Mortal Agent of a Vampire - Chapter 1

I was lying in a hospital bed (not a serious one), the sun shining through the window on one side, casting a square of light, and in the shadows on the other side, a figure sat, his dark hair slightly disheveled, his face pale and handsome.
He was Vince, and we had been through a lot together over the past two years, and as a man it was somewhat embarrassing to be so frank, but I decided to set aside my pride for the moment. I must admit that even though we haven’t spent much time together, he has become the hardest part of me to let go of, my best friend, parent and teacher. Sadly, I will soon forget all about him as if he had never been in my life.
He silently handed me a black-faced notebook with a pen clipped to it, and I reached for it, and in the brief meeting of eyes, he must have read my hesitation, and so nodded, carefully and with a hint of encouragement.
So I opened that notebook and began to write the story.

It is common for people to have many unrealistic ideals when they are young. Take me for example, when I was still addicted to lying on the roof looking at the stars, I once fantasized about becoming an astronomer when I grew up, wandering among the stars, which is really a joke now that I think about it. Later I also aspired to be a painter, and did study for a while, only to give up after bawling my eyes out in my first watercolor class because I didn’t have any paints.
When I reached a more stable state of mind (15 or 16, I think), I finally made up my mind that I wanted to be a freelance writer. My family didn’t think so, thinking that I was just saying that because freelance writing, to many people, is just an excuse to be lazy, or to save face in front of people when there’s no work to be done. But I know I’m serious.
After graduating from high school, I earned a bachelor’s degree in liberal arts, and my father was so happy that he asked an old friend of his to find me a position as a clerk in a public company in the city.
One evening on a July day, everyone-including Dad, Mom, my sister, my brother, and a dog-gathered in the living room. Mom presented me with the good news and the invitation, causing me to be incredibly surprised, and I said, “No, didn’t I say I was going to be a freelance writer?”
Dead silence fell over the living room, only to hear a boom as the cork of the champagne popped in Dad’s hand, bubbles boinging out and bursting.
Since then, everyone except old Otto (the dog) has given me a new name, ‘Crazy’. I have forgiven their ignorance with the utmost generosity and have often looked back on that drama-filled scene with secret amusement. It seemed to me that I was quick-witted and talented, and that it would not be long before I would shine in the literary world, and then everyone would understand me and prostrate themselves at my feet and admit that they had a mouse’s eye on me.
Naturally, this daydream-like fantasy didn’t materialize, and three months later, in my rented basement, surrounded by stacks of useful and useless manuscripts, I was huddled at my desk in front of my computer, painfully aware that the wrong person was me. Simply put, I was out of ammunition.
This basement is so cramped that it would be an understatement to say it’s a dungeon, and at the top of the wall along the edge, there’s a small, narrow window facing out, and when I’m bored out of my mind, I often stand up in my chair and look out. Check out the lawn, the asphalt, and the sky in the distance, sometimes surprised to spot a blueback or a cat. This pastime has become increasingly tedious as fall begins to take hold, and today is especially uninspiring. The winds of late fall whistled through the dead leaves, the swings creaked as they were pulled by rough spirits, and the dark clouds approached with heavy steps, making a downpour inevitable.
My inner world was as chaotic as nature was at the moment. How wonderful it would have been if I had accepted that clerkship! At least now I could fill my stomach beautifully with a cheeseburger with beef instead of starving!
I cursed – there wasn’t really anything to curse, because I was entirely to blame, but it’s human nature to find something to curse when bad things happen, so I blamed my parents for not doing their part to counsel me – they should have at least tried.
Soon enough, though, I forgot about the episode and became a hydrogen-filled balloon again, inflated and ready to fly toward the clouds. I received a letter.
Did I say I was an emotional person? No. Well, then, now meet Lyle Firth, Master of Temperamentalism. The letter was delivered to me by my landlord, and for the only time in three months she wasn’t here to collect rent or utilities. The envelope was typewritten with a typewriter address and contained a newspaper, a thin piece of paper, and a post office money order for fifty dollars. I turned it over and admired it for a long time before I began to read the letter, which, omitting the pleasantries, roughly meant thanks for the contribution, and it took me a while to rack my brain to remember that it was for a book review I’d sent out two months earlier, and that the name of the paper appeared to be called the ‘Evening Lunar News’.
This meant I could support myself for another week, I breathed a sigh of relief and stepped into my leather shoes, intending to cash in before the post office closed, and just in my haste I caught a glimpse of the last sentence, “We appreciate your writing and we are currently looking for a professional reporter, if you’re interested you can come in any weekday to talk about it for a great deal of money.”
I’m sorry, I guess it was hunger that triggered the primal animal in me, and when I read the words ‘favorable treatment’, my eyes fell out like a mouse smelling a cookie.
The next day, I cleaned myself up, put on a slicked-back haircut, and rode in the car to the place where the Moonlight Evening News was located. It’s no wonder it was given such an uninspiring sounding name, but it turns out that the town is called Moonlight Falls. It’s quite a small town, nestled in a valley, away from the hustle and bustle. I slept and slept and slept on the bus, finally arriving just as it was getting dark.
The editor of the Life section, the person who wrote the letter inviting me, enthusiastically gave me a tour of the newspaper office, a four-story building. The first floor was the lobby, the second and third floors were offices, and the fourth floor was the lounge area. We wandered around a lot and finally sat down on the second floor, at his desk. He briefly asked me a few questions about my school and work experience and kept nodding his head as I answered, as if I was the person he was looking for.
“When can you come to work?” Finally, as a closing statement, he asked.
“Right away.” I said.
He smiled with satisfaction, we shook hands, and he invited me to join him for dinner and promised to help me find a place to land. Oh, how I wanted to praise God for His goodness.
At six o’clock he picked up his coat and we walked out together, and it was at this time that I met Vince.
At first I didn’t pay much attention to him, he was just a stranger walking towards me with a stack of folders, and I was so grateful that I didn’t even notice his weird outfit, which was really suspicious now that I think about it… long black trenchcoat, black leather gloves, black pants and boots ……, etc… This isn’t the Matrix, is it?
We approached gradually from both ends of the corridor, and out of politeness I glanced up at him, and boy, did that glance give me the creeps.
Why, words were damn barren at this point, and Vince’s face was white, the kind of uncomfortable pallor that was obvious even in the glow of the dimly lit heat lamp. He was extremely handsome, with impeccable features and contours, not some girly, flowery pretty boy, but the kind of masculine handsomeness that any man would recognize. And, oh, those eyes.
What kind of eyes were those, first of all I can’t even describe their pupil color, they burned at times like a golden flame, and at other times they softened like a gray-blue, or emerald-green fire, leaping and snapping with the light. Those eyes also have a kind of magic, so that people can not resist, in it stared at me, my whole body’s blood seems to freeze, I stood there, the sky spinning, the universe around me is infinitely stretched, a kind of like a tsunami or a volcanic eruption of the general grandiose power swept towards me, I shivered, my whole body is paralyzed, my field of vision is only that pair of intimidating eyes, it is getting closer and closer and closer and closer
As he brushed past me, he finally withdrew his gaze and turned to me with a smile, and there could not have been a more stomach-churning smile than that. The divine experience I had just had receded like a tidal wave, and I realized that only a few seconds had passed.
“What’s up with this guy?”
“You mean Vince?” The editor glanced back at him, his voice flat, obviously not as experienced as I had just been, “He’s our star reporter here, you’ll recognize him.”

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