Once Bitten, No Longer Shy by Julie Steimle (chrome ebook reader txt) 📕

into a tee-shirt. And when we all saw it, we all bought it just to tease him.”

Hanz laughed, shaking his head. “Man. How did she get a picture of him as a wolf then?”

Pulling over the hoodie to cover the tee-shirt, Troy answered, “She took it the same day she dug a silver bullet out of his leg. She just thought she was rescuing a wolf. That’s what she does, you know. She’s into rescuing dangerous animals. She was selling the shirts at a conference to raise money to go to Africa.”

Nodding, Hanz continued to pack up personal items into a rolling suitcase. Troy grabbed food off the breakfast tray, scarfing it down. He then went out the door to get the lotion, a chunk of toast in mouth.

As he rushed downstairs, his mind naturally drifted over that time when he had bought the shirt. Though he had bought it to annoy Rick just like everybody else, he had never wanted it to wear. It had been sitting unworn in his drawer since he got it. But Randon wore his. So had Matthew and Tom, continuing the joke. But wearing it, Troy felt like he would be joining a fan club. He had even thought about burning it. Having it on now made him feel like he was betraying his principles.

Art was in the kitchen cleaning up breakfast and putting away his thick scriptures. His planner was out on the calendar page. Troy noticed that he had marked up the first support group meeting along with other dates and activities. One of the notes on the side said to call his brother and ask how to handle evil spirits.

Was that how Art saw him? An evil spirit?

Grumbling on his way to the bathroom, Troy then went back upstairs and dropped the bottle into the suitcase, restraining the urge to punch something. He liked Hanz, but Art… he was something else.

They were soon out of the apartment and taking the subway to Matthew’s neighborhood. Hanz sat in the subway car, reading some sort of self-help book while Troy brooded with his hood up and sunglasses on. He got a few stares, but most people left him alone. They had to transfer a few times, but they eventually exited at the station where Hanz figured Matthew lived.

“This is not a nice neighborhood,” Troy murmured as he looked about it, his eyes especially marking the graffiti and the degree of wear and grime on the brick and stone buildings.

Hanz nodded, agreeing.

“Let me check the address again.” Troy peered at the street number on Hanz’s cell phone then up at the street signs themselves.

They matched.

“Maybe this is all he can afford on a cop’s salary,” Hanz murmured, going down the street to find the building.

Troy shuddered, remembering that Matthew was also marked by the mafia. It was possible he chose this neighborhood for a particular reason. Matthew could hear people’s held-back thoughts when they spoke, after all. He knew the dirty secrets people kept from others.

As they approached an apartment door, a guy dressed like a fan of gangster rap, with dreads and lots of chains, called out to Hanz, “Hey white boy. What’choo doin’ here?”

“Looking for a friend who lives here,” Hanz replied as if it was natural to be conversing with this thug and these surroundings. Seriously, Troy was amazed how nothing seemed to faze Hanz… almost as if he truly was the Norse god of thunder.

“You ain’t got no friends here.” The guy rose. He was tall. His sunglasses masked his dark eyes. His high cheekbones and trimmed goatee and mustache made him a step more scary. He advanced on them, reaching into one of his sagging pockets.

Troy quickly put himself between him and Hanz, sure his dark angel would be furious is her fiancé was ever harmed. He lowered his sunglasses to reveal his red eyes, grinning to show his newly sharp teeth. “You don’t want to mess with him.”

With a lurch, the gangster guy pulled back, pointing with a shaking finger. “You… you’re a ghoulie!”

Hanz shot Troy a look. He opened his mouth to ask, but Troy beat him to it. “You’ve met a few ghoulies?”

“Yeah…” The man backed away further, digging deeper into his pocket for something.

“Probably Tom,” Hanz hissed to Troy.

Troy nodded then continued to the door of the apartment building, forgetting the gangster guy. Hanz followed. No one bothered them when they went inside.

They went up a few floors, found the number, and knocked on the door.

No answer.

Hanz then texted Matthew.

He got a text back almost immediately.

 

*There’s a guy down below who will give you the key. His name is Chad.*

 

The ‘guy down below’ whom Matthew was talking about turned out to be the same thuggish man who had nearly assaulted them earlier. He had followed them up. But in his hand, instead of it being a knife or gun, it was the key. He was smirking at them.

“Yo. You’ll want this.”

Hanz raised his eyebrows and shut off his phone.

“Are you Chad?” Troy asked, eyeing him again.

The guy nodded with a bit of distance. “Yep.”

Troy jerked his chin at him, taking the key sharply. “Do you dress like that to set people off?”

Laughing, a wide, teethy grin spread on Chad’s face. “Nah. It’s cool.”

And he stumped down the stairs again.

Hanz shrugged, letting Troy go ahead of him to the door to unlock it.

Stepping inside, Troy was surprised to see how cramped and rundown Matthew’s apartment was. For some reason he always had expected his friend to end up in a midtown sort of place with decent carpets and windows. But this place was like ending up where he had started off—back at the beginning. For a moment, he wondered if Matthew had a Men-in-Black style secret door with a room full of high tech guns. But all he saw was a dilapidated fold-out couch (clearly bought secondhand); book shelves made out of cinderblocks, boards, and milk crates jammed with textbooks and novels; a scratched-up coffee table and curtains pieced together with other old curtains. Was he not paid well at his job? Clearly he was not taking any handouts from Rick.

“Cool place,” Hanz said, sounding like he meant it. His eyes were on the cinderblock bookshelf and the French noir posters on the walls, which Troy always found weird about Matthew. Matthew had odd tastes in things… like black-and-white movies and MC Escher paintings.

Troy stared at Hanz, watching him go into the kitchen. Hanz opened the fridge and pulled out a carton of juice.

“Should you even be doing that?” Troy followed after him. The kitchen wasn’t huge. It had a small folding table with two chairs with a window opening to a fire escape. The fridge was old, one of those latch handle types from the fifties. The kitchen had a small pantry, though, a tiny four burner stove, and an old porcelain sink. 

“Sure,” Hanz said, pouring himself a glass. “Matt said to make ourselves at home and help ourselves to anything in the fridge.”

“I’m sure he was just saying that….” Troy said, opening the refrigerator. But looking at the contents, he saw that it was actually quite full.

“That’s doubtful.” Hanz leaned against the counter, drinking down the juice without any guilt that he was taking from a poor man. Once he swallowed, he said, “Your friend Matt seems to be the kind of guy who sticks to the truth or doesn’t speak at all.”

Which, really did describe Matthew well. Matthew abhorred lies. It was mostly because he could hear through them what people were truly thinking.

Yet Troy hissed, “Ok, but look at this place. I don’t think he has much money, so I don’t want him wasting any on us.”

A funny expression look formed on Hanz’s face. He closed one eye then said, “Was your last apartment as good as the one you are in now?”

Troy pulled back. “What?” He looked around himself. “No! Are you kidding me? Something as posh as that place? Only Rick can afford a place like that!”

Hanz nodded to himself. “Ok… so your last place was somewhere in between then.”

Nodding fervently, Troy replied, “Of course. This place is…” He shook his head. Yet he noticed the look in Hanz’s eye. Unlike Art, Hanz was extremely skilled at masking his judgement. Or at least, he was good at not being so obnoxious when he made judgements. Troy glanced about the room again, wondering what Hanz saw in this dump of an apartment. He finally said, “What?”

Sighing, Hanz said, “Eve lived in a really nice place, you know. Not as stylish as your current apartment and certainly not as nice as Rick’s penthouse. But it had one bedroom, a decent bathroom, and a living room attached to a small kitchen. Space-wise, it was smaller than this one. She used to say I should just move into her apartment once we got married, as it was a great deal larger than mine, which was a loft—no kitchen—and a half bath.”

Troy stared.

“It was cheap, with roof access,” Hanz said with a shrug. “And most of my money had to go to medical school. But it was cozy.”

Troy felt that sinking guilt again. Until now he had always assumed Hanz was a man from a wealthy background. He was so clean and neat. It never occurred to him Hanz was a working class boy who had scraped by and just took care of what little he had. But why was he so damn comfortable around everybody?

Hanz cleaned up the glass he used and went over to the bookshelf, perusing the titles without another thought to the conversation.

Troy was beside himself for a moment. He knew he had done it again, made judgements without thinking. He hardly knew any of these people and he was judging them. But, taking a breath, he went back into the living room and opened up his research folder, unwrapping the manuscript. He went to work on it, putting aside everything else.

 

It took hours to transcribe the words, studying the old writing. While copying the watermarks, shadows and changing inks in the paper, he noticed some of the manuscript paper was folded oddly. Troy unfolded and refolded it to try to find the original shape it had made, just in case it was part of the puzzle. This manuscript had been one of his best discoveries, penned by a man who had claimed to have been aided by angels or elves to be freed from the curse of vampire bite. Most of it was a retelling of the writer’s account, and was about as tedious as listening to one of those exercise and diet advertisements which recounted the woeful story of how such-and-such had looked everywhere and struggled through every avenue to lose weight until they found the golden key to weight loss. And you could have it too, if you endured the entire advertisement and reached the end to buy whatever book series they were selling. He was hoping this guy wasn’t also selling another lost manuscript somewhere. He had already had enough of reading about how the guy had been waylaid by five vampires on his way to Boston. The only reason Troy had stuck to it was that it was a genuine account and there had been some useful facts in it already. He also knew most of the side marks and odd features of the manuscript contained a code. He had to go through the entire thing to find it all.

 Hanz went out to get lunch around noon, also to talk to Chad who apparently turned out to be some kind of undercover security guard for the building. Chad had even had thorough police training, having graduated from the police academy with honors. The reason he knew about ghoulies wasn’t even because of Tom Brown. When Hanz came back, Troy found out that that Chad was a Gulinger alumnus.

“What?” Troy stared at Hanz as the man handed him a hoagie.

“Yeah,” Hanz said. “The guy told me he