Sitoplé.”

Tu es tellement négligé que tu parles Kréyol  ! Ne t'inquiète pas, mon cher, ton mari prendra soin de toi. 

He has been so ignored, my Louis, not given the devotion and attention he so desperately needs. No one has been able to take care of him the way that only I can. I begin to deliberately fuck into him, taking my time, lightly dragging my nails along his cock with my other hand. I see a tear slide out of his eye as he works himself into my fingers. I wonder if I could make him cum right here before I have even gone deep enough to make him scream. He opens his eyes and looks at me. Those beautiful green eyes, desperate and lost, begging me to fix everything that is wrong in our world with such a simple action. My heart sings and breaks simultaneously. My want has built for years, and I can tell his has, too . I slow down even more, pulsing my fingers in him watching him start to buck wildly.

“I can go for much longer than 9 hours, mon cher. I can go for eternity. Can you?” I thrush my fingers in deeply seeking the spot that will make my love scream. His eyes roll back and he writhes on my fingers, seeking it again and again. 

“ Yes, yes, please, please inside.” I can not explain this feeling, seeing someone so powerful, so deadly, so full of life and so commanding, begging me to split him open on my cock and hearing him fill this Cathedral with my name. Oh the Brat had returned and is going to fuck his husband so well that he would be ruined for anything else. I glide my hand up his trembling cock and gather whatever wetness I can. I wipe it on his moisten hole and Louis de Point du Lac wiggles down until the head of my cock breaches him and I lose my mind as I slowly slide home.

 

Notes:

Fernandez’s Wine Cellar was on the corner of Charters and St Ann for years until the family sold it to focus on their other enterprise- Cafe Du Monde ( Coffee of the World). Opened in the 1860s everybody goes there for the beignets. Here is my cheat. Buy cheap biscuits. Cut the dough in 4s. Get a pot of oil that is deep, 2-3ish inches. Put them in and hold them down until they puff up big. Sprinkle powdered sugar. It's not 100%, but easier than the box mix. Good luck finding Chicory for your coffee. It's only made and sold around NOLA, SE Asia, S. Africa, India and France. You can order if, if you like.

“De quoi mon mari a-t-il besoin?” - what does my husband need?
Mon belle mari désespéré? Ma bouche ? Mes doigts ? Ma bite? Hmmm? Être baisé et rempli ?”- My pretty desperate husband? My mouth? My fingers? My cock? Hummm? To be fucked and filled?
“Wé, sitoplé Mo bézwin twa, m'olé twa, Sitoplé.” - Yes, please, I want you, I need you plese!
Tu es tellement négligé que tu parles Kréyol ! Ne t'inquiète pas, mon cher, ton mari prendra soin de toi. - You are so neglected that you speak Kréyol! Don't worry, my dear, your husband will take care of you.
Kreyol is New Orleans Creole French. It's honestly spoken by such few people here, but if you say it out loud, it sounds like French. Wé as Oui, sitoplé as s'il te plaît. I wonder sometimes if it's not just French with our lazy New Orleans accent...

Chapter 12: A White French man dressed as the Devil

Summary:

All I know is, I wanted him before, but what I feel now is overwhelming. It is so much more than a physical want.

And I don’t want to stop. Nothing is going to stop me. I will do this a thousand times just to lie in his arms, to breathe with him, to look into his preternaturally blue eyes. To feel safe and taken care of. Whatever he did, he did it because he cares for me. Yeah it was sexual and all but, he held me, with his hand on my heart, and looked into my eyes, looked into my soul.

Is this what falling in love feels like? Being dizzy and not being able to feel my feet or my hands and not being able to move and wanting more, wanted to be consumed.

Notes:

Louis from 1891- 1973.

I am 14 years old and it's the first Sunday of Lent. I am hanging up my albs. Remy is doing the same. He is a year older than me and has always been soft. He smiles at me as I turn to leave. 

I am kneeling in my family’s pew, the same pew the de Point du Lacs have prayed in for over 60 years. Remy scoots in next to me. His family’s pew is further back in the church. He keeps looking at me, but I keep my head down. Pray for Mawma and Gracie, Paul is starting to have a hard time at school, so I pray extra hard for him. And for Sure Shot Dunlap, who broke his leg sliding into third base.

“Louis,....Louis!” Remy whispers. I shoot him a side eye and go back to my prayers. I suppose I should pray for Grande Tauntie Marie who fell-

“Louis!”

“What is it, Remy?”  He is nervous and excited. He tells me he wants to show me something. I make the sign of the cross and follow him to the confessional.

“In there?”

“Yes, I wanted to show you something Father Alcide showed me.”

That was the first time I let another boy touch my penis.

 

Three weeks later and Paul and I have just finished serving. As Paul is putting the cruets on the table in the Sacristy, Father Alcide asks Paul when was the last time he’s been to confession.

“Is it the same type of confession you gave to Remy?” Paul is 12 years old and innocent. Paul is 12 and is having problems staying asleep at night. Paul is 12 and the voices at night wake me up, but they haven’t happened during the day.

“Louis, I give confession to eve-”

“That’s not the type of confession I’m talking about and it better not be the type you are talking about either.” Paul is looking between me and Father Alcide.

“I haven’t been to confession in about a month, actually Louis…”

“You not going to confession with Father Alcide today or ever Paul.” He looks to me and Father. I know the color was raising in my cheeks but it was not as bad as it was in Father Alcide’s.

“But Louis…” I walk up to him, grab the tray right out of his hand and slam it on the table.

“You heard me Paul!”  I grabbed him by the hand and fix Father Alcide “And as for you, we won’t be serving any of your masses. And you won’t be giving my brother or my sister confession.”

“And why is that, son?” I turned to see my Father, Mother, and Gracie standing at the door. I was as caught as he was. I couldn’t say what he did because I would be admitting what I knew. They could figure out how I knew. I looked back at Father Alcide and then at Paul.

“He, he was being mean to Paul’s all. You know, sometimes he doesn’t listen, but he didn’t have to be sharp like that.”

“You are right Louis. I know Paul had been touched-” I turned back to see him look at my father, not my brother and me. He was no longer the kindly priest who gave the kids sweets. He was the man on the pulpit, preaching for his life. “And I should have been kinder to such a gentle soul.”

“Father wasn’t mean…”

“Come on Paul, you don’t have to defend anyone, let’s go.” I began to drag him out, my face redder by the second.

“I am sure sorry Mr. du Lac, it…it was a mistake, I shouldn’t have been so sharp…” I pushed past my parents and they followed me.

Two weeks later Father Alcide was transferred out of St Augustine.

9 years later, while I am combing through my father’s ledgers, I find a $500 payment dated March 14, 1891 to St Augustine with the entry note of “priest.”

****

I am 17 and it is springtime. Everything smells like azaleas and jasmine. I tell Paul to walk Gracie home from Couvent School, that I have to stay and help prepare for my graduation ceremony. Jonas runs up to me and smiles. I nod my head and turn back to Paul.

“Look, gone on home now, and here, here’s some money, take her to Mrs. Engert’s and buy her some sweets on the way home.” Gracie jumps up and takes off. 

“Gracie, Grace! Wait, Louis, I’m not sure…”

“Paul, it’s fine, I’ll be along in a bit. Better go after her! She heard sweets and is halfway down the block!” Paul runs off after Gracie, a surefire way to be rid of both of them. I finally turn to Jonas.

“So, you said your Mama’s visit her sister in McDonoughville?”

“Yes, won’t be home until tomorrow morning for the ceremony.”

I follow him to his darkened house. It’s not as big as ours, his family's not as established as mine, but none of that matters right now. No one’s home and I am hard already- that’s what matters. We walk out to his garçonnière. He locks the door to a room no one would have entered. He drops to his knees and I tell him no, not this time. This time I want to try something new. His Dad doesn’t get home until past 6 that night.

The next day I point to decorations I had never seen before and tell Gracie those were the ones I helped put up. Jonas catches my eye and waves. In my mind all I can see is him bent over and taking every inch of me. Hear him grunting before he comes and I don’t even have to touch him. I tip my chin up to him and turn back to Grace.

*****

I am 19 and maybe I’m wrong. Maybe, maybe it’s just because I have never had any relations with a girl. Maybe it’s because I had been shown what it felt like to have a man’s mouth sucking me off. Maybe I just need to find a pretty girl.

It is my cousin’s 20th birthday. We were close as kids, them all teased me for being so thin and little, but now I am as tall as the rest of them. We get drunk before we head up Uptown because Davide was too dark to go to Storyville. 

  I had never been here before, but some of the other fellas had. We end up in a house on Liberty with beautiful women. They tell this young girl I’m a virgin because to them, I am. They don’t know about the boys that I have pleasured me in their garçonnières or behind an abandoned house. Some boys whose names I don’t even remember. 

She is pretty. Doe eyes, hair soft and straight, but not good hair like a Creole girl's. Almost like she had hot curled it like Mawma had done to Gracie’s hair that one time, but it didn’t look as nice as Gracie’s.

“My name’s Rose, what’s yours?” Her accent was from the country, Mississippi, or something. Not New Orleans. 

“Louis.” I squeek out. She is wearing this yellow sheer cape and it is the first time I remember seeing breasts in real life. The boys are laughing and catcalling.

“Oh Louis, I’mma treat you real good. Take care a you nice.” I let her lead me up the stairs to a bedroom. She lights the lamp and starts to undo her top. I don’t know where to put my hands, so I sit on them.

“Now, now, what would my Louis like to feel good? Do you want to touch me?” No, I think. There is something curling up in my stomach and I don’t want to.

“No. Sorry.”

“That’s alright, sugar. I’ll do all the touching.”

Her mouth is not as good as Jonas’ or the last three boys I let give me face. But she’s better than that little white boy who took me down last fall. She knows what she is doing but it’s like someone told her, like she read a book. Not like she had ever felt it herself. It felt good, just,... not great. I close my eyes and think. I think of Jonas who I like enough. I think of the boy Stephan who was a year ahead of me in school. I think of Kid Ory, who has a swagger about him that let me look past his face. I think of the Kiss, the new vitascope I saw last week. I think of the handsome man in The House of the Devil and that was what worked. A white French man, portraying the Devil. I bat Rose off because thinking of that white devil has worked in getting me hard. Of what I would want him to do to me if I popped out of his cauldron. Of how his mouth would feel on me, of how other parts of him would feel on me. 

I tell Rose to turn the light out and come here. I have my first sexual encounter with a woman while thinking of a white French man dressed as the Devil.

****

I am 27 years old. Lestat has brought Lily here to pleasure me and I am in knots. I have been drinking but not enough for this. I had just brought him to meet my family, to introduce him… what? For what? Like Grace did with Levi? Because my Daddy was right, I am a Goddamned fairy, but I had promised myself to keep it hidden. For them. And here I was, parading around the man that made my heart aflutter to my family like a damned fool. As if I could ever be lucky enough for…

No, best not to think about that. 

I turn to him and he is watching me.

He thinks I fuck Lily. He wants a ménage à trois. Both of us on her. But I don't…it’s not like that with her. I can’t let him know. Lily had wanted this chance for ages. I don’t know if I can fuck another woman again. Especially not with him watching. Because this time it won’t take some moving picture star to get me off, not when Lestat is sitting there looking at me like….like he…like he wants me.

Stop it, Louis. That is not what this is about.

“You like to watch?”

Maybe that’s it. Maybe he’s one of those guys who likes to watch other people get off before he takes his turn with her.

“I’ve been watching you for some time now.” And all I can think is this, this is going to be as close as I come. Me fucking Lily while I watch him jerk off. Or while he fucks her after I’m done. Maybe she’ll suck me off while he fucks her and I can pretend that I’m feeling him. "From river to lake, lake back to river, looking for my companion heart." Companion heart? He removes his clothes and watches me, not her, me. Maybe he does want me and he just, maybe this is how he justifies it. He could be one of those guys who doesn’t act on his desires? Maybe this is his first time?

But it can’t be because in my dreams he is so masterful, so strong, and passionate.

The next thing I know I have his fingers in my mouth and I’m sucking. I’ve never done that before, I never been the one who’s sucked… it’s always been them pleasing me and now, like a fool, like, like a schoolgirl, the first thing I do is try to gobble him down. But he is just watching me do it. He’s not batting me off, not pushing me away. He caressed my face, smiling at me like this is what he is really here for.

I catch myself. What the fuck was I thinking? But he lets me. And now somehow Lily is asleep and he is looking at me and I am looking at him. I have not been in denial about how beautiful he is. Or how good he must look under that suit. How he would feel holding me down. His mouth on me. Fantasizing things with Lestat I ain’t never thought I would do with anyone. I just, we have become friends. And I don’t fuck friends. But he is… there is more and I don’t want to mess anything up with a misunderstanding…

It only takes me a second watching him look like that at me, with that hunger, then I rush him. I never make the first move, I,...but I jump up and my mouth is on his and I push him back and he is not just taking it, but he is not pushing me away. It’s physical, this dance. I knew it would be like this, not as simple as a quick exchange or simple gesture. But, but I’ve never done this with a man.

I mean.

I let them give me face.

I’ve even paid a few for sex. 

I know what is happening, how I am losing dominance and giving it up at the same time because I have never wanted to fuck someone so badly for so long. 

I want Lestat. 

I want his hands on me.

I want his mouth on me.

I…I want him to shove me into this wall and,... fuck.

Fuck.

Fuck.

He spins me around and I can feel him, how hard he is. The small wetness as he rubs against me and I want this in a way I have never wanted anything. I grind back on him with a need I have never felt. But before he breaches where no one has, before he takes me and makes me his, he… he….

He bites me.

He bites me and he is sucking, god I feel how hard and big he is as he presses right up into me and this is…fuck…this is so much more. This is, floating and riding and sucking and fucking and loving and needing and yearning and exposing and gliding and falling and flying and wanting. And wanting. And Wanting.

After I laid in his arms sore in places I had never been before and all I want is more. I want it again. I want to feel him again. Everywhere. On top of me, beneath me,  inside of me, wrapped around me, next to me, all over me. I am lightheaded and I want to kiss him again but slowly. I, I want to kiss him so badly, I am drawn to him, I hunger to be consumed in a way I never been. 

I have never kissed a man like that before.

I… I don’t even know if I had sex or if I orgasmed or what the hell happened.

All I know is, I wanted him before, but what I feel now is overwhelming. It is so much more than a physical want.

And I don’t want to stop. Nothing is going to stop me. I will do this a thousand times just to lie in his arms, to breathe with him, to look into his preternaturally blue eyes. To feel safe and taken care of. Whatever he did, he did it because he cares for me. Yeah it was sexual and all but, he held me, with his hand on my heart, and looked into my eyes, looked into my soul. 

Is this what falling in love feels like? Being dizzy and not being able to feel my feet or my hands and not being able to move and wanting more, wanted to be consumed.

He pulls me closer and for the first time in my life, I am curled up in a man’s arms with my head on his chest and I can think of no other place on earth that feels more perfect.

***

I am 27 years old and I have been fighting. I don’t want this. I, I can’t want this. What has come over me? I hear him in my head, I feel him all over me. My heart is racing and I need him so badly. It’s like a scratch I can’t itch. Is this like those dope addicts you see who live on the street? Lestat is a drug and I am hooked. 

Last night was the first time I kissed a man romantically, just…not to get sex or… because I wanted to be close to him. To feel him. In my chest and not with my dick. He asked me to be his companion and I kissed him.

Like he was someone I loved. 

I helped him bury my priests, I tried to run out to go home and nearly burnt my flesh off. I had to come back, figure out what he had done to me. 

What has the man done to me?

He carried me up the stairs to a room with a coffin. He kept saying we are vampires. And I don’t know what’s wrong with me. 

But then he takes all of his clothes off. Tells me I can be on top tonight. Which means there will be other nights. Which means I won’t always be on top.

I’ve never done, not like this. Not looking at each other, not being in his arms, not after kissing. This is different.

And I want to. 

I walk in and try to take my clothes off, my burnt flesh already healing. He he smiling up at me, waiting. 

What did I agree to?

I can’t go home, and… well I can’t go home. And I don’t, I don’t really want to go back to my Mawma’s house. Ain’t barely been there the last few months. I’ve been with Lestat. 

Now here I am. And I want to be here, there is a part of me that wants this, to fill the new thing that has been born and taken over, this hunger that he can created. 

After slowly taking my clothes off, trying my hardest not to hurt my burnt flesh, I climb into the coffin, like it’s the most normal thing in the world. I’ve never slept with, I mean I’ve fucked, but shared space, slept next to… except for him a few nights ago. I slide in next to him, on my side. I can’t, I can’t hide how much I want this. He turns his face to mine.

“Hello, Louis.”

“Hello, Lestat.” 

“I hope that you don’t mind, but I am a bit of a snuggler.” And I laugh. We are absolutely naked and lying together in a coffin and he looks at me like I am beautiful. Like he can’t get enough of me. It makes me feel like I should blush and look away but I can’t break his stare. 

“My feet are always cold,” I whisper.

“I do not have a blanket. Shame. I will just have to keep you warm in other ways.” He turns on his side and kisses me. 

I kiss him back. It is slow and hungry, just the way I wanted it to be, almost like he read my mind. His hand slips behind my head and I feel a fire in my stomach and a flutter in my heart. I can feel how hard he is. As hard as I am.

“Would you like a little blood? You have not eaten and it will help you heal.” His face is so close and I can’t get over the taste of him in my mouth. I will never not crave that taste.

“Will I cum and feel lightheaded for the rest of the night?” Lestat’s eyes widened as a sweet smile blooms on his face.

“Is that what you want?”

“I mean, it’s not not what I want. I,.. I just wouldn’t mind working up to that.” His hand is slowly messaging my head and neck, I have never been touched like this before. Like I am precious or delicate. It creates a different feeling in my chest than the other night. That overwhelming want is there, but something else is tugging. 

“I will give you whatever it is you want for as long as you want it. What does my Louis want.” He licks my bottom lip. 

I had fucked with plenty of men before, but I had never been seduced. Never, ever had I made love. 

“I,...I want you.” I squeak out. He kisses my bottom lip and sucks on it gently. Everything is so gentle and sweet, so different than the other night.

“And how do you want me?” 

“I just, I don’t even know, I just-”

“Oh you know. You know exactly what you want, mon cher.” Like I am dear, like I am important.

“I want to feel you.” I croak out. 

“Where do you want to feel me.” He kissed me again. Slowly, grinding himself up against me. Everywhere. I want to feel you everywhere. I want to feel every inch of you on every inch of me forever. 

But that’s not what I say.

“Inside.”

“You want to be inside of me?” He is beautiful. I have, I have had that thought so many times before. I have seen men who I thought were good-looking, who were attractive, who turned me on or who made me hard when I looked at their bodies. But Lestat is beautiful in a way that no one has ever been to me. I get mesmerized by his eyes, by the way they look at me with heat and something like adoration. His smile makes my heart speed up and get lightheaded. 

“No, no…I… I want…” His hand is exploring my back and my sides, and everywhere he touches, there are sparks of lightning.

“My Louis, you can have everything. Whatever it is. And you do not have to be shy or ashamed to ask it of me. There is nothing more that I want,” kiss, “than to give you pleasure and love. Then to worship every part of you as you deserve to be worshiped.” He grinded on me again and I know I whined like I had never had sex before but I had never had, I had never done this before. I have never been worshipped.

“I want to feel you-”

“Yes, my beautiful…” And his hand was around our cocks and stroking us so slowly in his big hands. 

“Fuck, Lestat. I want you to fuck me. Please. Fuckkkk.” And I kissed him. I held on for dear life as he worked his hand so slowly up and down our cocks. I had not, since first meeting him, there had been no one but my own self. I had never felt another man up against me like this. His pace was maddeningly slow and I feel like my whole body is going to explode. No other, I have had no other experience that  felt so completely overwhelming. I came so quickly, embarrassingly quickly. He laughs but not at me, not mean. His smile is radiant and kind. 

“Mon cher, you are so excited. It is as if you have not been dreaming of this for weeks now. Not wanting me to shove you against doors or push you down on beds. No, I will not be so violent with you,.... Tonight. Tonight, I will make you understand just how loved you are.” He lifts my leg and begins circling my hole with fingers covered in my own cum. I am gone. I ground on him, moaning, begging him to give me more, to make me his. I said things I would never, had never… I was in ecstasy. He slowly breechs my entrance and it was the most beautiful thing I had felt. My mouth gapped open and he smiled and filled it with his tongue. He slid himself in me further and further, slowly rocking his finger inside of me, pleasuring me until he was buried completely, and slowly fucking me with his finger.

“Is this what mon amour wants? To be fucked? pour me prendre et faire de moi son mari immortel? ” Again he laughed as if he were high on laudanum and would laugh too if I wasn’t in ecstasy and I realize we are high on each other.  He works his finger in deeply and I began to grind on him.

“Naaah, nah, nooo. Je veux….” But I keep bucking into him. “Plus, s'il vous plaît. Moi, j'ai besoin de plus.” The look of pride and love made me feel both like the most important thing in the world and scared beyond belief. He removed his finger and pushed in with a second. There was a slight soreness this time, feeling pushed wider, until his fingers touch something inside me and I arch up and into him. 

“Ah! C’est mon Louis, I’ve got you. Yes, take what you need from me. There you are, have all of me.” I had never had anyone speak to me, I had always been in control telling someone what to do. But every time his fingers hit that spot I am on fire, electric and alive in his hands. He begins moving his fingers apart as he thrusts, widening me and even though it was more and ached, it was not enough. My whole body is more alive than it has ever been, the room glowing with the light from the lanterns and Lestat. Lestat more beautiful and alive than before. Lestat more illuminated. He leaned in to kiss me and reach again and again for the button of electricity I didn’t even know I had. 

I was hard and leaking again and I had no idea how any of it was possible.

“Are you ready for me, Mon cher?”

“Yes, please, please, I need you. Please, inside. Please Lestat.” I had fucked men before, I had seen them scream out when I had gone deep, I even had a few come and never touch their cocks. I had no idea why until now. Until I am hard as Lestat removes his fingers from me and turns us so that I was on top of him. He takes what is left of my cum from his stomach and rubs it on his now throbbing cock. He holds me with one hand and lines his thick cock up underneath me then he lowers me slowly on him, as my hole swallows him down further and further until tears streamed down my face and I sat fully on his lap.

“Oh God! God!” I was complete and filled and his.

“Are you alright, mon Louis?”

“Oh fuck, Lestat. Please. Fuck. Lestat. Yes.” And he understands what I mean. He takes my hands and places them on either side of his head letting me steady myself. He slides his hands under my thighs. “Ride me, Louis. Take every inch of me. I am yours.” He slowly begins to raise and lower me and I slide up and down his cock. I find my rhythm, moving and bucking, writhing on him. On fire and exploding. I was not quiet, loudly crying his name and moaning as I slam on him again and again, taking him as far as I can.  As I feel my orgasm crashing into me, both inside and out, I bite his neck and drink from him. I hear his heart, I hear it burst when he cums inside of me. I explode all over his chest and he screams my name as he fills me up. I fall, shuttering onto Lestat as he grunts and thrusts one last time. 

That is when the tears spring up. Tears I can not explain, tears I had never had before. Lestat wraps me in his arms as he tries to slow his breath, as he hushes me and kisses my forehead, as he whispers how beautiful and perfect I was. And he hums songs to me. As he loves me. I whine when he finally has to slide out of me, feeling empty and wet, sore and wanting. Immediately wanting again.

For the first time in my life, I have made love and sleep with my head on my companion’s chest. 

 

***

I am 66 years old and no one, not one Goddamned person is going to tell me what to do. From now on, I call the shots. I make the decisions. 

I had gotten too soft in New Orleans, let myself be dominated and overpowered. Lost myself. I was afraid and compliant. Too compliant. 

I knew there had to be others, others like us. Not like, …well, like before. Others that I could feel more equal to, that I could feel, feel not so out of control when I was around them.

Armand gives me that. 

He is powerful, but, but he doesn’t use it like,...like before. He doesn’t have to be in charge of everything, we choose together. And there is so much that we do together, that we just naturally like that is the same. 

Same music, same clothes, same decor, same books. So much easier when everyone is so agreeable. 

And so we are equals. Except in bed.

Gone is the damned coffin, I ain’t never sleeping in one of those again. We sleep in a bed. In that bed, I decided. I decided when he fucks me and I decided how we do it. 

I am in charge.

No one will ever dominate me again.

No one. 

I decide if it is up against a wall or in the shower, down on all fours or lying on his stomach. If it’s from behind or if I can face him. Because sometimes I don’t mind so much if he faces me. 

And he cries out my name sometimes, when I fuck him good, after I’ve whipped him or tied him and denied him, or if I drip the wax that will instantly heal. He cries it like he needs me to do this, he needs it to hurt.

Not like when I used to cry.

Never like he wants me.

Never like he cherishes me.

Or adores me.

And if he does worship me, it’s what I do, how I make him feel and respect me, it’s not for no reason. I am in control of that, too.

Bricktop would be proud. I learned a thing or two from her. Except instead of giving them what they want, I take what I want. No one ever again is going to make me feel owned, I don’t belong to anyone but me. Won’t let someone take me, take advantage of me, have power over me, make me feel…I decide.

 ****

I am 98 years old and I wanna to fuck. I wanna fuck and suck and get as high as I can. If I can’t find one who’s fucked up, I’mma get him fucked up. 

I walk into another bar, maybe I a been in this one before and maybe not. I’own even remember and I don’t Goddamned care. It’s been what, 3 weeks now? 3 months? You know how many blond kids you can get fucked up in at amounta time in San Francisco?

There’s that curly-haired kid. Not my type. Keeps looking at me. I seen him before. Maybe another bar. Maybe another lifetime.

I tried about 4 months ago to put the needle right in my arm and it didn’t work. Wouldn’t even penetrate. So I smoked it. Not even sure what the hell it was. 

They say that when it hits your heart, it explodes and you feel it in every vein of your whole body at once, like a big Cadillac riding through your veins. 

But I’ve only felt that with him. No matter how many times I have tried to do it with someone else. Bite Armand while I take him from behind. Do it while he is sucking me off. Have Armand do it while he’s giving me a hand job. Threesomes, Foursomes. Fuck, I don’t even know how many somes that one time.

I’ve taken what, 30? Maybe 40 kids in the last few months, high, fucked out of their minds and it feels like…like a 10th of the subspace that asshole could do with a 5-minute quickie. I can’t even feel what it was like when that motherfucker just looked at me, let alone when he touched me.

Fuck him.

Fuck him for doing this to me. It’s his fault. Wouldn’t be here if... and her, too, for that matter.

There is nothing worse than your ex being the best fuck you’ve ever had and not being able to find anyone better. Fuck, anyone even close. 

I thought I could make it happen. Find someone who looks close enough. Maybe get high first so I can float up to the stars again, not feeling my feet or my hands, fuck, I couldn’t even feel my teeth most times. Just my heart and his for hours.

Not even a tingle in the last 33 years. Couldn’t even cum for the last few. 

“Hey, nice shirt you got there. Where’d you find something cool like that?”

Does it matter? It’s Channel from the Golden Triangle but you are a run away from Omaha and you’ve never heard of the Golden Triangle or smelled Channel much less worn it.

“Kmart.” Because he’s not tall enough. Weighs too much, not the right build. Hair to dark, eyes brown. He can fuck right off because I can’t get what I need from him. 

And for the first time in years, I need it.

“Wow! I have to go check that out!” I look into his mind and he doesn’t want me, wants to get high, misses his Mom, hates his dad for hitting them. I turn my back on him, scanning the rest of the kids here. Pretty girl who thinks she’s pregnant but doesn’t know whose it could be, certainly not the guy next to her who hasn’t told her he’s queer.  The group next to them is new to town. Came from some shithole in Alabama, going to make a new life. 

There. 

By himself at a table, keeps looking out the door. He’s tall enough, blond enough, I guess. Thinking about his ex. How he can’t believe he left him for some bitch. Fuck, tell me about it. How he gave up Grad school to move here to be with him. Yeah, sounds about right.

I wonder how long I can make this one last. Wonder if he can play with me for hours, can push me up against a wall, if he’ll try to take control. I ask the bartender for an Anchor Steam for the boy before I slam this poor excuse for a Grasshopper and take him to my apartment.

He’s the right height and a close enough build. Not much hair on his chest, but his wavy blond hair dusts his shoulders. From behind it might work. But he smells wrong and I have to pretend I don’t notice. He tells me his name and I don’t care. Tells me about Bill, who left him for some bitch named Dawn. I mention I had an ex who left me for some bitch. What happened? He asks. I took care of 'em, I say. He smokes, but that’s not what I want. I don’t need someone else passive, someone I can push around. I want someone who has a spark, someone who could challenge me. So I pull out some Speed. He’s used to a pill, but I get him to try to smoke it. I tell him it’s better, faster. I fuck him for three hours straight until he is limp and crying. He refuses to fuck me. Says he can’t, only Bill. But there is something about him crying, about him begging me. 

“Tell me you are sorry.”

“What?”

Tell me you are sorry!”

“I’m sorry.” I think about smacking him, but he’s not Armand.

“Tell me you should never have fucked that slut.”

“I, I should never have fucked that slut.” He is crying and confused and I just keep fucking into him but I don’t feel a thing.

“Tell me you still love me.”

“I still love you?”

“Tell me I’m the only person you have ever loved.”

“You, you are the only person I have ever loved?”

“Tell me I’m the ONLY person you have ever loved!”

Mon Cher, you are the only person I have ever loved.

“Tell me you are sorry for ruining our lives, for ruining her's. Tell me you're sorry you did this to me, tell me you're sorry you followed me around New Orleans and tricked me, that you're sorry for using your mind tricks on me and making me think I love you. Tell me you're sorry for forcing her to leave and for killing me.”

Mon Amour…

“NO! NOT TONIGHT!”

Mon Louis, I am so sorry, I have let you down.

“TELL ME YOU ARE SORRY YOU EVER LOVED ME! YOU SHOULDDA LEFT ME ALONE! NEVER TALKED TO ME, NEVER KISSED ME! TELL ME IT’S ALL YOUR FAULT! SHE IS DEAD AND I AM DEAD AND SO ARE YOU AND IT’S ALL YOUR FAULT!”

I have loved you from the moment that I lay eyes on you as you fought with your brother and have loved you every moment since. I will never be sorry for loving you, mon Sainte Louis.

And for a moment, I can pretend. For a moment the smell is right and the highlights of his hair are right and the trembling of his muscles and I am not in some shitty apartment on San Francisco and  he is mine and I am his and I finally release, as my head floats for a moment and I feel my heart skip to sync with his. I bite down to hear his heart, to hear ours in pace. To be one with him again. But his heart is erratic and then it slows. It does not keep time with mine. I release him in confusion.

“Lestat. LESTAT!”

But he is going and I have drained this boy before he can say another thing.

Notes:

French-
pour me prendre et faire de moi son mari immortel?- For me to take you and make you my immortal husband?
Je veux….” “Plus, s'il vous plaît. Moi, j'ai besoin de plus.- I want…." “More, please. I need more.

 

Sure Shot Dunlap- best baseball player in 1891, broke his leg and ended his career on April 20th.
Couvent School- the most popular school for gens de couleur libres in New Orleans until 1915. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Institute_Catholique
Mrs. Engert’s- on the corner of Esplanade and Marais St.
McDonoughville- Now the City of Gretna, across the River from Uptown.
Liberty St.- we think this whole story takes place in "Storyville" but there was a separate part of town that Liberty is actually on called Backatown. Basically Black Storyville. If you were too dark to passfor white ( which was 100% a real thing then), then that is where you had to go. City Hall stands there today. https://www.noirnnola.com/post/2018/03/19/from-basin-to-backatown-the-untold-story-of-storyville
Kid Ory- first real NOLA Jazz celebrity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kid_Ory
vitascope- New Orleans had the first movie theater at 623 Canal Street. A Vitascope was created in 1885 and this short of the French Devil in a cauldron was one of the first shown in NOLA.

Chapter 13: Choose your Companions with Care

Summary:

I am 35 and it is not that I am not physically attracted to Armand. His luminous eyes and soft curly hair have a certain quality that would make most people fall instantly. It is not his slight build, his need to be dominated, his lust for power, his want of attention, his quest to be obsessed over, his desire to be an object of desire, his hiding of his innermost truths, his dramatic retelling of his past, his insistence on being unique, the deep-seated necessity to finally, finally be understood. 
Actually. 
Yes, it is all of those things. It is all of those tiring things. His lies, his control, his lack of self-confidence, and his endless want, want, want. Even I could not give him everything he requires. No one could.

Notes:

Lestat's history.
I tried to make the Magnus part very, very vague as possible. It starts with I am 34 if you'd like to skip it.

I am in my 12th year. It is bittersweet because I did not want to leave the skirt hems of my mother, but I do so desperately want to learn to write. Le Prieuré de Chanteuge was more than an hour's ride from our chateau and to my boy-like mind it is splendid. Perched high above the cliffs with her beautiful arches and finely carved pews, it was the most magnificent place I had been to in my whole life.

I was sent there to obtain an education, or so I thought. My mother wanted me to learn to read so that I might become a priest. In truth, I think she wanted patronage from my father, to become the next Abbot here or the Bishop of Clermont. The Carmelites required much more money than my father was willing to part with. He was also too cheap to send me to Le Grand Seminaire de Clermont. So off to Le Prieuré I went.

My life is full of prayer, work, and study. No one yells at me or ignores me. I am a quick study, learning Latin and French with ease. I can comprehend Aquains and Boethius, William of Ockham and Albertus Magnus. At home I was a bother and scapegoat, at Le Prieuré, I am a scholar praised for my quick wit and astute understanding. I am a star student, a favorite of the Brothers. It means nothing that I shall give up my worldly possessions, one day I will be un Abbe or maybe the venerated Lestat de Chanteuges.

It is a cold February morning when I suddenly awake, needing to visit le reredorter. I had grown up in a draftier chateau, I am used to the warmth of my brothers and more blankets than the moth-eaten sheets we are given here. But I am content. I would take the cold if that meant I could be seen and appreciated. Before I move, I hear a noise. It is the custom of many young boys to lay their mats together to keep what little warmth we can between us, and I hear, behind me, that noise again. It is a, a slapping sound. Something tapping something over and over. And the sound of shuttered breath. Then a very distinct whine. The tapping is rhythmic. The breath becomes louder and I feel movement behind me. “Non, non, ralentir.” “Mais plus vite c'est mieux.” For a moment I try to remember who laid down behind me, who is making this noise. The breathing became heavier, more hurried.

A strange thing begins to occur to me, something that had never happened to me before. Or rather, it had happened before but not like this, certainly, it was not the first time I experienced un bander as it were. But never had it happened without me touching myself, never had it happened listening to other people. What were they doing behind me?

The breath increased as the tapping increased. There was a moan, then what I assume is a hand placed over the offender’s mouth. “Shhhhhh, you don’t want to wake the Lord d’Auvergne. Unless you want him to join us.”

“That brat? No, he is stuck up, would tell everyone if he….” but another moan came with quick breaths, panting and then a stillness. “knew you touch me like this every night.”

“Shhhhh, don’t.” There is a sound of something rubbing against cloth. “My turn now. Mmmmm.” I hear the rustling of much cloth, then a similar rubbing sound in a similar rhythm. Without warning, I began to leak. And it hurts so badly, throbbing, I just need to wrap my own hand around it, I think. I can hear the same slapping sound and now the other boy, Michele I think, whispering behind me. He mentions me again, something that sounds like would you like that? For the Brat to watch me do this to you? He’s the one you really want wrapped around your cock, pour te tailler sa pipe.

Tailler sa pipe. I had heard those words before. I had heard my brothers use them but they suddenly seemed to have new meaning.

Slowly, I have to just squeeze myself. I am in pain and it is only the firm clasp of my hand that makes it feel better. But as the slapping and the moaning increases, as the whispers about me putting my mouth on Jean Claude continue, I must move my hand. They can not see me, can not know I am awake. I squeeze myself and rub my thumb three times over my tight fist and suddenly my own orgasm slams into me with such violence that I scream and sit up, waking several of the boys. I can not control my breath, my hand is covered with a warm wetness. I look around at the faces looking at me, at Michele and Jean Claude who must know that I overheard their own endeavors. No one muttered a word.

“Sorry, it, it was a bad dream. I’m…I’m just going to the le reredorter.” I shoot up and run to the back of the dorms, walking into the hall. That is when I chanced a look at my wet hand and my slowly softening member. What had I just done?

********

I am in my 17th year and in love for the first time. Isabella has long blonde hair and a slender waist, her legs are meaty and her smile lights up my world. It matters not to me that she is five years older than me and sleeping with Giovanni, or that I have known her for less than a month. I am no longer in possession of my heart or my mind- both belong to her. 
I had joined the actors two weeks earlier. I was captivated by their poise and artistry, the costumes, and the make-up. I was in awe of them- for the first time in my brief life I saw others watching and applauding them, how exciting it must be to receive such accolades. I too wanted everyone to watch me as I pranced and pounced on the makeshift caravan stage. At 17 I see their cut glass as shiny jewels, the lead-based makeup as artistry, and the sad bush in a pot is grand scenery. It is dazzling to my childish mind and I too want to dazzle. It only took one look from Isabella, one blown kiss from the stage, to make me run off with only a rucksack and a single pair of shoes. For two weeks I had joined the merry band, learning the songs of the troupe, totally content for the second time in my life.
We are just outside of Saint-Étienne, a two-day walk from my town, celebrating my first performance. The men and women tell me what a good Lelio I am, the best they have ever seen. We drink at the tavern, singing and spending all of our earnings from the day before. I am suitably drunk when Isabella wants to return to the caravan. She asks me to walk her back, she wants to talk about the scene we shared. 
However, that is not what she wants to talk about at all. When we reach the outskirts of town, she veers deep into the woods, away from where the fires and the wagons lie. The stars and the bright harvest moon illuminate her.
“I see how you look at me. Is there something you want to tell me?” She is smiling at me, batting her long eyelashes.
I tell her no because there is nothing I know to say to this woman. How does one convey the blaze of a 17-year-old bonfire fanned by the flame of her lips?
“Hmmm, is there something you’d like to show me?” But what could I show her of my beating heart? Of my love and fantasy. So I shake my head no. She runs her hand through my hair, looking at my face in a way that no one has. She kisses me, close-mouthed and slowly. I am young, and too stunned to do anything at first. She pulls away but then goes back and I return the kiss. 
“You have never been with a woman before?” 
“I’ve spent plenty of time with my mother, but I have no sisters.”
“That is not what I mean” she takes my hand and places it on her breast. I can feel the heat rise to my face and my breath catches. “Do you want to be with a woman?”
“I…I would like to be.” My hand is still because I have no idea what to do. Isabella laughs at me for a moment, a moment I only register later as disconcerting, before she mutters that she will have to do this all by herself. 
She takes my suspenders and slides them off of me before she unbuttons my pants. She reaches her hand down and grabs me, tugging tightly. It feels incredible and terrible at the same time. She pulls my pants apart more, fully exposing me before she lifts her dress. 
When I enter her, the sweetness and warmth are nothing like I imagined. It makes my hand feel like ruff wool and I want this new sensation all of the time. I begin to bend my knees but she tells me no, to just let her just do it. Before I know more, I am releasing, bigger and larger than I ever experienced by myself.
“Merde. It’s your first time.” She moves off of me, and uses her hand to whip at herself. She throws my spend away off into the forest before she kisses me again, quickly. 
“Come on, let’s get back before the others realize we are missing. I'll let you do it again tomorrow night. Maybe you will not be so quick.”
My brothers come for me in the morning and I never see Isabella again.

****

I am in my 30th year and Beast of Gevaudan had long given away to our pack of wolves. After les Beast ravaged our towns and villages for three years and supposedly killed over 100 women and children (even though I had never seen a wolf do such a thing) it became my job to hunt and kill the wolves who prayed on our livestock. 
I alone took them on.
Our fiefdom is small, but it has been my whole world- I am known by everyone for arpents. It is not uncommon for me to be seen walking around with one of my dogs trailing behind or riding off on horseback to the surrounding towns. My brother might be the future Marquis but he knows nothing of our people, of their wants or their needs. It is for this reason that I alone must kill the wolves- he is simply incapable of such a task and does not understand. 
I rise to leave the tavern that I have spent the better part of the afternoon in. Because of who my father is, I drink for free and do not see the need to pay for any of the things I have consumed. Eulalie comes to gather up my cup, asking me if I will return tomorrow. She has light eyes and wavy brown hair that is long and braided. Her family has probably owned this tavern as long as my family has lived in our chateau. I tell her that I am going to hunt tomorrow, that I have no idea when I will be back. She asks me if I will come and visit her again. I tell her I will when I come back. She has become a dalliance of mine, a distraction every few weeks from this monotonous vapid existence I have endured these last few months. 
I have no thoughts of a family or a future even though I am old enough to, nor does my family have any thoughts for me. I am well beyond the age of marriage, but as the youngest son with five older siblings, I have no prospects for anything more than a dalliance. I should have been allowed to stay at the monastery.
The next time I visit the tavern, it is to search out Nicki and I do not even notice if Eulalie is there.
For weeks I talk to Nicki, our great conversation. I am taken over by him, I feel an ache when we are not together and I know that there is more. That I feel physically for him what a man should not. But I remember the night so very long ago, at Le Prieuré and the pressure and my longing are the same. But it is wrong, it is a sin and I visit Eulalie. I turn her around and toss her hair over her shoulder. It is only when I climax and moan Nicki’s name that I realize what I have done. And that she has heard me, too. I quickly dress and leave her. She watches as I leave the inn the following day with Nicki, even though I do not make contact with her eyes. 
As I dance around him in the forest, I accepted that it was he I was thinking of the last few times I was with Eulalie. That she meant nothing and for the first time, someone meant something to me. I know that I do not think of Eulalie at all when she is not in front of me. But that there was someone in this world who wanted nothing from me but my companionship, someone I think about even when he is not there. When he stops the song, I kiss him there, under the moonlight. He lets me and kisses me back, it is the most amazing thing I have felt. That right and wrong and sin and evil meant nothing. That being there, this is what should happen. 
A few months later, my landlord presses in my hand a letter that had arrived from my mother. Nicki and I had a rare day off, so we have discovered a new section of Paris filled with cafes and bistros, shops and sites. We rush upstairs with lovemaking on our mind and the letter, filled with local town gossip and such, sits for two days before I open it. 
“Eulalie, the Tavern maid, died in childbirth yesterday. She told no one who the father was, but your father suspects it was Justin’s or Fabien’s. Both of your brothers deny it but it makes no difference now. A bastard child would have brought her no joy and when she finally admitted which of your brothers it was, it would be one more mouth we could not feed.”

*******
I am 34 and am sharing my life with a most extraordinary man. We have shared a room and a bed, the little wine and bread that we can afford for the past three years. We drag the streets of Paris at night for hours after getting off of the stage and make love until dawn. It is the sort of life that I had never dreamed could happen to me as a child- where I would be happy and free.

Or we did until I am taken.
Until I am stolen in the night. 
Until I am chained.
Wine and broth pour down my throat. 
I have no idea how long I am here. But when I wake, I am sore and swollen. My mouth and throat hurt. I hurt.
And I hunger.

I am surrounded by a most putrid smell. How many other bodies lie around me in various stages of rot and decay. After a few days, I no longer register the stench. Then, one day, I wake up in my own room. With a warm bed, a table, some food. I see him. Is this the monster that watched me when I was on stage? The eyes I could see but could not discern? Is it hethat stole me and did God knows what to me? This is the nightmare that I get to awaken to?

We argue. Wolfkiller. I am to be his heir, but I have little idea of what any of it means. I must get back, flee, and return to Nicki. And then he pierces me and it is ecstasy. It is not like anything I have experienced and I want more. It is sexual and sensual and intimate and private not all at the same time. I want to hit Magnus and I want him to do it again and again.

Wolfkiller. Heir. Vampire.

Then he rips open his arm and pours his blood into me. The ecstasy is greater, greater than before, greater than anything I had yet experienced or could imagine. I am in love and more. Rapture. Exaltation. More.

Is this what Heaven would feel like? To commune with the Angels and Saints? I hold him, I kiss him, in that moment I feel such love. But it is fleeting and in the next, it is all gone. We rush down the stairs, flames dancing before me. But my love leaves. I had the single most extraordinary…but it is over and I am alone. How do I find that love again? Do Devils love each other? Do they walk arm and arm in hell saying “ Ah you are my friend, how I love you.”

I find a treasure beyond my imagination. I find the corpses I must have spent my first days with. They are all blonde. They are all roughly my build. My age. 

But I alone survive.

Wolfkiller. Heir. Vampire.

I want to tell Nicki all of it! I want to share it with him…
Nicki…
What do I do about Nicki…

**********
I am 35 and it is not that I am not physically attracted to Armand. His luminous eyes and soft curly hair have a certain quality that would make most people fall instantly. It is not his slight build, his need to be dominated, his lust for power, his want of attention, his quest to be obsessed over, his desire to be an object of desire, his hiding of his innermost truths, his dramatic retelling of his past, his insistence on being unique, the deep-seated necessity to finally, finally be understood. 
Actually. 
Yes, it is all of those things. It is all of those tiring things. His lies, his control, his lack of self-confidence, and his endless want, want, want. Even I could not give him everything he requires. No one could. 
One kiss. One kiss and he is a puppy that follows me everywhere, that longs for me. Not even my mastiffs…Even if it were not for Nicki, in his moodiness and increasing madness. Even if I were free and unattached and -
Armand wants the illusion of giving up control while he himself holds all of the cards. Manipulation. A sleight of hand and a flick of a wrist. A portrait, a moment captured in a painting of love, not the real thing itself.
There is never a day, regardless of how desperate for love and affection, that I could lay down with…
There is a knock on my dressing room door. I stand to open it, hanging my motley jacket on the back of my chair. When I open the door I am greeted by the largest bouquet of ranunculus. And Armand. 
Well, maybe. 
Maybe I could.
But not today.

****************** 

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********

I am in 115  and it may as well be my first. I have fallen so very hard for the most beautiful man I have ever seen. And he has fallen just as madly as me.
At first, I think that this is a simple attraction to me, his desire rolling off so obviously, so quickly in our first encounter. But with each passing day, something else is obvious by his sweet smiles, how close we sit, the little things he says and does, that it is so very much more than base attraction.
Marius' words ring in my head, go and live a whole life, choose your companions with care. Choose them because you like to look at them and you like the sound of their voices, and they have profound secrets in them that you wish to know. In other words, choose them because you love them. Otherwise, you will not bear their company for very long.
I know that I love him. This is different from the ecstasy of my youth, the wildness wreckless of Nicki. This is different from my need to be seen by Gabrielle. This is not Armand. But I have given him an opportunity and he has not capitalized on it. So I think, Lily. The whore that is in love with him, the one he does not sleep with because he does not like women. I invited her for a private party a trois the night that he is taking me to meet his family. I am hedging on the fact that he will want to prove how much of a man he is, and she will certainly take the opportunity to have whatever she can of him.
I invite him in and he resists, as he usually does even though his desires whirls about him; he wants to be here with me. And he sees her, a present, a patsy, a lure. It takes not a second to fill his glass while she is jumping to undress. He is distressed, his thoughts are loud, desire for me to understand what meeting his family meant to him, feeling elated when we walk back to my house together, afraid I will find out who he really is. 
I watch him as she walks towards him. He is petrified, he wants to please me, to be whatever I want him to be- with her, with the both of us, me watching. But I see, more than anything, his true desires. I can not help but look at him hungrily. I have finally gotten more than just that jacket off and he is as beautiful as I had imagined.
 I don’t know if I can fuck another woman again. Especially not with him watching. Because this time it won’t take some moving picture star to get me off, not when Lestat is sitting there looking at me like….like he…like he wants me.
Stop it, Louis. That is not what this is about.
“You like to watch?”
We both want so much more than to watch.
“I’ve been watching you for some time now. From river to lake, lake back to river, looking for my companion's heart." And he is desperately thinking of any way he can have a small piece of me. I undress and he can not look away. My yearning can not be contained and I am so lost in my emotions that I have not even looked at Lily. I can not remove my eyes from him, his want for me, his need. 
I move to the other side of her, just to be near him. My hand is drawn to his face, to touch him and to my absolute delight, he places his hand on mine. He holds it out and he, he not only kisses it, but he puts my fingers in his mouth and sucks on them. MMMMMMMmm. He regards me while he does it, lost for a moment before he catches himself. Ahhhh, there he is, eyes wide and hopeful and I see how he sees me. Not the faux adoration of Armand or the detachment of Gabrielle or the hollow void of Nicholas. He sees me as strong and passionate and beautiful and equal and understanding and… and loving. 
I…that to someone I could finally be seen as, as loving.
The moment is fleeting and he bats me away, the hard mask he is so accustomed to slides back into place and he looks at Lily dutifully. It is time, time for her to sleep and time for him to break free.
Her head has barely graced the pillow before his realization- it is just us. It is just us and he can act on his feelings, feelings he understands now are mutual. He rushes to me, placing his mouth on mine, holding my face, pushing me back. He is perfection, passion and romance and fear and need. At this moment, I am his. I feel his strong hands as he tries to push for dominance, a man who was scared only a second ago to show me his want and now is so impassioned he is rushing into my arms. Not to dominate me, no, that is not what he wants. He thinks it is, for him it has always been. He wants to be loved, seen, felt, heard, yearned for, caressed, cared for, with every heartbeat that is what it sings for.
Companion. 
He understands that this is different. There is recognition that he wants to surrender and is giving in so beautifully. He is terrified but he feels safe in my arms, with my careful hands on him as I entwine him for the first time. He feels desire for me that is as electric as I feel for him. He is scared, but he has not backed down.
I spin him around and can not help but press myself against his taut body. I want to take him as badly as he wants to be taken, no, needs to be taken, to be made one with mine. Louis is desperate for it. 
I brought him here to act on his fantasies.
Now that he is here, I can not. I…he is so warm in my arms, his desire is so high. But anyone can give him that. I can give him more. 
He wriggles himself into me. I am so close to losing my mind, it swims with so very many things. He would willingly give this up to me, a part of him that he has never shared. And I want to share it every night for my immortal life.
Companion.
Companion.
I must share with him what no one else can, though. I must show him all that we can be. Companion. And so I delicately pierce him, in the gentlest way, and am hit with a flood of emotion. Images of how he sees me, of how I look to him, of how he feels when we are together. And I can not stop from doing what I said I would not and I press myself into him. I line myself up and press so, so carefully.
Companions.
We are one. We are connected and there is no conceivable way to explain the ecstasy, the rapture. It is the best …, better than anything, better than Magnus. Better than Akasha. I can not adequately express what I feel but I know I must let go. I know that I must not be seduced by the beating of his heart. I know that there is time immortal to share this. And he wants to, he wants to share this and so much more. With me.
As our feet touch the ground, he falls into my arms. I lay him down next to me so that I may watch his beautiful face and do what I thought could never be done- I fall deeper and deeper for him. He is cycling through emotions but is still, and so I lay my hand on his chest, to feel his beautiful heart and to calm him. He places his hand on top of mine and looks into my eyes. I have never, no one has ever gazed into me, into my very soul and claimed it. But Louis de Pointe du Lac did and somehow I fall deeper. And this is perfect.

 

************
I am in my 145th year and I am in anguish. I have ruined him. I have ruined all of this. I have done everything that I have said I would not do. I have pushed him, I have killed and destroyed all of the love. But the way he looks at me sometimes. The tenderness that he shows me when we are alone…

I have packed trunks for a Rome I may never see. They are planning to hurt me and in turn, I will have to hurt them. I am furious at Claudia, I wish she never would have returned from her travels and poisoned mon Louis. But he has allowed it. He has quietly let her plot and plan. I have broken him so much that he can not see what she is doing and would rather go along with our daughter than to stand by me, his husband….
They plan on poisoning me and do not know yet that they can not. That they could not both kill me. That even in a fire, they know not that they have to scatter my ashes and maybe even that, well... Keeping them ignorant has kept me alive, it has kept them alive as well. 

It is settled. I will kill Claudia, but not, but…I can not kill Louis.

I am in coffin, closed and lying to face his as I hear him enter our room. The sounds of him opening his armor, he is probably putting up his robe. He moves to put another log on the fire. He shuffles to his coffin side, where I can hear him take off his slippers. But I do not hear him lift his coffin. There is rustling. Two footsteps. And my coffin opens. I look up to see his beautiful face, a face I may not see again after tomorrow night.
“Hey baby, you still awake?” I realize he has on no shirt.

“Oui.” His smile is sad and sweet.
“Mind a bit of company? Iss cold in here.” He has no bottoms either. I move over so that he has room to lay behind me. I can feel the heat he is letting off, the softness of his arm as it wraps around me.
“You been real quiet today. Nerves got ya?”
“Oui.” I swallow hard, let him think that, let him think it is the ball and not my impending demise that has me quiet. He kisses my neck gently.
“My baby’s got nothing to worry about. He’s gone be a perfect King of Raj. In your fancy outfit, with your fancy headpiece.” He is kissing my neck again.
“Well, it is very heavy.” I feel him slowly nudge himself against me.
“Oh, that’s nothing for you. Big and strong.” His hand wanders under my shirt, rubbing my chest.
“Even so, it will still be difficult to manage if there are winds.” I can feel his fingers glide down to my waistband. He traces them there a few times before he moves back to my chest. 
“I’m sure it a be a perfectly calm night for my King,” he shimmies himself close to me again and I can feel him harden against me. He glides his nails down my chest and up again before he trails them near my waistband. “Mmmm.”
“And what of my Queen? Do you have last-minute preparations to take care of?” his nails make another round down my chest and his left hand moves up under my shirt in the back.
“Nah, your Queen only has one last thing to take care of.” His nails trail down my back and up my shirt. He moves his hips in the slights of circles. His left-hand travels down feather-thin to meet at my waist band and one finger slides along in between it and my flesh.
“And what is that one last thing?” It is impossible not to feel electric as he moves both hands to my back and traces patterns of feather light and nail sharp. 
“Juss takin care of her King. Making sure he is rested and relaxed for tomorrow night.” He kisses the back of my neck again and gives me the slightest nip. 

Even if I know he is meant to do me harm, there is never a day where I say no to Louis. There is never a time where I deny him of a single pleasure, especially when it is this intricately linked to my pleasure. Louis is a dynamic lover, there is no doubt, but he is perfection. He knows how physical to be, how hard to push, how long to tease, where I long to be nipped, how much pressure he can apply, how I love to be stroked when to open his throat wide, the weight of his nails on my back, when to beg for more, when to give in and when to let go. My head will spin for hours, sometimes it takes days for me to come back to earth after having him. Or, after being had. There were whole years where I would have killed to have him like this, where I did kill. And yet, it is not until now, when we are here, that I get him like this. “Why dontcha take this off, hmmm?” And with no thought, I sit up to remove my shirt. He sits up with me and kisses my back as he rubs it and scratche its. Light and rough. Light and rough. He draws blood and licks it up and I am rock hard even if he were trying to kill me now.

“This does not feel like resting and relaxing.” His hands travel to my chest as he kisses my neck. 

“Well, maybe not the restin’ part. Certainly the relaxin’ part.” He lets a hand trail down and lightly rubs my hardened cock through my pajamas. “And what’s my baby need to relax tonight? He needs me to take him in my mouth over’n over until my throat is raw? He needs me to ride him til dawn?” His hand travels down my thigh now as the other sits on my left hip drawing little round circles. “You need me to hold off, tease you and play with you until you beggin me to come on me? Lick yourself off me?” His fingers graze my leaking cock again and the thought of making his throat raw is not unappealing. Claudia will certainly be able to see that even in his dirty dealings, he is still mine. 

“Mhhhh” He places his hand on my most private hairs, with his thumb just lightly touching me, slowly, every once and again stroking up, his fingers rubbing right as my thigh ends and I begin. He bites at my neck with no fangs and he slowly squeezes me, licking away the marks he has left. I roll my head back and around to kiss him as best I can. He slowly rubs his thumb up me as I kiss him hungrily.

“Oh, s’not what my baby needs tonight. Come one, tell me, Mr “you- can- ask- for- anything”. Tell your Queen what you need.” He lets his hand go and it slides down my thigh and up with nails. I move my right arm around to touch his thigh, to drag my nails up and down it as best I can to hear him hiss.
“I need you, my Queen.” I want his cock in my mouth so bad I am salivating, but that’s not what I really want. I pop myself up on all fours and back myself up into his face. I arch my back and shake my ass so there is no mistaking what I need tonight. 

“Oh, my King needs to be topped tonight!” and he reaches for my waistband as I reach back and play with his cock. 
“But I need you everywhere, my Queen. I need you down my throat, I need you inside of me, claiming me as your own, I need you to ride me, to feel me throbbing inside of you as I fill you with my love. I need to see you play with yourself and cum on my chest so that you may suck it up, and kiss me with it. I need you dirty, I need you to scream my name as I lick you open wide. I need to suck my cum out of your gaping hole and then swallow you down. I need to fuck your mouth so deeply that tomorrow at the ball you can’t speak without it hurting, to know you are bruised and marked all over so that you can not sit for days. I need everyone in the City of New Orleans to know tomorrow that Louis du Point de Lac is mine. And that I, full of his cum, bitten and sucked on, scratched and marked, with your blood streaming in me as mine is in yours, am forever truly yours. For all of eternity.”

I keep pushing my derrière back until it is so in his face that he is forced to lie down. I back up more and take his cock deep in my throat. I lowered myself into his face. He is rubbing me through the pajama pants he has not yet gotten off of me, circling an entrance I want him to destroy later on tonight. I am gagging on him so much that I nearly vomit, even though the only thing in my stomach is blood. I force myself more, and further and I do retch just a bit. I jump up, turn, and face him as I lock eyes and lick it off of him. 

The look in his eyes is wild- tonight I have feral Louis, my insatiable lover. He pops up suddenly and slams his mouth into mine, biting my lip until the blood flows in both of our mouths. He pushes me off and commands me to get on all fours, and I do better than that as I stand up and bend over, holding onto his coffin. He drops to his knees and licks me from hole to tip. He keeps me there for the better part of an hour, sucking me, biting me, licking me, fucking my hole with his fingers, his tongue. He has his entire hand in me while he deep-throats me. 

I push him down on the ground, as I lick his stomach, his thighs, his quivering testicles, and his member. I watch the waves of ecstasy while I play with him, as he cums all over his chest, two fingers inside him, stretching him open. I let the cum stay there, dripping and drying before I lick it up and kiss him with it. I slid down and use the rest to lick him wide open until he is crying, yelling my name, and begging me to fuck him. To fill him and stuff him. I suck and bite his thighs while I circle him slowly with my thumb, pushing but not entering. 
“Who is your King?”
“You are.”
“Say it.”
“Lestat, you are my King.” It is so hard to circle so slowly because I want to fill him so badly. I lift his legs to my shoulders and rub his entrance and push myself to press right on his entrance but do not enter as I slowly toy with his cock.
“Yes, I am your King. And who is my Queen?”
“I am,” he whispers. His eyes are blown wide and his thighs are trembling and I have not even fucked him yet. “I am your Queen. I am yours. Totally and completely…your.” And I slowly push, as his eyes close and tears flow. But I am not kind, I am rough. I fuck him hard for plotting with Claudia, for all of the nights he has pushed me away, for the nights I will spend alone without him. For what we have become. I slam into him and he opens his eyes wide and he knows. He knows this is a punishment and for the first time I am not being gentle, that I am not adoring him or worshipping him and that I am taking what I want. And he takes it. Slam after slam, his bottom lip pouting, blood streaming from his eyes, he takes it and I am done in just a few strokes, but when it is over and he slides off of me, I am a mess. I am in tears and shaking. I am not ok.
“Shhhhh, shhhh, it’s ok, baby, it’s ok…. That was not what you needed, was it? Shhh. It’s ok.” He wraps himself around me as I shake and cry, as if I am who was just punished and not the other way around. He sits and not for the first time, I curl up in his lap. I know that this is the last time between us and I have not loved him as I should have. I let my fear and my anger get to me and I have again pushed away the love of my life. I have hurt him and in hurting him, I have hurt myself. He wraps his arms around me and kisses me. It is tender and sweet, it is healing and loving. I fall into it. I fall into it and I can hear his breath as it falls in sync with mine. I can feel myself calm and something comes over me. I can feel how tightly he is holding me, how firm and strong. I have never been held like this by anyone except Louis and after tomorrow I will never feel this again. My tears start to rise up again, but he is rubbing my back and telling me that everything is going to be fine, to come here and shhh, his pauvre babe and I can feel how hard he still is and I…I want that. I want to feel that with him one last time.
“Can you…can I?”
“Lestat, whatever it is you need baby.” 
I need to start over.
I need him to understand.
I need to express what I myself can not comprehend.
I need to apologize for all of my transgressions.
I need to never touch another being.
I need to relive this night for every night for the rest of our eternity
I need to never let him go.
I need to never push him away.
I need to hold him close.
I need him. 
I need Louis.
I lift myself up and it is then that he realizes what I am asking for. The look on his face is confused at first, but when I use my own cum to slide down him, when I am fully seated in his lap, when I slowly wrap my hands around him and kiss him so deeply, I get so lost in the most beautiful man I have ever set eyes on, he understands. I sit there, filled, with the only person in all of my years that I have ever known such completeness with. I am not sure if he knows that I know, but he slowly lifts me and I move my legs to get better leverage. There, holding each other, wrapped and entwined, we slowly move together in sync, crying together, as we make love for the last time.

Notes:

Le Prieuré de Chanteuge- https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prieur%C3%A9_de_Chanteuges
It was not uncommon for a younger son to enter into an ecclesiastical life with a patronage- noble "purchasing" a church appointment for their children.
un Abbe- an Abbot
le reredorter- communal latrine in a monastery
"Non, non, ralentir.” No, no, slower.
“Mais plus vite c'est mieux." But faster is better.
un bander- a hard on
pour te tailler sa pipe.- to give you a blowjob
Beast of Gevaudan- this was a three-day wormhole. Google it if you want...
Arpent- a premetric unit of measurement. It's like .8 of an acre.
King of Raj- Raj is a thinly veiled Rex, our more modern King of Carnival. He is usually an older white guy who pays the most money, whose family has connections. His Queen is always some young 20s debutant and yes, we still do that here. But I love the idea of them calling each other stupid little pet names and it is a lovely allusion to the Prince in our future.
I wanted to show the first time from Louis' point of view and the last from Lestat's. I wanted Lestat to see through Armand in a way that Louis does not. I wanted to show Louis searching for Lestat

Chapter 14: Mr I-do-not-exaggerate

Summary:

“She has good bones, no? She might be old, but she is not stuck, she can change, be updated. You were so sad and so distraught when we came here, so haunted by the ghosts of our past. I wanted to show you a future, that something new can come from what we shared, something good. That it can be familiar but without the baggage it carried. Maybe, maybe beautiful, even.” I place my hands on his waist.
“Are you talking about your or this townhouse?” His smile broadened and he flipped that hair.
“Maybe…maybe a little of both?”
“Were you maybe still doing the most, Lestat?”
“I am very good at 'the most'.”

Notes:

Post-Coital Fluff and stuff.

In my infinite wisdom, or maybe my supreme stupidity, I forget about 7am mass. 

I had been to 7am mass before. 

The Cathedral bells ring every hour on the hour. And at each quarter hour. Have my entire life.

And yet, somehow, I don’t clock this at all.

At some point, in the drunken haze of my lover, I know damn good and well that the next morning, my body, immortal as it is, is going to regret how it would feel after being pounded into the communion table. 

The alum.

That pew in the first row.

The organ bench.

The confessional.

Up against the Marriage of St Louis and Margaret of Province stained glass window.

Again on the communion table, but this time face down. 

Let’s not talk about the state of our knees.

We are covered in bites marks and scratches and I am so inebriated that I don't hear a bell and forget about 7am mass.

I am lucky my husband can confuse the security guard who enters to unlock the building at 6am in preparation for mass long enough for me to grab my damned drawers and jump into my pants. That he can keep him there while I laugh and throw on my sweatshirt. That I don’t lose it because Lestat has thrown his shirt on backward. He has his shoes in his hand as we make for the North Entrance, locking the door behind us.

“They goin be confused by that candle wax...” I laugh as he hops on his right foot while putting his left shoe on. 

“That whole place reeks of sex and blood and I am only slightly responsible for the mess we left on the communion table.” Lestat stands up straight and flips his hair back with that devastating fiery look of his.

“Baby, your shirt….” And I can’t help but double up and laugh again.

“Mon Dieu, look at what you have done to me.” 

“What I did to you? You did plenty of doing in there.” He brushes his fingers through his hair before taking my arm and rolling his eyes.

“Here I thought I was going on a nice stroll with a beautiful man and instead, I desecrated the oldest cathedral this side of the Atlantic.” But the radiant smile on his face says he wants it no other way.

“I didn’t hear you complainin’ .” We are at the corner of Pere Antoine and Royal.“Do we have enough time to get back to the condo?” We look up. The sky is light and we have less than 20 minutes until sunrise. 

“No, but we could Cloud Gift. There are too many people out however, someone would see us.”

“Cloud Gift? Like levitate?”

“No, like Cloud Gift, whishhhh, to the condo.” He motions rising and zooming to the left with his hand. I looked at him in astonishment. I had seen Armand float to the books and I knew he could rise…It never occurred to me that he could… like... over longer distances, can he fly? “Go up, move forward, land on the balcony. I suppose I would have to carry you. I’ve never tried that before with another person. But…I…I have brought you up… before.” He looks down at his feet. We hadn’t talked about that, we hadn’t talked about allota things. Broad conversations, only some little instances. We might have made love, but we still had plenty of shit to work out.

“No offense, but I have no desire to do that again.” He wouldn’t meet my eyes. “We need to go now, and we are not going to make it to the foot of Canal.”

“The sun will not hurt me, not as it will you. We can go to Rue Royale. I have changed…a few things since we last visited. It is only 2 minutes.” I swallow hard. Visiting was bad enough, but staying overnight? He risks a look at me to me to gauge my reaction. We don’t have much choice. So I shake my head side to side thinking and then I nod in agreement. 

“Fine. Fine, let’s go.” 80 years ago we would have naturally turned right and walked the few blocks home. But this feels surreal to do the same. The lock opens without Lestat moving his hands and we walk through the porte cochere as we had so many years before.

“Not the front door?” I ask, following a step behind. Somehow, all this time later, he still walks faster than me.

“You have forgotten? Family does not use the front here.” He reaches for the same door that we have used a thousand times. But as he opens it, the dark wallpaper that had hung for over 100 years is gone. Everything was a lighter and creamy color, exposed brick and barge board. While the lighting looked the same, it had been retrofitted for LED bulbs, the wall sconces removed for lamps. The flooring had been refinished and the rugs were light with geometric designs. I blinked my eyes like I am in a dream. It was not sleek, modern, and new, not the soulless grey everything modern had become. It was classical French Provincial still, made to look a little like decadent decay but with gilded mirrors and celery green velvet drapes. 

“When I called Shawn Smith to renovate the condo, I had him work on Rue Royal. They were renovating upstairs when we visited a few weeks ago and I didn’t want to spoil the progress. They are nearly finished downstairs.”  His fingers drag along the lilac velvet couch as he walks towards the white grand piano. It takes me a second to realize these were our chairs but refinished, pictures of us that I had never seen in frames as if they were taken yesterday. He turns to look at me with his usual whimsical smile. My stomach lurches. He had been creating a place for himself, to be by himself, all the while I was falling in love. He is still creating an exit plan, isn’t he, regardless of how wonderful the last few months have been.

“And Ursuline?” I feel the lump in my throat.

“I’ve decided to go with Patrick Dunn for Ursuline. More eccentric. I thought you would like the sleek lines of Smith, while I am a little more, ah, bohemian. They are  working on it now before they start on Coliseum St.” 

I looked at Lestat in disbelief. 

“Coliseum St?!?” He huffs as only Lestat can do, picks up a picture that we had taken one Christmas before everything went so terribly wrong.

“Yes, I bought Coliseum right after Claudia came to us. You know, you have a child, you need more room, they have so many things- the dolls and dresses and bows. But you seemed happy here, so I never mentioned moving.” I didn’t know what to say. Only an hour before we were entangled, rocking into each other, and now I feel like we are so far apart. Like, I do even know him?

“Come, we don’t have much time, we have to close the skylight.” He puts his hand out to me and I take it but am still shaken. What had I done? There was so much I didn’t know, not only about the last 80 years but evidently about the years that we had spent together. I had done what I told myself I was not going to do- jump right back into his arms. In less than an hour after I dressed, I was stunned by what I still didn’t know. But just as I had done in 1910, what was I to do but take his hand? I had put my trust, blindly, wholeheartedly, into a man that I was not sure if I….I had to, hadn’t I? I had to trust him. Had to. Not a real choice, was it? As the moon rose every night, Monarch butterflies migrated thousands of miles, cherry blossoms bloomed each spring, and snow-dusted mountaintops, I had to put my hands in Lestat’s and follow him. I had nodded my beautiful head and said yes and furthermore asked him to do the same. 

But what had I really, really… what did that mean?

He brings me upstairs to a lightly colored library; it looks at once familiar and brand new. New rugs, new lamps, new wallcoverings, refinished chair and table. My books but some newer titles. That picture is the same, but this one is different. He closes the skylight and walks into the room that had posed as our bedroom for years. When the lamp turns on- it looks refreshingly different. Our large wooden bed is still there, but everything has… it is as if our whole world was illuminated and bright- accents in gold and silver, cream and light muted tones. The doors are open to our old coffin room, and even though it too seems lighter, but also calmer and empty.

“No coffins?”

“Not yet. But our bedroom room is now completely lightproof as well.” 

Our.

Lestat turns a crank similar to the skylight, making it mechanical, not electrical. It takes me a second to think. Everything in Dubai had run on the swipe of an iPad. But he chose something we both had access to. Something that didn’t depend on electricity or technology. This was on purpose, in case something happened. Storm couldn’ knock it out. If someone came in, he would likely hear them and the sun would never affect him…not like it would me. They couldn’t do it remotely, had to pass by him to get to it. He moved to turn off the hall light now that the bedroom, our bedroom, was cut off from sunlight.  We had shared a coffin for months now, but somehow this felt different. This felt like crossing a line. We never slept in a bed, we only used it for…other things.

He kicks off his shoes and tugs at his backward shirt. I laugh at him as I watch. He is completely bare by the time he gets to me, throwing his clothes over a chair by the door. He always was the first one naked. He lifts up my sweatshirt and I fail at using the Fire Gift on the fireplace.

“It’s gas now, faux logs.” He walks over, bends down, and flips a switch. He loves bending down bare assed and I love it when he bends down bare assed. “I have central heat as well, but… ambiance.” He is electric and delighted and I am scared and every red flag that was politely put away slowly begins to unfurl and has started to shake the wrinkles out. I had absolutely lept right back in his arms and here I was, in… our bedroom, ready to keep making the same mistakes all over again.

Or maybe not. I put my hands up as he approached.

“Marquis d’Auvergne. Renovating Rue Royal, owning a Garden District house, owning a whole damned Theater and a chateau-” 

“-It’s honestly falling apart-”.

“Fucking flying …what else have you kept from me?” I am only half joking.

“Oh, you know, my career as a savage wolf killer, my love of dogs, traveling the world with my mother, the secret vampiric origins, the Queen of the Damned choosing me to bestow her gifts upon, my inability to be killed, my starting a rock band, you know, the usual.” He smiles, slowly moving my hands from his chest and kissing my neck. He moves to remove my pants and even though we have gone all night, I am hungry for him again. He takes them, my shirt and my shoes, and lays them on top of the chair opposite his, by the window. On the side that had always been my side. On that side of the closet, as if it were there solely to hold my things. Like the whole closet had been built this big to hold the clothing of two people.

“The usual…??”

“I’m not keeping things from you Louis,” he turns and smiles at me honestly, not with his usual impish grin, a smile that has been much more present these past months,  “just, the time has not been right, to tell you these things. When does one bring up in polite conversation that you were the son of the last Marquis d’Auvergne, it was only a Noblesse chevaleresque title, not a féodale or ad'épée. I mentioned I grew up in a ruined Chateau a few weeks ago, didn’t I? ” His hands light me up with a fire that I have been aching for. I have needed this for decades, needed him, needed to lose myself and fall into him and go supernova and implode all at the same time. Only him. It has only ever been him.

“A Noblesse what ?” I know if Grace were alive today, she would tell me I look way too much like our Mamaw right now.

“A Noblesse chevaleresque title is from the 14th Century, the Chateau was about 450 years old by the time I lived there…

“I thought you were exaggerating like you always do.”

“I do not exaggerate! You have such little faith in my accurate retellings of things and look! In the end, it all comes true.” That satisfied little smile will kill me every time. 

“So when is the time right, Mr I-do-not-exaggerate?” The seductive heat is barely at bay, as he slides a hand to the base of my neck and one to the small of my back. 

“Everything I have done has been for you- to keep you safe, to keep you happy, to give you everything that I did not have. I have made tremendous mistakes, terrible decisions, and numerous miscalculations in that, but understand that since I laid eyes on you, my intentions have always revolved around giving you the world. Should I have, on our first date to the Oprea, discussed my first time on stage, running away when I was 16 with a group of actors until my father and brothers showed up, threatened to have the troupe locked up for “kidnapping” the son of a Marquis before marching me back home? No probably not.”

“Wait, what?”  There seems to be an aching honesty to him. Like this time there are no secrets meant to hurt or manipulate. Like this time he means it.

“Or, as we walk home from your family’s home, I do I go into great detail about my time at the monastery and how my brothers pulled me away and stopped my education once I told them that I wanted to be a brother before I invite you for a manage a trois, or after?” I squint my eyes and he cocks his head and rolls it to the side. “It is great to say, today, why didn’t you tell me about something then… sometimes they were not secrets, sometimes there were… embarrassments.” And he doesn’t look so satisfied, but maybe a little more like when I first walked into that Ursuline house a few months ago. 

“Sometimes I rush in to buy a grand house with space and a yard because Lestat over does everything and I see you happy here, sharing a coffin with our infant death, happier than you had been in years … and then I don’t want to suggest moving us all out to the suburbs…. because it could start a fight and I didn’t ask you, or what was I thinking, or I ‘do too much.’ ”

“You do do too much….”

“I know. I get excited and I go overboard and you love it but you hate it and then I get hurt instead of realizing it is not ME you hate-”

“Welllll…..”

“What?!?” but I smile and he knows I am only provoking him. “I…I don’t express all of those things, directly. I should, I just… it is hard. So I over board or I shut down or I get mad when really…I…I just want you happy and you are not always and I know it is not always me, but I want you to be happy. So I do a thing and you either love it or you hate it, so I try again and eventually, I am renovating several properties sneaking text messages about rugs and hiding my screen from you when you are reading to send pictures to be printed and then it gets so big and I get so…scared. I get scared that you will hate it, will hate me when all I want is for you to be as happy as I am.”

“Hummmph.” I have that one eyebrow raised.

“And for you to love me, as I love you.”

“Ummmhunnn,...”

“To see that beautiful smile.”

“Mmmmmm.”

“And to make you mine, Louis de Pointe du Lac. Be mine. Eternally, as you were meant to be.” I can not state enough, there is simply no way to explain, how drunk I am. No matter how smart I am trying to be about this, I am lying if I say my head isn’t swimming, my heart isn’t pounding. 

In 2015, Armand gave me a book called Healing the Hidden Hurts about attachment styles. It said anxious attachment styles feel like butterflies in the stomach, nervousness, an intense desire for validation and return of emotions, overthinking, clinginess, whirlwind of emotions, a need for reassurance, fear of abandonment, hypervigilant and falling too fast. 

Yeah, yeah. He was trying to tell me that all of these, these overwhelming feelings, were not real love. That real love is empathy and boundaries and communication and healthy self-esteem, positive viewpoints, self-sufficiency, and trust- surely all of the things I must feel for Armand! Instead of the obvious fact that we shared a facade, with none of those things. The fact was there was no real love, no excitement, no moment when I felt cherished, valued, and important. No moment when my hands were taken and held, where I fell into his eyes and soul when I anticipated seeing him or I missed him so badly I was beside myself. Where our hearts beat in sync for all of eternity. Where I was looked at as if I was the only thing that mattered in this world as I beheld the only thing with any worth in my universe. Especially since he knew who I really felt all those things for.

Because in the end, for me, there is only ever Lestat.

And maybe the book was wrong. Maybe what is meant to be is both. The excitement of his hands on me, the communication of multiple houses, and his insecurities. Me being able to ask what are you keeping instead of pulling back and reading into it. And I had started that, hadn’t I. Maybe this wasn’t his escape plan, his exit strategy. Maybe…

“Lestat, honey, why didn’t you tell me about the reno?” And for the first time, I don’t say it mean or cruel like my mother would. Or accusatory and judgemental like my father. I ask it honestly, calmly, without making my mind up and pulling away before he even spoke.

He looks down at me, and the hand around my neck slides down. A sad smile.

“She has good bones, no? She might be old, but she is not stuck, she can change, be updated. You were so sad and so distraught when we came here, so haunted by the ghosts of our past. I wanted to show you a future, that something new can come from what we shared, something good. That it can be familiar but without the baggage it carried. Maybe, maybe beautiful, even.” I place my hands on his waist.

“Are you talking about your or this townhouse?” His smile broadened and he flipped that hair.

 “Maybe…maybe a little of both?”

“Were you maybe still doing the most.”

“I am very good at the most.”

“Can we work on Coliseum together?” His eyes lit up and danced. Danced like I had just proposed the most wonderful idea in the world.

“So what do you say, humm? Do you like it? Is this acceptable, all of this, maybe even this” and he gestured himself, “to the collector’s sophisticated eye.”

“I guess…”

“You guess! No, no! It is too late! You have already said yes to me, twice! You have said it…. You asked me on the altar of the cathedral! There is no…. How is it that you guess??” But he was not really mad and I was not really fighting. Who knows who seduced who this time, no different than the last. I wrapped my arms around him and kissed him, not with the heat of earlier in the night but as his companion, as the man who loved him more than anything else. I felt cherished and cared for. I felt seen. He pressed his forehead against mine.

“Are you ready for bed, mon, ange?”

“Oui, mon mari, I am.” And for the first time in years, I felt safe and warm as Lestat and I bedded down for the night at our home.

Notes:

Ok, there is no 7 am mass at St Louis Cathedral. Sorry. And I can't find where there has been since Katrina. Forgive me. Go look at pretty pictures of the Cathedral.... (if you are not following Marco, are you even alive??)
https://www.instagram.com/marcorasi1960/
For Tet (taken 1/ 30) - https://www.instagram.com/p/DFgmmRGuAJE/
SNOLA- https://www.instagram.com/p/DFQWsv6u9C2/
https://www.instagram.com/p/DFG3eH1OuSe/

 

Real NOLA designers- ​​https://www.facebook.com/ShaunSmithHome/photos_by
https://decorationslucullus.com/portfolio/

Chapter 15: Not to Keep Score

Summary:

“If you fuck me as hard as I want you to, this ancient brick will crumble to the dust it was before mixing with River water.” He had torn my shirt off and is on my neck. He makes an incomprehensible sound which could be “Lestat, shut the fuck up.” Or “Lestat, you are amazing.” Or “Lestat, I need to be so deeply inside of you that my dick surges out through your mouth.” Honestly, any of these seems like a possibility now as his hand is around me and pumping me hard.
“How about this- I fucked thousands of men to get back to you.” He spins me around and throws me onto the planter.
“Oh, careful, we just had the pansies planted,” I turn my head to look back at him.

Notes:

I have written this like 86982347 times. Still not happy with it. Oh well.
RATING CHANGE
*Warning!*
Rough sex
Slight BDSM
I don't have testicle, but CBT happens...
I promise it is consensual because honestly, they match each other's freak.
destruction of replicated antiques
New Orleans pronunciation of the word Baby (If you know, you know)

It is late and I will add the few notes that I have to tomorrow. We are in Mardi Gras, I am up to a King Cake every 2 days. 8 more days of parades, we got this

I trounce down the stairs and Louis does not notice. I loudly sigh. He flips a page.
“Louis, we should fight.” He peeks up from his page.
“What?”
“I said…. Louis, we should Fight.” I place my hands on my hips. This means I am tres serious.
He looks back down at his book and continues to read for a moment, then tosses down whatever he is engulfed in tonight and looks at me as if he had not heard the words I had just clearly said, so I must repeat myself.
“I said…. Louis, we -.”
“Nah, I heard you the first time, I’m just not sure why I heard those words- Like. At. All.…” He picks the book back up and shakes his head while his eyebrows dance around. I am trying to be direct, and this response would not do.
“Ok, you know what, no wait-” He places the book back down. Ah! Maybe he did understand! “Why in the hell should we fight? Lestat, things have been really, really good. What is there even to fight about?”
“I think we keep the townhouse three degrees too warm. Bombas socks are the best sold even if you wear Uomo-”.
“Lestat, you don’t wear socks….”
“Why don’t men wear hats anymore? Men should wear hats! Don’t you agree? I am going to start wearing white tomorrow, regardless of the rules about Labour Day!” His expression is still pinched as if he as if he were ready to fight, but I have not hit the nerve yet. These are not working.
“Lestat…”
“Does my hair look better brushed out or in ringlets? I like it best in ringlets unless you do, in which case, I like it best brushed out. In a bun! …I prefer a light blanket on the bed, I do not like your duvet cover. ”
“Lestat, none of those thing are fights….”
“Damien Hirst is the greatest living artist!” Now my hands were up. Surely he would know that I meant business. He pinches the bridge of his nose harder and squeezes his eyes shut. He is radiant. I have lived more, these past few weeks in his arms, than I had in decades.
“Lestat, stop.” He looks down and picks at a piece of lint on his pants. “Why are you doing this,-”
“And you hog the covers that we have!”
“- why do you want to, wait, what?  I don’t hog tha…I mean, mosta that is like questions and debatable things, that’s not… like, like you didn’t take out the trash or you left the toilet seat up.”
“I could leave it up!…. If that would help. Should I leave it up?” He shakes his head exasperated.
“Lestat, we don’t use the bathroom. Baby, why do you want to fight?” Those eyes. I could lose centuries in the depths of my Louis’ beautiful eyes. He offers me his hands and I make towards him to hold them. I stand between his knees and we lose ourselves in each other for a moment. Yes, why indeed did I want to fight?
Because this is exactly what it feels like we should do. It is true that our life, as of late, is so peaceful and happy. We would wake up and make love. We would drink blood that Louis procured from farmers in the Florida parishes. He would wash the glasses while I took the garbage out. Some nights we would go out while others we stayed in. There were numerous bars, restaurants, concerts, events, or simple walks we could occupy our time with. Or we could read, talk, lounge in bed, watch movies. Vraiment, it has been a most peaceful, tranquil time, more so than we had spent in years. And yet, it felt wrong somehow, that I should be so blissful, as if I should not be this… this serene, as if this can not be for Lestat. Our previous nights like this together, nights sitting by the piano or radio, were colored with yearning and unspoken words, the anxiety of which I now realize I cherish. These past few weeks were all tentative, very bare and raw, honest and heartfelt. We were learning each other all over again and I felt the excitement and nervousness of our first winter together.
But this? To be honest, I had no idea what to…do with this. There was an utter lack of conflict, there was not yelling, there was not drama, not too much excitement with no hiding or longing or coded looks or…, there was not fear of being found. There was no chase. This was, this was exactly everything that I had dreamed of, what I had desired, my whole existence.
“I want to fight…” how can I explain? I had always fought- my brothers, my father, my mother, him, her. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. “ I want to fight because it feels like what I should do, it feels like what is supposed to happen.”
“Ok, baby, ok. Things are going real good, so there’s not a reason you want to fight. You just naming stuff, random stuff, some of it don’t even make much sense- none of that is a real reason to fight. But you sayin it feels like we should. I know that this is different and scary, but the goal here is to have conversations, to not push shit down or blow up so that we don’t fight. I do thank you for telling me you want to, though.”
“Naturally”
“But I want you to take a minute and think, why is that you need to get into an argument so bad you are making up shit about me hogging covers.” How do I explain his look of concern with the smile of love? When Louis looks most sympathetic to my plight but with love and…What, what is that?
“You do hog them,” I whisper, demurely.
“That’s some bullshit, yeah… Take a minute, baby.”
There is a very particular way people who have grown up in New Orleans say “baby.” It, and the term “love” or “my love”, are used to refer to someone not necessarily romantic in nature. It is, as everyone here is, friendly and familiar- you are ours, you belong to us, we are connected in this savage garden. Love and my love obviously come from the Americanization of “Cher”. However, the use of baby as a term of endearment towards other New Orleanians is of its own. It could be said to a person who is 30 years older than you, someone who you just met in line at the bar, someone who is being sweet, to the lady waiting on your table. I would, speaking French or Louis speaking Creole, say something that sounds like /be-be/. Mon pauvre babe. Most people who visit make a noise that sounds something like the awful guttural English /bay-be/, quickly, with an emphasis on the first syllabus. But Louis, as all good New Orleanians do, makes this word special. It is drawn out, as if all of the sounds they had dropped from all of the other words in previous sentences, all added themselves up together and ended up in this one. Your register drops on the first /a/ sound and rises as high as the spires on the Cathedral with the /e/ at the end. The emphasis is especially prominent on the first syllable.
Baaaaebeh.
After 114 years, even when he says it to the girl at the cafe or the man holding the door open for us as we leave the Saenger, I melt every time he says it. And this leads me to blurt out the first thought that pops into my Louis fogged addled brain.
“My brothers used to fight with me.”
“Ok…” his brow is furrowed but soft, concentrating on my every word as if it is of utmost importance instead of thought from the recesses not yet covered in the mist of Louis.
“My father as well.”
“Good, ok that’s… that’s a good start. Keep on going, love.”
“My mother, she rarely fought with me… she just read books constantly and ignored us all until my brothers brutalized me so awfully that we became a nuisance and disturbed her solitude.”
Louis’ eye flashed to the book by his side before darting back up at me.
“Lestat, does my reading make you feel abandoned?” I must not have kept my visage as calm as strictly necessary because he squeezes my hands. “And you feeling ignored ignites something that makes you act out for attention?”
“Ufffff…” I did not like this sudden feeling in my stomach.
“And the more you act out, the more I give you the Florence glare of ‘you better stop acting like that or your daddy will whip ya ass good when he gets home’.” I can audibly hear myself swallow. “But then I just curl my lip and say soump’en nasty I will regret because there is no Alcée to come home and whoop up on you. And so the cycle of trauma continues where you act out more and more and I suck my teeth and fein disdain until Alcée and the good Marquis finally rear their ugly heads and we are screaming at each other or worse…. Baby, why would you want that?”
“I hate that you leave a little ring around the goblet sometimes because you let blood get cold and it sits too long-”
“Lestat!” he stands up more exasperated than devastated. “Stop. We don’t need to fight so that you can feel something. Especially something that is shitty even if it’s the shitty that you’re comfortable with because it’s the only damned thing you know. Fighting isn’t love. Shit, not fighting isn’t love, either.” He rolled his eyes for a reason I do not understand. “Honey, what is it that you need right now? What is the real thing that you think pickin a fight will achieve?” I feel my throat tighten.
I want… the excitement of the chase. I want to thrill of getting caught. I want the gossip of our scandal. I want the heat of all of it when we get home. Him rushing into me, shoving me against that wall again.  I want, truly, all of these, I need them, in some variation, to survive. To be Lestat. But the truth I share comes to the surface from a memory unknown.
“To feel close to you.” My voice is high and unsure of itself.
“Physically or emotionally?”
“The only way my father spoke to me was with curses and indignation. There are nights you read so much and you ignore me so completely. Gabrielle used to do that until we fought and only then would she finally see me.” He cocks his head and smiles.
“Didn’t I say fussing is love?” His eyebrows dance as he says it in a way that I can envision with my eyes shut.
“Maybe you did. Once.”
“Come here, you silly…” and he captures my mouth with his sweetly in a quick kiss. “Me reading isn’t me rejecting you. I like to read. Yes, it was an escape when I was little. Someplace I could be and not be, me. I am not escaping from you, I was escaping from me.” I feel my throat getting tighter and my voice, high-pitched, strains more to come out.
“So, you aren’t trying to escape from me?” Just like she did, trying to escape my father and my brothers, myself, and the crumbling chateau. I can feel, without knowing they had been hiding so close to the surface, a tear begin to form in my left eye.
“No, not in the least. It’s just somethin I enjoy now. Stories feel complete, almost predictable. Not messy and confusing sometimes like real life. Just like you like music because it tells a story in a pattern. Beginning, middle, end. It is our little coping methods from childhood that somehow we can’t shake, right? Predicable makes you less anxious, closure of the story puts me at ease. But today you can still play music and I can read just because we like to. We can share space together, be together as us and I promise I love you just as much as if I was tearing you a new one and not have to… you need an affirmation right now, don’t you?” He squeezes my hands in his. I know I shake my head even if a human eye would not have detected it.
“I…. it wouldn’t hurt.”
“Lestat….I love the little freckles that I can faintly see on your face.” They were more prominent when I was a child.
“I love that beauty mark.” I free my hand to graze the one that lives on his right laugh line.
“You make little chew noises in your sleep.” His free hand finds my waist.
“You wrinkle your nose when you are disappointed.” I boop his nose, as the children would say.
“I love the sound that you make when I snuggle up behind you.” I feel his thumb start to make little circles on my skin.
“I like when you trace your fingernails down my back past my waistband.” And I feel them slide into my waistband then. He leans in and whispers.
“Sometimes, when you are not looking, I sneak a glance at you and look away before you catch me.” I whisper back at him.
“I always see you glancing out of the corner of my eye. But I know that you will look away when I turn to look at you, so I pretend not to see you.” Even though I can not see his mouth, I know that my Louis is smiling now.
“I move your slippers to the right spot when you leave em lyin ‘round because I know you'll get mad and curse everyone who “moved them on you” when you can’t find them.” He kisses right outside of my ear. It is a slow kiss, a sensual one.
“I had your initials monogrammed into my leisure suits in the 70s.” I feel his breath as he chuckles at me. I feel another slow kiss closer to my mouth.
“I kept your calling card from that night at Azalea. Still got it.” He brushes his cheek against mine.
“I have the receipt from the first time you brought me shopping at Karnofsy’s so I didn’t look like I had stolen clothes from, who did you say, Robespierre’s.” And it is my turn to kiss his cheek as his hand releases mine to slip into my waistband with the other.
“I hallucinated you for years. When I was sad or lonely, when I was happy sometimes too. Had whole conversations with you. Sometimes when I was with someone real, sometimes just the air around me.”
“Mon cher, I am always around you. I called out to vampires and humans for years hoping one of them would be near you and I could know you were well.” He kisses the corner of my lip. This, this build-up of suspense, of want and yearning. This is what I need, childhood trauma be damned. He pulls back to face me.
“I paid a journalist who I nearly killed 50 years ago to fly to Dubai in the middle of a pandemic to tell the story of how we fell in love in front of Armand. Then I threw him into a wall, left Daniel there with no help, and flew 17 hours into a Cat 2 hurricane with nothing but my wallet to find you.”  Our foreheads touch.
“I have put off my album release and tour to stay with you.”
“You what?” But I can no longer wait. I can smell him, hear his heartbeat. I pressed my lips to his gently, breathing him in. He is already pulling my pants down. I unbutton his shirt as I step out of my pants. He finished with his quickly.
That first time, the night in this very townhouse not but 2 meters away, he was so physical with me. Nikki was my first experience with a male lover and was so very passive and docile. I had thought, before Louis, that male lovers would be just as passive as the female ones I had had. But the man I saw nearly stab his brother, pawed at me, tried to force me, a vampire, up against a wall. It was heavenly. I shoved him against that same wall.
“Oh, you were all sensitive a few minutes ago and now you pushin me.” He grabs me by my waist and pulls me to him.
“I did say I wanted a fight.” I hear him growl into my neck and my cock twitches at the sound of it.
“S’that what you wanted this whole time, a little tussle before I pin you down and give you all of the attention that you need.” His nails ride up my spine as I hold onto his waist before I climb him.
“Oh, Mon Cher, I could give you more than a little tussle.” I drop to my knees instead and begin to kiss his thigh.
“We just finished the renovation.” His voice is risen and it takes me a moment to understand why he has said this. There is a devastating heat in his eyes.
“Then we should make our way to the courtyard.” Then I lick a strip from the underside of his cock to the very tip. His head falls back and it takes him a moment to comprehend my meaning. I rise and, for good measure, I drag my nails up the inside of his legs as I do so. The sound that comes from the back of his throat tells me we might not make it that far. He pounces and we stagger back, knocking down a coffee table.
“That was a Jacob-Desmalter!” He grabs me by the waist and hoists me up.
“It was a replica.” I wrap my legs around him, taking his head in my hands.
“I paid $35,000 for it.” I begin to consume his mouth, feeling the heat my body is producing, rubbing myself against his taut stomach. He holds me as he walks me towards the back door.
“You got ripped off.” He fumbles with the knob and I hop off of him the instant we cross the threshold. The night is cool, what would pass for a cold night in New Orleans. I hear music being played in the distance, a jazz song no different than we would have heard 100 years before. I begin to walk backward and he is upon me in an instant. We tumble against the brick wall.
“If you fuck me as hard as I want you to, this ancient brick will crumble to the dust it was before mixing with River water.” He had torn my shirt off and is on my neck. He makes an incomprehensible sound which could be “Lestat, shut the fuck up.” Or “Lestat, you are amazing.” Or “Lestat, I need to be so deeply inside of you that my dick surges out through your mouth.” Honestly, any of these seems like a possibility now as his hand is around me and pumping me hard.
“How about this- I fucked thousands of men to get back to you.” He spins me around and throws me onto the planter.
“Oh, careful, we just had the pansies planted,” I turn my head to look back at him.
“Whadda you call me?” Louis is radiant. Not angry as the night he swam to find me in Algiers, not as soft as he had been in the years after, not as confident as these past few nights. He grabs me roughly around the waist, keeping me on all fours.
“My love. My lifelong companion. Mon raison d’etre.” He licks me from behind and I can not help but wiggle into him. His mouth, his hot, sensuous mouth. “None of them smelled like you. None of them touched me like you. None of them lasted as long as you,” and his mouth was back on me.
“Naturally,” I wail as I lean back needing more.
“All I wanted, all I yearned for, was you. Your hands, your mouth, your stomach, your heat, your heart.” He licked his fingers and began to play with my hole. Circling, pressing, grabbing a handful of my hip with his other hand. “I’d get angry when they weren’t right, couldn’t last, couldn’t keep up.” He released me and started to stroke himself lazily.
“And what would you do, would you kill them as you came, mon petit mort?” I whispered.
“Sometimes.” He slid a single finger in and out before I could clench onto him.
“And others?” he forces two fingers in, deep and hard, and rips them out again. I whine for more, shaking myself before him. He swats my ass with vigor and I cry out in ecstasy.  He pulls me away from the planter, scraping my hands on the cement, grabs my face at the jaw, and squeezes until it opens. The taste of his salty flesh, as he slides himself down my throat, might be enough to send me over. He holds my head just so while he thoroughly fucks my mouth. I know my eyes roll back in my head as I tremble at feeling him slide deeper and deeper the rougher he gets.
“I’d just fuck ‘em untl they couldn’t take me any more. Sometimes, I’d imagine they were you, imagine I’d chock you on my cock. Shove a toy up you ass and watch you take my every inch and come all over my feet.” He pulls out and my eyes are huge.
“Fuck yourself.” He only has to say it once before I am sliding my fingers inside,  and stroking myself as he stands there trying to catch his breath. “Slow, slow. I want to see how long I can edge you out tonight.”
Who was this Louis? This Louis is so commanding and, honestly, it was incredibly hot. But,.... I did want to fight.
“No,” and I let go of myself even if I dare not remove my fingers.
“Whaddyu say?” He looks at me hard, not mad, incredulously.
“Je dit non, I do not feel like touching myself tonight. There must be a better use of my hands.” I pretend to scratch my cheek and look away from him although I know he starts to huff.
“ I know you heard me, I didn’t stutter, I said I want to watch you fuck yourself.” I shrug my shoulders.
“Et…Je…Dit…

.” His eyes grew wide and he shoved me over onto my back. We were in clear view of the cast iron gate just past the carriageway and illuminated by the gas lamps.
“I’mma gonna give you your ‘Non’. ” He lifts my legs and lines himself up to me. I place my hands above my head, crossed at the wrists. He looks at them and then at me. I huff.
“Well, you weren’t holding me down yet, so I trying to help you out by readying myself.” I scooted down as I tried to get my hole as close to his cock as possible.
“Wait, you want me to hold you down and fuck you?” He looks at me confused as he holds my ankles above his ears.
“I mean, I did say I wanted to fight,” I smile impishly.
“Was all of this just to get some BDSM?” Someone catcalls to us as they pass our gate.
“Maybe some of this was, yes.” he places my ankles on his shoulders and presses the head of his cock to just open my entrance. The pressure is to die for, he is so close but not fully where he belongs. He begins to play with my testicles and stroke my thighs. My cock is dripping and twitching. He runs his nails up my length before he moves back and scrapes them along my pelvis.
“And the rest?” his hands run all over me, my legs, my abdomen, my ass, and every once and again he will just brush my most private places. He starts to slowly press into me and then pulls back. My whole body is on fire with his teasing. My hands stay above my head, crossed at the wrist.
“Maybe some was because I don’t know what else to do.” His hands ride up my thighs and he scrapes them back down. He gently lifts me up and slowly puts just the tip of his cock inside of me. He is moving ever so slightly playing with my tight ring of muscle that will never fully loosen no matter how much he uses me. He places his hand on my cock and does not move it, just sits there and holds me.
“What if, what we do is everything but fight.” I pout at this. I am very good at throwing a fit. “What if, I promise to satisfy you so deeply, so thoroughly, that instead of fighting, you are begging me to move inside of you. Begging me to stroke your cock. Screaming my name out in the courtyard as I hold your balls for hours and before I ever fuck you.” My cock jumps at this and makes contact with his hand and instinctually he wraps his fingers around me.
“How satisfied?” It is impossible to look away from him, even if people are stopping to look at us naked and entangled in our own courtyard.
“When's the last time you felt like we were floating and we never left the ground?” At this, I close my eyes and remember. Remember feeling so completely overtaken that I felt foggy and weak for the rest of the night. I feel a smack on my ass before I feel him squeeze my testicles and gently pull them down. He is rubbing my reddened cheek before he smacks me again. I try to move so that he is deeper, but he pulls back, tugging my testicles harder. He scratches into the reddened mark and tugs me in time with his cock pushing on my entrance.
“Mon Cherrrr.” He settles, takes a deep breath, and wrings my cock as he tugs on me hard.
“Keep your hands where there are.” It is not a request, it is a command. “We done fighting. You’re gonna listen now.” He squeezes me again harder and holds my cock completely still. My need for friction is great. His hands on me, his cock barely pulsing inside of me.
“Please.”
“Please what?” his voice is hardened and detached but his eyes are wide and drunk. I try to move but he removes his hand and smacks me again harder.
“Please…” his nails are not kind this time as he draws blood on my abused cheek. I have kept my hands still, crossed at the wrist as if his words alone bound them. I want to slide down into him, to bottom out and feel him fill me. He kisses my ankle before he bites it.
The ecstasy of my Louis slowly drinking from me, slowly tugging me, and bouncing his head just inside of me makes a single tear slide from my eyes. Yes, yes, this is why I wanted to fight. To be punished for being so very bad.
And to make up.
He pushes in slowly as he licks my ankle wound, but still, his whole head is not inside of me. He does not pull out or move. He adjusts and pulls my testicles up, so beautifully, painfully skyward. I can feel the heat of his hand as he holds it just above my cock, as he sucks such a bruise on my ankle. I make my member jump and touch his hand. I do it three times before his fingers catch me and wrap around ever go lightly. It is with enough weight that I can have no friction. I so badly want to fuck his hand. But if I do, I lose what little of his head is bobbing just inside of me and pull my own testicles further away.
“Please” I purr, just the way he likes, shaking my head and smiling.
“Please what?”
“Please fuck me.” He laughs a low deep laugh, a laugh with just a twinge of malice that tells me this is not the Louis who did not want to fight with me a few moments ago. This the Louis that will push my body to the limit and make me come over and over until I ache. I love this Louis.
“No,” he juts his lip out and shakes his head.
“What?”
“Je…Dit…Non.” and he starts messaging my balls and pushing the head of his cock almost inside my ring of muscles.
“What do you mean, non?"
More tourists pass, yelling some obscenity or another to us. But I stare at my Louis, eyes blown wide, glee on his face as he messages harder and harder.
“I could stay juuuussst like this, the head of my cock almost all of the way inside you all night long.”
“As you should, but you should move more than- ” he squeezes me particularly hard and his lip jumps up at it. I can’t help but moan “-you have such strength.”
“I do.”
“You could literally pound me into this pavement if you wanted to.” He moves his hand in a twisting motion for the briefest of seconds and then stops, still no tighter on my cock. My breath is heavy and laboured, my desire mounting.
“Oh, I could.” He twists his hand around it again before letting go and swatting at my other ass cheek. My reaction pulls him out of me completely but he lines up again and slowly bobs back and forth almost to the point of allowing me his full head. “But I won’t.” He tugs my testicles again high above my body.
“Why not?”
“Because you not fighting.” His words do not register. His nails slid up my opposite leg and he holds that ankle as he licks and sucks and bobs and tugs. It has the desired effect on me. I feel on fire and my need is growing.
“I thought-” he finally slides the head of his cock just inside of me and stops. My head goes back and I keen.
“Not no more you don’t.” His tone is gruff and tourists catcall as they walk by. His breaths are measured and not as shaky as mine. He has done this before, this withholding torture. He smacks my ass again and digs in with his nails. I can hear myself, hear my whines and shattered breaths. I must try again because I am not sure how long I will last. I tighten my muscles around him and he pulls back against it. Absolute ecstasy.
“I…thought… that…you…didn’t… want to fight.” He is caressing my testicles and my eyes are locked into his when he licks his hand. He puts his hand back, above my hard and leaking cock and I tap it into him until he holds me and twists himself around me. He tugs back his cock a few times gently as he barely tugs on me before he lets me go.
“I done wanna fight. Not with words and not about toilet seats or covers. But I’ll fight to bury my cock so deep inside you, to not move, to place my weight up on that leaking cock a yours and make out with you for an hour, makin you beg for it.”
“Merde! Ok, let us fight like that. Bury yourself, fill me with every inch of you.” He removed himself from me totally. The loss of what little I was allowed is awful. He sits back on his feet, bites his lip, and watches me as he lazily plays with himself. I move to sit up.
“Nah uh… I didn’t tell you to move yet.” And he moves to straddle me, his testicles in my face. “They sure are dry.” So I lick them as I move my bottom, move it as if he is as deep inside as I wish him to be. “Oh, you hungry tonight, hun. Hungry for this cock, hungry for my balls. What else you hungry for? Hun? Hungry for this dick down your throat again?”
Who is this Louis? Certainly not the meek man I had to guide on our first trist 115 years ago. Not the tender lover who refused to push me hard when he did top me.  He pulls up and moves his cock into my willing mouth. “Mmmmm, feels good. You love this, taking me deep in your troat, wanting me to fuck your mouth. Bet your ass feels this good. Bet it’d be warm and slick, as I deep and fill you full. Is that what you want? No fighting, just fucking?” He teases my mouth with the very tip of his cock, a small amount of his juices glistening amongst my savala. I reach out my tongue to touch it and he allows me, allow me to lap and lick at him. But gives me no more.
“Here he is, wanna create some bullshit fight, so he can get his lil adrenalin all pumped up. When all he had to do was tell me he needed some Daddy Lou in his mouth." He lowered himself a bit, just enough to get his head in my mouth. “You sucking your own ass offa me like the little bitch you are. Go head, suck it, suck it for Daddy.”
And I do want to gobble his cock down until I digest it. But there is also something in me that does not particularly like being called a bitch. Which is not to say that I am not a bitch, I most certainly am. And I am certainly his bitch, but… maybe it was the way that he said it. His tone. His intonation. The fact that I was rock hard and wanted to fill him or be filled, at this point, really, either would suffice. So I sat up as much as I could, took him as deep as I could and, well, nibbled. It was not a bite, it, there was no blood drawn, so. He jumped up and howled.
“What the fuck is wrong with you? Why the fuck would you-” but I am faster than Louis, stronger. I lay there, obedient, meek, on my own blessing, surely he must know the grace in which I had granted him. But I did want to fight. And he did want to, as well. So I snapped up and pushed him against the incinerator- the ancient wall was much to dear to hurt. Not that I wanted to hurt him, no but, maybe punish him, a little. To show him who Daddy really was. At least, at least some of the time.
“You wanted this sort of fight, qui? You wanted me to push back, to not be docile as all of those other boys, the ones who were not me. Because you wanted to be pinned and pushed and punished this whole while, too. You act as if your own cock is not dripping, glistening with the excitement of fucking every inch of me. As if you aren't twitching to take me, as if you were not going to float just as high as I was from your edging and your games.” I was able to hold his wrists with one hand and rub his ass with the other. I drug my cock up his slit and watch as he tries to find some friction from me. “Ah, and who is now trying to get fucked, hun? Who is whining now? Who has wanted to be bound and edged because no one has given him that pleasure?” I lean my weight on him and put my fingers to his mouth. “Make them wet so I can make you wet.” He sucks my fingers like a true professional, and it both excites me and pains me to think of how many others had been in his mouth. But there is one place that is mine alone. I slide them in and hold him down, which is no longer strictly necessary. He writhes on me. Lifts himself as much as he can to get as much as he could. One, Two, Three fingers slid in.
“I see you have learned the art of patient torture from the Gremlin. Surely he liked the heartbreak of thinking you cared enough about him to do this for hours. He did not know that the whole time it was me that you wanted to enter, me that you wanted to suck, me you wanted to spend hours floating above the ground in, what do the children call it now, subspace ecstasy.” I push in four and hold him there before I started to move my fingers to widen him. When I feel as if I have teased him satisfactorily, I pull out, spreading his legs with my own. “But what you really desired, that whole time, was for it to be you that was taken. You drempt as you held them down and toyed with them that I was doing that to you. It was me that you wanted to touch you, “ I smack him on the derriere with a quick pop and receive the whimper I knew was hidden under his cool exterior. I drag my nails, raising blood quickly before I complete the process two more times. “That what you secretly longed for on the nights that you prowled, was for Daddy Lou to be taken and made mine over and over. Or was it for me to punish you for hours, dangling on the edge of ecstasy only to pull back and watch you writhe so beautifully. To feel his husband so deeply that a bed merely became an impediment." I rub his ass before I smack it twice more.
“All you had to do was tell me what a bad vampire you had been, that you needed me to punish you over my knee for your transgressions. Is that what you want?” He moves his head to the side, looking back at me. “You have played the dominator for so long, mon petit. Do you need to take me, or be taken?” I release his wrist, drop to his hole, and begin to eat him.
“Lesssstttttatttt.”  He bounces on my tongue as I probe him, holding his hips in place more perfunctory than vehemently. I am absolutely dripping and take myself in hand because this is all too much for me. I am drunk and have not stopped drinking from the fountain that is Louis.
He is moves so that I may pull his testicles down and hold his cock as I continue to fuck him with my tongue.
I can take this no more, I stand up and enter him as he shimmies on to me.
“Hard, make it hard… then I get you…” The very thought of it, that I take him and then are immediately taken makes me hold his hips and make him mine slapping into him with abandon. I had not twitched out my last juices before he is pushing me back. I am pliant and I stumble, falling back on the grass as he pounces on me, using my own spend to slowly slide himself in.
“God, I wanted it to be you for so long. Thought about taking you slow, breaking you apart, watching you lose yourself and know that I did it. But I also wanted you to hold me down and fuck me, too. Wanted to finally surrender underneath you, to let you take me. Fuck, my head is swimming.” But the roll of his hips is controlled and he holds me up to reach as far inside as he can.
I move my arms above my head and cross them at my wrists.
“Shit. Shit. You just,” he begins moving faster as if in a trance. “You just give me that…”
“Take me, Mon Cher. I belong only to you.” And instead of letting me down, we float gently up, him moving towards my mouth, draping over me as he made me his.
Later, as we lie tangled unable to move, floating without leaving the ground, no longer hearing the calls of those walking by, I nuzzle into him.
“You are right.”
“About?”
“We don’t need to fight for me to feel close to you.”
“We need to fuck dirty?”
“No, we need to tell each other what we want. What we need. When we need to be taken care of, when we are feeling needy.”
“Can I get that in writing?”
“What?”
“On this day, in the year of our Lord 2024, Louis du Point du Lac was right.” I turned my head and kissed him.
“Louis, you may have everything it is that you want.”
“Everything?”
“Even to think that sometimes you might be able to dominate me in bed.”
“Think??? Might? ” I kissed him again.
“Even to let yourself go and finally allow yourself to be taken.To know you are safe in that moment to surrender to me as I surrender to you. To be cared for and not have to keep score.” This time, it is he who kisses me. 

Notes:

Ok, I dropped a few French words along the way
Vraiment- truly
Paurvre Babe- Poor baby adding the mon makes it my poor baby.
Mon Petit Mort- My little death, it is an older French term for an orgasm
Et…Je…Dit…

- And I say no
derriere- an ass, ya booty....

Florida parishes- Parishes (what Louisiana calls counties, it comes from the Catholic territorial idea of land division. Each church has it's own "parish" or territory, the people who live there (parishioners) belong to that church. Here we use it for actual governmental designations) that once were part of the Spanish Florida territories before becoming US territories- they were not in the original sale of Louisiana to the US. They are north of the lake and ride right under the Mississippi boarder.
Saenger- one of our two main proper stages for plays.
Damien Hirst- Possibly the most controversial living artist
Jacob-Desmalter- https://en.chateauversailles.fr/discover/history/great-characters/jacob-desmalter
Carriageway- what a driveway was before... people... drove... They are almost always cut out of the house itself. It opens to the courtyard and would lead to the backdoor, the servant's quarters, the stable and garconaire if there was one- . Rue Royal's is here- https://preview.redd.it/reminded-of-my-tour-of-the-gallier-house-in-new-orleans-v0-stya0ef0gemd1.jpg?width=3024&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=e15fda2131e3fe280f70dc660ac236ae253e164b
The walls of the courtyard are made with old New Orleans clay brick and are original to the house, so about 168 years.
The New Orleans pronunciation of Baby-
https://www.tiktok.com/@sochimamaeats/video/7340721934470073632
A moment about writing for Louis. I realized that I am writing New Orleans grammar but not really how we phonetically speak. We drop words and sounds and run all sorts of thing together like a lazy New Yorker on downers. No lie, I thought ‘of’ and ‘have’ were spelled ‘a’ when I was a kid because that is how we say it- ‘I needa coupla dollars. Y’all a thought I was craaazy!’ So my real accent spelled out would make Louis say this when he is talking about the cycle of trauma he and Lestat suffered and replay-
" Ana more yaxt out, da more ah give ya dat Florence glare a “You BETTA stop actin lie dat or yo daddy’ll whipya ass good whens gits home. But den I juss coil ma lip and say soump’en naaastaa I’mma regret cuz dey ain’t no Alcee ta come home an whoopup on ya. An soda cycle a trauma con-tinuas where you axt out mor and mor and I suck ma teef and fein dissdaine til Alcee ana goot Marke fondly rear dey uggly heads an we screaming or worse….Baaebeh, whyja want dat?"
Even if you read it, but are not using the right intonations and inflections, it still doesn't quite sound right. Soooo, I'm going to just carry on as I am.

New Orleans backdoor use- honestly, Lestat taking Louis through the front door was a big deal. I put money on the fact that he never did again- https://thesocietypages.org/socimages/2014/12/26/a-proper-entrance-creole-culture-and-the-front-door/

Chapter 16: It's Carnival Time and Everybody's Having Fun

Summary:

Louis is amazed. He is marveling at how different this Mardi Gras is from those of his childhood even though this is his 13th night of festivities. He keeps looking all around, up at people on the balcony, certainly something he must have seen when he was here as a child, the people excited next to him begging for trinkets. Yes, there are still horses and floats, but as with everything in a vampire’s life humans have evolved and everything else is different.
“Jesus! How many plastic beads can they throw?” He leans over to a Lestat who is fully engulfed in the spectacle.
“Do you know that is how they determine crowd size? How many abandoned beads are swept up by the street cleaners?”
“And no doubloons?”
“There are some, still metal.”
“Claudia used to have that-” and Lestat turns to him, a smile full of nostalgia.
“Yes, I have added to her doubloon collection every year since. It is probably the most extensive collection in the city.” I feel Louis's heart double beat slightly out of sync before it falls back into rhythm with Lestat’s. A smile of fondness I have rarely seen.

Notes:

I am not going to write a Mardi Gras Chapter. I am not going to write a Mardi Gras Chapter. Attends 5 straight nights of Mardi Gras, watches everyone losing their mind during Endymion. Fine.... I am writing a Mardi Gras chapter...

     I have never traveled to New Orleans for pleasure. It has strictly been for business purposes. I can not say that this visit is any different from any of the others—I pop in, pop out, accomplish what I must, and leave before there is any…unpleasantness.
However, this time it is Carnival. The celebration here is so vastly different than the Carnivals that I have experienced in other places, at other times. There are fewer masks or impromptu parades. Beads are thrown instead of eggs and confetti, full costumes on the riders; fewer operas, more marching bands. It is just as political and satirical as any I have attended, certainly as festive as Venice, or Rome or Paris.
      If you have never been to one, have never lived in the moment of Carnival, it is an experience like no other. The mood in the city is electric and contagious. People travel from all corners of the world to participate. There is music and dancing, and food and drink are shared. People cook food on the streets and share it with strangers; and children play with each other, some of whom have just met for the first time. There are babies taking naps in strollers next to their grandparents who are doing the same in a cloth folding chair. In some places, crowds reach 10-15 people deep, but the revelers are filled with merriment and laughter, dance and song. Whatever small town parade you have seen, whatever waving of hands and people standing in place as spectators, that is not the case here. There are throws of beads, trinket, stuffed animals and yelling from the throng for all of these items. People walking up to floats, sometimes with small children on their shoulders, some 18 feet in height and in some cases 300 feet long, pulled by tremendous tractors, alight with stringed lights, LEDs, and music. And while these  are still made with traditional paper mache yes, innovations such as foam and machinery allow some of the floats to move mechanically. Each float is decorated thematically to tell part of the tableau vivant of that parade. These floats ride hundreds of similarly attired, masqued krewe riders (for that is what each parade here is called, a Krewe) in an embellished bauta made of plastic and cloth. There are school marching bands and street dancing troupes in between. The crowd is dressed in various shades of purple green and gold. The air is full of food that is unique to this city, takes of French with African twists and Indigenous ingredients, seafood and deserts in a medley that even tickles me.  The night delights every sense.
    The population of the city triples in the days leading up to Tuesday. But tonight, on Lundi Gras, most of those million-plus tourists have already packed and gone home. The few that linger catch the oldest continuously riding parade in New Orleans.
   The night is well-illuminated. Traditional street lamps, illuminated floats, Flambeaux carriers who had paraded since Mardi Gras’ inception to light the way with their flaming torches, businesses up and down the street awash the mostly local crowd. I am easily able to make my down Canal Street to watch the parade with the other revelers.
   As with all of my kind, I can feel the heartbeat before I see its owner and yet I knew that there were two distinct hearts. 
   The first time I felt it, witnessed something I had never before with any of our kind, they were not even together, not physically. And only one was aware the other was near. Within a matter of seconds, I realized that their heartbeats were indistinguishable from the one. In all of my years, I had never… it was not a cheap parlor trick. It was as if their hearts syncopated, creating a song only for them. I have shut myself off, but they have not. They do not sense me, and if one did they would have to tell the other. At least the Mind Gift has left them handicapped in that area. I am, however, sure that they sometimes know what the other thinks without it.
    Louis is amazed. He is marveling at how different this Mardi Gras is from those of his childhood even though this is his 13th night of festivities. He keeps looking all around, up at people on the balcony, certainly something he must have seen when he was here as a child, the people excited next to him begging for trinkets. Yes, there are still horses and floats, but as with everything in a vampire’s life humans have evolved and everything else is different.
“Jesus! How many plastic beads can they throw?” He leans over to a Lestat who is fully engulfed in the spectacle.
“Do you know that is how they determine crowd size? How many abandoned beads are swept up by the street cleaners?”
“And no doubloons?”
“There are some, still metal.”
“Claudia used to have that-” and Lestat turns to him, a smile full of nostalgia.
“Yes, I have added to her doubloon collection every year since. It is probably the most extensive collection in the city.” I feel Louis's heart double beat slightly out of sync before it falls back into rhythm with Lestat’s. A smile of fondness I have rarely seen.
   His heart literally skipped a beat.
   Louis’s feelings of love and adoration are...overwhelming in the least. He so often closed his thoughts off from me, but often could not control his feelings. He usually lives in world of sadness, hesitation, loneliness, then anger and apathy. The is only other time I felt the feeling currently emanating from him: when Lestat first walked on the stage at the Theatre des Vampires. I was hit with such a wall of, you can not even describe it as love. It is more than that, more than I have ever…I knew then that he would never love me, neither could ever love another, the way they do each other. Even how much they both cared her paled in comparison with what they felt for each other. From her, it was anger and disgust, at both of them, but also longing. A flash of dancing in their courtyard, of Louis driving them in an open-aired car, she longed for the innocence of that life. She could hear Louis too, even for the mind-numbing coming from behind them. I could not image living with this for that many years, loving someone who you knew would never love you as much as they loved another- being an eternal 3rd wheel. And yet, hadn't I done just that? Sadly, or maybe fortunately, neither knew what Lestat felt. 
     Lestat was his usual bombastic self, waving his hands at the floats for beads he had little use of, or clapping and dancing along with St Augustine as they marched by. At one point he held a small child on his shoulders and walked up to get a stuffed animal. Lestat was made for Carnival, and occasionally there are flashes in Louis’ mind of him dressed in a white costume when he was Raj. Powdered. Beautiful. And ache and an overwhelmed adoration at the same time. 
     Lestat bares emotions that are indescribable. I first saw it when he was on stage, in love with himself. I watch as he catches beads that light up and dance as he puts them on Louis. He stops to caress Louis’s face, “to further brighten your already luminous eyes” and the smile, that smile, the one that makes you feel as if you are the only person alive. As the crowd jumps and screams, the brass instruments of the Warren Easton High School band blaring “Hey Baby”, lights flashing from all directions, Lestat and Louis exist in a moment that no one else here is a part of. If I was not there myself, I would have thought that Lestat stopped the whole of the crowd, but no, he did not have to. Lestat’s complete devotion, his passionate worship, and madden infatuation are beyond anything that I have seen. Certainly, he cared for Nikki and Gabrielle, but this,... It is as if he exists to breathe in Louis, to think only of him, to stand forever by his side, and Louis has no idea how much of his ether Lestat  inhales. I have to look away. It is bad enough I hear their heartbeats when they kiss, I do not have to witness it as well. 
    It is just then that I feel a small force run into my leg. A child, of not more than five, with a look of terror in her eyes. She is lost, she thinks her mother will be mad at her. I kneel down and ask her her name. She stares into my eyes, mesmerized without me having to do a thing. 
     “My name is Mia. My mama is Shonda.” I lift my chin until I can hear the frantic cries of a human. Shonda. I tell her I will take her to her mother, but all she can do is shake her head. To do this, we will walk much closer to the two of them than I had wanted it. In a manner of moments, the child and her mother are reunited, hugging each other, hugging me in a way that seems completely normal for the occasion around me but is a level of shared openness that I bristle from. When I look up to move back to my vantage point, Lestat is looking at me. 
    “Enjoying the festivities, Armand?” I hear directly from his mind, his voice dripping with the intoxication of Louis’ kiss, so different than the last time I was here a few years ago on business. “And what is it exactly that you are giving up for Lent? Hmmm? Not the truth. You gave that up years ago.” His arm is around Louis’s waist. It is not possessive, it is not protective. It is gentle, the need to touch Louis, and Louis is emblazoned with the need to be connected as well.
    “I wanted to make sure he was fine.” I swallow. He leans over as Louis speaks in his ear and then kisses his cheek with such tenderness.
     “He wasn’t the one thrown into a wall….” It is as if he can not help but gaze at Louis’ beautiful face as he animately tells him something. Lestat laughs and shakes his head as Louis continues.  It is something about Louis as a child, with his siblings on a Lundi Gras in the past. Lestat rolls his eyes up and cocks his head, and Louis’ smile breaks into the most glorious laughter. Their heads tilt together as Lestat puts his hand up to wave for more beads.
     “Are you sure that you only wanted to make sure he was fine, Mon Petit Gremlin? Or is it that you had to see for yourself what you always knew to be the truth.”  Neither of them are facing me. They do not have to. How much longer will I stand here and torment myself with something that I knew. All along, I knew. I knew the moment we left Magnus’ tomb. What did Lestat say, let’s see how long it will last?  And Louis did not look me in the eyes even after he made love to me that night. I knew, just like she knew, that I would always be a third wheel. A name not spoken for years, even if I knew he was like a ghost, always present. 
     I stood watching a rider on a stopped float pointing to Louis, then him pointing to himself, walking up to the float and handed something circular. Louis thanked the man. The human was thinking how absolutely beautiful Louis was. And he is.  It is not as though I have not had dalliances. I had after those awful nights in San Francisco. Lestat, Lestat, Lestat- his only thought for days. I could blame the bad, drugged blood, by why? Just because he has not uttered it didn’t mean he didn’t think of him constantly. When I met Louis, he was running from so much. Over those early years, he slowly came into his own. But his heart was never fully mine, no matter what I did. And I actually thought, if I can just give him what Lestat could not- I listened, I was only ever tender, we could do this together, he has just as much control as I did. I never raised my voice, everything we did was together, what we both wanted. Until 1972. Until we saw the blond boy in Los Angeles. Until Louis followed him for days, engaged him as he never had a human before, unlike anything he ever had in the last 23 years and I knew why instantly. Over 120 boys followed after, until Daniel...   
     Lestat grabs Louis’ hand and they dance as Edna Karr’s band plays “If Ever I Fall in Love.” For a moment, Lestat lets me see Louis's face- the joy, the happiness, how drunk he is on Lestat. What did he tell Daniel over and over again, about the vampire bond? No, this is beyond any bond. The image is gone and I turn to walk away. I was happy. Louis was the first happiness I had known in centuries. It comes as no surprise that it was not meant to last. The music fades as I walk towards the river, the lights flashing behind me receding the further along I went. My business here in New Orleans is done. I shall never have to return unless Louis wants. I suppose my tormenting of Lestat had its consequences. 
     As I stand under the Starbucks sign across from the Convention Center, I a moment of harsh honestly with myself. Yes, I loved Louis. I still do. Would I have loved him if I didn’t know who his maker was? If I didn’t know that Lestat chose him, fell so hopelessly in love with him…? If I didn’t hear their hearts as Lestat recounted to Sam, Santiago, and me the events in New Orleans as he saw them? If we had walked into Magnus’ tower together, but if I walked out alone? Would I have pursued him then? If he run off while we were in San Francisco, turning Daniel and leaving me? If he had walked up to me on a warm summer’s night in Bangkok and said, this was all a mistake? If he had left me or if he left me for Lestat, would that have changed how I felt or how I reacted?
    To be honest with myself, Daniel. Daniel. Daniel for years. I have shared time with him. I have created a,... a life with him. Am I upset that I lost Louis or that I lost? Is this not what I wanted? To be able to carve out this, this same intimacy, this same feeling of consumption with him because I would never know it with Louis? And how was I to do that with…is this not as I had wanted? I had been biding my time, trying to find a way to navigate. Why do  I feel as if I lost what I wanted, Louis to be happy, myself to have the ability to be happy, and Daniel finally to choose to be mine? Is that, simply because all of this means Lestat is happy and I enjoyed his suffering? I think again of Daniel in New York with me, of our time on the Night Island. How Louis’ detachment from me meant that I could see Daniel in London or Vienna. Of how we walked hand in hand in Paris and how he would have loved this night. Of how he still would, if he were here with me. I have run from him. I…I am afraid. Not of, him, but of… what if I have ruined all of it. In my attempt to finally be happy, I have destroyed everything. I have heard him through other vampires. I know he is trying to find me. I look up at the Starbucks sign, the green siren, and how she calls for me. How he calls for me. 
     It is, I suppose, time to let Louis go. I have, I had, I tried. I gave him the best I had. I think of his face again, as Lestat sees him. I take a deep breath. I think it is time. Time for me to start over. Live the life I deserve. I see a couple walk past me, they are local, walking back to their car. I smile and ask them about a great place where I can eat. I see how I look in their minds, standing under the siren. To her, I am radiant. I project that image. The Vampire Armand, radiant, happy, healthy, standing under the siren. “Come to me, my fledging, and listen to my voice for you shall be charmed and enlightened.” I project that image to every open mind, vampire and human. I get flashes of other vampires and humans, flashes as they hear me and send my message far and wide.
     And for the briefest of moments, in those flashes, I see Louis again. Louis without clothes, sitting up, moving rhythmically up and down with a look of ecstasy, looking right in Lestat’s eyes, in my eyes, drunk with love that he never shown me. I hear Lestat laugh, then I shut my mind to him, turn, and walk into the night.

Notes:

These are HIGH SCHOOL Bands, and people wonder why the Human Jukebox and LSU band are what they are....
St Augustin-
https://youtu.be/59hbvy3XLuo?si=KH6bzdBx8uZBxdIy
Warren Easton-
https://youtu.be/0Er5TbahNYg?si=NjIO5U7g0WciLjp7
Edna Karr-
https://youtu.be/3PQpg-H9GvQ?si=JshC08ZPNhbVxMjQ
There is no way to explain a parade, which is why I didn't want to even try. Here is a video of Endymion, but you don't smell the food or feel the excitement. It is unlike any other thing.
https://youtu.be/GGzj1ZDKbUI?si=RZrrQL1cNaFFpvtU
A Lundi Gras last year ( my favorite night). The audio is just Mardi Gras music, but you can see the floats really well.
Lent-
So, um, Mardi Gras is part of a religious holiday. We will drag our hung over asses to church on Wednesday, get ashes placed on our foreheads, not eat meat because Jesus went to the desert for 40 days before Good Friday, pray and donate/volunteer. Honestly. We legit do not eat meat on Fridays and give something up- I usually eat no sugar for 40 days (any kind, ketchup and fruit are the exceptions but in severe moderation). Catholics used to fast like Muslims, then no meat at all, then just on Fridays!

Chapter 17: An Elegy to the Vampire

Summary:

“Jesus Christ, he does know how to use a fucking phone.” I have been trying to call this asshole for weeks now. Is that… piano in the background?

“Hello Daniel. How are you? I hope you are well.” This is hysterical. That smooth Dubai accent is back full blast, like he’s still there. Sorry pal, we are way past that.

“Ohhh, where did that big NOLA accent go? Even your thoughts sound different since you’ve been there. ‘How you, baby? You awrite? Girrlll, I shor’preciate ya !! ”

Silence…. Fucker. “Yeah, fine, I’m fine. How the fuck are you?”

“Jesus Christ, he does know how to use a fucking phone.” I have been trying to call this asshole for weeks now. Is that… piano in the background?

“Hello Daniel. How are you? I hope you are well.” This is hysterical. That smooth Dubai accent is back full blast, like he’s still there. Sorry pal, we are way past that.

“Ohhh, where did that big NOLA accent go? Even your thoughts sound different since you’ve been there. ‘How you, baby? You awrite? Girrlll, I shor’preciate ya !! ”

Silence…. Fucker. “Yeah, fine, I’m fine. How the fuck are you?”

“.........I am doing well.” And his mind is now shut for business, sorry folks, see you tomorrow. Well, it was good while it lasted. It’s 11pm New Orleans time, and nearly 7am here. It’s funny, I was tired all of the time from the Parkinson's, now I am tired because the sun is coming up. Go figure.

“And your boytoy?” 

 < audible sigh> Because honestly, what the fuck are they? How the hell do you go from “The Vampire Armand….the looooove of my liiiife” to wax poetic about the actual love of your life right in front of him with zero cares? The Vammmmpppiirrre Bonddd, yeah, yeah, yeah, whatever it takes to convince yourself,  pal….

“Lestat is fine.” And in a flash, he lets me see him. Not the caricature that I envisioned of this heartless killer who was somehow also this simp, this romantic, this… fuck boy? Is Lestat a fuck boy? Louis is looking down from the top of the stairs, and I see his back, his perfect fucking hair, Christ, that’s not fair. He turns and smiles the most dazzling fucking smile and tilts his head, swirling it back into place while playing,...is that “Ashes to Ashes?” Jesus, you can see why everybody fell for that insane Adonis jaw, but the guy’s got to be an ass. Has to be. Wouldn’t be right if he isn’t the biggest asshole to walk the earth.

“How is month 7 of bliss?”

“We are well.” I can hear the smug smile as he closes his mind off again.

“Renovations on the house going well? I heard you purchased some insane Audubon, what “Blue Heron”? And possibly a painting of Marie Laveau?”

“ “ Rare Portrait of Creole Woman” is not Laveau.” I take off my sunglasses and I try as hard as I can to stand behind this garbage truck. If anyone told me 7 months ago I’d be hiding behind a damned garbage truck in the middle of Geneva trying to pick up the scent of my 500 year old….Is Armand a fuck boy?

“It’s not her? Hun…. But yooou know who is it.”

“I would know my grandmother anywhere. And yes, the Audubon was more than usual, but I also purchased a picture for very little that no one has heard of.” I mean, there is something there; it might be him. Screw him for bouncing images of himself off of people. There are over 35,000 Starbucks all over the world. You know how many Google Maps I have looked at? Most of the menus are in English, so that narrows down nothing. It’s been weeks now. At least I narrowed his most recent images to Switzerland.

“Except yooooou, right Louis?”

“Except me. It is actually unsigned. But I am sure I know who painted it, in the late 1850s, of his cousin Norbitt, done when they both lived in Paris.” No shit.

“Jesus, are you related to Edgar Degas and Norbert Rillieux ?

“Ah, so you know your Degas! Look at you! And no, I am not related to either, but I have a cousin on my mother’s side who is. Who… was.” Color me unsurprised. I adjust my glasses and try to pull my collar up as high as it will go.

“Of couuuuurse you do. Everyone in New Orleans is related to each other through 6 degrees of bullshit.  Look Louis, I didn’t call to talk art.” There is certainly someone here, but there is something off about that heartbeat.

“Really, you could have fooled me.” I could not fool your ass for a second, Du Lac.

“No, I called to talk business.” And here is the big fuck you, buddy. This is going to suck.

 “Art is business, Daniel.” The sneering laugh. Smug again, sounds more like the taunting Louis that I met when I first got to Dubai. Not the Louis that opened up, cried, shared his world. How quickly that shield goes up.

“Yeah, talk my business, not yours.” Rip the fucking band-aid off for him, old man…. Wait, the heartbeat, is there another?

“Literature? Are you writing again Daniel?”

“I am, sort of.” Or I did, sort of.

“Fiction?” Not by a long shot. Fuck.

“No, decidedly non-fiction, but I think it will be considered fiction.” He is going to make me say these words, isn’t he? Come on, Louis, put two and two together.

Armand didn’t stay around long enough for me to recognize his heartbeat. Is that him? Is he with someone else?

“What’s the topic? Old man’s retrospective on his life? ”

“Says the man pushing 150.” Asshole. I don’t want to leave my spot here behind this truck, but I am going to have to get a closer look.

“Ah, be kind there, hope you make it to my age.” And I should be kind because he’s the only damned undead friend I have. What an irony. 50 years ago, he tried to kill me, and today he’s my only fucking friend. 

“ Yeah, it’s not looking so great at the rate I’m going. But no, maybe not fiction, ah, maybe it’ll come off that way though.” If we are lucky.

“So what is the topic of esteemed journalist Daniel Malloy’s next book?” At least he’s smiling now. I can hear it. He won’t be reeeeal soon. Is he going to kill me, for real this time? Can he do that over the phone? Ok, Malloy, it is now or never.

“My publisher has a copy of the interview.” By my publisher, I mean the one that Reglan had the Talamasca set my editor up with. 

“He WHAT?” Annnnddd I’m gonna be dead, again. But, on a brighter note, that New Orleans accent is back! 

“Yeah, I had… I had a backup of it, well, most of it, the interviews at least, and some of my notes, and he read my transcriptions.” I mean, especially the ones I had been sending to him and Reglan…

<Silence>

“Look Louis, I know what the NDA said, but the moment I talked to that jackoff from the Talamascea, they… they warned me. I started converting the audio to transcripts. It was on a shared drive, I didn’t really think he would read it unless something happened to me. It was more… insurance, you know, in case…. Anyway, he read over some of it, and most of my notes and…” and the edits he suggested, and the ones I suggested. Memory is a monster, but so are editors.

“Daniel”  The first heartbeat is slower. Slower than Armand’s probably, feels older. But the second one. Who the hell is he with? And is it sad that my first thought was ‘I’m gonna kill them’. But I can’t see into the damned Starbucks any better from my vantage point behind this glass train stop, and I sure as hell don’t want to get any closer. Not yet.

“Evidently, he started reading it as I was transcribing, but then listened to some of the audio as well.” The ones I sent him, the ones about Lestat turning you, about how you made your bloodsucking family.

“Danielllll”

“Look, the truth is he thinks it’s all a sham, you know, that I went to Dubai for vacation, had an actor friend tell this really elaborate story...” And he thinks it’s the best piece of fucking fiction ever and the publisher wants a three-book deal,….But I can save that nugget.

“Dan-iel…”

“Which actually, makes for a cool story, you know. Horror Metafiction. Sort of like how House of Leaves pretends to be real, like Cabin in the Woods, but it’s clearly not metafiction.” The names have NOT been changed to protect the innocent, and I’m going to have a hell of a time convincing them to do that. 

“Clearly.”

“Yeah, but it could be not… real. It could be read as fiction. Like a gimmick. Like Blair Witch. ” Like I add a bunch of shit to it that makes enough of it seem like bullshit, and I make an assload of money and you keep your fucking life in tack.

“We had an NDA and a handsome payment….” 

“Yeah well, nowhere in that NDA was a 'if I get made into a vampire’ clause, and I’m pretty sure you all violated it way before me talking to my editor.” Or maybe when you let me out of that apartment, beat up and mind bent in 1973. Or when he followed me to New Orleans to find Lestat. Then Lisbon, Berlin, Prague, Switzerland, Paris, Venice, England….New York in ‘81. Or 83 in Florida. I ran away for most of 84, but he keeps finding me, etcetera, etcetera.

“Daniel.” So, for a moment -fuck you and thank you at the same time for both ruining my life and giving me the best fucking life, even if I didn’t remember it until a few months ago, is what I should say. So maybe this is selfish.

“And I got an advance that was about 5 times what you paid me if I wrote it for an audience of one.” Ok, definitely this is selfish.

“You didn’t.” Nah pal, I did. We both did. We are going to be in so much shit for this.

“See, I thought you were going to say my name a different way than the last 4. Daniel. Danielll. Dan-iel. Dan-”

“Cut the crap Malloy.” Pissy, pissy, you are mad for another reason… and it rhymes with tit for tat. Well that ain’t on me.

“See, that’s the thing. I’m not Malloy anymore. Not sure that I ever was, but certainly not after 1973. That guy’s only ever existed on dust-covers. And I think you owe me this one.” I take a step out from behind the train stop. So fine, he’s with someone else. It’s fine, it’s whatever. But he keeps projecting these images and calling for me to find him, and I owe him a little of his own stalker medicine. 

“I owe you?”

“Yeah, again, I sort of left the penthouse in a totally different state than when I got there. For the second time in my life.” Being followed for years, sure, cool. Memory erased, fine, whatever. Fucking becoming a vampire? Theeeeer’s a price to pay here and this,... this has nothing to do with an NDA or money.

“And Armand turning you is my fault?” I reach out again, and the heartbeats are faint. I should move, I should go after them. Damn it.

“No offense, but you invited me, waxed poetic about your ex being the most amazing thing since sliced bread in front of your, what’d you say, love of your life or some shit? When you found out Armand was stale and full of mold, you dumped your one true blah blah blah for your actual one true blah blah blah and left me with a really pissed off vampire.”

“I told him not to-”

“Yeah well, I told my editor not to read anything either. Look, I know what you said to him this time, Louis. I was there and I remember it. Funny thing, though, I was the one who outed him, so… He was pissed at you, but I was not his favorite person at that moment either. You wouldn’t be with Frenchy, and I wouldn’t be a member of the Undead hiding behind a train stop in Geneva if I hadn’t. And if you hadn’t mailed me, I’d still be in my apartment, living my peaceful life.”

“Dying a slow death.” But still fucking alive, chief.

“Look, there’s… there’s more to it than all that.” A… a lot more. Sorry, friend.

<Silence>

“He fucked with you, but he also fucked with me. A lot. More than in San Francisco. More than just 1973. Lots, lots more. And it’s radio fucking silence now. You told me your crazy ass life story in 1973 to piss off your maker, so-” and I feel no more heartbeats. Did I mess this up? I waited, didn’t I? I should have…just followed and talked to Louis later. 

“So you get to use me as a patsy to piss off yours in 2022?” I mean, collateral damage. You understand the damned Vampire Bond bullshit, right? Is that the story we are sticking with? I put my glasses back on and look around. Good, no one has watched me stand stark still behind this train stop with near murderous thoughts at a second heartbeat next to whoever that was that was not Armand. The sun rises in 20 minutes. I can hit the next Starbucks, it’s close enough and it opens in 5.

“Louis, let me ask you a question. Why did you reach out to me? Why did you mail me after all of those years? Really?  Hell, why did you ever tell me your story if it was never meant to be published in the first place? ” Because it was never about the vampire bond, buddy.

“To set the story straight.” It was about way more than a bond.

“For who? For you? Because I didn’t remember much about any of those nights before that letter and the box arrived. Hell, I listened to those tapes, I recognized my voice, and still didn’t remember much. But you and he remembered. Who were you setting the story straight for?” Starts wth an L-

<Silence> ends with a Brat.

“Come on, Louis, I listened to every moment of those tapes twice before I set out for Dubai. You went on and on about what an ass Lestat was in 1973, he was cruel, he was manipulative. Treated you like shit so badly that you had to go on and on about it for days 6 decades after it happened. Another 50 years later, and you had all of this clarity, hindsight, et al. Right, ‘let the tale seduce you… like I was seduced.’ You praise him and admit you were in love with him in front of your current partner for days on end. Literally said it was the best sex you’d ever have and graphically described it in details that held nothing back and let all of us know how important it was. Told him that you dreamt about Lestat the whole time you were together- there were 3 people in that relationship, and one of them existed in your head. Shit, you damned near told him the only reason you brought him to Magnus’ lair was to piss off Lestat, not to actually be with him. So you either did it to hurt Armand or did it to hurt Lest-.” 

“He suggested you.” Oh. I stopped in my tracks. Literally, I stop walking, and a guy nearly runs into me as I rush across the street. The light sky is too light, and I need to get off of these streets now.

“Why.” It was a command and not a question. This changes shit.

“Because things were… things were… they were dead between us, Daniel, had been for a long time. I think he wanted me to retell the story to see how I would reimagine Lestat- move passed it all, close a chapter before you, well… In the telling of it, maybe he wanted to see if I would tell the same tale, or see who would be my savior, praise him, close a chapter,  fight to get him back. ” I would say zero chance of that.

“Louis, he has been following me for years.” Ok, more than follow. Like, way, way more. A whole lifetime of more.

“I assumed.” As well you fucking should, Sherlock.

“ So, no offence, but I don’t think he wanted to reignite the flames with you.”

“In light of everything, probably not, but that’s not the premise that I was operating under when I reached out.” The sun still has a few moments to break the plane, and I am closing on the last Starbucks I can hit. It hits me that Armand created a manipulated reality for both of us. And that I am the unwitting side piece to my only Undead friend. I force myself to switch the hand I am carrying the phone with and enter this damned Coffeeshop.

“What, tell me your whole story. Use me as a therapist? Kill me, and all’s well that ends well?” More like King Lear with my daughters . Or Prospero “ W e are such stuff as dreams are made on; and our little life is rounded with a sleep.” Or maybe not so with us.

“No, he wanted to kill you in 1973. He didn’t expect me to actually be interviewed, didn’t expect me to talk about Lestat. Thought I would take you up, fuck you, suck you dry, move on. He was angry at me when he saw you alive, angry when he heard that I was actually giving you the time of day. But it was easier to be angry at you- you opened the old wounds, not at me, certainly no, creating cracks in his story. He tried but, I stopped him. There was something about… how you saw me, how you listened. How you wanted what I had, said I missed the point when I thought you did. In 2022? He knew damn good and well I wouldn’t let things go down like they did then. He pretended to tolerate you, but, in the end, I think you were.... He wanted to bring you back to get rid of me, I think. Wanted me to turn you.”

“I was your replacement.” His official replacement. To finally be his official companion. 

“If I died. Or if I walked out. Or if they came after me. Or if he did. I didn’t see it then, but I think that was his plan. He knew you were sick and that you didn’t, or that he didn’t, have much time left. And we'd been over for years, held together by circumstance and complacency. Maybe he thought we could be our own little family, a mighty threesome until I was killed for my story, drifted away, or burned myself up again.” Jesus H. Christ.

“And you? What was your plan?”

“Find peace. Live my truth. Confess my sins. Purge my conscience.” Utter some bullshit. Pretend it’s real. Deny your true self, again.

“Get back to Lestat?”

“In 1973, I wanted him to come and fight with me, I wanted to feel something because I felt nothing for so long, wanted something before I just died. In 2022, I… I wanted to maybe tell him goodbye before I did the same.”

“You were suicidal?”  Utter some bullshit. Pretend it’s real. Deny your true self, the remix.

“Maybe. I think I have been on some level in one form, one reason or another for years, maybe my whole life. Repression, rejection, obsession, compliance. I lived a dangerous life as a human. Maybe I didn’t want to actively end it as much as I wanted someone else to do it for me. But I wanted to feel something that one last time. I wanted to know it ended with nothing undone. Left a more accurate account of what had happened, I…I owed him that, both of them. Shit, my life ended the last time I saw him. My life ended when hers did. I spend days telling you about them and spent, what, less than 10 minutes covering Armand.” All I had to do was turn this corner. Less than 10 minutes until sun time.

“Yeah, a simple ‘how I turned into a vampire’ story became a therapy session of your first marriage in front of your second husband. Certainly had a death wish talking about how good Lestat was in bed in front of Armand.” I stand here at last and hear…nothing. No Undead heartbeat at all. Fuck.

“It was spite, I suppose, no different than kissing him in front of Lestat. Except I didn’t even need a person to try to make Armand jealous, just a memory. It had come to an end.” 

“I think there is one other thing.” Ok, there are lots of other things. One at a time, Malloy.

“Which is?”

“I think you needed to know it was ok to love someone, still after all those years, who hurt you. I think you needed to know it was ok that you loved him more than her, more than Armand, more than anyone, even after everything. I think you felt awful for what you did to him, what you two did to each other, how it affected her, and to reconcile with the fact that you were still in love with someone who was responsible for breaking your heart even after all those years. And that maybe, if you two hadn’t fucked it up so good, maybe she would still be here even if it were not with you two. You were asking permission, not from me, really, you were writing your manifesto of justification.” He takes a long pause.

“That is possible.”

“And if you could convince me, if I could say, yeah, I get it, he was a shit, he was an ass, toxic, terrible, but cool, you loved him, it’s ok that you did, you could end it all in peace.” I am trying to make it back to the hotel before I turn into a walking torch

“I’m not wholly sure I wanted to die...”

“No, you just didn’t want to keep on existing, at least not like that. Like those guys who, what do they call it, death by cop? If I just do this terrible thing- admit I am still in love with Lestat as Armand watched me helplessly, tell the world the secrets of all vampires, write about Lestat just slanderous enough so he comes for me, or give enough detail that it pisses others off, then, then maybe someone will stop this pain.”

< Silence> Bingo!

“Sorry, I don’t mean to hit a nerve, man. It’s just, I heard my own voice on those tapes, heard myself, and I didn’t recognize it. I knew something had happened that changed me, and I had no recollection of it. So either you were insane, or I was, but I had to know. And in the end, would you look at that, neither of us was insane. Just broken. So, look, I am going to publish it. I am going to change the names, alter events, no ‘Mind Gift’ or ‘Cloud Gift’ or hell, even Christmas gift, just present it as meta-fact-ion and let people think it of it as some cutting edge art. Armand can be my bad guy, piss him off so he comes for me, finally. No one will know it is real.” Because he needs to come for me, or at least, stay still long enough for me to catch him. And I zip right into the hotel with only a few minutes to spare

“Well, some of them will know it is.”

“Who Sam, Real Rashid, Reglan, I can change those names-”

“Lestat.” Well then, that sucks to be you.

“Well, I mean, yeah…” Yeah. Because I can change the names and change a lot of shit, but what I can’t change, what will never change, was, what did she say? Was the torrid love affair of the two of you…”

“I was not always…. complimentary.”

“No, you were honest.” Maybe. Maybe not at first, maybe you got more honest as you went. Maybe he’s not a monster, and you were. Maybe it was her. Maybe it was Armand. Shit, it could be me. 

“Was I? Really? I was tainted, I was altered, wasn’t really my version in the end.” I carefully close the curtain in my room. Blackout curtains are amazing and so much better than sleeping in the fucking dirt. Or in the shower or the closet. No more closets for me.  But the best part of this room at the Fraisier Suites it that I can close off the bedroom from the rest of the suites with this dark glass door. Absolutely dark. 

“But wasn’t it? Didn’t those things happen, the way they happened, weren’t those events real?”

“Yeah. Yeah, most of them, but I wasn’t blameless. The way I tole it…how I painted it…I, maybe I colored things. Maybe I saw it through the lens that Armand had created. Or Lestat….”

“Spoken like a true victim. Look, my honest advice, friend to friend, or whatever the hell this is, use this as a starting point. Now you know you have been fucked with by Armand- which you didn’t know at the start of our interview. Now you know how much Lestat means to you- which you probably did know at the start of our interview. And how much you really mean to him- which you probably knew, but were in some sort of sick abnegation. Figure out what is real, rediscover what parts were worth keeping, and move past the bullshit. The two of you rewrite the rest.”

“You think I should tell him?” Jesus, had his man learned nothing about keeping secrets?

“I mean, he knows you did it, right? Just, blame me. Tell him I’m an ass and I’m publishing it to try to get back at Armand. I’ll add some details, change the names to protect the innocent,  make Frenchy look not quite as crazy as he is.” Hard fucking task…

“Daniel…, don’t change names, don’t change any of it.” NO. SHIT.

NO.

SHIT.

“What do you mean? I have to change it some. Even if you come to peace with Lestat about it, the others are going to know.” Like the two that I just caught a wiff of outside of that Starbucks that were decidedly not Armand. I put the phone on the charger and sit on the side of the bed.  

“Let them.”

“What?”

“ Armand crafted a universe himself, and in a million ways I did, too. And I’m not saying that as a recovering victim, not just as someone who had their child die over this. I have been a pawn in his game as much as you have been. But also in Lestat’s, Claudia’s, all of them. And I played them like a game master just as well. Sometimes you reap what you sow. And I am going to have to do that, too. You don’t have to write him as a villain, Daniel. If he is read like one, well, then maybe it’s because he is one.”

“Buddy, you have no idea the shit that he did to me.” Hell, I’m not 100% sure I know that shit that he did to me.

“I don’t know that I want to know, no offense. Or maybe, more than I don’t want to know now. Or that I can’t, not yet. It’s not that I don’t want to afford you the same ear that you afforded me, it’s just, I am not prepared for it today.”

“And what happens to the others if we keep this shit too close, too real? Those nameless faces out there, they’ll know this is not some crack-out speculative fiction. They’ll know. We don’t just expose him or us, we expose everyone of us.” Because sure as I am standing here with my metaphorical dick in my hand, they will come.

“I am infinitely more worried about Lestat, but keep what you have, I want to prove a point.”

“I don’t think this is the right climate or, I mean, people are coming off of a bad time. Do you listen to their voices, or are you so neck deep in dick that you don’t hear them? Covid killed vampires because there weren’t people out- like, at least during the plagues, some of them went out because they didn’t know better. But the last few years? Died off because of starvation, buried themselves, sustained themselves on rats and dogs alone. They are in as bad a shape as humans. And this is before we publish.” I kick my shoes off and lie down. Geneva has been a bust. But I’m sure as I sleep, he will send pictures of himself. Probably in Mongolia by now, asshole.

“Those two weeks changed, opened, maybe transformed me. I am different than I was when we met in 1973, I am different than five months ago. Besides, did you call me to warn me it was going to be published, to get my permission, or to have me fight to get it killed?” Oooffff. Touche.

“Ah, yes. Yeah. All of the above.”

“Daniel...”

  “Look, it is going to come out. But I can control how it comes out. I can change it, save the innocent, and the not so innocent. Make it enough that it is discernible…”

“Nah, it’s my life, for better or worse. Leave it in it’s raw ugliness. Let it be a lesson, I guess, for whoever. Claudia’s own Sonnet 18.”

“Sonnet 18?”

“Shall I compare thee to a-” 

“Yeah I know it. Pretty shitty to dedicate a sonnet about a summer’s day to a dead vampire.” Then I remembered what Louis had said, ‘Claudia in an impossible afternoon light, Claudia as Madeline perceived her….’

“ ‘So long as men can breathe and eyes can see, so long lives this, and this gives life to thee.’ ” It is was even worse than I thought. Not just a version of Claudia loved, but an eternal Claudia for the world to love. A Claudia cast in word and sentence, scripted and carved by Louis. An Elegy to the Vampire. Not a bad working title.

“Giving the not so immortal beloved her immortality back by publishing her story?”

“It’s as much her’s as it is mine. Seems the least I can do for her.”

Notes:

James Audubon lived in Louisiana for a number of years following the Battle of New Orleans. His Great Blue Heron is one of his more famous works.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portrait_of_a_Creole_Woman_with_Madras_Tignon

Edgar Dugas also spent time in New Orleans. His mother was a native and his father and brother both lived here for extended time. He was cousins with the famous Creole Norbert Rilleaux, one of the first chemical engineers in America. Rilleaux's father and Degas' mother were cousins. Rilleaux's mother was an gens de couleur libres in a plaçage or a mariages de la main gauche ( a left handed marriage) with Rilleaux white father which was a common mixed race common law marriage. They were supposed to be extralegal, but many in New Orleans shared the exact same rights as any marriage of that time.

Prospero from his famous speech in "The Tempest" from Act IV, Scene 1. I honestly like it better than King Lear even though Daniel like Lear and Marius more like Prospero

I used this amazing DM timeline for a reference- https://cup-of-lixx.tumblr.com/post/708560197794299904/devils-minion-timeline-by-lixx

Chapter 18: House of the Rising Sun

Summary:

I knew it was inevitable, that he must return to clean up the broken pieces of his former life, to salvage what little good still resides there, tie up loose ends as it were.  I know that he has much to do, much to say goodbye to. I understand all of these things, naturally (of course he did not want to be with me, it was fine). But it does not change the fact, that I am here whilst he is there.

The average high in Auvergne is about 21C. That translates into roughly 70F. New Orleans’ average low is 23C, meaning its coldest was the warmest I knew as a child. Humidity peaked in the winter months to make snow and my hair looked beautiful. It never, never looked like… this. This straw, this mop, where are my curls? 

So I wear it back during the summer.

Loneliness is the worst thing that can happen to a vampire, yes. What this weather does to my hair may well be the second worst thing. Fine, it is the third worst.
Louis is in Dubai. 

I knew it was inevitable, that he must return to clean up the broken pieces of his former life, to salvage what little good still resides there, tie up loose ends as it were.  I know that he has much to do, much to say goodbye to. I understand all of these things, naturally (of course he did not want to be with me, it was fine). But it does not change the fact, that I am here whilst he is there. He did not want to say it, I know, he wanted it to be an unwritten, unspoken understanding. Je connais. (Just because I know doesn’t mean I want to hear it or speak about…) (Sometimes hearing the words, especially since we are so very unlucky to hear what the other thinks.) (Then again, that might be a good thing that he can not hear all of the things I would have done to the Gre-) But, so of course when he mentioned it off-handed, I made it as if I completely understood, yes, yes, that I agreed, that there was no doubt he should travel back and make sure everything was as exactly whatever it was supposed to be… exactly that he exactly wanted it to be. Exactly. He wanted to make sure that he would (be left alone) have the time while here was there ( away from me), no chance of a surprise reunion, (because I had shown the Gremlin glimpse of mon mari in the particularly private moment to so that we had a clear understanding), no desire to rehash the past (without me), the 70 something years of disappointment and lies ( because there is no way there were any happy times, none, of course), of deception and manipulation (that he has never felt with me.). I know that my Louis is not perfect, that he could be cold and cruel even at times, and that in the past he might have been capable of… freezing someone out. But his want to wait, now, after 8 months, to ensure he would not be disturbed. We discussed it. We…. discuss things now… when you do a thing I feel like a thing. When you say the thing, what I hear is this other thing. Moreover, he feels like enough time has passed. He needed no reassurance from me- wasn’t asking or, or telling, it was a courtesy a, there is this thing and it must be done and I feel it best if I go finally take care of this (Alone). Of course! And I feel fine about it, you should, you must! I encourage you! It will be good! I will miss you but I have things to do here,... to take care of… things… I will fill my time with… these things. Will be occupied. I will not fall apart completely. You know, mostly.

Not dramatically. 

And also I know that Armand knows where he stands. But I did not tell Louis why. And he has talked back and forth with this Daniel and his occasional loud thoughts, who must know something because he seems to also feel that he knows where Armand stands. 
It should be in a bog but it probably is in the second row of a fashion show in Milan.

Or London.

Probably not Paris. 

After his Parisian Catacomb rebirth, he fancies himself a pinnacle of fashion. I suppose we must all have a hobby.

It is a balmy 23C in Paris.

In Dubai it is 40C.

Phones have been a God-sent. I am able to text him and video call, so I can have him in the palm of my hand as I wander down Frenchmen to the Art Market. There is a little club that does a live-action role play that we must do when he returns.

Because he will, he will return. 

The time difference is hard. But he should only be there for a few more… weeks. He is thinking of selling it. Or… or maybe not. He and Armand have houses in different cities. I am not sure how Vampire Divorces work these days. You take Rome’s villa, I will have Jakarta… you take the table, I take the chairs. 

When he left last time, he just… left. Left it all, no matter if they were his books or hers. His clothes, my shoes, our cologne and aftershave.

< It is almost sunrise here and I will have to bed down soon. Got lots done today, paperwork and storage stuff. >
<Feels good to make progress, get some of this shit finally off of my back. Let go of some baggage>

Instead of a picture of Armand with a handle attached to his head as I imagined it, he sends a beautiful picture of dawn. I am not sure how he took it, maybe his Rashaid did it for him.

<That is lovely. It is hot and awful here and it has made a mess of my hair.

 I miss you being sweaty and sticky in coffin with me.>

My picture is of the nighttime 500 block of Frenchmen. We have not explored this pocket of town much, this little island of music and clubs for locals. It’s been evolving for the past 40 years, and gone are The Dream Palace and Cafe Brasil. But Snug Harbor is still there. And somehow the Apple Barrel has managed to last these years as well. This is where live music, real live music, like the kind I first heard when I sailed up the river, still lives.

<Is that Mini Canal Street?>

<It is, but gone are the shops, and now is the music.>

<And you have neglected to bring me here, why?>

 

I walked and texted without looking where I was going and nearly ran into a pair of beautiful young ladies. I smiled and made apologies, explaining I was texting my husband and they cooed and giggled and told me all was forgiven.

<A girl can’t play all of her cards, can she?>

<She sure did that first time.>

He was so beautiful that night, biting his lip. He was already thinking of dirty things he wanted to do with me on our second date….

<And Monsieur fell for it then, hun?

If I showed them all to you now,

would you finally swipe all of those chips off of the table

and take me right there?>

I dip into d.b.a. I do so love this little bar. Felix brought me here a handful of nights when it was so full and loud you neither saw nor heard the petit coup. But on this Wednesday night, it is less crowded. I ask for a 20-year tawny port from their excellent menu. I almost asked for the Lindemann’s Lambic, which I have not had in some time but enjoyed occasionally before I came to America. It is the perfect moment to enjoy a message conversation, not too dark nor too loud, there are no beautiful young ladies to run into.

<I’d take you anywhere you want. Baccarat tables at the Casino, Brennen's at brunch by the window so you can watch people pass as I tap that ass, tarot card table outside of that Cathedral. Hell, push some beignets off and take ya at Cafe du Monde there if you don’t mind having powder sugar all over your dick.> 

A very sordid and lecherous image floods my mind. I actually take a sip of the tawny port before I respond. I do not like the taste, but I will love the feel.

<only if you are willing to drop to your knees after and clean me of sugar.> 

Because that, not just watching Louis not only be who he is, but to feel safe to be who he is in public here with me, that would be the chef’s kiss.

I wanted nothing more than to share my life with him both publicly and privately before and I wonder if there are not times that I am overtly affectionate with him in an attempt to make up for that. Or as retribution for a lack of attention previously displayed. Even though I know, I can intellectualize and rationalize all of the other ‘izes’ that he does love and care for me. Old habits die hard for me and having him act out his want for me now, proving that they were his desires all along, not just that he was complacent and committed behind a door is silly. I know it is silly. But the thought of him looking at me with those big beautiful eyes while his lips are wrapped around me as I fuck his throat, sticky and sugary is an image I will not soon forget.

<I would gladly lick you clean.>

And this is the text at sends me just overboard. That awakes my member and starts the blood flow. How will I leave here, hardened, wanting, and alone for several weeks? 

<I would gladly watch you take every inch of me. >

<Sugar covering your perfect lips makes a tight circle

while you suck me as if your life depended on it. >

Just then a subpar little band takes the stage. Crappy Jazz. And that is how I will leave this bar right now. Because right now, I do not want to think of jazz and a Louis that I could look at but not touch. A Louis that I longed for while dancing with someone else because we could not. No, no reminders of then when we are solidly moving to now.

I stood and pushed my member down. The things just a few choice words and an image I conjure up could do to me! Even with him thousands of miles away, I feel closer than some of the nights we had shared together. And even though myriad little snippets of that life flashed before me, moments of joy with Claudia, moments of coldness from Louis, I kept moving forward. I am grateful for what we had. But I am looking forward to growing into what we have yet to become.

<Why you doing this to me, honey?

It’s 6 am and I have to jerk off like a teenager before I go to bed

because I can’t be there next to you.>

I took a picture of what I hoped was my sad face with puppy eyes. Eyes that said, so sorry you could have stayed with me. Or you could have let me come and help. Or make sure that you were really alone. But I know that he must be because if Armand were near, he would have reveled in showing me pictures of my beloved. I am quiet as I stand outside of the bar. No, I do not hear Armand in the din of humanity. I pick up words from near and far. Different tongues, different desires. Hungry, angry, longing, loss. Humans, vampires, others. But none are in Gremlinese.

< Or you could wait and save all of your aggressions for when you see me next>.

I dash across the street to the Arts Market. There is soap and paintings. One jewelry artist catches my eye. She makes chokers and beautiful necklaces with butterflies. I notice out of the corner of my eye a fetching beaded necklace. It is made entirely of beautiful little beads.

“Those are natural faceted garnets,” the artist says. They make a lovely necklace, but it will not fit me the way I want to.

“Can you make it in small natural rubies? Like a choker but with beads from only” and as I pointed to my neck at the exact spot of my second death, the band that had been tuning began to play. I spoke louder, talking to the sales clerk, but the band began to play a tune I was familiar with.

“My mother was a tailor
She sewed my new blue jeans
And my father was a gamblin' man
Way down in New Orleans”

The artist nods while jotting down some notes. Her first thought was that I was insane, trying to trick her out of money. I opened my wallet to put 5 hundred dollar bills in her hand with a quick message that I was very much serious. She procured her tape measure and began to drap it around my scar.

“And the only thing a gambler needs
Is a suitcase and a trunk
And the only time he's satisfied
Is when he's a drunk”

“Do you want them just covering the scar?” I smile. Surely Louis will not find this as funny as I do, maybe I shall wait a while before I wear it. I hear the band again, the singer’s low voice, raw but melodious nonetheless. The female’s crisp harmony as the chorus kicks in.

“Oh, mother, tell your children
Not to do what I have done
To spend your lives in sin and misery
In the house of the rising sun”

It was a song I knew well. Antionette sang it may times at the Azalea, although the lyrics were slightly different then. It did not become popular until long after Basin and Liberty had cleaned their act, Basin given a new name to clean its wanton image. But there was something about how they played, about the soulful sound in such a young voice, about how clear the harmony sounded with it. I quickly finished my business, leaving my calling card which now contained my cellular phone number and email address and wandered over to the makeshift stage.

“I got one foot on the platform
And another on the train…”

There were but three of them. The boys looked similar around the eyes and mouth, related, cousins perhaps or brothers. The drummer’s hair a darker version of the same lazy waves of the singer. He was the older, the one who seemed to take the lead. The girl, not much more than 25 or so, had bleached and dyed her hair a now faded blue. Or… was it green? She was petit with a look that screamed to not mess with her, that contrary to her frame, she was a force. She was no longer Emily and she wanted to let you know it. 

“And I'm going back to New Orleans
To wear that ball and chain”

They were nervous but obviously talented. I stood alone, watching them. I was enchanted by the rough rock sound, so different than the last time I heard this very song. They were completely happy, this was the best gig they had gotten in the 4 months they had been together the drummer though. The guitarist felt like this was going well. Playing cover songs, but Larry, the younger guitarist,  had written a song and was too embarrassed to share it with the others.

Enchanting. 

I just could not stop myself. I just had to. Honestly, some days I had no control. Which was something I have struggled to control since I was a young man. And so when they sang, I simply had to sing along.

“There is a house in New Orleans
They call the Rising Sun
And it's been the ruin of many a poor boy
Dear God, I know I was one
Dear God, I know I was the one”

The smile on the girl’s face, Cookie, was huge as I whistled and others politely clapped. A couple had stopped when I began to sing and three friends, watching the spectacle before them.

“Hey man, that’s some good pipes you have there!” the drummer, Alex, stood up and said.

“Oh, I have dabbled once and again with singing. Once recorded a song, but,... it was for an audience of one.”

“Seriously? What was it?” I took a few steps forward. I was under a spell that I had not felt in some time.

“Oh, an original, one I wrote for my husband, although, at the time, we were going through a rough patch.”

“No shit!” The Cookie looked like she was about to explode. “You were incredible! Like you were born to do this!” No, I was born to be the back up to the back up to the back up of a poor and desperate Marquis whose lands were in ruins over a century before I was born. But I digress. “You ever think about singing again?”

Did I ever think about singing again….

“On occasion, when the mood moves me. I was classically trained, but I enjoy jazz and some rock.”

“You wanna sing with us?!?” Larry looked hurt for a second, but the Cookie’s enthusiasm was shared with Alex.

“I might. If the sound is right and the music is right.”

“Like what music?” Larry relented. He was both relieved to not have to sing and slightly hurt that my voice was, well…you know. I have had over two centuries to practice, which is hardly fair for him to compare himself to.

“Do you know “Hello, I Love You” by The Doors?”

I did not see that I had two missed texts and a call from Louis until I left Satan’s Night Out at Molly’s well after 3am.

Notes:

Yes New Orleans cold is sometimes Auvergne hot. The high tomorrow is 81. It is March.
Frenchmen St is close to the Quarter and really mostly locals. Don Lemon used to do his very drunk New Year's broadcasts there. He's from Baton Rouge... so... as far as we are concerned not REALLY a local.
All of the names of the bars and restaurants is true. I have a Great- Great Uncle that still occasionally plays at Snug Harbor. He is in his early 80s. But the Jazz in that area is hard to beat.
d.b.a. used to have the most amazing menu of drinks when it first opened, and way less music. It was a good spot to stop and talk on that strip.
Brennen's is the brunch spot to go if you are in the know ( and have the money to blow). They invented Bananas Foster. Which if you have had, so make you some. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bananas_Foster
Do I have to Cafe Du Monde again?

"House of the Rising Sun" was not written in NOLA. It was based on an old English Drinking song. But somehow, we got tangled in the mess. A brothel, in New Orleans, you don't say. I had to use it, it was just a matter of time. The most popular version was The Animals in the 60s, but here is my favorite from Jazz Fest 2 years ago.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1K0QN8xy1kM
The Azalea- It is azalea season in New Orleans. Bloom 1 is just falling off of my bushes. They are amazing even if the bloom only lasts a few weeks- https://www.thenewsstar.com/story/life/deltastyle/2018/03/07/splendor-spring-profusion-azaleas-louisiana-landscapes/336920002/
Basin and Liberty were the main streets of Storyville and Black Storyville. Basin Street Blues is also an amazing song.

Chapter 19: Who is Louis?

Summary:

My phone buzzes. It’s Lestat. He hadn’t called me last night because something is wrong, something that I don’t know but am so fucking afraid for because I am raw and new and full of him and I am terrified of the bottom droppin out again. I watched that little dot on my phone's map go from our house to Mid-City again and then to the bar more than once last week.What, she work at the bar? She live in Mid-City? Not home when I wake, not home before I sleep.

I just came back to him and….. Not gone but for a few weeks and…he just can’t fuckin help it, can he. Always got to have somebody to entertain. My fuckin coffin not even cold.
***********
Author's note
I have one more comprehensive Exam before I am done with Grad School. I have 6 more chapters to edit. I'mma be strong, but French Quater Fest is next weekend and I make no promises to have it done before June.
Wish me luck!
It's midnight in NOLA, I'll post my endnotes tomorrow. I am tired, me.

       The thing is, there is something. There is something and I don’t know what it is. I’m afraid I know what it is. I hope to hell I’m wrong. But there is certainly something. And I am tryin real hard to not let that green monster stir in me, but….. 

I gotta stop. Breathe.

   Fareed stops by while I am going through boxes of papers with a new supply of blood and an ass ton a question. There had been a NDA, there is always an NDA, but some humans get close, get comfortable, the NDA can become useless. And other measures have to take place. 

   Where had Daniel gone? What happens to someone who has an illness such as his when they become a vampire? If your hair doesn’t really grow, then can old scares heal? What happens if something happens to this body, a finger for instance gets cut off? If vampires can’t reproduce, what is in their seminal fluid? Could they invetro? Tears are blood, but why isn’t salava? Do vampires have ear wax?

   A thank you card from Princess Maria-Anunciata of Liechtenstein from a gift for her wedding. In my keep box.

   It was the last one that taxed my final nerve. Because, how the hell am I supposed to know if female vampires were menstrual, or if they needed more blood during their cycle,  and do they always- Man! We didn’t talk about shit like that growing up! I just knew it was my sister’s time for her visitor to come even though Paul and I ain’t never seen one. I was the only vampire Fareed knew, I mean besides…. 

   Armand wouldn’t have been honest. And who the fuck knew where he was anyway and honesty I was not about to try and find him. You gotta scrape 10% of the top of any story with Lestat as pure bullshit; who knew what, if any of that, was real. Maybe hyperbole. Or just a crazy sounding tale and then, like, 70 years later, you find out that all that shit was true. The damned fly Marquis d’Auvergne, owner of a castle, founder of a theater of vampires, wolf killer and some shit about the Queen of the Damned- no, best not to let Fareed anywhere near Lestat.

   A program from Mary Bevan’s 2019 concert. I sat there while she sang “Ch'io mi scordi di te?” shaking. Did Armand even notice my tears as she sang Non temer, amato bene, per te sempre il cor sarà.”? Throw away pile.

   And there are, other reasons to not let him near Lestat.

   Stop your self, Louis. Don’t let….

   You see, the time difference is awful. Was always gone be awful. I’m rising, he’s setting. His eyes poppin open, mine slammin shut. But I felt like it wasn’t fair. I had led a tangled life these past 7 decades. I own this, he owns that. Dubai is mine, should I sell it? Keep it because it is secure as hell (well from anyone who isn’t Armand. Or who can’t apparently fucking fly.) So we liqudate things, and we sell things. I take the Renoirs and you have the polo ponies and the stables because they remind you of your childhood. The books are easy, but not when there are books in my houses, in your houses, in “who knows who is going to own the apartment in Bangkok's” house. Things needed to be moved, arranged.

   I pick up a receipt from a suit he bought for Sole DXB three years ago. Throw away pile.

   Roget had been my law firm since the day I walked in and asked if Lestat was still alive. Actually, I hadn’t known it, but Roget and Albert had been my firm even before that. They understood certain…pecularatires about our lives. Surely there were other firms in the word that had clients like me. But I never asked Armand who he used, or about anyone else. Just “my lawyers.” 

   And insurance policy on the house in Montreal he sold two years ago. Legal paper work pile.

    You take the Rolls and I’ll take the Bentley.

    I’ve never like the house in Monaco, but I have always loved the Lake Como house. You take the Lürssen, it reminds me too much of traveling to Europe. I want the Night Island.

    Did Lestat need to be involved in all of that unpleasantness? 

   When you are creating a life, you never thing about how it could unravel. The easy stuff, the hard stuff. You’re weaving, not thinking about how tangled it could all get with the slightest snag. Getting a divorce was bad enough, I'm really trying hard not to have a second one so soon but (can you consider divorcing somebody you've already divorced once? I mean is that what really happened?) Because I have been honest, up until a point. Does he need to know the dirty details? Does he need to see the socks and underwear still left in the drawer that had to be boxed. The dildo that I will certainly never touch again being tossed out. This is, private. And I feel like it should be because I am closing this door. Ending this part of my life. But it was mine, not mine and Lestat’s. I have put this off long enough. Whatta they say, clean out the old makes room for the new. Or… new again.

   When I walked out a these doors, I never considered this moment. I only thought that I had to get to Lestat. Not having to sort through the last few years of my life. Never considered the catch in his voice because he missed me while I had to organize my shell of a life into piles. How I couldn’t find his scent anywhere but was hit by a wave of Armand whenever I entered the closet. 

   I knew I shouldn’t have jumped back so fast. I had shit to take care of. I knew it. But, but he's like a drug and you see here in Dubai, there are no drugs. None to take. None to fill myself with. Dubai had for years been my methadone- it was a way to get me off my fix, numbing my pain and helping me wean hallucinations. Only moments of sadness, not weeks. It was better for me. Or maybe not. Maybe instead of looking at Lestat as a drug, he was my medicine. Just what the Doctor ordered. Maybe last time it was the wrong dose, the wrong strength. Because now my euphoria feels real and grounded. Like I’m Goldilocks and he’s just right. Here I am surrounded by cold and empty, it's just, it's just sterile and sober. What did I say, being suffocated by the beighest, softest pillow. I shoulda gotten my shit together first because here there's no Lestat to breathe, there's no Lestat to feel, there's nothing. It's just me. Nothing.

   A consignment agreement for “Love and Pain,” by Munch. Keep pile.

   And I stop before I pick up the next meaningless piece  of paper from the meaningless stack from my life and wonder for a second, is this what it would have been like if I told him I needed time and I didn't move in? Apart but wanting? Or if I got on a plane, flew to New Orleans and told him I miss you, but I have to be by myself now?  Or if I jumped on that plane to New Orleans stood in the street in the rain of a hurricane and never went through that door? Never walked up those stairs? Never once told him “hello, I missed you”? Never held him or kissed him. Made sure he was ok and come back at a later date, when I had sorted my shit out?

    Because here in Dubai, I ache and everything is sterile My hand hovers over the stack and I think is everything sterile because of Armand? I look at the bed we slept in not touching for years, I look at that art that's on the wall but not mine. That's Armand.

    I stand here, with a shipping contact in my hand for a handful of sketches by Hans Bellmer. They reminded me of the dolls Lestat used to buy for Claudia. Looking back now, I suppose Armand bought them to hurt me. How did I not know? Why did I do nothing? I look at walls I didn't like, paintings I didn't choose and think who the hell is Louis?

     Who, who am I? Because I lived here without ever living here. Am I the pimp livin a dangerous life hopin someday somebody would off me so I didn't have to deal with my own bullshit? The young fledgeling vampire, who lingered in a messed up relationship with a man I could never let go of, but make no attempt to fix? Am I the lonely vampire running around the European countryside trying to justify killing the man I love?  Hoping to make my daughter happy knowing it neither of us would see peace? Or the vampire who lived a pretend life with a pretend man and gets mad when the charade can be ignored no more. 

    Is the problem that I haven't been alone for the past hundred and fourteen years? That I lived and defined myself by someone else my whole life. I have no idea who Louis really is.

    Would that interview have looked the same if Armand was never watching over me? Or if I hadn’t met Daniel before? Would that interview have looked the same in 1973 if I was not fucked in the head? What story would I tell in 1945? What if I wore a different suit?

   I stand in a room that I called a home that was really my coffin for years and it suffocates me now because I see it for what it was all along. A tomb. I am not just disgusted at Armand, I let this happen. I believed his shit because it was easier than being alone. Easier to believe the lie that face my own truth. Because the fear of being alone is…

   What did Lestat say? Loneliness it the worst thing that could happen to a vampire. Yeah, ain’t no one else there to blame your shit on. Just you. Just you and your shit.

   I sit on the floor. 

   I don't know who I am. 

   Not really. I've defined myself by him, by her, by Armand, by Florence, Gracie, Paul, hell even by good ole Alcée even though he’s been dead longer than I have been. 

  Who is Louis?

   I look at the paper in my hand. I can’t ever remember these prints, not in detail. Do I collect art because I love art do I collect art because, because Armand….

   I let the books be out of reach for years and yet made Lestat the villain of my story. And somehow at the same time the hero of my tale. The books were out of my reach for years and I allowed it.

   Who am I? That I let something I love so much be so close but so out of reach. That I allowed her to kill him? I followed her all around Europe chasing after the ghosts of some ideal so that the inevitable of her leaving me would be pushed off a little further. I allowed them to convince me that they loved her, had her best interest in heart. I allowed Madeline to exist, I allowed her to start to leave me. 

   I look down at the paper in my hand with my signature. I signed this. It is my handwriting and yet, who the hell signed this? I stayed with somebody who I knew, I knew I should not have. I knew he was not innocent. It was easier to blame Lestat than Armand or worse myself. Make him culpable and evade any blame. Easier to make him the villain than that face in the mirror. Or face the one that lay next to me for years.

   The hard part about being back here in Dubai is not just that I'm not around the Lestat, hard part about being here in Dubai is that for the first time in a long time that I'm not around Anybody. Armand was always following me, even when he was keeping Daniel. Today, I sit on the floor and know that Lestat is asleep thousands of miles away and I am alone.

   Who the fuck am I?

   I sit there for hours, numb, morning the wasted years. I want to live honestly, because I haven’t for so long and the weight of what I told Lestat has hit me full force. I had not lived honestly in all those year, but have I in these last few months with him? And now that I want to, I have no idea who Louis is, much less how to live....

    My phone buzzes. It’s Lestat. He hadn’t called me last night because something is wrong, something that I don’t know but am so fucking afraid for because I am raw and new and full of him and I am terrified of the bottom droppin out again. I watched that little dot go to Mid-City again and then to the bar more than once What, she work at the bar? She live in Mid-City? Not home when I wake, not home before I sleep.

    I just came back to him and….. Not gone but for a few weeks and…he just can’t fuckin help it, can he. Always got to have somebody to entertain. My fuckin coffin not even cold. 

   Who the fuck am I?

   I pick up the phone to answer it, but I don’t. I check the dot. Still Uptown. At least he’s not spending the night with her. Yet. 

   Who the fuck am I?

    What the fuck is wrong with me? I call him back but he doesn’t answer. Should he have come with me? Would that have changed? Or will it always be this way with us? Do I figure myself out? Or do I continue to let someone else define me? Can I figure out who I am drunk on him? What is so wrong with Louis that I can’t just be who I am. Put the paintings I want up on walls I want, not that someone has picked for me. Decorate how I like. Not we. Me. What… what about me? What about….

    He calls me back.

    “Mon Amour!!! I missed you so!” He is so happy and my heart lurches.

   “Duh Fuck’s Her Name?” He takes a pause, confused, like he don’t know

   “Louis… are you ok?” He sounds gentle but I’ve been played before.

   “I Said, Duh Fuck’s Her Name?” I can feel what would have been bile if I was still alive like it is bubbling.

   “I..I don’t..”

  “Duh Fuck You Don’t! That bitch up on Cleveland and Gayoso?”

   Silence. The longest fucking silence I have ever heard in my whole

   entire

   life.

   “Her name is Tough Cookie, well, not really, legally she is Emily, she’s my… she’s from Satan’s Night Out.” I fucking knew it! I knew it. I fucking…. All along!

  “YOUR WHO FROM SATAN’S FUCKING WHAT? ” I throw something and I have not idea what it is.

   “She is just my keyboardist, my backup singer. From my…my band. Louis, I…. I am so sorry, I…Louis,  I have a band now.”

   “A WHAT? YOU’RE FUCKING A WHOLE BAND?”

   “Fucking? No, no Louis that would mess up the entire vibe of the band, the music. It was already weird for Larry because Alex wanted me to be the lead singer and he had no idea how to tell his brother he was both upset and relieved, and so Cookie had to have this big meeting with everyone and our manager, we have a manager now, and we had to air out all of our feelings before the show last week. It was quite refreshing actually, I used many of the techniques that you suggested about being honest and using ‘I’ statement-”

   “So your just fucking this Cookie??”

  “Louis, mon amour, mon mari. You are the only person to put his hands on me in decades. I fuck no Cookies, only you my little-”

   “Your ass better not say Brow-”

   “Louis Alcée Francis du Pointe du Lac! What has gotten into you?” He hangs up.

   I am heaving and panting, shaking, got somethin balled up in my fist and am damned lucky I didn’t just toss this phone across the room. What has gotten into me? What the fuck is wrong with me?

   Who am I?

   He immediately video calls me. He is at home, Uptown. He is wearing my shirt, his hair done up in a night cap. This dumb motherfucker has cold cream on his face. He’s a fucking vampire with cold cream.

   “Louis! Mon paure baby, what is wrong my love? I have missed you so! I,...do I not call and send you little presents without being too overbearing because I have a tendency to overdo it which makes you anxious and want to run because you are used to taking care of people and don’t know how to react when someone is trying to take care of you, even though both Armand and I very much took care of you because deep down you are little bit of a princess and like to be pampered, but not to a suffocating degree, so that the gifts had to look impromptu and not like I spent hours agonizing over the blue shirt or the green one.”

   “What?”

   “I go with the green always. It brings out your eyes.” He is smiling, with his goofy ass covered in cold cream.

   “What the hell is on your face?”

   “Christine says I should use it because she doesn’t actually believe I am a vampire and thinks I am about to become wrinkled at any moment, ahem, ‘at my age.’ She has a photoshoot scheduled for later in the week.” I am still panting. I need fucking blood. 

   “Christine?” I think my legs are moving towards the kitchen.

   “Our manager. Look, Louis, something is wrong. You are sweating all over that shirt. Which is fine, a new one might already be on its way.” This man is absolutely insane. I open the fridge and grab a bag. Then another. I close my eyes which is fine because everything is slowly closin in anyway and turnin black and I just try to just breathe. I slide down the side of the counter and sit on the floor of a kitchen that was only used for Daniel.

 

“Tu as le coeur à rire, Moi je l’ai-t-à-pleurer.

J’ai perdu ma maîtresse Sans l’avoir mérité.

J’ai perdu ma maîtresse Sans l’avoir mérité.

Pour un bouquet de roses Que je lui refusai.”

 

His voice is that of an angel.

"Pour un bouquet de roses Que je lui refusai.

Je voudrais que la rose Fût encore au rosier.

Je voudrais que la rose Fût encore au rosier.

Et moi et ma maîtresse Dans les mêm’s amitiés.”

 

Jesus I have missed that voice. Then my mind works again and it clicks.

“Lestat, did, did you just come out to me as a musician?”

“I prefer the term rock star, if you would.”

Notes:

I will put my endnotes here at some decent hour on April 6th. For now bonnwi, mi fé dodo.

Chapter 20: Weeping, Like a Child

Summary:

“Yes Daniel, what do you want now?”
I hear from the other side of the apartment. And see! He can have friends! With no jealousy whatsoever. He has Daniel now, the Gremlin’s minion who is somehow now Louis’ problem. Friend, he is his, his friend. Not a problem. A friend who understands exactly what would happen if he misunderstood the nature of that relationship, taking Louis’ understanding, his patience for an adopted fledgling, the first Armand has ever made, even though he has utterly shirked his responsibility, for something more. We can change and grow, can we not?

Notes:

Finals done. Masters secured. Now to finish this!
It's Jazzfest time, the weather is lovely and you could honestly gain weight just looking at the food. I hope Spring is treating you right!
Should be posting closer to weekly until the end. Enjoy!

Put it up, pull it down. Put it up, pull it down. Consider a bob. Make an appointment to have it all cut off. Cancel the appointment. Show up even though you have canceled said appointment. Scare off stylist. Know that she would have probably ruined your hair because she hates blonds. Wire her the money you would have paid her had you gone with said bob. Tip 20%. Consider a man bun. Disregard it because the name is tres stupide. Wear it anyway but call it a chingnon and fasten it as a knot. Waver about using a black silk ribbon.
The absolute mop that is on my head. And I thought my hair looked bad in New Orleans….

Dubai is, well, disappointing. Maybe. 
Yes, it has bars and beaches. Yes, people are beautiful and rich. Yes, it is everything, all of the things, that everyone says Dubai is, certainly.
And yet, it has no soul. 
None.
Whatsoever.
Absolutely not.
Nothing. 

The people here are flavorless. I mean this quite literally, the blood is young and moneyed and stupid and insipid- a word I have honestly only used on one other Grem….person, one other being. A being I honestly thought I could evade just a little longer.

But the Gremlin is everywhere. He haunts this town and he haunts this apartment. No matter where we go there is an anecdote about him, a moment shared. A memory. A bit of reminiscence. Not that it is a positive memory or one that is fond, in fact, many are matter of fact. The purging of one person from the other’s soul. But we are surrounded and I wonder for a moment if this is not what Armand felt for years, living with the ghost of me. 

Except my ghost haunted every moment of their time together and his has only been in the one, singular moment of our lives.

The Armand esthetic of pathic, the victim who places himself just precariously enough to be able to cry out but no long-lasting repercussions, is truly suffocating. This place is brown and dull. I mean, Dubai itself is visually stunning, do not misunderstand me. I wake and look out on the vastness protected by a window that allows me to see the sunrise for the first time in eons. And to see it standing next to mon Louis… this is a happenstance that I only dreamed could be possible thousands of years from now, to hold his hand and feel the heat hit our faces with no true consequence. At night we stand here, talking, taking in the smell of this new modern oasis.

But the rest, ehg…. Full of him. And I suppose, in the background of so much beauty, surrounded by it on all sides, it makes this contrast all the more obvious. All the more drab. The walls are a brownish greyish, blackish- it at once reminds me of Magnus’s lair without the charm of decaying boys. The catacombs of Paris but with a Rembarant here and there. This is an evolved Armand, going from a tomb that is underground to the exact same tomb some 30 stories in the air. Oh, how he has grown all of these centuries.

And what a life my poor Louis has endured.

Have I done a disservice decorating our home at One Canal Place to resemble this too much? This painful reminder….Maybe it is not painful to him. Maybe this was his want. Maybe… maybe I do not know his heart and that in and of itself is enough to make me move away from these beautiful windows, down a corridor to some other shapeless, emotionless room in the catacomb. I have to reconcile the fact that mon Mari lived an entire life, the entire life I was supposed to live with him, with someone else. 

This both saddens me and angers me- in the end, I have no one to blame but myself. I look at the boxes that he has worked these last weeks to pack, sifting through these years, deciding what to discard or keep, labeling them “New Orleans” or “storage”. There are boxes everywhere, the exact same color, style, and size, as if they are just another brown accent piece à ce décor terne . Boxes of bland belts and socks, of bland shoes and wallets, of bland little tailored clothes that could be quite beautiful if they weren’t so very Armand, all shades of brown and grey with no pop of green or red. Which says so much, really. In my fear and loneliness these past few weeks, Louis really has been at work sifting through the remnants of whatever this was. I move a box with my foot before I pick it up from the ground to place it on top of another stack.

“Would you like a drink, some entertainment?” It is Rashid, Real Rashid Daniel calls him. He is nice enough, another addition to my life that is Louis’s. Another reminder that for all of the ‘us’, there was a separate ‘him’ that I was not a part of, that I do not know about, that is a mystery and will probably remain as such.

“No, merci.” I smile my most alluring smile, trying to seem both pleasant and accommodating and simultaneously utterly unapproachable. He nods and lets me know that Mr. Pointe du Lac is getting ready so that we may go out to some other soulless club or party or museum opening. 

Armand used to come, on nights when I was especially longing, nights where he must have heard me call out to anyone who had seen my beloved. He would come as a voice or a picture- Louis sitting at a cafe in Prague smoking and looking off into the distance, Louis walking just in front of him in Mumbai, a picture of hands I so missed holding on to a railing on a boat. Sometimes it was just the sound of Louis’ voice. Just a snippet of him saying something inconsequential- “pass me that sock”, “nah, I didn’t see that movie”, “Yeah, that’s pretty.”  As the years progressed, his accent vanished, his voice sounded cold, cold like Armand. He no longer sounded like my Louis because, in reality, he was not. 
Occasionally, he would let me hear Louis laugh. The heartbreak of that.

I move another box of what looks to be papers from the ground. Useless.

The heartbreak of knowing that Armand got to travel the world with Louis. That we will never both experience Buenos Aires for the first time. Or discover jazz in Chicago, discussing how different it is than our New Orleans rag. That the beauty of Shanghai had been unveiled to him and Armand, but occluded to me. 

But, I am here, now. Amongst the litter of whatever it was they had. Louis did not take my being in a band well, or, he thought I was doing a band and that he did not take well? Which, considering our past is understandable, but… will we ever move past that? His jealousy or mine? Of the stupid choices I made even though I have apologized and he has forgiven me. I suppose there is a difference between the heart forgiving and the head forgetting.

Maybe it will take time for him to let go of my past mistakes and transgressions as it will for me to move past the hurt of our unshared life.

“Yes Daniel, what do you want now?” I hear from the other side of the apartment. And see! He can have friends! With no jealousy whatsoever. He has Daniel now, the Gremlin’s minion who is somehow now Louis’ problem. Friend, he is his, his friend. Not a problem. A friend who understands exactly what would happen if he misunderstood the nature of that relationship, taking Louis’ understanding, his patience for an adopted fledgling, the first Armand has ever made, even though he has utterly shirked his responsibility, for something more. We can change and grow, can we not?

“Yes, I will tell Frenchy you said “Hi.” Lessaaaatttt! Daniel says “Hi!”
I pick up a remote from a table that is for something, I know not what.
“Tell our petit Scribe I wish him well.” I press the remote and nothing happens.
“Yeah, he said “Hey”. Listen, about the copy…” I assume he has entered the closet because I can barely hear him. I press the remote again. Again, nothing.

It is hours difference, but I have been writing song ideas and sharing them in a group chat. The group name in my cellular is “Satan”. I am workshopping different names though, mostly without the band’s input.

I hit the remote again, pointed at the other side of the room. Silence. I grab for my phone and share with the group-

< A song about how boring Dubai is.

A song about how old people can be meddling and bothersome

to your husband. A song about a remote that doesn’t work.>

I shake it before opening the back and noticing there is a battery missing. Well, that would explain things. Lestat, how many times would you press the remote without looking at the obvious reason it would not work.

Three.
 The answer is three times.

“...ok, sure, send it here, I guess, if that’s what you want. Just, attention Rashid. I don’t need anyone else to see…”

<Third time’s the charm, a song about

getting back together for the third time.>

I steal a battery from the remote to the television.

<And no, that song is NOT about me and Louis>

I shove it in the mystery remote.

<ok, fine, it IS about Louis.>

I press the remote and I hear something. I hear something muffled, but my phone makes its notification noise.

<lestat, stop, it’s morning>

I keep pressing and moving towards the sound before I shoot who is I presume Cookie a quick message.

<But it is 9:54 am there,

that is not too early.

You have a fitting at 3!>

It is coming from a stack of boxes behind a stack of boxes. Which honestly could describe any wall in this place.

<BYE LESTAT!!!!>

I slide my phone back in my pocket. Mortals…so difficult.

I move as many of the boxes from the first stack away and occasionally press the remote to make sure I am on the right path. The top box contains very ugly 1970’s silk ties. Why would the Gremlin have any need for this? I should do him a favor and burn them. Maybe he should be burnt, too, you understand as a favor. To myself at least… I hit the remote and it is not this box. I toss it to the side. Gently, I gently toss it…. Nevermind.

“….yes, I can read, you ass. I got a whole library of… yeah I know, I know….Look…Damn really? Iss like that??....”

The next box has large Ziploc bags of play programs. One of the bags contains all Oprea programs. Oh, mon amour, you were thinking about me, weren’t you?  “Carmen?” You silly, hmmm. I always thought Don Jose should have killed Escamillo instead of Carmen. Carmen was a tragically misunderstood woman. Or maybe Don Jose slit her throat for a reason…No wait, Don Jose stabs her, stabs her in a jealous rage…he doesn’t slit…yes, yes well maybe Louis had been thinking of me, hadn’t he. I move the box.

The next one contains scarves and leather gloves that were completely useless in this Dubai heat. Again, it would have done Louis good to burn some of this. I toss that one as well.

The next box, it does not make a noise. It is filled to the brim and, I supposed if I were so inclined, heavy to life. But I do not lift it. I do not have to, to know the weight of this box. And the weight of what it contains. I know exactly what it is when I open it. 

I have not seen these for years, but I would know the missives that my daughter wrote if I were blinded in both eyes as my father was. I reverently move the first, the second, the third. How many…. He must have them all here. Must… and yet he did not tell me, did not share this with me. I pick up the first one that Louis gave her. One I had read parts of before. Recounting Louis as an angel and me as his white devil. I flip through the pages, the first months of my fledgling daughter’s life. The second, recounts birthdays and dolls, car rides, and kills she made by herself. 

“No, no I have not… Don’t know where he is, just gonna send them to some storage…I don’t know….Look, unlike you, I am not tryin’ to find him.”

I do not hear Louis as he walks in, not his footsteps, not his breath. I am consumed with the innermost workings of our daughter’s mind. In her hatred of me for what I had done to her, what she perceived I did, her child-like understanding of our love and relationship. In her rage for how I hurt Louis. In her disgust at his love for me, how could he possibly love me, a monster? At how simple and weak he was, as if he did not hold all of the power over me. At her hatred of an Antoinette she does not even know. At men for what happened to her. At women who are grown and mature while her adult mind lay trapped in a child’s body. At her killing sprees, as if that alone would free her. Her reluctance to come back to us but knowing that the only way she could truly be free is to run away with one of us with the intention of eventual abandonment. Of pages ripped out. Of some of them taped back in. Of the blood-stained tears that must be Louis’. Of the flowers pressed, the hair ribbons I know that I purchased from a Paris that would kill her. Of her hatred for Louis, of how he could not move past me. Of her hatred for Armand, of Santiago. Of Madeline, of love, of longing to run away. To live one human life together in love. 

It hits me. The magnitude of her emotions, of her love and adoration, turned frustration turned blame turned revenge turned resentment turned loneliness turned hopeful, and then, turned back to love. It hurts me so deeply, in a way I was ill-prepared for. Wave after wave of memories remembered and truths uncovered hit me in the face. But, I am struck by a few things, intellectually.
She hates me, but she thinks just like me- we share thoughts, feelings, instincts.
She is hurt and wants to hurt others as both Louis and I were.
She loves me, but she starves me from it as he does. 
She does not love him more but feels that he can be manipulated. 
That what started as a new life, a life to give her life, became her prison.
What none of this changes is how heartbroken I am by her vitriol, how I could love someone and it be so misunderstood, so mistaken. How everything I touch I destroy in the end.

“Lestat…” 

How my best intentions, how my love for Louis was so misunderstood by someone who lived that close. Or… or was it I that was mistaken all along? Was Claudia’s child-like view, her sight without the bias of puberty and maturity more correct than my broken jaded one. Maybe my gifts and treats, my little tokens, were mistaken as my attempt to buy affection. Maybe I was buying it. Maybe I never was spoiled and I so badly wanted to spoil my own… my little…our little…

“Lestat.”

I do not hear him at first because we are in Paris and she is complaining about how Louis pretends to stop thinking about me because Armand is around but she can hear him talk to me in her head. “You’d think with his dick in someone else for a moment he would stop talking to him, thinking about him, feeling his hands on him instead of poor pathetic Armand. I’d hope he could fuck Lestat out of his system, but it just brings him back to every picture of a million moments they shared and I am sick of seeing it. Not that I am any less sick of listening to Armand whimper because he is thinking of Lestat, too. I fucking kill him and run half a world away and I still can’t get fucking away from-.”

“LESTAT.”

I turn to face Louis, his hand firmly shaking my shoulder. I am a mess of blood running down my face, hands trembling at her truth as both sad and satisfying. I have sat down somehow, books spread before me, no idea of how long I have been here. But he must know. He must know at once what has happened, what I have found. Did he do the same, after she had died? Gone back to the theater and salvaged as many as he could? Or had he been reading them all along? Did he know what she thought of us, how she clung to him for her very survival and yet hated the need to depend on him? There is instant recognition on Louis’ face. I sob, large tears. Not the crocodile tears my mother claimed I cried when my brothers did me the slightest injustice. Not the tears of a Judas. The tears that I held at bay as I watched our daughter right before my very eyes….

He lifts the book and places it on top of something and in an instant I am in his lap, weeping, like a child. But he is not shedding tears like mine, only silent ones. Ones that say he knows my pain, but he has already been through it. Ones that say that her truths, her rage, and vengeance are not new to him. Maybe he had known it all along. Or maybe, on a night, long after the burning of the Theater and my sailing home in defeat, he had read these words. He had known and relived what is new to me. He has seen, as she saw. Maybe had, had read over them time and again, visiting our home in his mind very differently than I had. Maybe he had just shown these to that journalist a few months ago. Maybe Le Petit Scribe has seen my daughter’s words before I have, exposed these… these lies…. These selfish, childish… how could she not see me, how could she not know….
I stand up and push the box of remaining books over before I rush past Rashid and out of this insufferable mausoleum. Louis stands behind me, picks up the box clearly marked “New Orleans” and puts it back on the stack before rushing out after me. 

Chapter 21: Exactly Where I Belong

Summary:

Bricktop looking at me one day as we were going over books, with that knowing smile.

“Duh fuck you smiling at?”

“You, Louis de Point du Lac. Just… glad to finally see you happy, s’all.” She took away the books for one house and put down books for another.

“What’s that suppose to mean?” I flip a few pages and a handwritten note falls out. It’s good Bricktop doesn’t read French, but it don’t matter because I feel the blush on my cheeks.

“That. That right there. Pretty sure that’s not an IOU, sure as hell ain’t an invoice.  Don’t gotta be able to read it to read you, du Lac…Now stop fawnin’ and start addin’!”

Having Lestat with me in Dubai has brought me to another galaxy in this universe. And just when I think there is nothing else, there is. 

Remembering back, ma Gran-Moman Louise did more looking after, if you will, me and my siblings than my mother did. She had that grandmotherly, slide you a hard candy, don’t tell ya Mawma, wink, wink. So in that regard, I was cared for. And I always had the right clothes and shoes, showed up at the right places with the right people, went to the right schools, and had the right friends. But none of that was about me. It was for the scion of the de Pointe du Lac family or some 7th Ward Creole crap. Keeping up with the Porees or the Batistes or the Glapions more than anything. I wasn’t educated because I was particularly smart or loved. It was because of who WE were. 

Materially provided for, emotionally orphaned. But it always looked good from the outside.

Once my Popa died, well, it was my turn to do the caring, but I could only do what was done for me- a sick little repetition of the sins of the father or some bullshit. Did I love my siblings? Yes. Were they provided for?  Yes. Did I know what Grace’s favorite song was? The shirt that Paul loved best? I knew what sweet my sister loved as a child, but… as we grew older I grew further because, well, it was for the best. The more I emulated my father, I knew them less. And even if I knew Paul’s favorite Bible verse growing up (Mathew 6:26 ) or Gracie’s favorite dress (the one with the pink sash), by the time I moved into Royal, we were strangers who looked like each other and shared some childhood stories. But it was my job, to take care of them, to look after my girls. I did the caring.

There is something about being,...cared for. Not coddled, or kept, or, which is what I thought cared for meant… something about being looked after,.. taken care of, maybe? Being cared about? Something about your favorite pair of shoes cobbled when the sole starts separating. Having a new sweater that replaces your old favorite sweater with a pull in it waiting for you in the closet in the right spot without having to say a word. The book you just finished placed in the bookshelf, where you would put it and the next one in your stack dusted and ready to go. About handwritten notes placed in the pockets of the pants you had packed so when your hands slide in, out came little pieces of paper hugs. Like the dealer you have been trying to get in touch with for years suddenly runs into you and says they were told they needed to meet you about a piece. About waking up with blond hair up your nose because you are being held in your sleep like you are precious. About all those things you notice and the instances you never see all working not to control you (gone is the black and grey), but to fulfill you, that anticipate your wants and needs. Moments of adoration. I put his slippers back where they belong because “someone has moved them,” and my cell phone is magically on my side of the bed, plugged in and charging. Not just the words but the millions of little deeds that prove you are the center of a universe and the other person is the center of yours. For no other personal gain but to see you smile.

So when I wake up and Lestat is nibbling on my right ass cheek just above where it connects with my thigh, as he slowly licks and nips and kisses even though he thinks I am asleep, that to you might be creepy. Or too much. Or just fucking weird. But knowing Lestat, I know exactly what this is.

 Now 117 years ago, it did feel like all of that- weird, creepy, but also hot as shit. There was no way in hell I would have said how much I liked it and certainly wouldn’t have asked for it. Not a single way in hell could I have said that. In the now, knowing what I do of life and love, having searched and failed,  I am so fucking hot for him slowly making out with my ass that if I wasn’t already hard as hell, it would have only taken a moment for me to get that way.

Old Louis would have panicked, wanting but not comfortable enough speak up even in the confines of our home. Just hoping that Lestat would know that I needed just a little more pressure but too scared to demand it. And when he did know, that was scary for other reasons. If he knew, if he could tell, when then, who else could? When we went out and my favorite song got requested, or if a suit was delivered and it was in my size, well then, people knew, they all knew. Forget that we lived together. Forget that there was never anyone else but the other, even when that whore was around. Forget we were a little family with our daughter. I had been tough Louis de Point du Lac for years, had to keep that up, had to be hard, had to be a man. I had to do the looking after.

Bricktop looking at me one day as we were going over books, with that knowing smile. 

“Duh fuck you smiling at?”

“You, Louis de Point du Lac. Just… glad to finally see you happy, s’all.” She took away the books for one house and put down books for another.

“What’s that suppose to mean?” I flip a few pages and a handwritten note falls out. It’s good Bricktop doesn’t read French, but it don’t matter because I feel the blush on my cheeks.

“That. That right there. Pretty sure that’s not an IOU, sure as hell ain’t an invoice.  Don’t gotta be able to read it to read you, du Lac…Now stop fawnin’ and start addin’!” I quickly flip it over. But it’s too late, and she recognizes that handwriting. And I can’t tell her what it says or get giddy or gush about it. Gotta to keep up that front, be hard. Men don’t fawn. Men don’t blush. Men don’t rush home to sit on their lover's lap and while he whispers how much he missed me, kisses me all over I play with the ribbon in his hair.

“I don know whatcha ya talkin’ about. Gimme that stack a receipts.” But it’s too late and the “ummmhmm” and smile make it harder to play gruff.

Couldn’t ask. Couldn’t tell. Couldn’t share. Couldn’t enjoy. Couldn’t…couldn’t live.

Louis today has no problem popping that ass out, showing my slightly stretched hole still slick from last night’s escapades. I will gladly lift my leg so as to let Lestat have access, to grind himself into that beautiful face, to demand for it to be bit just a little harder, to nip just a little blood, lick it up slow slow, while he messaged me now in a slow and maddening way, eventually slips a slick finger inside me. 

“Baaaaby, again?” I whine playfully and I can’t help but moan just a little as he teases me with his tongue.

“Mmmmph, more like, still….” And he is lavishing my ass, there is no other way to say it. This crazy motherfucker is full-on making love to my right ass cheek like it is the most amazing, important, like…. Bitch we have been fucking for over 100 years! My ass has not changed one bit. And so it goes for the better part of 30 minutes, him lazily licking and sucking and biting and kissing and tonguing and fingering and I’m just drowning in it. 

“I can taste myself from last night,” he growls rough.

“Why don’t you give me more, then you can drink yourself out of me.” 

‘Putain Louis, les choses que tu me fais.”

This is what I mean when I say I am drunk on this man. I can be across the room at an art installation opening, him listenin to some half-cocked story a little ole lady is spinning. He is invested, askin questions like his life depends on if Cyril remembered their anniversary or not. I don’t even have to make eye contact. The intensity in his share, the serious lines in his smooth pale forehead, how the light makes his hair seem more white gold with every year, his hand on her shoulder when he belly laughs at the punch line. I am intoxicated. I am swimming. I am not listening to a damned word the artist is telling me about this awful painting that I will more than likely buy and sell for twice as much in 50 years. 

Lestat is the work of art. Lestat is the masterpiece. 

And then he will look up at me and flash that nervous little smile. The actor breaks character for a moment, the facade of the Prince falls to mon mari- needy,  vulnerable, and insecure. A plead for me. Not that he wants to walk away- he needs to know how Cyril got himself out of the dog house. But because he wants me there next to him, on his arm, close, safe. His heart skips a beat as I excuse myself telling the artist I’ll take it and my people will make arrangements. It beats a little faster as I move to him, letting him introduce me as his beautiful husband, as I hold his hand and remind him we simply must go in a second to force Bernadette to finish this story. And even though I can’t read his thoughts, or he mine, I don’t have to know what he is thinking. My pulse races, I feel him squeeze my hand just slightly, and hear the deep inhale so he can breathe me in. Watch him turn to look at me and for the first time, before he can turn away, I finally catch him. And he lets me. I am no longer standing in an art gallery on an opening night, I am in Lestat’s universe and he is in mine and all I can think is, I want this. When I kissed him on that altar, when I looked at him, it didn’t matter that he was covered in blood. That he had done some Hoodoo to get in my head. It was too late then. I wanted this every night thereafter. Pretending to the world this man was not my husband, that we were not a family. Pretending I wasn’t swimming at a little note that read come home to me, Cher, I miss you already and need you in my arms that fell out of a ledger 90 years ago. I was addicted, intoxicated, just like I was at the Cathedral a few months ago, just as I am in this gallery. Just like I am when we get home an hour later, just like I am going to be for the rest of the time I am on this earth. Except now I allow myself to let go, get lost in him, and not worry about the rest. We might not make it out of the car before one of us is screamin the other’s name. Might be 3 hours before either of us comes. Might be longer. Might come 6 times in a night, might just be once, might be a night where all we do is cuddle and share stories. I’m floatin in some subspace high as a kite on the same man that fucked me up decades ago.

Now that, that is something.

Might be creepy to you. But it’s damn hot to me.

And trust me when I say I have NOT been thinking about Armand anymore than necessary. A year ago seems like a lifetime. It’s like I walked out of here and took off some beige coat and stepped into a world of color. There is no comparison. I packed box after box thinking, how could I let myself exist like this? Convincing myself I was happy or this was what I wanted? The same degradation, whip, yes you are a little bitch, yawn, Maitre with no fucking voice, it’s what’s best for me bullshit. Brown sweater, black sweater, beige sweater. 77 years boxed up shipped to New Orleans, storage, to his handlers, and each seemed so empty.  How many items did I hold and say, oh, I kept this for 60 years because it reminded me of Lestat. I went to this concert because Lestat would have loved it. I might have lived with Armand, but we were living with Lestat all along. Maybe that’s why leaving this wasn’t so hard, because my life here was never about this.

It is about finally being able to be introduced as his husband. It is about finally being able to stare at each other in public and wink without caring who sees. It is about waking up after getting railed good because we couldn’t keep our hands off of each other in the car ride home from a gallery to Lestat celebrating my right ass cheek. About him moaning at the taste of his own cum from the night before as he tounges me open to take him again so he can drink himself out of me. It is about biting him over and over again as I have him seated backwards on my cock for hours, playing with his nipples, lightly ghosting my hands down his stomach and chest, pulling on the black ribbon I have pulled out of his hair and have wrapped snugly around the base of him to edge him until neither of us can take it any longer. It’s about him finally realizing what that remote was for and being delighted at the new possibilities of all. It’s about him using them on me for the first time ever, the devil in his eyes when he realizes he controls that buzz that is coming from my ass as I fuck him, the haze that falls over for me finally having someone that wants to use them on me, and for me finally having the one person who I would ever allow it to slowly slide it in as he is praising my for being his beautiful precious princess. It is about losing time and space because he is in my arms and I am in his and I could spend my whole existence like that and I want for nothing more. This, this is the art of lovemaking. Of being cared for. Of being cared about.

And I want it, I want to be his companion forever. Honest.

I went through so many of them and not a one, not in over 70 years, has even been a patch on this crazy French man’s ass. The thing is, it’s not just about the fucking and that’s what I didn’t get then. I mean, not a damn one of them was going to be able to pick me up and fuck me against a wall like him, to bite me when I came so hard while we fuckin,...fuckin floating, I mean, literally no feet on the ground. Go for hours or make it 4 times in quick succession. None of that was I ever going to get from a human. 

And what I didn’t know then was I wasn’t going to get it from one of us, either.

There was something else. 

Waking up to a hand kind of gently, kind of possessively, draped on my waist. Seeing his handwriting on a banal piece of paper and my heart racing. Smelling him after he had left a room. Listening to him breathe on the few occasions I woke first. Pulling strands of his hair from off of me because he has held me all day long. Having all of my needs and wants considered, planned for, taken care of- not what he wanted my wants to be, what they really were. Having flowers delivered. And more. And more. Until you are surrounded by dozens and dozens of azaleas and … honestly how did he even get those delivered to Dubai in September? Maybe another vampire might could made me leave the ground when we fucked, I guess so. But with Lestat, I had been head in the clouds since day one.

Maybe me wanting to be my own companion didn’t take into account that I could let go, I could get lost and we could both fall and I could still somehow be me.

And so, maybe what I should say is, there is something about being made love to at every moment of every day and just letting yourself finally fully give in to it, about not knowing where endings and beginnings are. About time and space also stopping not just because the sex is beyond anything else I’d ever experienced, but also for a second as you smile and fall deeper than you thought possible in your husband’s eyes after decades when you don’t think falling any deeper is possible as he talks to little old lady at a gallery opening. It’s seeing the excitement in his eyes when you go down on him even though it’s been over 100 years, or when you bring him a glass of blood, or run a bath for him, or when you finally catch him looking at you for the first time because you have felt like he has been looking for years and you were just never quite quick enough, and because he feels like you are finally ready to see how he sees you, and that you are ready to see him that way too, regardless of who is around. It’s about a ring appearing on your dresser next to your wallet and it’s the color of your eyes and fits perfectly. And you realize that he has been wearing one for years and you were too fuckin blind and stupid and scared to admit it for what it was, what it has meant to him for years, and that it is exactly what it has really been to you, too. But today, now, you can, because you want this. To feel it on your cock as he slowly, lazily slides his hand up and down and around and twists. To watch as yours slides in and out of his hole before you take him and make him yours again and again.

Yeah, yeah that’s what I mean when I say cared for.

And so we have been awake for hours but have not gotten out of bed. His wrists are now crossed above his head in this new totally submissive moment that he gives me, I am here mon Ste Louis, make me yours vibes. I am completely bottomed out and am slowly kissing him.

“Please.”

“Mmmph, no, not yet, baby.”

“Mon amour, you have been squeezing my cock inside of you for 37 minutes now.” I tighten and move up only a little. I kiss him as I hover over him barely an inch.

“38 minutes.”

“Please. Please let me take you.” He tries to gyrate his hips. To be fair, Lestat’s hips are a work of art that should have songs written about them. Which reminds me that I really want to lick them. 

“ I wanna lick your hips.”  And I desolve in kissing his swollen mouth.

“My lips?” So I bit them and lick the drop of blood I draw. 

“No, they are swollen from me face fucking you an hour ago. Your HIPS. When I dig my fingers in them, you roll them so perfectly. I was just thinking of how beautiful they are.” The compliment makes his ego dance and his eyes twinkle and he would probably let me do any damned thing I want to.

Which is a thought I entertain. And one I decided I may well need to cash out soon enough.

“I would love to roll them in to you right now, please let me show-,” I slide back down to bottom out and grind my ass into him. “Putain, mon Louis, tu es tellement parfait, you make me want to use my hips to commit unspeakable acts of terror on your perfect derriere."

“I might could let you.”

“Might?”

“You wanna roll them into me from underneath me? Wanna take me on all fours? Want me on my back begging for you to go deeper? Pirate booty….How’s my baby gonna make me scream his name tonight?” His eyes light up again, because him rolling over and showing me belly to rub is one thing, but he loves me as a Pillow Princess. There was just no damned way I was gonna to let him pamper me and place a pillow under my ass while he takes me for everything I am worth 100 years ago. But today I am more than willingly his prissy little wife and whine and call him baby and tell him how big he feels. Or beg him for the first time in my life to let me fuck him so good and slow that he can last all night on just my dick alone. Or let him pound me into this bed just as hard as he can while tears roll down my cheeks because it is all so very, very perfect.

We have given this sad drab room the spark it had needed for so damned many years. There is something in his eye, that look, the twinkle, that little fire that dances that tells me he has an idea and someone is going to pay for it. That someone was my ass. Before the moment registers to me though, he grabs my hips and ruts up into me so hard there are not spaces left between us and my eyes…ok… fine. They do roll back in my head and my high-pitched yelp does prove without question that I am his absolute bitch. His Pillow Princess. Just as he is mine. 

And I would have it no other way.

I’mma be honest, my legs were like jelly for the rest of the night and I’m a damn vampire. That man fucked me up silly, and for the first time ever it dawns on me. I can only imagine what would have happened if I hadn’t let him turn me. How he would have had to hold back every time. If I’m not able to walk now…holy shit. And he really did hold back that first time at Royal, willingly restrained himself just to be able to have what he could. The truth I can admit now is I would have come back. I couldn’t say it before, couldn't think it, but he never needed to call out to me. Eventually, my ass would have been right back there with him, no need for Lily the next time. Damn.

I am so fucked out that I can’t run a shower until the next night. 

And. I. Am. A. Damned. Vampire.

“We should probably burn those sheets,” I call to him. I know he is sprawled out like the King he is, hands under his head, sated smile on his face. What’s funny is sometimes he is so damned manly. And then other times he is my little girl. But, I am the same, hun? Took me a lifetime to realize it, a lifetime to accept it, and understand that we complement each other so much because I was too busy fighting the truth.

“No, I want these sheets to be framed. Memorialized. A shrine erected around them. I want to smell them in 3 centuries and say ‘Ah! Yes, I remember that. Let’s recreate it again in new and arabesque ways’.” I don’t have to see him to know he is, in fact, not kidding. But my nose is wrinkled.

“Les, that’s gross.”

“It could never be, mon amour.” His words are thick and slow and you know it’s good when I can get him like that. Honestly, those moments when he is so blissed out that he can’t even speak- I feel like I should get bonus pay on those days. Commended. Gold Star. Certificate. Fucking Vampire of the Month or some shit. I think about what smelly bath fizz we have to cover this smell of sweat and blood and sex and mend the aches. Lysol. Do they make Lysol-flavored bath bombs?

And no matter how much he has railed or ridden me, this motherfucker somehow saunters in the bathroom like he owns the place. Like this is his dominion. Those cut muscles, that smooth perfect almost luminescent skin. Armand who?

“Mmmm, do you think you can take me in the bath? Should we not with the fizzes?” And he is deadass serious. 

“Lestat, I am exhausted.” He leans down to pull me into a kiss. A real, this is not like sexy or wanting. This is being cared for. “Then later.” He steps in and stops to kiss me again before he stretches out. 

If you would have told me a year ago, when I contacted Daniel, that I would have Lestat back in my life, Lestat so blissed out he can’t barely spark, Lestat laying with his eyes closed in my bathtub, humming sweetly probably some song he is writing right now to celebrate my right ass cheek, I would have called you a liar and denied wanting any of it. Not even when I was rushing to New Orleans to be companion enough for myself right in his arms. Jesus, I have never been so glad to be wrong. He puts his hand out for me to join him and so I do because when do I ever not? The water is warm and feels amazing on my achy skin. And we sit, his chest vibrating as he hums, arms around me, possessive. Like I am precious. Like I have value, like I am more than the person who is doing the looking after like I am worth being cared for, looked after, wanted. Not owned, not possessed, not a prize. Like I belong. And finally, or maybe it is again, I am exactly where I belong and not a thing can stop that.

Notes:

7th Ward Creole crap.- So now that we have a 7th Ward Passe Blanc Pope, I hope that I don't have to explain this much. 7th Ward is still very Creole. There are tons of rules and mores that are still followed today.
Porees or the Batistes or the Glapions- I am a Poree decedent, the Batistes (Harold, Lionel, and Jon among the most famous) are musicians, and Pope Leo is a Glapion.
Matthew 6:26- I mean,... it writes itself.
Straight up, Bricktop should have been in every episode because I think I know 30 or so women just like her. Love each one of 'em. And there is NO way she didn't know.
Putain Louis, les choses que tu me fais.- Fuck Louis, the things that you do me. So much of how we speak English words in French places.... we still use the phrase "do me" instead of do to me.
Hoodoo, Voodoo, who doesn't own sage and red brick dust here? The discussion of New Orleans and strange shit is a whole 'nother thing. Most people would have been like- what the fuck! Louis' reaction is NOLA spot on.
I know there are Armand stands out there. I get it. I read the books first and the only thing I don't like about the show is making it seem like Louis and Lestat were together a shorter amount of time than Louis and Armand.
Putain, mon Louis, tu es tellement parfait,- Damn, my Louis, you are such perfection.

Chapter 22: You Can Not Unappologize

Summary:

“It must have been difficult for you.”
“What is that, Lestat?” I slowly turn myself around. Even in the lack of light, Armand is haughtily beautiful. It is such a shame, really. A waste.
“Listening to his thoughts for all of those years. Listening to every conversation he was having with me while he was with you. Louis’ thoughts as a human were always so loud, and I never taught him how to shut himself off completely, as it was just the two of us.” It is a mostly imperceptible moment- just there. If you do not know him, you might have overlooked it, thinking it normal. Mais, non. It is a moment of weakness, and I love knowing I have caused it after he has inflicted so much on those I love.
“You must have heard each thought that he had about me. The pure ones, the less than pure ones. Knowing you were the third wheel to a phantasm, one that you put so much effort into tarnishing while taking credit for his heroics. That you would always be my lesser, even when I was thousands of miles away and le scélérat.” Satisfied with the slight look of horror on his face, I turn. “Him having whole tête à têtes with me in his mind about the concert that he just dragged you to because it… reminded… him… of….me.”

Notes:

WARNING- I used the P word, which is offensive to some. Lestat is jokingly called P- P-Whipped and has no idea what it means.
Forget that this took me a month ( 12000+ words), I kept getting an error message. So I got it out at 2:38 am NOLA time. I will publish the notes late. I'm sleepy, me!
Publishing notes less than 36 hours later, and wow. That's a pretty good response. I thank those of you who are still here with me! Ok, finishing my notes!

 

“Cookie, I appreciate the idea very much, but I said emphatically that I wanted an arpeggio right before the chorus.”

“For the 20 millionth time, it is TOUGH Cookie, not just Cookie. And I know what a damned arpeggio is, Ms. Norton taught me when I was 9. Now are you trying to Hotel California this or Clocks this? Because those are very different and I’m not seeing how either works.” I watch Alex continuously flip and twirl the drumsticks he has held without playing for over 37 minutes. Larry left some time ago for the bathroom, a smoke break, or to get food. Some human thing or another, I have no idea.

“No, Just Cookie , I am going for a more Bohemian Rhapsody vibe, “Mama, I’ve just killed a Maaaannn-”

“That’s not the lyrics, it’s just 'Mama, just killed a man’, "Alex mumbled.

“Well, she killed her fair share, too, I suppose,” I shrug. I nearly miss my dear mother. Nearly. It is a strong almost at times.

“Jesus, you can be impossible,” Just Cookie is showing signs of tension. And stress. Elevated heartbeat. Sweaty brows. Even though it can all just be New Orleans in October…

“What she said.” The drumstick slips and hits a drum.

“… but now that you have mentioned Clocks ….” my eyes sparkle.

“That’s it, break time…. Alex?” He gets up and follows Cookie, holding his sticks tightly, like I would want them. I huff, walk over to the piano, and plop down. 

“It is not that hard, an arpeggio. Just a poor chord torn apart, each sound giving its moment instead of a shared one. Like a little family who had split up. Maybe it is, it’s more, Clare du Lune- than Nocturne Number 2? Humn? Notes together, creating a story before they break apart in the 27th bar, to be on their own, yet somehow still complement each other by themselves. Longing to be reunited. ” As I play the opening bars, I hear footsteps but sense no thoughts. 

“Whadda ya call me?” The warmth in his voice as he walks would make my stomach lurch if it still could. Tight, fluttery, swimming, and…and excited. I turn to see mon mari holding a bouquet of camellias. He holds them out and puts them in my hand, that smirking smile he keeps.

“I called you Louis de Pointe du Lune.”

“Looney Louis? Well, that would be the first. Normally, the Looney was reserved for Paul. I got more dreamy, head in the clouds.” He sits down next to me. I place the flowers up on the piano as Louis places his phone next to them. 

“Maybe the wrong type of du Lune?” and I rip into the 3 movement, the Presto Agitato, of Beethoven’s Sonata No. 14. “You are familiar with the first movement, no? Moonlight Sonata is what it is called today. But I feel this 3rd movement- violent, wild, explosive, savage in its heartbreak- is a much better reflection of the recesses of your soul, my love.”

“Thanks?” But the smile and the twinkle in his eyes make me love his ferocity all the more. This is my Louis, to look at him, a sweet and kind man. But underneath is an ocean of emotions. At times too angry and others too soft, frantic in his eruptions and docile in his contemplations.

“Jesus, has he gone back to Beethoven? We are a rock band, not a string quartet!” Cookie walks in with the boys in tow. 

“Bien, bien, j'arrête! I was just showing off for my husband.”

“Your husband hears you play all of the time at home.”

“And does he like my playing here as much as there?”

“He does…”

“Wait,” Larry says, putting down what was left of his Flying Burrito, pointing at my love, “ I thought YOU were his husband.”

“I am.” Louis peels his beautiful eyes away from me for a second to fix Larry with a raised eyebrow and a laugh.

“Then why are you talking like that, like, saying, ‘your husband’ and not just saying ‘me’ ?”

“My husband finds it endearing.” Louis motions with his head before turning back to me with a ridiculous smile. 

“Qui, le mari de Louis le trouve très attachant.” I forget to play for a moment as I reach my right hand out to caress Louis’ jaw.

“And he just breaks out in French?” Alex adds.

“Yeah!”

 “Qui!” 

We look at them and laugh, the ease of it all, answering in a syncopation that we have come to take for granted. 

“ I just wanted to stop in, see whatcha up to.” He kisses my cheek as he swings his legs to stand at the bench. “I’m gonna go grab a bite, then go to Arthur Roger’s Gallery to see a piece by a guy named Peter Macon. Thinks he's up and coming, could be big.”

I know that I am beaming at him, as if only he exists in the world. Everyone else is a fly, buzzing to annoy me from the feast that mon Louis is. I could consume him. I stand up and take his mouth in mine, to feel his searing kiss meet me. I lean forward, looking at him. I feel my cheeks as the flush arises. I am smitten. He puts his forehead on mine and whispers to me.

“Come home early, hun? Don’t stay here all night, composin another ode to my eyes.”

“Or your mouth, or your jaw, or your perfect neck, or-” I purr back.

“Hello, Earth to Lestat, we are still here, we still exist.”

“Forget it, Alex. The moment Louis walks in, we don’t exist.”

“How the hell are you going to record with him in the same city?”

I clear my throat as I slowly make for my love’s mouth again.

“Did you hear something, mon cher?” I deadpan.

“Ummm, what, honey?” And his eyes crinkle and dance as I kiss him again. Chastley. Yes, I am prudent when others are around. He is mine, I will not… share.

I place my forehead on his and whisper back to him.

“I will rush home in exactly one hour to watch you fall apart in my arms.” 

“Not if you are the one doing the falling.” He does it for a quick peck before pulling away and turning.

“Be good to my husband, don’t give him too much grief.” Louis shakes his head and wanders towards the door, light-headed. 

“If you all think I am the crazy one, you have no idea what he is like if I am not pampered!”  Louis shakes his head as he walks out, throwing behind his shoulder.

“That’s you wantin to be pampered, Lestat. Don’t put that on me!”

“Au Revoir, mon Ste. Louis!” I sigh deeply. I hear the snicking behind me. I turn to see the three of them, clasping mouths and holding sides. “What? WHAT? Have you never seen someone in love before? WHAT?!?!” The three of them explode in laughter. 

“Man, you are whipped.” Alex explodes, and they all laugh harder.

“I am what?”

“Whipped, you…” But he can’t not complete this thought, and he is slapping at Larry’s shoulder.

“It’s like you are a completely different person when he is around!”

“Like from a different planet.”

“There’s Lestat, and then here is Louis’ husband. And Louis’ husband is pussy whipped!” The three of them are laughing together. At my expense. Larry is nearly doubled over. 

“I mean, we know how to get anything accomplished now, right? Forget Christine, we just need Louis to tell Lestat!” Cookie chirps.

“ Oh mon Louie! Annnnything for you, my little creampuff! My mee-rry! Oh mon Louieeee!! I wrote six songs today dedicated to the beauty of your pinkie finger! I will ruuun home to you!! Whatever it is you want, mon cher! ” Cookie is now sitting on the ground, shaking with laughter.

“How is one guy so fuckin intimidating and then, no offence Lestat, but what did he do to you? Honestly, to have you so wrapped around his little finger?” Larry is bent over, with his hands on his knees, trying to catch his breath as if he has just run a marathon and not mocked me.

“It’s like a damned spell. Somewhere in that house is a little Lestat Voodoo doll, all dressed like it’s the 19th century with kissy marks all over it!” Cookie is now pretending to play with what I can only assume is her mind’s version of a small Lestat doll.

“Like, is he hung like a horse because you got it bad …”

I was standing stock still not quite over Alex’s terrible mocking of my accent. My pulse is still fast, but not from Louis. I think,.. they are laughing, but their minds were filled with love for me. They are mocking me, but... They were… making fun of my adoration, but not condescending like my brothers. This, … this was with love. They are happy for me. This is with fondness.

Not with hatred or jealousy or contempt. 

“What is this whipped? And Louis has never hung a horse. He does not particularly like them, which is why he had the Rolls-Royce when we first met.” They look at me for a second and then peel again with laughter.

When Marius told me to come to the New World and make a family, I thought very traditionally. A partner, a child. But I look at Larry and Alex, Emily too, and think, why could this not be a family? I might not be able to share certain things with them, but we could live a human life together. We could make music, and they could grow old, and we could be a family. They care for me. They want me to be happy. Not like companions, but as friends might. This might not look like Louis, Claudia, and me, but this, if we toured and stayed together, this could be a little, friend family.

I hear the sound of Louis’ phone on the piano. He must have forgotten it here…

I retrieve it while Larry gives Cookie a hand so she can stand up.  I see a text message from Daniel.

<Hey, here’s the final edits

from the publisher on the

chapter where you kill Frenchie.> 

 

Publisher? Chapter? Edits?

My heart lurches for a different reason.

 

<Thanks for sharing Claudia’s

journals again, they were more

helpful than your useless ass>

<And just like you asked,

I was NOT sympathetic to Blondie>

<You painted him like a pompous

ass, so an ass he stays.>

 

What… what journals…where he kills,...me….

“ I paid a journalist whom I nearly killed 50 years ago to fly to Dubai in the middle of a pandemic to tell the story of how we fell in love in front of Armand.”

“I thought telling my story again, telling it right, would help me see the truth.”

Telling a journalist your story is one thing. Publisher. Chapter. Edits.

It is not hard to figure out the code to Louis’ phone. It is Claudia’s birthday.

< I left in the part where you said

you wanted wanted him dead and

alive and all to yourself, but I took

out the part about feeling how hard

he was when you kissed in on the

dance floor made you want to

fuck him right there in front of everyone.>

 

Where he WHAT? 

 

<Hello… Louis… what,

are you suckin' his balls again?

Jesus Christ, how do you two do

anything now that you are

fucking again>

 

Louis can have a friend. Louis can have a friend. The band are my friends. We can have friends. I type frantically as if I am Louis-

                                                 <No, just caught up reading.

What else does it say?>

It takes Le Scribe entirely too long to respond.

 

<I kept almost everything you told me.

Tried not to embellish too much.

It was fun editing this because you

are “falling for him” again,

as if your dumb ass years wasn’t

in love with him all along. >

<You were stupid for him the moment

you said his name and haven’t

stopped being stupid since.>

<But the fact that you killed the guy

you loved because you loved

your daughter, who loved both of you

but wanted both of you dead

is actually crazy. You two need therapy.>

<And for the last time FUCKING IS NOT THERAPY>

 

I am shaking and my mind is reeling. Respond like Louis, respond like Louis…

                                                                    <But, it might could be.>

<Yeah, that’s what you said last time.

Look, here’s the link. Read over it,

tell me what you think.>

 

Said that last time…I am relieved because after decades, I do know what Louis would say. Don’t I?

                                                                                                <Ok>

<Now get off of that man’s

balls and READ>

 

I… I can not. I can not read this. This is… I am shaking and the band is waiting for me. 

What… What did he…but I can not. I will not. This is Louis’ phone. It is Louis’ message, I can not break his trust, the trust we have so carefully crafted with love and patients these last few months. There is not a day where I will fall into the same pattern of jealousy after I have seen the fruits of my own ill fated labour. Where I will try to posses… no. I have learned from my past mistakes! I have grown and we have, we have become so much more! Louis can have friends and a career and a life. Just as I do! I am honest! I tell him about all of my…and yet, this, the interview gone to a publisher, not just a cathartic purging of the sole to an old man turn fledgling who was his cuckold but now his best friend. 

And what other messages have they sent? What other things have they said? What do the other chapters say? He must have told him of our first months together because he said falling in love again. There are other chapters! What,.. I can not even begin….

‘You painted him like a pompous ass and I kept him an ass.’ What other parts of our lives did Louis expose and how…

But I can not stand here, while my family waits for me so lovingly and reads all of these thoughts of my Sainte Louis.

“Jesus Lestat, stop sending the selfie to him and let’s get playing!”

So I forwarded the document to myself and deleted all of the conversation.

 

Loneliness is the worst thing a vampire can experience. Betrayal, however, runs a close second. It took Le Gremlin only 2 days before he reared his head, gloating, as Armands oft to do. I had thrown myself into recording these last two days, fervent about my craft in a way to release the valve of my emotions. But this is not fair to my humans, and I must take care of them. Tonight I have ended my genius early, albeit I am unsure if I can face Louis again tonight. I hugged my new family goodbye, slipped them some pocket change, and waved as they made it safely to their vehicle. No one would hurt my new little tribe, but keeping a vigilant eye is what I do for my loved ones. I barely make it down the block to the corner of Esplanade and Charters before I feel the shift, the disturbance, avant le tapage d'Armand. He had probably been watching me for hours, and I had been so enthralled in the moment of my own genius that I missed the signs. He had done well to hide himself, probably standing on a balcony or a close-by rooftop, far enough away to, lucky me, to not be detected and yet sadly still close enough to be able to drop right in my path. I know well the heartbeat, the signature of his being, before I see his standing under the street light, not unlike how Louis must have first encountered him 7 decades ago. As I did over 200 years ago.

“Well, well, I thought you learned your lesson the last time you stopped by for a little visit.” He stops picking at his nails and looks up at me with his huge eyes and the slightest of smiles. 

There was a time, for more than a moment in truth, that I found Armand beautiful. Looking at his clear skin, perfect curls, and doe-like features, it is understandable why Marius loved him as he did. I found out in time, however, that Armand was less than lovely on the inside. In today’s modern world, my humans speak about trauma, kidnapping, child abuse, sex workers, gaslighting, manipulation, cults…. None of those things existed for him in language hundreds of years ago, except everyone existed as an act in his reality, and it left an indelible scar on his soul. Scares so deep that they have altered the very fabric of what he was. Just because he could not put a name to it, does not mean it didn’t leave its name all over him.

Who would Arun be if he had been allowed to live out his human life in any of its versions? Who would he have become? It is impossible not to see the damage that these last 500 years have wreaked upon him, but was he destined to live like this if Marius had turned him later, say, in his 20s or 30s? Would Claudia have become what he is- powerful but alone, bitter but wanting, so full of love that it becomes self-loathing and obsession- if she lived another 400 years?

Time has granted me the ability to see Armand differently than I did 200 years ago. Rivers shift, buildings come and go. People, names, mores, and cultures. Everything inevitably undergoes some sort of transformation, be it for the better or not. I see some of those transmute in Armand. Then, there are other aspects that have not been as amenable. I, too, have grown and learned and transmuted, and possibly there are parts of me unamendable. I am willing to see him with a different lens, as an adult looks back at the child version of themselves and thinks, ah! If I had known the truths then, that I do now, the ugliness of it all, the inner workings…. I might not like it, but understanding is created. Sympathy and connections made.

However, lucky for Armand, that wisdom changes nothing about our present situation, and my contempt. He looks up at me, trying to be coy and innocent and, and seductive, almost dropping his hands to the side of his slightly too big trench coat and sighing. He would never have needed it for the warm fall night, most certainly it was for the wind in the clouds.

“And what lesson would that be?” I take a few more steps towards him, but leave enough space so that he cannot lash out at me. My mind is running through all of the reasons he is here, not to spy on us, but obviously to just see me. I am a few blocks from home but I can no longer go there. This is optimally not a conversation to have in public, I weigh my options. The River? Maybe I could dunk him in. 

“That you are not wanted or needed here. That it is advisable for you to leave New Orleans, to not try to engage where you have no place. That what is mine, what has always been mine, still is. I have learned my lesson. You, obviously, have not.” I hear the little chuckle even though his face is still. Yes, River, dunkable, the only answer.

“No, you are wrong, on both accounts.” Of course, he uses this moment to stand his full petite height, rolling his shoulders back and tilting his neck. I know my lip twitches before I am even conscious of it.

“Enlighten me.” The words are thick coming out.

“First, after reading a few text messages, I certainly am needed here and, perhaps by the end of this conversation, you will see how you, as usual, want me to tidy up for you. As for what is yours-” I take another step towards him, to move towards the River. Zut alors, I like these shoes and they will be ruined when I toss the Gremlin in the River. But his smile broadens when he thinks I am going to get cloer to him.“You can not force love, Lestat. A concept not altogether foreign to you, if I remember, as you confessed something like that some 77 years ago. And-” he suddenly turns and jaunts towards the Neutral Ground watching me more than watching traffic. I dash out after him, and he turns with his back now pressed against a butterscotch townhouse.

Did you know, there are historic colors here that are approved by the Vieux Carré Commission? You must use these colors, no garish hot pinks or all boring whites. I am not sure if 600 Espanade is Dorset Gold or Marblehead. I do know that I hate these shutters. Armand’s back is pressed against one of them when I stop in front of him. This is surely what he wants by the way he takes my shirt off with his eyes, which then linger on my mouth, “no matter how less toxic an option one might happen to be, people will commit to making the wrong choices over and over again. It is not that you have learned your lesson, L’enfant Terrible, you simply have a second chance to repeat the same mistakes.” His slight smile and cocking his head, panting. There is no reason for Armand to pant and surely he must know that I am not chasing him because I want to be chasing him, it is simply,... well, when two people are having an argument and one keeps bounding off, the other simply must follow so as to continue to be right. It is simply common courtesy. 

The more I think about it, I think they painted these shutters Tea Light Green. It is entirely too light and is not the same level of boldness as the rest of the house. And it does nothing for Armand’s hair. Had they painted it that beautiful Avon Green or even Fairmont Green, it would show the highlights better in his eyes. I know I am making a face as he is still watching my mouth before he pushes off and nearly collides with me, stumbling across the street.

Sashay? Was it more of a…..?

Oh! No! Great Barrington Green! Yes, that is THE color green for shutters! We have got to use that color on the Uptown house!!

He is walking backwards, making sure I follow him. He thinks that he has the higher ground, when I am really thinking of shutters and drowning him. I have no desire for this conversation now or in a decade. I call after him as I saunter towards him.

“Well, spurious charges in a bogus trial where everyone except judges and jury are being manipulated, starved, and tortured does have a way of making one say things. I am not so sure it was a lesson- I was a witness in the trial of my very own murder, which did not take place, obviously.” He stops walking and again looks at me in the most inappropriate ways as I hold my arms out, showing my obvious aliveness. Well, sort of aliveness. Maybe alivesque . You understand. “But…. semantics. You say “meurtre” I say, which you well know I could not ever be able to say if I was actually dead, but as I am not because the murder that my family was accused of never took place,... I say still very much ‘ alive’ .” I move past him, still intending to have this discussion on the docks away from mortals and possibly Louis.

“I would not say the charges were spurious-” he calls, closely on my heels.

“-or as much alive as a vampire could be”

“-certainly there was an attempt to murder you-”

“-especially since we are not, in the truest sense, really alive-” I shrug and continue towards the Gremlin’s imminent demise.

“So attempted murder is still a charge…”

“I, somehow, am both alive and dead. What did that pale man call it in the song? ‘Undead, undead, undead.’”

“And the trial was by no means bogus-”

“IT WAS A PLAY, ARMAND.” I exploded. I feel my blood rise to my face, and my hands shake by my side. I turn to face him, knowing my face was hot and the coy smile has slid a little from his lips. “A horribly written, terribly produced, completely scripted piece of theatrical shit,... theater that I taught you, gave to you and you twisted it against me. It was orchestrated and manipulated by you to force Louis and I apart, and in which you actually murdered our daughter.” Armand looked away as if pained by having to have this conversation.

“The same daughter who wanted you dead? If Claudia had known how to do it corre-” he spoke to the curb, not daring to look me in the face.

“-THAN LOUIS WOULD HAVE STOPPED HER AS HE DID!” I had not been in such rage in years. Was I using this moment to exercise the resentment I had been burying for years? Louis had been given his moment to lash out, but I had not avenged our daughter yet. “This had nothing to do with her, it never has and it never will, except for the fact that she was ours. You hated her the moment you saw her, despised someone so young who had grown up loved by their makers, not abandoned, not constantly longing and wanting like some vampires we might know. For what happened, for the actual murder that took place that you committed and were never tried for, my daughter was used as a pawn to get Louis for yourself and to hurt me, and you never so much as said that you were remorseful.” The lateness of the hour afforded us some privacy, but I knew that even on the wharf or on the Riverside we would draw a crowd of mortals. 

"I freed him from an abomination that would have destroyed you both." Armand's composure nearly cracked, and his fake smile twitched. "She would have murdered you in your sleep, Lestat. Was that what you wanted? To die at the hands of your own creation? Because when she got to us, she felt a good deal of things for Louis and, what did she call you, Uncle Les?” He leaned in close, his eyes burning bright, shoving his hands in his pockets. “But love was never one of them.” The streetlight flooded him from above, shining down like the moon had done so many centuries ago when I first encountered him. Always seeming so meek and sweet, until he struck. This was not going to end quickly. I grabbed at his arm, pulling his hand out of his pocket, and began to walk towards the old Claiborne Powerhouse.

“She was, is my daughter, our daughter,” my jaw is clenched and my grip on him is tight as I pull him along, “and you killed her just as she found happiness to have Louis for yourself. She was leaving Paris; there was no reason for what you did, other than to damage and divide. And you may say what you want, but I saw her, I looked into her eyes in those final moments, and there was more feeling there than you yourself has ever experienced.” He tore his hand away, not moving an inch from the curb we had just crossed. I turned to face him. 

“You have always picked those who could not love you back. Always. Even if someone stood right under your nose and offered themselves to you.” The self-referencing is painful, correct? Him feeling he has to be that forthcoming, even though he has so less than obviously offered himself tonight? Someone so deluded as to think that their need for possession was love and that I could so easily be possessed?  Someone incapable of any real love?  “Your parents never did, and you have been looking to fill that emptiness for years. I saw her, Gabrielle, by the way, when I was passing through Nakhon Pathom recently.” I tried not to let the shock and surprise of it show. I had not seen or spoken to Gabrielle in decades, centuries maybe. I smirked back towards him, never allowing the Gremlin an inch. 

“Oh? Was that when you were running away from Louis’ wrath… or teasing Daniel?” I turned the corner to jump the fence by the gated entrance on the less crowded North Peters. I knew I did not have to wait for Armand to follow me.

“She wanted to know if we had been in contact and if you were well. But she did not care enough to ask how to get in touch with you, or where you were, or try to contact you herself.” I held in my pain. I had made my peace with her long ago. You can love someone and not be able to be a companion to them, love the concept but not be able to endure their reality- even if they are your parent. I heard Armand’s soft land and his pattering after me as I continued to walk towards the back entrance of the largely abandoned plant. 

“Unlike you, whose only understanding of love is one that is one crafted from lies, cheating, mind tricks, and manipulation. I do not have to have her here to know how she feels. Rather, I kiss my mother goodbye and love her on her terms than craft a fabricated relationship to hold someone hostage and call it companionship.” My mother loved me. She did. As best as she could, she loved anyone. I did not fail as a son. I failed because I was her son. In a different lifetime, in a different situation, we could have lived long days together. But her need for solitude was as strong as my need for connection. Only one could win out. 

The door was easy enough to push open, and the relic gave us a certain privacy. I remember walking past the station with her large smoke stacks when she first powered the streetcars in 1910,  just another charm of New Orleans. She shuddered long before those dark days when Claudia ran away from us.

“Is that what you are calling it these days? Loving on ‘their terms’. Certainly not that Lestat is too much, too loud, incapable of keeping someone. That he will take the crumbs he is offered and call it “their terms.” Louis is no different than Claudia, no different than Nikki, than Antoinette, or than your Mother- none of them could give you what you needed, could return what you gave. What feeble second chance with Louis you have will not alter that.” Armand closed the large cypress door behind him. Light shone through the broken windows, illuminating dust and dereliction over generators that once powered her. All things, grey or rusty or white with dust or blackened, eerily glowed as the moonlight touched them. The company that has owned this building for years has decided to restore her, bring back some of her glory, and place a mural on her. That after over 100 years of disuse, she has stood the test of time and is ready for a revamp. There is a metaphor here about an abandoned power station that once controlled all of the streets, getting approved for restoration after sitting neglected for years. Something about it being solid and useful, even if it sat vacantly watching over New Orleans. Blah, blah, blah rebirth, second changes, still useful regardless of its condition. But I digress. He is goading me, and I will not take the bait. I am the one with the upper hand. He is a hurt and injured thing. I toe a rusted gear with my boot, watching the dust instead of his face, although I can still hear his heartbeat.

“It must have been difficult for you,” I sigh quietly.

“What is that, Lestat?” I slowly turn myself around. Even in the lack of light, Armand is haughtily beautiful. It is such a shame, really. A waste.

“Listening to his thoughts for all of those years. Listening to every conversation he was having with me while he was with you. Louis’ thoughts as a human were always so loud, and I never taught him how to shut himself off completely, as it was just the two of us.” It is a mostly imperceptible moment- just there. If you do not know him, you might have overlooked it, thinking it a normal face he pulled. Mais, non. It is a moment of weakness, and I love knowing I have caused it after he has inflicted so much on those I love. There, again, a slight widening of his eyes, a skipped breath. He knows I have seen it and recognize it for what it is, pushing a perfectly crafted curl out of his way.  “You must have heard each thought that he had about me. The pure ones, the less than pure ones. Knowing you were the third wheel to a phantasm, one that you put so much effort into tarnishing while taking credit for his heroics. That you would always be my lesser, even when I was thousands of miles away and le scélérat .” Satisfied with the slight look of horror on his face, I turn back to the rusty gear. Once bright and useful, now tarnished and reddened. Funny, blah, blah metaphor… “Him having whole tête à têtes with me in his mind about the concert that he just dragged you to because it… reminded… him… of….me.” If Armand still needed breath, his would be hitching right about now. The look in his eyes had gone into a panicked silence. One could barely hear the cooing of a nearby mourning dove.

“That is not what happened, it was not alwa-” I knew without looking that his eyes had widened further and that now his mouth hung slightly open. 

“It must have been a new and unforeseen hell for you, to know that not only could you not have me, but that you could never truly have him either. A specter of me was more precious than the reality of you.”  I shrug and do a little dance not much different than I had done at the Theatre de Vampire when he first saw me. 

The mourning dove is, for the most part, a monogamous bird…

“You have no idea what we had.” 

“I know it paled in every comparison-” I replied, looking at my feet and not his unraveling.

“His heart belonged to a phantom!" Armand snarled, dropping his careful mask, his wide eyes narrowing, and his mouth now cunning. He looked most beautiful when in pain, and that is the tragedy of Armandeo. The bird’s feather beat as he flew from the safety of the nest. "To a,...a beautiful monster who destroyed everything he touched! Do you have any idea what it was like listening to him remember? Watching him attempt to piece together a love story from the wreckage of trauma you inflicted?" Was he shaking? There was a lovely piece of moonlight just to his left. I wonder, can I, could I get him to shift just a bit? It would make this a more stunning moment for me to remember in the forthcoming centuries. 

"The agony," I spoke slowly, so relishing in his gorgeous suffering, with a moment of genuine sympathy, "to realize that even emptied of memory, he would still never choose you."

Armand is immobilized, the look of spite slowly dawning across his perfect skin. "You understand nothing."

"I understand much more than you think." I moved closer, trying to corner him in that light. It would truly illuminate him. I’m sure if he knew it would make his ruddy highlights more brass, he would just, but no, Armand fought not to step back. "I understand that you've been in love with impossibility for so long that you've forgotten what requited affection feels like. So you took whatever scrap you could get and you held it while suffocating it in your grasp." His eyes held mine with increasing wonder. The glow upon him, this close, from the beam of moonlight, made him seem innocent again. I can understand, and forgive, I suppose, Louis for loving him. He puts on a great show. Concern, caring, protection, empathy. Love is, how would Cookie say it, transactional with Armand, which strikes me as odd for a minute, and I simply can not think why that is.

"And you're an expert on requited affection?" Armand's voice dripped venom, but he did not flinch. "You cast me off as one who chases unavailable hearts while you chase ghosts the same. How is love not a commodity for you? ‘I could not make him love me.’ You can not buy it or earn it, Lestat. No matter how much you try. Still, you do not know the difference between obsession and devotion?" Touche. I might have flinched, showing how his blow hit me. But surely Armand is not one to talk about obsession and devotion, non?

"Oh, silly moi! Are we talking about your inability to differentiate devotion and obsessions? I thought we were talking about me? It is a common mistake, I usually think the conversation is about me… But you just uttered the words obsession and devotion and I was not yet ready for your confessions. Wait…” As I advance, his eyes run all over me, and it is difficult to tell if his pulse is racing because he is threatened or because I am near. I stop short of him and place my hand on my heart in a dramatic flop. Armand pants like a trapped animal who is looking to gain leverage as I encroach upon his space. “I am ready. Dominus sit in corde tuo, et te adiuvet ad peccata tua cum vera tristitia confiteri".  

To be fair, I could understand how someone as love-starved as Armand could conceive that my flirtation was something more. Or that Louis’ pretty smile was his alone. Or Daniel’s addicted fixation was devotion. What Armand needed was, for once, for someone to choose him. Not flirt, not be emotionally unavailable because they were in love with someone else, and not select him for convenience or resentment. Rather, he needed someone to look at him, or possibly see beyond his appealing face and faux innocence, and to think, yes, this crazy 500-year-old Gremlin is worthy of my time, energy, and effort even if he will do heinous things to keep me because that is what he thinks love is. 

“Louis is in love with the pain-” he starts. But I erupt.

“LOUIS LOVES ME!"

"Louis is bound to you by the wounds you inflicted! Not by a ring! Not by an altar! That is not love, there's a difference."

The words hit their mark. Words I had not considered. My jaw tightens before my lip twitches. "That's not—"

"Oh, isn't it? Tell me, when did he last choose you freely? When did he last come to you without crisis or catastrophe driving him into your arms? Escaping the pain of his brother, the guilt of causing the fire that caught Claudia, after our…what happened in Dubai…Looking to you to fill the void of his family abandoning him, or because he is unable to take responsibility for his past deeds," Armand stepped closer, with a slight smile on his face. Oh, he is adorable, I must admit. Queen takes a rook. "He doesn't even know who he is beneath the damage you've done."

"And whose fault is that? Surely not the person who stopped him every time he tried to figure it out in these intervening years? Who stole his memories before he could shuffle through them all? Who made him forget—" Mine. It is my fault, in truth. I wholly know that I am the one who first broke him, but that is not the point of this, and I will not concede a ligne!

"I gave him peace!" Armand's control shatters completely, his breath no longer controlled, and a tear forms in his eyes. As if he truly believes the words now flowing from him. "For years, I gave him peace! He smiled, Lestat. He laughed. He created things instead of destroying them. He walked and enjoyed things. He lived freely for the first time-” I huffed and laughed in his face.

"You orchestrated it all, Armand. Every moment, every choice Louis thought was his own—you pulled the strings. There is no freedom in that! The first night he came back to me, he said he wanted to live honestly because for years he had not. How is that free?" Just as the emotion from Armand could be considered real, so might my own. My words were true. Louis was manipulated, and I had to believe that he didn’t know it at the time. Because when he was being manipulated, when I… when I manipulated him, his feelings, pulled at his heartstrings, he knew. He knew every time. And he fought me. But he did not fight Armand…

"Did I?" Armand's voice held silk and poison in equal measure suddenly. He took a single step to the left, still avoiding the beam of moonlight. "Or did I simply... guide him toward what he already wanted? Show him the possibility of a world where he could be taken care of, but not forced to flaunt our relationship. One where his quiet moments were appreciated. One where he was in control, he had the upper hand-" The morning dove coos again.

And at that, I laugh. Loudly, quickly. We were entering the heart of the thing. Where finally Armand had to take responsibility for his part in this, the wake of my disaster. "HA! What he wanted? What he wanted?  You manipulated a grieving man, twisted his memories, made him forget—"

“Not that you didn’t? Not that the very night he buried his brother-” I know without doubt that my eyes bored into him. I was not on trial. I had done my confessions. It was his turn. I could no longer stand to look at him and turned before I struck out.

"We had made love before and were going to again! We courted for 6 months, we had our first formal dinner with his family that night, and I bought him a Valentine’s gift! I did not manipulate his falling in love with me like you tried to do. As I have said, my mistakes and misgivings were laid bare some years ago, and he is here with me now. We have come to peace about our past, a peace that you obviously have not accepted. You are trying to rehash mistakes over 100 years old, yet take no responsibility for all that you orchestrated for the entirety of your… time with him. You stole his memories! You took her away again! Where is your acknowledgment? Your remorse? Where is your penance?” I hope that I do not look as tired as I feel. I should get home. If I do not soon, or if Louis tracks me, he will come looking for me. If he comes looking for me and overhears us…

“I made him forget what, exactly?" Armand steps into the light, finally, his boyish features sharp with malice. I was correct in my assessment, it shown perfectly on the highlights in his curls, creating a heavenly glow about him. I could understand Marius falling in love with this version of Armand- nearly moon kissed and looking more innocent than he had any right to. I had played fair, but I was tiring of his lack of onus. "The way you abandoned him? I know the taste of his tears when he spoke your name. I know the way he flinched from tenderness, as if kindness itself was a betrayal. I know how he carved himself to ribbons rather than feel what you had done. Do you know what it was like in San Francisco? Who and what he was!” It came to me in a moment, hitting me lightning bolt. The paradox of the demonic angel, that is what Armand is.

“I knew who and what he was while you were still licking your wounds at my departure!” Being mad was so unpleasant now. But this must be stopped, and so, it shall be. It is sad that you can give some people the of all of the benefits of the doubts, but they fail by only reacting to their past. “I know about his refusal to eat for months, when he languished in bed, barely speaking, when he had to be fed. What it was like when she left us when he was near catatonic. That had little to do with me, but I cared for him as I knew who and what he was long before you did. And I would take that version of Louis, honest and real, over the one you constructed, who had been lied to about our daughter, brainwashed and manipulated into staying with you while you were thinking of someone else!”

“He was destroying himself, destroying everything!” There is a desperation in Armand’s voice. In a moment of sincerity, the guard slips a little, and I can see that he genuinely feels his actions were justifiable.  “His need to be understood for who he was, someone you could never understand. His loneliness, his alienation. And after he tried to kill himself, when he lay there in my arms, inconsolable,” and for the most dramatic Gremlin effect, he wrapped his arms around himself, “ I told him, I could take away his pain. I heard him think those words over and over through the years, and so, that is what I said to him. That I could. And that is exactly what I did. I took away that which was killing him from the inside in an attempt to save his life.”

My hands clench into fists. "Was that before or after you called out to me? Refusing to tell him I loved him and telling me he was fine? In that moment, your solution was to steal his memories?” I turn away and pace towards a heap of twisted metal. “To manipulate his thoughts? To create an alternate reality? To make him forget Claudia?" As soon as I get to the heap, I start to pace because if I did not, then I could not be responsible for which window I would put him through.

"My solution," Armand said softly, dropping his arms from his body and standing up self-righteously, "was to save him from the poison you had poured into his veins. He was dying, Lestat. His life, his whole being, was slowly slipping away. Every night, another cut, another attempt to feel something other than the agony you had left him with, and with it, he lost another piece of himself.” He turned his head, sniffing, now radiant under the spotlight of the moon. "He needed to forget you." The words hung between them like a blade. "And her. And for a while, he did. For a precious few decades, he was... almost happy."

And there was the crux of it. I study Armand's face, reading centuries of pain in those ancient features. Deep down, somewhere, he had felt for Louis. I do not know if it was love, but he had, for a moment, convinced himself that he had. He had convinced himself the savior. "Almost? Without us and with all of you, it was only an ‘almost’. But that isn’t what you wanted, my greedy little Gremlin. Non, if you could not have me, then you wanted him to love you." His pain twisted into words he almost believed.

"I wanted him to be free."

"You only wanted him free from me! So he could, could turn to you instead, when you yourself are not free!" My laugh is loud and bitter. I stop, the dust falling around me creating a sparkling mist in the moonlight. My smile is wide as I whisper to him. "Did you really think it would work? That you could simply erase me and slide into my place? Because being with you is free, vraiment?” His expression hardens, but he is pinned in place. 

“There are no vampire anti-depressants, Lestat! There are no, no, therapists or doctors to go to… What did I have?” His arms flop around him for emphasis. He is selling his exasperation like one would bark on the street corner in Paris to sell their wares. “I could dull it, I could ease it. I could make it less, make you less.” He pointed to me as if he had identified the murderer in the courtroom. The dove cooed as if on cue.

“Make me less?” I am genuinely confounded here. And exhausted. “Mea Culpa. Is that it then? Yes, I am the big, bad villain. I fell in love with someone who had depressive tendencies, and I probably committed 1001 acts of criminality towards him that make all of it the worse.” My pacing has stopped, and I place my hand over my heart. “Mea Culpa. I have heard it all- too loud, too big, too bold, too much. I am so much that he threw you into a wall and flew through a storm to me when he found out who the big bad villain really is. But, by all means, mea maxima culpa. There is only one small problem.” I walk boldly up to him. “This is no mistake about what I have done. I have paid for my crimes. For once, it is not about Lestat, but you and your crimes, your lesson, this was about, and your responsibility in all of this….” I gesture as if pointing to the entire world around us, but he jumps up and down. Jumps as if a small child is mad and hurt and cannot understand why he is not able to have chocolate for dinner.

“You miss the point! You hurt him! You loved him too much and, as usual, you could not do anything quietly! Without this, all of this that you have done, then, none of this would have happened!” 

For a single moment, I have a thought. A thought that possibly my “this” and Armand’s “this” are different thises. 

“No, the actual point that you are missing here, Mon Gremlin, is that you hurt him, too. That you did, in 77 years, not one single thing to help him and his complexities because you were going to quietly indulge him to obtain any scraps of attention you could.” My this had, to do with what Armand did or, more importantly, did not do. He however, was not talking about that this. I suddenly realized it and simply could not fathom what his this was. “And then, when he was out of control, you sought what was simplest for you yet the most detrimental to him. Blame me all you want, but I learned much quicker than you my mistakes, admitted them publicly, and claimed my responsibility. It is time to take yours.” But he was not conceding an inch as he shook his head in frustration.

“You still miss the p-”

“You killed our daughter, manipulated my husband, and lied to Daniel for nearly his whole life. How is there any other point?” I shriek, but at this, he pounces.

“The, the damned interview! Daniel! None of that was because of me and what I did. He spoke about you for over a week. Every detail, in graphic form. Your harm pushed him to ruin us all! And you are too simple to see it.” His exasperated breathing is labored, yet he is working at trying to have this conversation, not an argument.

“Armand, you have spent too much time with me. You are being dramatic.” Of course, Louis would talk about me, I was a far more interesting subject than Armand.

“Am I? Will you be saying that when it is published and everyone knows about what you have done, good and bad?” No one needs to hold a mirror up for me to see what expression I must have. I have felt it a thousand times. My attempt to hold in rage, my hands clenching in first again. Published. Chapter. Edits. Published. I did not misread the text. “You talk about honesty as you read his messages, text Daniel pretending to be him, is this honesty? Is it trust?” He sighs a deep, dejected sigh. The fight has abruptly extinguished once the moment of realization happened. “I see your mouth twitch…You are a book too easily read. Do you think I didn’t figure it out immediately? I sat for two weeks listening to them banter, go on and on about you for days to barely mention me, our 77 years a side note, not to recognize that Louis would never have responded to Daniel with those words, in that way. That stiff English, which you still translate in your mind. The lack of joke and familiarity. I knew by the brevity that it was not Louis.” I felt my mouth go dry. Mea culpa, mea cupla. 

Mourning doves are notoriously skittish, not trusting people regardless of how well they are acquainted. 

“I see that look, Lestat. A look I have seen before when you are bluffing, dealing a card two you are trying to pass off as an Ace. You knew about the interview, but you did not know that our dear Daniel is sending it to print.” He perches himself on one of the old pumps and pats the dusty seat next to him as if I am a young child he is going to have a talking to. I feel like I am walking into a Venus flytrap. “So, things have not changed. Louis has gone back to keeping secrets again. I fear it will be the hardest defense to break down. Withholding information to control because he simply does not trust anyone.” While it hurts, there is a shared truth to it. A commiseration more than a critique.

“Can you blame his apprehension to trust anyone? Of course, he is traumatized! Weary of being vulnerable!” Armand is, there is no other word, exhausted. This was never supposed to be a fight, was it? I read it as more accusatory than I strictly should have…and the fight has gone out of me, too, my shoulders drop, my voice lowers. “I am not altogether certain he trusts himself, and that is the real problem.”  He looks out towards the cedar door, as if in thought. There is no malice to his words, just a statement of fact.  “He is an open wound who oozes self-loathing dressed as swagger. He tried so to be the tough American when I met him in Paris, but the person who should have protected him pushed him and ruined him with deception and cheating. You ruined him, Lestat. The very foundation of what you laid was lies and avoidances, omitting truths, and for as much as you two have “grown” Louis still feels that vulnerability is weakness.” He looks at me, not to gauge my reaction, but, if it were anyone else, in sympathy. I shake my head.

“And you treated him any differently, how? I stood there, my heart splayed wide for all to see, admitting my faults, confessing my sins in front of an audience for their entertainment, and for what? To be one up by your committing each and every one in more arabesque ways?” I point first to myself,  “Me- cheated.” Then to the Gremlin as if he were a choir. “You- cheated for 50 years. Me- lied, omited the truth. You- created a whole new reality. Me- manipulate. You- erased an entire lifetime. Was it stupidity, arrogance or spite…? ” At that very moment, a very small, very real smile spread across Armand’s face. Maybe the first smile, a true smile, I have seen this evening. Maybe the first real smile I have ever seen. He smiles and tilts his head away from me, drawing patterns in the dust with his finger.

“Please, you wanted to prance around on that stage. There is no reason to pretend otherwise. As for the rest….” he shrugs listlessly, placing his hands in his lap and looking at me sweetly. “I’m not sure it matters. What does is that you two have a mutual codependency wrapped up in the most romantic language I have seen. Destructive, yes. But also...” I think this is the closest to a real compliment and conversation we have ever, maybe Armand has ever had.

“To be fair, his family had ruined him well before I got to him,” I state in my defense, rolling my eyes and tilting my head away from him.

“As had yours you.” We sit for a moment in companionable silence.

“And yours as well.” We shared this silent moment, I would never have expected us to come to. On that, I thought incomprehensible not 30 minutes ago when he first landed at my lamppost. It is almost as if we, for the first time ever, stopped and put our bullshit aside and had genuine discourse without the mess of our ego, eventually. Eventually, put our egos aside. What had I thought a few minutes before? That I could feel empathy and sympathy and…but I could never tell him? Especially tonight? Armand is barely audible next as if there is a catch in his throat. “I hope that what it is that you have can withstand what comes next. He is going to publish it, you know. Probably before the spring is over. They will all come after him, the old ones who want to rules to be kept; the young ones, the humans, they will come after you. His version of you is…romantic to say the least.”

“You are being so paternal and caring,... are you sure you are not ill? ” He chuckles. “You are so sure no one will come after Armand?” Ever the victim. “Or will your boyfriend soften your character, add a few inches to your height, make your hair more voluminous?” I tease. Maybe, maybe I am not teasing in the least."And what role do you play in this masterpiece of fiction?"

Armand's smile flickered. "A smaller one than I deserved, at least I think I deserve. And I have a product for that,” he kicks at the pump we are sitting on. Now it is my turn to chuckle.

“Products for Daniel……??” I tease. He laughs.

“For my hair!....,” and he turned to face me with his knee against my leg. In another lifetime, some 500 years ago, things could have been very different. But after 77 years of lies on top of a 50-year-long affair, I think I dodged a bullet that my poor Louis did not see coming. 

"Let me guess. He penned you as the helpful mentor? The kind friend who tried to save Louis from the big, bad Lestat?" I dramatically flip my hand across my forehead.

""It doesn't matter now," Armand said finally. "The story is told. The book will be published. And when it is..." He shrugged eloquently. "Well. Our kind has never looked favorably on those who break the silence. They will all come after us, all of us. Regardless of Daniel’s lens, how he tells the story, be it with license or just as Louis told it. Have you read any of it?”

“I did.” Fine, it was a single page. That is honestly all I could get through before I reached for my new choker and cried horrifically.

“It is not pretty.” Understatement of the year. Our morning dove returns with a coo and a flap of wings.

“It is his version of his life. It was not always pretty.”

“Lestat, why are you always so difficult…” Exasperated, again….

“Wait, I need to take my phone out to record you. Say that to my notes. You calling ME difficult.” I fumble with my phone as he play slaps at my hand before growing more somber.

“Louis is putting all of us at risk. I… I had no idea that this would turn out this way. I thought, I thought he would…I thought it would be cathartic for him, a way to let go. A way to say goodbye to the past. To Claudia. To... you." Armand's voice grew soft. "I thought if he could finally let go of the toxic hold you have on him, he might be free to move forward."

"With you? Or away from you?" It could have been cruel. I could have been cruel. But I think, for the first time in possibly all of his existence, Armand was being…sincere.

"Perhaps. Or perhaps simply... away from you."

I study Armand's face, reading the layers of deception and truth. "But that's not the only reason, is it? You have other motives."

"Don't we all?" 

"You wanted him gone, or at least moved on." The pieces slide together, the timing makes sense, and all of it flashes before my eyes. "Either truly free, finally seeing what you are and leaving you for good, or running back to me in terror. Either way, you'd be rid of him. "

Armand said nothing, but his silence, the slow slide of his smile to a frown, was confirmation enough.

"Because there's someone else now, isn't there? Someone who actually might choose you willingly. You admitted that you saw the texts I sent to him. So, you have stopped running? You are talking to him now? Are you fucking him?" I was certainly more than teasing him now. But we were having none of it and the moment of levity was sliding away. 

"You know nothing of—"

"I know you've spent decades grooming him. I know you've been feeding him your blood, your stories, your careful seduction." I laugh. "You erased his memories, too? Were you cheating on Louis with Daniel or on Daniel with Louis?"

Armand's hands clenched before he spoke. "Leave Daniel out of this."

“You say you wanted Louis to be free of me then, maybe now. But it was you who finally wanted to be free.” Our dove coos softly. Armand stands without moving.

“No… yes…it’s it is complicated. I wanted him to be free. I wanted…” But his honesty had run out and I may well get no more out of this confession. “I do honestly care deeply for Louis. There was a time when I was romantically attached. There was a time when I was keeping him alive. I care about him, he is…. Important.”

“Important?” He was still standing, within reach, but not looking at me.

“Important…. To you.” Ah. Another attempt.

“And that is important why….it has not mattered before… Nikki, Claudia…”

“They are not Louis. He, his thoughts are loud. I knew very early on that, where his thoughts and feelings lie. And when you came to Paris, I knew…You have been gifted the silence of the other's thought. But yes, I heard him loud and clear. And, no matter what my feelings ever were towards him, or him to me… I will never be…” Me. He will never be me. 

“So why did you not leave him, let him go, for Daniel years ago?”

“He was a broken mess, Lestat. I could not drop him off at your doorstep, nor could I not properly care for him. I had been everything I could for him, and it was never enough. Daniel walks in, and Louis tells me this mortal, this… boy is more interesting than I am. And so, I-

“Became obsessed, like you do about everything. Especially those things you can not control. Like me. Like Louis. Like Claudia. Like San-”

“I quite get the point, Lestat. Yes. Yes, I was, I…. I wanted Louis to think I was fascinating. Daniel was the first person he had any sort of spark with, a spark like he had when Claudia was particularly funny, and I wanted to capture that. But…”

“But…” Armand stood quietly, unable to look at me, unable to profess more.

"So….the question remains… why did you not leave Louis for Le Petit Scribe?”

“I cared for Louis. I owed him peace because I,... I caused some of that pain that was eating him alive.”

“AH! There is it” I jumped up and stood next to him “Finally! If you had just admitted this an hour ago, I could be at home in bed and you could be chasing your fledging. Or… whatever it is that the two of you get up to.  I appreciate your apology. I do not accept it, however, but I appreciate it. ” He turns his face up to me.

“I will not apologize for what happened. Claudia was too young, I,...knew from experience. She was full of rage at Louis who just wanted to love her. She was reckless, rash, a powder keg who would have ruined Paris or wherever she landed. You two were the only reason she had not exploded before they got to us. They would not have survived another year-” 

“That was not your call to make. And I have already acknowledged your rejected apology, you can not unappologize.”

“If it was not my call, then whose? You broke several laws. They broke several laws, everything was so…. Broken. If I had not upheld the rules, then what would be the point of them? The coven would have turned and… I will apologize for some things, she was not one.”

“So, kill her, let him think it was my fault, take him away from me.”

“No.”

"No?"

"No."

"If not that then…"

“Kill her. Kill him. Watch you suffer. Break your heart.” Armand stands inches from me, close enough to reach out if I gave him any signal. I can hear his heart, and he is begging, as usual.

“Was not Nikki enough?” I whisper.

“You never felt for Nikki what you felt for them. Nikki could not love you like Louis…. And she was your child.” We stood there, silently.“I cared deeply for Louis, there was a time, yes, I cared romantically for Louis, but… things changed. I did everything I could to keep him alive.”

“You mean after you planned to kill him?” I laugh ironically.

“Yes. After.” I watch as Armand’s eyes get bigger. I ask the question I already know the answer to, but as he is in the mood to bear his soul tonight, it is best we get it all out in the open, non?

“Why?”

“I knew what he felt for you, he was….competition. I heard his thoughts, but did not know- Then I found out what you felt for him.” Almost Armand, so close but as usual not close at all…

“So you lied to him, then tried to steal him from me?”

“Or,” Armand bites his bottom lip with the slightest bit of fang, “maybe punish him a bit at the beginning. With him out of the way, I could have had another chan-” 

There. There it is. On purpose. My poor Louis.

“You could not have had another chance, Armand.”

“Well, that’s what you say now.” 

“Why didn’t you tell him about Daniel after? It was over for you by then, just, let him be free as you say.” Armand has not moved from me, nor I from him. We stand there in the silence.

“I wanted Daniel to live a whole lifetime. To give him that which was not afforded to me.” 

“That’s what we tried to give Claudia. Love, attention, gifts. It did not matter. So you bided your time “healing” Louis to set him “free” so that you could give Daniel a life. Or, you have an old man kink. Which is fine, I do not mean to shame. We are all allowed to be a bit of a freak about things. You do not have to blush. Armand, you… you are blushing. Marius, Daniel. We all have a type-”

“That’s ridiculous.” He laughs a nervous laugh, and for a moment, the levity is broken. “There has to be a plan, Lestat. The Talamasca will have the book ready to go to print by February, it will be on shelves by the end of spring. They are going to come after him. And you, too. He painted you in the most romantic, tragic, ruinous way.”

“But not you?”

“I have no idea, but I would rather be cautious. In his story, you are the villain. I am merely... forgettable." Armand for the first time in our conversation seems small, seem fragile.

"Is that better or worse, do you think? To be the great love or the great betrayal? To be remembered with passion or not remembered at all?"

Armand's smile was bitter. "Ask me in a century."

"We may not have a century.” I walk away from him, from those thoughts, from what has happened, what was and what can not be changed. In the end, it does not matter why he did or did not do any of it. What matters is here. Louis is what matters now. “ If what you say is true, if the other vampires come..."

"Oh, they will come." Armand's voice was certain. "The only question is whether they'll kill Louis for breaking the silence, or you for being the devil in his story."

"And you?" I turn to face him. There are moments when Armand looks every bit of 500 years old -this is one of them. 

"I suspect I'll survive. I always do." But there was no triumph in his voice, only a bone-deep weariness. "I'll watch you both burn, and I'll survive, because that's what I do. I endure." We stand in silence, looking at each other, at the cliff waiting to be thrown off, for once on the same side yet still at odds, in some kind of understood partnership, and maybe something else.

"He never loved me," Armand said quietly. "Not the way he loves you."

"No," I agreed. "But then, I'll never have the version of him that you saw, years of peace. I gave him immortality, but you gave him something I never could."

"What's that?"

"A version of himself that wasn't defined by his damage. Or by mine.” My dove spread her wings and flew the coop again, free of our conversation and maybe of our past.

“Did I?” Armand closed his eyes and if possible, his expression saddened more than it had before. "If I did, then I took it away from him."

"Yes. You did." I shook my head plainly.

We stand for a moment together in the darkness, dawn just starting to lighten the sky, each lost in contemplation of love and loss. In the end, is there a scorecard? What had I said to Louis? Shall we name all the ways in which we hurt each other? Centuries to be companions and centuries to ruin each other. I turn and begin to walk out.

"When it's published," Armand said finally, " his story, when the world reads it... Louis will become famous. The most famous vampire who ever existed." I laugh at the idea of the man who tried to hide who he was our whole life together was going to come out as the Vampire…

"And the most hunted." I turn back. If there had never been a me in Armand's life, would there have ever been a Louis? In the end, not only did I save Louis from the crowd, but, because of me, Armand also saved him from his death.

"Yes. But also..." Armand's voice grew soft. "Also finally, truly free. No more secrets. No more hiding. No more choice but to become who he is, or what he has always been."

"And who is that, do you think?" I placed my hand on the door. I want to live honestly, he had said. 

Armand smiled, sad and knowing. "That, Mon Prince Gâté, is what we're all about to discover." I open the door and leave him, left him with his version of Louis, his version of peace, and the years he had. I left the past in an old, abandoned power station. Blah, blah, history repeating itself. Blah, blah, leaving what we were behind for who we shall be. 

Whatever that is. 

The night stretches out before me as I walk home. I did not hear him leave, but know Armand is no longer here. He is right, though, as much as it pains me to ever admit the Gremlin is right about anything. They will come for Louis. And perhaps me as well. And something should be done to protect Louis, even though he will never allow it. He will not see what his actions have put into play, the results of his therapy session with Le Petit Scribe trying to exercise the demon that is Moi. Or maybe, maybe that was not it at all. Maybe it was not to exercise me, but to, antagonize me. To revive, to mobilize. Maybe it was to get me to rouse myself and save ma belle épouse. I was the Brat Prince come to save my damsel, calling me in his distress.

In my version, things would be very different. If it were mine to tell, then he would be the prodigal companion! Mon mari returns to my arms so that we may live a, what does he say, an honest life. I think my version would actually portr-

And I stop cold where I am. 

The morning dove flys down and lands two feet ahead of me on the sidewalk.

My version.

It looks at me.

"There has to be a plan, Lestat."

It pecks at some indiscernible speck on the ground.

My version.

And then it is gone.

A plan.

Armand said it would be published by this spring, that is maybe 6 months. I take out my phone and text a Christine who is still asleep. I tell her that we need to push up the release date on the album. I tell her we need a 20 city tour. No. 30. 

I need to be in New York when the story hits. Or Paris. I need to be…

Louis will never let me protect him, he is too proud of that. So there is only one way. 

Tonight, we should fight.

Notes:

I image Lestat recording here, on Esplanade Ave. It is a former church. http://www.esplanadestudios.com/

He is refering to Chopin’s Nocture 2 in E-flat major.
https://shorturl.at/2NhGd

Everyone DOES know the 1st movement of Moonlight, but if you have never listened to the 3rs minute STOP. Stop whatever it is you are doing and go listen.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zucBfXpCA6s

“Bien, bien, j’arrete!” Fine, fine, I’ll stop.
“Qui le mari de louis le trouve très attachant.” -Who Louis's husband finds very endearing.I just have in my mind the stupidness of them talking about themselves in third person to each other.

The burrito comes from Juan’s Flying Burrito. There’s not one close, he had to have Ubered it.

Arthur Roger’s Gallery is really cool and Peter Macon is the artist who paints the final picture that Louis is looking at in S2E8.

“Zut alors” I loved this phrase when I first learned it. There really isn’t a translation for Zut, and in actually no one uses it anymore. But… Lestat.

The actual historic colors of New Orleans. Yeah… that’s a thing- https://vccfoundation.org/fqcolors/
There is no ONE color green used. Back then they just mixed stuff and while a French Quarter Green or Paris Green might have been used, Essen is probably closest when you first paint it, but it fades to something that sort of resemble Great Barrington.
https://shorturl.at/jIRiz

“L’enfant Terrible,” is the terrible enfant. It’s just fancy for Brat.
“Meurtre”- murdered

Clairborne Powerhouse was built in 1895 to run streetcars. There were about 50 lines then but a consolidation made the Powerhouse obsolete in 1922. The land has been used continuously since, but the building had been abandoned until restoration began on it 2 years ago. ( were there raves there in the early 90s…. maybe) Here’s a picture from the early 1900’s and some from 2008.
le scélérat- the villain

“Dominus sit in corde tuo, et te adiuvet ad peccata tua cum vera tristitia confiteri”- May the Lord be in your heart, and may He help you to confess your sins with true sorrow. This is how the old Latin mass began confession. If go ahead, confess those sins isn’t peak pettiness.

Ligne- a french unit of measure used before the metric system. It is itty bitty, like 1/12 of an inch.

Mea culpa, mea cupla, mea maxima culpa- we say mea culpa, but it comes from Latin Mass- my fault, my fault, my most grievous fault.

Mon Prince Gâté- My Brat Prince.
ma belle épouse- my beautiful wife

Chapter 23: Chasing the Dragon

Summary:

“Get up on all fours, I am going to take you now.”
I would be lying if I didn’t say I sprang up. “No, get me ready first.” I spin, grabbing his hips and taking him deep. “Get me wet, there, like that, so I may fill you with cum as you fill me with lies.” I looked up at him. There was no softness in him. No love, no kindness. I slather him, drooling all over his cock.
“Enough.” I was grabbed, flipped, and filled in one stroke.

Notes:

This one is messy.
So, warnings-
Some brief breathplay/hand around the throat
Mention of subspace
Rough penetration
A really mad Lestat

“They don’t understand why it ends like it does? What do you mean they don’t understand?” 

I sigh, scratching the back of my neck. The exhaustion of working on these chapters for the last few hours is settling in my bones. And stupidly, I thought we were close to done. I sip at the remnants of a glass like I had not licked the last drops out hours ago. “It ends when the interview ended, Daniel. It’s Interview with the Vampire, not Interview and Two More Phone Calls.” I take my phone away from my face to check the time. Lestat should had been home by now, even though he’s been staying out longer each day. Should be a relief because we were able to go over lotsa edits. And a relief in that I wouldda been so jealous of the band years ago, but now, I know that it’s good for him. Gives him a lil project, something to do instead of drive me up a wall. And it gives me time to argue with Daniel, which is evidently my new hobby. 

“Man, it’s 200 pages covering 33 years of ‘I hate this man that I am really in love with’, then 75 pages of about 6 years of you running from the ghost of the man that you tried to off but are still stupidly in love with, and only about 10 seconds of the 77 YEARS with the, ahem, love of your life. They wanted it more, a third, a third, and a third.”

“S’not Interview and Some Follow Up Questions, Daniel…”

I can hear Daniel sigh. 

“Not Interview and Where Are They Now. Not Interview with the Epilogue…”

“Louis….”

“The story is the story, Daniel. I was always going to end with ‘and we walked away happily ever after into the sunrise.’ There was never going to be more than we left Paris together. Those 77 years were not eventful.” This brought a snort and a laugh.

“Did you just hear yourself? Honestly, did you just hear what the fuck you said? You think your years with Lestat were so much more eventful than the double that time that you spent with Armand? That is the reddest of flags, my friend. If you had thought about that for more than a second at any point before contacting me, you wouldn’t have needed to.” 

He’s right. He’s right, and I knew that. I didn’t need Daniel to tell me that Armand had been a placeholder. Didn’t need him to know that things were off and wrong and there were pages missing and years missing. But there are so many layers of this that I sometimes get lost, and that’s what I needed Daniel for. 

“And you didn’t walk away happy, and I didn’t either, Du Lac. The last 50 years have been way more eventful than either of us realized. You might have wanted that cut out, but Armand had no intentions of letting this end with you and him walking arm and arm into the sunset, uh rise, whatever.” 

I had realized in the last year, well, we had both realized, that the only reason the interview actually happened was so that Armand could have Daniel in his life again. He

suggested it as a way for me to process, think things out loud. Like a really expensive therapy. And I stupidly said yeah, yeah, that sounds like a great idea. Someone to go back and revisit the childhood of my vampirism with, right, because that is where my wounds must be, my trauma, make me the way I am. More than a year later, and there are still holes. What the fuck was true? I have a Lestat before me that is different in so many ways from the one I had in my mind. I spent 77 years with an Armand who doesn’t exist. A whole universe has been illuminated for Daniel. Memory is a monster, but what happens when that monster has on a mask the whole time? Was it the memory or the holes in it? Or the whole of it? I have lived almost 120 years, and the last few months are the only ones I know are real real.

Daniel went from being my therapist to someone in my support group. Hi, my name is Louis. “Hi, Louis,” It’s been a little over a year since my mind had been fucked with.

And every time we patched together an answer, we had about 50 more questions. How many people, in those years, had gotten in Armand’s way in order to keep Daniel? How many years were wasted pretendin’? I think, now and again, what would have happened if Daniel had not found the truth. Finished the interview with no more follow-up questions, never spoke to Regalan. Would I have walked away after? Seen my life differently, even without the lies exposed and set off right then to forge a new path? What would that path have been? Would we have gradually drifted apart? For how long? It was certainly a way to bring Daniel back into our lives, and was that it? Was there anything in his heart that wanted me to grow or heal? Questions tore at me, and the wanting for answers ached, but that need did not succeed my desire to not see Armand again. Or hear about him. Especially from Daniel.

“The story is what it is. Not gonna change it anymore because every time I do, it’s like I have to revise my whole life.” I go to the window and peek out. It’s still dark, but not for long. “Is Armand putting you up to asking me to write more about him?” There is something about Daniel’s belly laugh that reminds me of Paul, like the ones that he and I shared a lifetime ago. That bonded ribbing, having lived a life together that no one else experienced. The hope that we both come out of the other end of this friendship grows for me every day. I take off my denim shirt and throw it over a chair.

“No, I mean, that seems to pin him completely, I got to admit, but no. Things are uh,...that-” This laugh feels less like Paul to me. I put the cup down and start closing the windows.

“I don’t want to know details…”

“You brought him up, man. Let the record state that I, Daniel Molloy, did not…. No, this isn’t about him. They just want some sort of resolution, especially since they know you two are together. They think the novel is just not balanced. Maybe I can sell them that epilogue.” Now it’s my turn to sigh as the crank that shields the impending light clanks shut. “ Maybe you can write a sequel? 300 pages of the last 15 months. Graphically describe Lestat’s veiny dick. Tell us in exact detail how many pimples he has on his ass.” This laugh felt less funny and more jealous. Not of Lestat per se, but of the fact that he has stuck around long enough for me to count the pimples if they existed.

Lestat does have 26 moles on his back, though. 

“Daniel, vampires don’t ge-” but he cuts me off as he normally does.

“That stork bite he has on his hair line that none of us see because that mop is never up?” I hear the side door open downstairs, signaling Lestat’s return.

“He doesn’t have a stork bite or any other birthmark.” This conversation needs to come to an end and fast. 

“That’s not the point, Louis-”

“We end it when we stopped recording. The rest is off the record. It should stop with- What the fuck?”

Lestat rips my phone out of my hand and throws it against the wall. 

“Lestat? What the hell did you do that for?” The instant I register his face, I know that something is deeply, deeply wrong.

“Yes, why the hell, indeed?” Lestat’s eyes are rimmed red as if he had been crying, mouth angular and twisted, hair askew. This better not be a night when he just needs to fuck nasty. I just got a new phone from him, pushing me in the shower fully clothed last week. Then the electricity shifts in the air, and this feels different. This seems is consuming. Feral panting. Rage.

“What the fuck’s wrong with you?”  There is no change in his tone or his expression.

“What the fuck is wrong with me? There is so much, mon cher. Maybe I should sit down and have Daniel interview me, hun? Go on and on about my other lovers, who I slept with and who I didn’t, right in front of you while you are a pinned butterfly!” His eyes are that searing look that happens when he is manic. Lestat somehow feels bigger, wilder, exuding a raw power.

“I mean, you could, you know. He’d love to finally meet-” his eyes narrow and that seething smile spreads across his face because he is not listening to any words, like I am his next meal.

“I could tell him about Nikki while you sat and listened. About how I slowly deflowered him in an oak grove for his first time after he serenaded me. What his legs looked like, splayed out before me in the soft afternoon light. Spend days talking about the vampire who destroyed me by making me, who toyed with me as I fought for my life, how I was used for my blond hair and blue eyes over and over again, until time became meaningless as my sanity shattered!”

He flips his hair back and slowly advances on me just as a big cat does in all of those documentaries.

“How Armand seduced me, or maybe, how I seduced him?  I was addicted to him, how I let him take me and teach me the art of endless vampiric lovemaking. Or maybe I was his first Maitre and you were just sloppy seconds?  Or maybe the story is that he was an awful, pathetic lover who whimpered and cried the whole time, so terrible that I left him wanting during intermission and finished the third act instead of finishing that act. Knowing you're telling me that you would be with him was meaningless because I had already tossed that book to the side.” 

“Baby, I don’t understand…” I realized my body had started to slowly back away from his advancement without even thinking about it.

“I could go on and on while you sat there forced to listen about the love of your life cum all over himself as he watched me on the stage of a Theater that I bought for him!” he spat. This wasn’t nasty talk to get me to push him down and take control- not that I wouldn’t do that in a second. This was nasty for other reasons. This was real. I placed my hands up, like you would for a police officer. Nothing to see here, sir, just a copy of my license and registration. 

“Lestat, baby, what, what are you talkin about? You are real mad and I’m tryin to understand here.” My attempt at calm is not even a speedbump as his tantrum builds.

“Maybe I will go behind your back, mmm? And have it published, non? Create a version of you that you yourself do not even know. Hun? Does not recognized! Take you and exaggerate and stretch and lie-” 

“What the hell happened, man?” Fuck. Daniel. For a moment, I forgot all about Daniel.

“Lestat, let’s just take a second-”  I watch his knuckles go white as he grabs the back of his chair.

“Which Louis should I give them? Hmmm?” I shoot a quick thought to Daniel of ‘not now’ because all I need is him to show up for my honor, or morbid curiosity, or some shit, and Lestat ripping him limb from limb.

“Would you be the smug and learned man, mocking my lack of formal education, condescensionly correct every social moree and cultural rule that I offend now that I am in America? Keeping me around to feel better about myself, lording over me. Trying to make me feel inadequate and lesser, even though all I ever did was love you!” I try hard not to look like a deer caught in Lestat’s headlights, but I fear I am doing a shit job.

“What is Frenchie on about?”

“Not NOW, Daniel!”

“Or reading your nights away and ignoring me. Leaving me alone in our marriage while you live in a fantasy world of letters. Your books make superior companions to me. Consumed with your stories of love and happy endings while I sit and long to be the next thing you pick up and consume!” His pacing makes him look all the more like a caged lion in our room. His hair like this is unfair, it is glowing white and dancing around him mane- like. He is so incredibly beautiful when he is his most deadly.

“I, I never knew you thought me reading was me acting uppity-”

“You didn’t fucking tell him, did you.” Daniel’s voice rings out in my head, not so much a question as a statement of fact.

“Or maybe the master manipulator? Yes, yes, that Louis. Pretended to cherish humans while you savagely took on Alderman Fenwick, started a riot on Liberty, plotted the demise of New Orleans’ who's who, burned down a whole coven, and decapitated Santiago.” This is when his clothing starts to fly off the back of the chair. It’ll be the damned chair next, hope he doesn’t throw it at me.

“Ok, now That motherfucker deserved it.”  But he ignores me. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen him this worked up. Reminds me of a conversation, I just can’t quite place which one. He, he was mad then, mad but hurt, a terrible combination for Lestat. My denim shirt goes flying across the room.

“Knowing how in love and devoted I was, you withheld your affections on purpose to try to control our lives through weaponizing your melancholy and guilting me into thinking I was solely responsible for your happiness!” Thankfully, he throws a book, and the chair is still spared, for now. 

“Nah, now that is not why I withheld…and I’m not withholding with you now, baby.” 

I know this will only last so long. Since we’ve been together again, we haven’t fought like this, been years since we have really sparred, and I hope I can hold on to my tranquility long enough for this to subside. 

“No, twist you, paint, you as a… what … an aloof housewife? Oui, c'est celui-là! Cold, emotionless, even in our most intimate moments. Maybe not just controlling like Alcide, but also incapable of warmth like Florence.” And the smile as he knows just where to turn the knife.

My phone rings from somewhere across the room.

“Take my Mama’s name out of your mouth.” My calm starts to steel, and I know he is after my rage.

“Constantly criticizing my accent, my clothes, my manners. Who could never tell me he loved me, even though I lavished him with the world, with fine clothes, with a life beyond his wildest imagination. Who then wouldn’t love his husband because he was incapable of such a thing, so he had to murder me. And years later fucked hundreds of other people in an attempt to find what I had so willingly had offered him!” He is walking towards me, and for a second, a fear rises in me from long ago. For a moment, he can call my Mama anything he wants, just don’t…

“Now honey, you know that’s not true, you know that’s not how I feel.” But his advancement does not stop. He is stalking me. He is… he is hunting me.

“  ‘Oh, Daniel, you want to know about Louis? Everyone thinks they know him from that maudlin confession he gave. Let me tell you about the real Louis de Pointe du Lac—not the tortured saint he pretends to be, but the calculating, cold creature I lived with for decades! He seduced me with his beauty and his pain, made me believe I was saving him from despair, when really he was just using me as a patsy for his shame and guilt, to ease his transition into a life of murder and crime he had already chosen to embrace! Blaming me the whole time!’ ” All of a sudden, my back hits the wall and I am caught, a trapped thing.

“Louis.”

“Lestat, you are talkin outtcha ass, that don’t even make sense.”

“Louis!!”

“I can tell him since you were too frightened to be who you really were for all of those years, I was forced into someone else's arms…!” Something happens then. I stop listening, and I don’t even make a choice about what I say because all of that tranquility and the mantras and the feet in white rocks evaporated the moment he tries to defend those actions. My explosion happens before I can stop myself.

“Man, no one told you to fuck that whore! You did all that by yourself!”

“LOUIS!!!”

“DON’T CALL HER A WHORE! She was more faithful to me than you were!” His hands shoot out as if he is going to grab me and…and he stops himself. He stands there, breathing hard, his arms still extended as if something is holding him back. Some unseen power. Or maybe it’s his own sheer will. He’s panting like a caged beast. 

And damnit if he isn’t absolutely radiant.

My phone rings from across the room.

He tilts and twists his neck like he does when he is trying to contain himself. I could speak, but I know whatever the fuck I say is gone to set him off, all the while my ass is still clueless as to what started this.

He laughs, his deep, maniacal laugh, and speaks with a lowered voice.

“I just spent the last 2 hours fighting with a Gremlin, and the first thing I do is defend him. Strange. He somehow always gets under my skin.” He is still panting, and his arms are not lowered, lips carved into a sneer. I’m not outta it yet. I just wish I knew how to get out because I have no idea what he is talking about or what the hell is going on.

The phone rings again. Our eyes are locked and neither of us looks towards the noise. I gesture with my head because it is the only thing I will risk moving right now.

“He’s gonna keep callin ‘til I answer it.”

“Let him call! This is his fault! This is HIS FAULT! His words will let the world know about our kind! It will beckon every vampire walking the earth to our city, to our door! They will come for us, you and I, and probably himself and Armand, too. You brought this to him for reasons I still do not understand, and he did not have to, yet he put words to paper, hateful, vindictive words.”

Suddenly this makes way more sense than I want it to. 

The phone rings again. Lestat storms over to pick up what is left of my phone. The screen is shattered, and the picture of the two of us from that Saint’s game is unrecognizable.

“Yes, Scribe, Louis is here. I have not hurt a precious hair on his head even though he has scalped me.” If I listened hard enough, I could hear this conversation, but I am too busy trying to think of how I am going to smooth this over. My attempt at a plan is disrupted by Daniel.

“You fucked this up, du Lac.”

Lestat shouts into the phone. “YES HE DID! And you are not blameless in this disaster, either! Was that the plan all along? You keep him on the phone with edits to distract him while your maker ambushes me on my way home? Occupy him so that I have no choice but to entertain the Gremlin!” Things slide into place a little more, just not enough to help me dig out of wherever I am.

“Also, you do a terrible job of keeping your mind shut.” He holds the phone away from his head while he looks around as if he is speaking to a ghost in the ether. “Gremlin! Teach your fledgling to shut his mind off, especially when he is committing those disgusting acts that you try to convince yourself are passion. I am tired of hearing him! You are not a sexy minx, and your attempts at love-making are pathetic!” he tosses the phone back against the wall. I am going to have to buy a new one, again. “Try Therapy!” Lestat yells. Maybe to Armand. Or Daniel. Or me. Possibly even himself.

The Cathedral strikes 6am, and this conversation will take us well past sunrise. I have to weigh my options. We can try to hash this all out, but his eyes are so dilated that his rage is nearly blind when he turns his attention back to me. We can try to go to sleep and work this out tomorrow. Or…

Or…

I don’t even know when I began to pant and feel that tingle right before my fangs drop. It’s, it’s not that I only recognize these things until after they happen. It’s usually that I am just so caught up, so enthralled that I don’t even realize what’s going on. He is ethereal like this. Otherworldly. What’s the word that he used to use…preternatural? Huge light blue eyes, somehow phosphorescent, lined in bright red blood, his hair a white haloed mess, his fangs are… I don’t make it past that thought before I am tearing his mouth up with mine. He takes me for a moment, clasping my head in his hands as he so often does. Before he shoves me into our dressers. This kiss is not kind or passionate. This kiss is ruinous. This kiss is meant to tear each other open. We are scratching and ripping, I have a clump of hair in my hand because I knew he would thrust into me so hard if I pulled it out. His nails are scraping my flesh as they are shredding apart my white undershirt. It is unfair how seeing him like this, on the brink of harm, knowing what sort of hurt he could inflict upon me, ignites a flame that no one else…

I tried. 

I tried to find some kind of replacement or substitute, a close proximity of this… feeling. This high. When heroin hits your veins for the first time, it feels like someone drivin a Cadillac up your arm- hot and wide. It makes its way to your heart and - goo goosh- that ecstasy, that absolute communion with euphoria… and you will never experience it again. It happens just once, just the first time. What did the kids call it in the 70s, that first high? Chasing the dragon. That was what it felt like with Lestat. The difference was unlike that first hit of opium, never having it that good again, Lestat, shit, every time could be that good. Every time could be intoxication, the rhapsody of consumption. With Lestat, if I let myself go, give in to him and to me, stop thinking and just feel, time and space stop. And matter, that just don’t matter anymore. I leave this world and enter a realm that is better than any drug, than any life I have taken, than any sex I had. 

It is a moment that is indefinable as anything other than Lestat.

And I chased it. Chased it for years. The feeling of his skin on mine, his heat, the smell of his arousal mixed with sweat, mixed with blood. His blood. The feeling of his breath on me. Every touch electrifies, every sound thunderous, every sight of him brilliant.

His claws scratch across my neck, and I feel the blood trickle out before he licks it. 

“There, are we even now? When will it ever be even, mon cher?” But I bite him and spin him around, throwing him against a wall before I can answer.

You should have told him. 

But we both yell for Daniel to shut the fuck up. 

I should have. I know I should have. I certainly probably should have. It would have been the right and just thing. 

Of course, my dick wouldn’t be pressed against his stomach, painfully bent because I am so fucking hard watching him stalk me around the room. He wouldn’t be pushing me off of him until I crash into the chair as he forces me down. This is not like before; this is not him needing to fuck nasty or wanting his dopamine hit. It’s a real fight for dominance, his pain exploding to encompass me whole. This is my pajamas and undershirt strewn all around us like tree leaves after a hurricane, furniture destroyed like lawn furniture blown down the street. This is me hard as hell. One monster to another, skin under fingers, so much blood; I don’t know if it’s his or mine, he is tryin to lick off my chest. I’m pinned down, bites on my thighs as he forces his ass in my face. The smell of him, my God the smell of his sweat and his want. It’s, there is no other way to describe how animalistic the smell of him makes me, how excited I feel. I might could explode from that alone. I lather his asshole as best I can with the weight of him on top of me, and can not wait until he slams into me hard.

So to egg him on, I nip his ass cheek. He jumps, and I use that momentum to push him off so I can throw my weight on top of him from behind.

“Ain’t about being even. I made mistakes, you made mistakes. That’s the past.” The sound of his breath, ragged, gruff, does nothing but get me hotter, harder.  He arches his back for me, goddamned I want him as much as I want him to take me and make me his over and over until there is no end and no beginning. 

Until there is just Lestat.

“Then why? Why spend two weeks crafting some fabrication, for what if not to hurt me?” I stop rutting against him to line myself up, fuck, I got no lube, but that don’t matter. In the moment it takes me to have that thought, though, he uses his weight to flip us. He somehow spins himself so that he is sitting on my stomach with his back to me, and begins to stroke us both in his hand. How is it that all these years later, the feel of his hand slowly dragging around me, of our cocks against each other, still pushes me into the beginnings of that space only he can send us. My head spins, and my vision narrows until it is only him I see.

“It’s not about us.” I moan, and he stops. My body begs to feel his hand around us, but he pops up, standing above me with that raging look in his eyes, wanting. I sit up, resting my weight on my elbows, still hard for him.

Jesus, this is so fucked up. Can you tell him? Finally?

“Get out of my head, Malloy!” Instantly, the rage intensifies, and in seconds, he has swept me up. My instincts are to fight. Fight like I had to my whole life, hell, fight my own brother. But I don’t want that. 

“Is that it? This is for that FUCKING SCRIBE?” I climb him like a tree to feel our flesh on each other again, my hands around his beautiful, jealous face, and my tongue so deep down his throat. Because I gotta be inside of him now. And it’s not even a fully formed cohesive thought, it just is- getting inside of him, him being inside of me. Getting so lost that I no longer know who is Louis and who is Lestat.

Honestly, the only thought is Lestat.

For years, I denied myself this exact moment. Letting go this far, where there aren’t even thoughts. There were times when it happened. Some nights, he got me going so much that my mind just shorted out. Nights were we destroyed coffins and chairs, drapes and clothes. Nights where we were destroying ourselves and each other in the most divine ways.

I would be lying if I said that I had not thought about this exact thing a lot since I first sat with Daniel. Recalling that first night. God only knows how much of it Armand altered it. Yes, there were times when we were tender and gentle. Yes, we had sex, we shared in each other’s mutual release as he would say. We, more than I wanted to admit it to Daniel and way more than he is going to read in this book, made love. We joined in some sort of sacred union that at the time made no sense to me. I had traded in sex for years, saw so much of it that I was desensitized to it. Fucking had been fucking. No love, no caring, no tenderness. So for me to feel that, that love and gentleness, that care, felt foreign because making love was something I had never seen. Felt like a gift I was not worthy of.  

But there have been nights like this. Nights where we disagree and fight and fuck. And we would FUCK. This is not some black-widow spider eats her mate shit. This is beyond total consumption. This is I want to be a part of you, I want to be slammed into so hard we cease being two and are now one entity. I wanted him dead, I wanted him all to myself, isn’t that what I told Daniel? I didn’t accurately recall all the sweet times, but I also didn’t give fair billing to those vicious times, when two predators fight for dominance and complete submission of the other. 

And when I first grabbed him downstairs in our… our living room more than an fuckin century ago, the first thing I did was pounce and fight for dominion. 

But forming thoughts is hard, yeah. And if I give him my penance too early, if I tell him now, then I won’t get my ass pounded. Then I won’t be able to fuck him and bleed him and cum all over him, and I need that bad.

“Nah, if I wanted to fuck him, I would have done it 50 years ago.” He spits on his hand and lathes up his cock. My heart is pounding in my chest. On instinct, I scoot back until I am up against a wall, and he is grabbing my ankle with his other hand to pull me back.

“And why didn’t you? Since you fucked everyone else.” He tugs my leg hard, too hard. I hear a crack, too, and a brief shot of pain, and in my protests, he forces me to flip over and gets on top of me. I would be lying if I said that I strictly had to scoot back, that it was certainly not so he could grab me and get physical, or fuck me into a wall, that I wasn’t the hardest I had been in months and I didn’t want spread my cheeks and pop my ass out to take every inch of his thick cock over and over. Fuck, I wanted to take him, too. I wanted him home and filling me until I couldn’t walk. To fuck and fill and fill and fuck until I passed out.

“Not my type, didn’t look like you. I needed him for other things.” He sinks into me in one hard thrust, and I cry out altogether too loud to be proud of. I had wanted this for years, to have him split me wide, pound into me, punish me with his strength, make me his. I held back for a million reasons and excuses instead of this, this dance of decadent destruction. When I was ready, there was no one who could do this. How many others had I fucked to get back to him? Daniel provided something else.

“What other things could you possibly need?” his breath is hot and loud in my ear as I feel his hand slip around my neck as he uses his strength to both hold me down and push himself into me as much as is earthly possible. Dear God, yes! Yes. YES. He had not done this in years. Yes, yes, punish me, baby. Fuck, put that large hand on me, put a collar on me. I am so fucked out over this man that my fighting him is only so he will fuck me all the harder. “You wanted to watch him and the Gremlin? Take your turns with him?”

Armand was my last thought right now.

“No,” I manage to squeak out as he grinds into me to hit that sweet spot over and over, “Wanted him to take Armand away.” I can not explain the strength of Lestat. Whatever beast made him, whatever blood runs through his veins, made him stronger than Armand; not that for a moment Armand used that this way. Armand wanted me to punish him for some transgression he had made hundreds of years ago, something I didn’t give a rat's ass about. But again, he is not my concern now. Now, I am enfolded, but I want Lestat to own me. I want him to possess me. 

“You needed another fucking spree? Eh? Take on dozens of men at once? Would that finally be enough?” His thumb is on my jaguar, and if he keeps pushing on it, I am going to go lightheaded and see more stars than I already am. I am pushing myself wide open as I can, trying to meet him at every slap of his body onto mine. Which means each thrust, I am fucking the rug beneath me as well, and the burns I feel make me try to meet him all the harder.

“Deeper” is all I can whisper out. “More,” I panted. I hadn’t begged in months, not since we shared each other in the Cathedral. This ain’t like that, no. This is another kind of pleading. “Please” comes out as more of a gasp before the stars start.

Lestat knew about the interview part, I just left out that Daniel meant to publish my story, and probably for reasons like this. When Daniel and I sat down in 1973, I spoke of a Louis and Lestat that existed in my mind at that point in time. A torrid version of a picture of star-crossed lovers in a New Orleans that no longer existed. A Louis and Lestat that ruined each other, tumbling back in love over and over again. 50 years later in Dubai, we were different because I had changed, as had my experiences and mindset. So, that version of Louis and Lestat had changed, too. And we metamorphosed as those days went on, becoming a less romanticized version, until the bottom fell out. Then, who was I? What was real? Furthermore, how much of Lestat was Claudia’s teenage version? Armand’s editions and alterations? Or mine, tainted by all of the versions of Louis that had been? How had he evolved over time, as I had? I had barely been conscious of my changes, but certainly not of the filter by which I viewed him. Was the Lestat that existed in my mind real? The 1910 Lestat, Lestat of 73, or even last year? How had he changed and grown with each new iteration of me? Or did I view him for all of those years as a static picture in my mind while I evolved?

Would it have been better if he knew? To sit together and try to remember each instance as I had just months before, or as she, or as he? Edit it together? Some sort of fucked up couples therapy. Set the story straight... maybe just straighter? Should it have been The Interview Plus a Heavy Edit by His Villainous Love Interest? Was it my story that I was telling, really? And was it mine, actually, to tell?

When I was a mortal, there were a few comfort books that I read over and over. A safe world whose ending I knew with certainty. Reading King Solomon’s Mines, Men of Iron or Sherlock Holmes allowed me to escape the problems of little Louis du Pointe du Lac and pretend to be the hero with all the right answers. Wasn’t until I was sitting outside of a cafe in Bangkok with a copy of Dorian Gray that it hit me. 

Like all young people, my first reading of it was about the failings of vice. I picked it up again at 26, my reading more focused on the nuanced sexuality and homoerotic undertones, concepts that only slightly registered before. When next I read it in Bangkok, it was wholly different because I was wholly different. There I sat holding a drink I would never ingest, a man having experienced, just like Dorian, a frozen youth for some 45 years. Who would never age, whose own soul was probably trapped in a townhouse across the world as much as Dorian’s was in a portrait; I read the story with different eyes. Same story, different me. When I was younger, I was Basil, idealizing, infatuated. Later, I was Dorian with Lord Henry, convincing me to be his eternal companion. And now, was I Lord Henry the hedonist, or Dorian the eternal beauty, or had I gone back to Basil, ready to lose my life for my art? 

We are the same people, reading the same story, and yet, we are different people with different perspectives. Does the story change, too, or do we just pay attention to different parts, see the in between and beyond lines, or interpret through the perspective time grants us? When I reread Lestat today, not as the fledgling in awe or the spurned husband or the irritated ex, but as I am the Louis of today, I see him with different eyes, with a hindsight that I had not previously. If I were not the same Louis, how could he be the same Lestat? I ask again, how different would my story be if I had published it in 1973? Or 1915? Or with Lestat sitting next to me instead of Armand? 

All of these thoughts and more had bubbled up in the recent weeks since freaking out alone in Dubai. But in a single epiphany, the thoughts converged and hit me big as his hand is removed, and I feel his mouth on my neck. I had never added up all of those separate pieces to make the picture of this exact moment. For all of my changes and evolution, I was still the Louis withholding, and he was my obsessed, unhinged husband. And maybe, just maybe, I had done all of this on purpose. I have had opportunities to do the right thing since my immortal life began. I knew he would find out, and yet….

And yet.

Without warning, Lestat pulls out before either of us comes. He stands, panting, hard and covered in a blood sheen. I turned to look at him, my legs trembling and in so much need. Stars still in my eyes. His were filled with anger, which had not subsided, and it was warranted.

“You lie here, begging me for more, while this time, you stab me in the back. I believed you when you said it. I had waited years for those words, played them over and over in my mind. Louis finally says it. Louis finally loves me. Louis walks in and sweeps me off my feet. I run into you one night, and you weep, confessing your mistake. You see me from the stage and can’t help but fall in love, jealous of every mortal there with their desire and want. You come back to me, unlike any of the others, you return to me and do not leave me with betrayal. But never that Louis works for a year to convince me that he loves me while he destroys me Behind My BACK!” I jump up and grab at his face, crying a baby or a honey, or a mon amour, but he bats me away, not even using his strength. 

“I DO LOVE YOU! I do! I didn’t do this to destroy you! I didn’t mean this to hurt you! It wasn’t for any of that!” 

And that is a truth I should have shared long, long ago. He leans down to pick up the chair he had tossed and is throwing his clothes on it. He will not even look at me.

“That’s not it at all, honey. I, I needed to get my head on straight. I needed to sort through all of the things that I had fed, lied to myself about, and clear my head of bullshit and figure shit out. I-” but he spins on me and starts coming for me again. 

“And to ruin me in the process? To produce a hideous caricature of me? To mock me by taking all that we had and making it a farce!” This time, he does not stop himself from putting his hands on me. His hands are around my shoulders, and he squeezes as he lifts me off up the ground like I weigh nothing. “Or is it that you did not think of me AT ALL!”

“NO! I was fucked in the head! I was clouded and tainted, I was warped. I had been so far from the truth that I shaded all sorts of shit in my head.” His grip on me was not his full might, but he was not letting up, either. 

“You lied to me,” he seethed in the lowest tones. 

“I never lied, but I..I kept the truth from you.” 

And that, that was the sad truth. For all my pride, nothing had changed.

“ Again. You did it again, Louis. ‘I want to live hoooonestly.’ So when you do it, it is acceptable. But when I commit any minor crime, I am the, what did he say, the romantic villain of your story. Is that what I am to you? Do you see me as some wretch that gives you the tragic means to your ends?” My body begins trembling on its own.

“No, no, that’s not… can you put me down, please? Please?” 

“Anything for you.” Before I can place where I have heard those words before, and not for the first time, he drops me. The 22 inches I fall to the wood floor of our bedroom do not compare to the hundreds of feet I fell to the ground, but my soul don’t much register the difference. What’s a few little details in the stormy romance that is us? Lestat barely takes three steps before the reverberations of his act hit him, stopping him cold and rigid. His horror-stricken face as he turns and gazes upon me, immediately realizing what he had done. 

Just say it. Say, 'Lestat, I am never going to love you.’

Neither of us dares breathe anything but ragged breath, he at the terror he has recreated and me at my hand in crafting the situation that prompted it. Again. He lifts his head up to the sky as if he sees us there now, far above, in a place and time we were years ago. As if we are really so far away from that now.

You would help me a good deal....to hear that from your lips....your quivering, hateful lips.

And the truth of that moment is the same as this- I am going to love him. I do more than anything. But my own deep-seated fear of being found out, seen for who and what I really am- I’m gay, I’m a vampire, I’m still in love with him- wins out over all of that still more than a century later. 

And so is the other truth- that over and over, that fear ruins him, but he loves me so recklessly that he will allow me to destroy us a thousand times and will always, unfailingly take me back, no matter who and what I am. And we both know it. 

But also, that his love, his love for me, is bigger than my fear, and I have been too stupid for all of these years, too blinded by my own insecurities still to recognize the magnitude of it. To understand it. Take comfort and, on occasion, shield myself from the weary world in it. And, sadly, to finally let go, accept what he unconditionally offered me years ago. Lestat had been through so much more than me, kicked and beaten down, used, abandoned over and over. And yet, he fiercely gave me everything he was. And again, I prove my selfishness, or rather, my need for selfish preservation, still stood in the way of just letting myself love him.

We stay there, me now sitting on the floor in a heap, unmoving as he refuses to look at me. 

An impass. Again.

“I did it for her,” I whisper. The silence is deafening. Shakily, I stand, unharmed from the fall, just as he is by my words. There exists an injury here for the both of us that is not physical. 

“Don’t use her for your misdeeds.” I shake my head, but he goes on, “How many times will you use her to hide behind? You did not sit there and tell the story of Paul or details of our life for her… ”  I slowly move towards him and notice his eyes are closed. The red streams that fall from them pierce my heart.

“No, I’m… I started telling it for me. My own selfish,...Then I realized that what I thought and knew and what she said, and even what he said, didn’t all make sense. How am I selfish? Don’t even know myself. I was tryin to figure me out. I had a bunch of puzzle pieces that didn’t add up to any picture I could say for sure was real. Ended up going to a different version of the same tale. And once I realized what really happened, after I got the real pieces and put them together, and I told you this baby, I paid Daniel, I lit that laptop on fire, and I flew to you. What I didn’t know is that he had been sending transcripts to his editor the whole time, then, to the Talamasca. I was mad, but I owed him this. We had, I mean, Armand and me,... I destroyed his life in ways I didn’t even know then. But I was the reason he was where he was, and I owed him something.” He rolls his lips into his mouth and bites down until blood flows from there, too

“He gave me the option to change all of it. I could have rewritten it a thousand ways- make me the bad guy, make you the bad guy, make Armand the bad guy, shit, make her the bad guy. But I kept like how it unfolded to me, I told it for her. As…as an apology.” The streams continue to flow, and I still before I touch him. There is anguish there, pain that I had caused the one being that I love more than any other.

“She was mad at me the whole time after we left. Mad at how I loved you, mad at never being first because she knew that no matter what, you were always first. She knew, even if she denied it and blamed it all on you, you read those diaries, honey… she knew I was just as responsible for our whole mess as you were. Maybe in some ways more. And I never got to tell her I was sorry, that it was my fault, too. For a long, long time it was easier to lie to myself or to believe the narrative that what I knew didn’t add up but was fed to me and blame you.” I gently brush the stream on his face before he turns away from me. My heart sinks. I came to live honestly, but somehow I was still not doing that. I had still not come clean to anyone, including me.

“I blamed you for making her, but it was me. You did it for me. I begged you, I said words I knew you wanted to hear after I had just broken your heart on purpose. I manipulated you. I was cruel to you, I said mean things, I walked out and saw exactly the fruits of my labours- destruction and so much fire. And instead of taking responsibility, I ran back to you with her in my arms because I knew you would make it all better. I wanted you to make me all better, but that was my job. I wasn’t fair to you over and over for all of our years together. Shit, I wasn’t even fair now.” He moves away from me, walking towards the headboard, the tension in his back rippling.

“So, this, this little elucidation is supposed to change anything?” He is looking up again, blinking, trying to stop the tears.

“When he told me he was going to print it, he gave me the option to change things, but I knew you would know. I could have revised it, changed names, maybe we were in St Louis, maybe I had on a different suit, you were a brunette, she was younger, but instead I kept the story as I thought it to be true when I told it. I needed you to know why and how because I never got the chance to tell you. If I wouldda walked away, God knows what they would have portrayed us as. And so by holding some control, I put her first.” Even like this, fuming at me, he is beautiful to behold. The tension in his muscles, his hair wet with sweat, the grip with which he held onto the headboard. He shakes his head and stares at the wall while I slowly advance toward him. “This is uncomfortable for me, too- I don’t paint myself in a great light, either. I’m…. I was an idiot to believe him for so long. To not question things. To let myself be lied to, to lie to myself. I let Danial see her diaries; lots of what’s there is from her point of view. It’s ugly. I’m ugly. I’m weak, I’m…I tried to honor her and contain the malevolence that dripped from her pen.” He does not move to look at me. 

“Great. An eternal teenager ruins my life from beyond the grave.” I place my hand on his back, and his muscles quiver. 

 

“We both ruined… we all ruined each other’s lives. Yeah, she was our downfall. But she was our joy. Her story gets to live on honest- we were failed parents. Flawed in almost every way. Her death, both times, was on us. But so was her life. And the love. And by publishing this book, I can give her the immortality we promised her through words. Claudia’s story, a broken girl from a broken family, gets told. And for the first time ever, she comes first.” When he does finally look at me, the devastation in his eyes, the murder I have committed tonight, I will pay for years to come.

“Then why not just tell her story. Publish her journals. Let it be some teen epistolary about her two terrible fathers.” I take a step further and hesitantly reach for the tear on his cheek. He lets me without a single blink of his eye.

“Her story is hateful, baby. Her story is cruel to you and to me. We are villains because she didn’t live long enough to see it on the other side. Could you imagine the story I would write about my parents at 17? Shit, at 33? How did your views about your parents change the moment we became parents? Because the Florence just flowed outta me without warning on too many nights.” I rub that tear between my fingers as the next one slowly wells up.

“Your father’s temper. Your maker’s temper. You didn’t see that at first; took time, took life, being a parent. She was so like you, and in 40 more years, she prolly could see it for what it is. Admit it, know where it’s coming from, try to do better by her kids.  My story, my story is that we loved each other. My story is that I was not the best father to her, but I controlled how… how bad we were. Can you imagine your version from 1940? Of the insolin daughter and the frigid wife. Or the 1970s version of your daughter’s death and mine, too?” He snorts lowly, but his eyes are still fixed on the wall. I slowly slide my hand down his cheek. 

“Baby, I should have told you. But I didn’t do it to hurt you. I never mean to hurt you. I was scared, I am always scared. I had just gotten you back. I,... I wanted to control the damage. I wanted to rein in Daniel or, by extension, Armand.” He leans into my hand, turning a little more to face me.

“Armand is upset he is such a small player in your life.” There is a definitiveness to it, like he knows this as fact and not just some educated guess. “He feels like he should have had top billing. I mean, he is the true villain here, I suppose. No matter that, he will never be the romantic one as I am.” Now it is my turn to snort. Of course it is him. Been trying to get through to my mind for months now, probably using Daniel for information about me. Maybe. Maybe using him for …other reasons, too.

“So he’s where this is all coming from. I don’t even want to know what bullshit story he crafted, laid it on thick, Armand’s version, where he is a poor, innocent, misunderstood victim. Done matter what kinda billing he gets, he’s still stirring up shit.” His face falls into my hand more.

“Of course it was shit, I can read Armand’s mind and eyes like the bad painting he is. No, it was the fear in him, for the first time, that might have been real.” His hands slipped around my waist in a way that was so possessive. His. I will forever be his.

“Fear?” So I step in closer to let him know, yeah, his. I will always be his. And maybe to let him know I am trying hard to get out of my own damned way.

“Fear for what you're telling of our story will do to us, to our kind.”

“How’s he got fear of that? He’s telling you that he wished he had a larger part ‘en at the same time telling you that we were all going to perish? Seems typical, upset he doesn’t have a bigger role in the tragedy that is just not quite tragic enough for him. Forget the fact that calling Daniel was his idea.” I risk kissing his shoulder and stepping closer until I can feel the heat of his body. I am still hard as fuck, and he is still a deadly monster. 

“He wants to be Iago, but he will forever be Roderigo.”

“Wait, does that make me…?” He rolls his eyes in the most beautiful of ways and tilts his head from side to side. 

“Desdemona. You are Desdemona, mon amour.” A small chuckle erupts as I run my hand down his shoulder. 

“Yeah, but Othello is the Moor who kills Desdemona. I mean… I think I’m more Othello and she’s more you.” He snorts again, a laugh this time. I step closer, yet our bodies brush against each other. I can feel his heat, his cock against mine. I threw my arms over his shoulder, trying hard not to launch myself at him again. 

“Beautiful, young, loyal, most certainly. Meanwhile, you are easily manipulated, mon cher. Should you reconsider?” He cocks his head, but his arms slide around my waist, closing the gap between us. Even in this moment, his anger, our runation, I can not help but feel my heart beating as his is, in that same rhythm, see the sad beauty in his eyes and feel him throbbing against me.

“Baby,” I drag my hand down his jaw, and he leans into it, closing his puffy, streaked eyes.  “I am still hard as hell, and it’s 6:30. Can you just finish takin all your aggression out on me, and we can continue this in the evening?” His scowl is gorgeous as he feigns upset.

“I am still mad at you, Louis.”

“As you should be. Not that I was trying to hurt you, but because I was too scared to trust you could handle the truth. I let my fears override your love.” I dropped down to my knees and nuzzled my face against all of his hardness. “That you think I haven’t let you ruin me yet.”

“Let me ruin you?” I can’t help but kiss all around him, licking at that skin still red from smacking my ass.

“Ruin me for anyone else.” I turned my head and licked down his length. “Might still got a little left in me, might gotta get in a few more rounds. Make sure the ruin took real good.” I took him slowly in my mouth all the way to his root. The heft of him, lying on my tongue, and not thinking, I let a huge grown out, which makes him thrust into me. I had not thought about it in years, how he loved it when I hummed him down. I couldn’t help but run my hands around his thighs, feel how taut his stomach was, how hot he felt. Must have fed before he came home. I wanted that blood; it was mine, even if it still ran through his veins. He was mine. I rolled my tongue over him as my fingers found my way to his rim. 

It was his hands on either side of my head, gently holding me as he slowly fucked my mouth that did it. Or maybe it was when he threw his head back. The groan of pleasure told me he might still be mad, but not mad enough to let go of this. Or feeling the coolness of his ring against my temple. Or when he started to babble in French. Probably because I had been all worked up earlier, but I drag my nails down his ass, drawing blood, and he moans. 

“Putian, mon amour!” He slows me down, so I deep throat him real good. “Do you want me to paint your face, hmmm? So I can lick it off?”

“Mmmuh mmm” Is all I can say because have you ever gotten off on sucking someone else’s dick? Like, how I get harder and feel like I am going to come, he’s not even touching my body. My mouth was so full of saliva, I knew if he watched my drool, it would push him over the edge.

“Need you to fuck me, baby. Finish me up.” I made sure he saw the saliva string from my mouth to his cock as I swirled my tongue around his tip. “I’m still so hard for you, be a shame if we waste it.” His eyes are blown wide again, making me dizzy enough to forget how mad he just was.

“Can I use a plug?” I am licking him as I slowly slide a finger in. The beauty of a body that is always tight and yet somehow always ready.
“The big one, so you be ready for me after you fill me. I’mma just dump my load right into you, so don’t hold back on me.” I suck his balls a minute before I cup them and lick his cock again. He rocks his cock into me, hitting the back of my throat again. Fuck, I need him so bad I might not let him get that plug.
“Fuck, Louis, Fuck, you can not say things like that, mon amour.” I make a sucking pop noise after downing him three more times, tugging his balls with one hand and teasing his ass with the other. 
“Suppose I can’t tell you to wrap your hands,” I lap at his tip, “around my neck just tight enough?” I suck on it before I slowly deep throat him again. He goes again and clenches around my fingers.
“I need leverage to hold you in my hand. Not, not like…”
“Take me standing, hand around my throat, hand on my cock, you sucking blood out of me.” I slowly take him one more time before I stand,  take both of us in my hand. I can’t stand not having him in my mouth, so I force my tongue in his. I am stroking him entirely too slowly with the sun coming up, but fuck, I want this to last for hours. I whisper in his ear. “Wanna float, want you to make me yours over and over until I can’t think of nothin but you.” I lick his ear and tug his lob in my teeth as I tug on him a little harder.
He spins me around and pushes me towards the wall. I hear a drawer open and close before I feel a hand on my hip pushing me into the wall, the other spreading me wide for him to lap at me. I can not spread my legs wide enough, I just throw my leg on his shoulder. His left hand slides up my legs before he pulls my cheeks wide.
“Fuck baby fuck, please, I need you.” I can’t help but bounce on his hot mouth. His tongue is wonderful, but I need to be filled. 
“I know, but you do not get that yet.” I feel his hand slide up my leg and caress my balls before he slides the rubber bands around them. “Let us just see how long I can keep you like this, so when you fill me, it is so much that it drips right out.” He puts his head between my legs and suck on them as he slowly fingers my rim. Finally, I feel his left hand loosen around my cock, and I am trying hard to fuck it, but he is not holding it tight enough for me to get friction. His thumb is pushing on me as he kisses and licks my thighs, but will not slip inside. 
His hand rubs around the tip of my cock once and is gone. I try to find it, but finally his thumb pushes right past that ring of muscle. “Yeah, baby,” and clench and try to keep him in, but he pulls out again. I turn around and watch him reach for a plug, but I drop to my knees, kissing his back, and he closes the drawer. I put my hand up so he will give it to me. I playfully push him to all fours so I can fuck him with my tongue a bit. Again, the smell of his sweat and blood and want, my tongue inside of him, and the stars start to come back just a little. When he starts to quiver and leak just a little, I sit back on my knees, still hard as hell with 3 rubber bands tied around my balls, and inch it in and out, in and out, deliberately taking my time. Watching him consume it and try to hold on before I drag it out of him.
“You should play with yourself so you will be ready for me,” he says shakily as I swirl the plug, taking my time to gradually ease it in as he sucks in a breath.
“Wanna watch?” as I loudly suck on my fingers. 
“Yes, on the bed.” I play with him a few more times before I leave it inside of him and pop up on the bed. I put my fingers out for him to suck on while I play with my cock for a second, and he makes a noise. “ No, you can’t touch yourself. I said I need you to fill me, but you are not ready to do so yet. Ready yourself.”
Lestat looks at me no less predatory as he holds my taut balls out of the way and I circle myself than when he first walked into the room. I was not going to get fucked, I was going to get devoured. He stands and watches me as I use a finger, then two to fuck myself open, lazily playing with his own cock. I watch him watch me, like a hawk ready to pounce on a mouse. As he stalks onto the bed, I remove my hands away for him. “No, not yet, go back.” He lay with his head between my legs and began to run his claws up and down my legs. He places his hand on mine, holding my aching balls, and begins to massage them before he licks his own fingers. One, two, soon there are six fingers in me. “So, do you think you can take more? My whole hand? My fist?” I know I am a writhing mess as he stretches me so good with all 8 of our fingers. I am throbbing now, watching him focus on himself as he finger fucks me. 
“Get up on all fours, I am going to take you now.”
I would be lying if I didn’t say I sprang up. “No, get me ready first.” I spin, grabbing his hips and taking him deep. “Get me wet, there, like that, so I may fill you with cum as you fill me with lies.” I looked up at him. There was no softness in him. No love, no kindness. I slather him, drooling all over his cock.
“Enough.” I was grabbed, flipped, and filled in one stroke. Now, now he was using his strength. I feel his hands bruise me as he holds me too tightly. There is no way that he enjoyed a bit of it because he forces himself so strongly. He lowers himself over me, placing a hand on one side of me as the other slides around my neck. He is hitting me in just the right spot over and over, and I am on fire so much that I burn up.
“I waited years for you, years for this. He will come, I said to myself, he will figure out the truth, he will love me again, it will all be better. And you did. ”  His hand tightens slightly around me, and I can barely pay attention. I am lightheaded and throbbing and in pain and in love. “Except just like Armand, you are not wiser, only older.”And he sinks his fangs in me and gulps. My blood flows as he fucks and fucks, with no end in sight for either. He lets go of my neck and wraps himself around the base of my cock, and I am fucking and getting fucked and drained at the same time. 
“Baby, iss too much. Please, don’t.” But he does not slow his hips, his hands, or his drink. Suddenly, my request for a hand around my neck seemed like a much better idea than his mouth on me. “Baby, please,...plea-” But I could not finish it before I heard him release me and yell as only our kind can do. He slows, erratic, pushing me as hard as he was holding on. I crumple when he lets go of me, emptied and filled at the same time.
“Up, UP, you must fill me.” He rolls me over, but there is not enough blood in me to keep me hard. Ripping at his own wrist, Lestat let the blood drip on my mouth as Armand had years earlier when I was stuck in a rock-filled tomb. I am so fuzzy and gone, I do not remember grabbing his arm to my mouth, gulping and gulping, taking back what he had taken from me. Taken from me years ago.
I am hard again, before I am full. 
I fumble with one hand to take the rubber bands off as I keep his wrist to my mouth. When I have my full, I pounce upon him, savagely taking his mouth while tears rolled down his face.
He drips out of me while I kiss and grab and eat him. Lestat tumbles back, barely weakened from feeding me, which in the moment says things I don’t quite add up yet. But unlike him, there is no need to punish because I have done that enough. There is only a need to love. To slow down, to feast upon him. To worship at the altar that is Lestat. 
And so I do. I take my time, kissing him, grazing on every inch of cool flesh, ingesting his scent and his taste as if he were prepared for me alone. I praise his beauty, but Lestat is well aware of how his looks have opened every door for him, even opened a few that he wishes would never have been. No, I praise his love, his kindness, his care, his devotion to a husband and child who never deserved him, and I slowly tug the plug from him. I praise his passion and his talents, his tenderness, even after having been ripped apart and put back together by him.
Because in the end, we will always rip each other apart and put ourselves back together again.
I apologize with every methodical deep thrust, massaging his hips, and drowning in his tear-filled eyes. I confess the moments I fell in love, all of them, over the century, the moments he knew about, the ones he didn’t. The ones I didn’t know about until they tumble out of my mouth in hushed tones. I slowly and methodically made love to my husband so completely, so sweetly so that he knows, without a shadow of a doubt, that he was, has been, and will forever be the most important thing in my whole world. Forever and ever, no matter what, world without end. Amen.
I hold him right before we cum within seconds of each other, as he places his wrist to my mouth again, and I put mine to his.
The architects of our creation mean to humble us. We can not read our maker's thoughts, or they ours. Except, except.
The moment I tore into his wrist and he into mine, I saw me how he did- eyes of green I had not seen in over a century looking at him in awe and wonder after our first night together; looking up at me from my lap as I put a book down to brush away a lock of his hair; my face as we spun on the dance floor absurdly hard pressed upon him; at the Saints game as I watch an impossible interception take place; at an alter, in a church, trebling to reach out to him; at an alter, in a cathedral confessing my sins and earning absolution with each stroke of my cock. 
Me as he spins around to look at me, walking towards a certain bench in Jackson Square in an impossible sunlight. 
How,.. how can that be?
When I release my mouth and my love inside of him, his face is just as tear-stained as mine.
What had he seen? What images did I, at that moment, share with him? Of him? Of his unwavering love and his aching beauty?
I fall upon him, still inside, spent and more in love than I had been the day before or the day before that. He holds me in his arms, tight, right where I belong, the only place I have honestly ever belonged, the only place where I have ever felt safe in my life; kisses the top of my head, and I slowly slide into a sleep more satisfied, more in love than I have ever felt in my whole life.
 
Lestat and all of his important belongings are gone when I wake up.