My time with the Vampire Lestat. (Ch. 1)

How the mighty had fallen. My Father, once a strong man with an impressive career now lay mumbling to himself in his twin sized bed. His once muscular body was now small and covered with wrinkles and liver spots.

"Hi Dad," I said as I entered his little room. This small room that was at the corner of the hall had been my room growing up, but it was only suiting that my Father had it now, I supposed, since he didn't need the space any longer.

Of course there was no answer from him; there never was. There was just the constant string of him muttering to himself. His glazed over green eyes were scanning back and forth across the ceiling, like one of those Felix the cat clock's that's eyes went from left to right constantly. Except, with my Father he wasn't grinning like the Cat Clock did. Instead his mouth was in a bit of a frown as he slurred his words in what sounded almost like a different language.

"Can you sit up so I can fix your pillow for you?" I asked. I didn't even know why I tried talking to him; I was sure he didn't even know I was in the room let alone hear me. He held tight to the top of his flimsy cotton blanket and kept it by his chin.
I sighed and tucked a loose lock of hair behind my ear before leaning down over my Father and gently holding onto his bony shoulders; not the slightest hint of comprehension of his surrounding. I lifted him off of his bed just enough, his head falling backwards like a newborns as I did, so I could grab his feathery pillow.

The once white pillowcase was now almost completely yellow. Though the case wasn't next to my face, but even from an arms length I could smell how rancid it had become in just a week. I could easily see all of the drool and little bits of vomit on it. I was numbed to this chore now and without feeling I pulled the old pillowcase off and replaced it with a new one. The new pillow case had two ducks with blue bonnets on embroidered in its corner bottom right corner. I gently slid the pillow back under my Fathers bald head, which now resembled a corpses head rather than a head that held real thoughts in it still.

"Try to sleep, Daddy, I'll be back in two hours so you can have dinner. . ." I whispered to him. Still no sign of him knowing I was there; his eyes just kept going from right to left over the white washed ceiling.

How painful it had been to see my once successful, handsome and seemingly perfect Father wither away, but how fast it had all went. Would the same thing happen to me, Taylor Bellerose? Would I end up becoming just a skeleton and unable to care for myself like my Father had? What a hideous thought that was, it gave me the shivers just to wonder.

The memories of my Dad's book signings and his national talk show interviews felt like a dream now, completely fictional. The handsome middle aged man who wore khaki pants and a blue stripped shirt felt like the myths he had spent so many years researching; now all that was left was a the shell.

Two hours passed and I put my Father's soup in the microwave for a minute on high, and afterwards walked into his little room. The shades were pulled tight and even though it was only six o'clock, it was autumn and it was almost completely pitch black and I could only see the outline of his bureau by the window and desk, along with the end of his bed. My Father's rasping breath was all that I could hear, and just bringing dinner to him almost seemed like a horror movie scene. Little did I know that this night would be the night that bringing dinner to the old man would actually be something from horror movies.

"Taylor. . . Taylor. . ." My Dad was saying with great effort. He spoke slowly, there was at least a full thirty seconds in between in each time he spoke my name. It was the clearest he had spoken in months, though, and maybe that was a good sign.

"Hold on, Daddy," I mumbled as I set the little green bowl of tomato soup down on the nightstand that was placed beside the bedroom's door. I then groped around the wall for the light switch; funny how I had lived in this little house almost my entire life, and spent a majority of it in this very room, but I still couldn't find that damn light switch.

"Taylor. . . Taylor. . . Up. . ." He said, sounding weaker this time. Just hearing him talk sounded painful, what great lengths he had gone just forming a real word.

"I'm here," I assured him as I flipped the light switch finally. I was greeted with the same sight I always came to; my Father with his blanket tugged up to his chin like a little child, and his eyes bulging up at the ceiling.

"Up. . . Up. . ." I ignored him and grabbed the little white chair, what had pink flowers painted daintily on it, from the corner with one hand and placed it beside his bed and then grabbed the bowl of soup and sat beside him. I got a half a spoonful and slowly started to get it towards his face. Once I almost got the spoon to his lips he moved his arm; the way he moved his arm made it apparent that to him the limb was like a heavy object to lift. He hit the spoon away. The spoon didn't go far, it only landed in front my feet, but the thick, red soup had landed all over his white blanket and my jeans.

"Taylor. . . Up. . ." He repeated. I sighed, feeling extremely agitated because now I'd have to clean his blanket as well, but looked up to where he was looking. I felt that doing so would be stupid, though, since nothing would be there. Or so I thought. Just the same plain, white ceiling would be all there was, I thought. However, I was wrong. When I looked up there was more than a white ceiling, for sure. . .