Alan opened his door and stepped out. It was a bright, sunny day but the wind coming over the hill made it cold. He pulled his jacket tight and waited while Ricky told Tucker to be good and came to stand next to him.
“Should we go knock?” Alan asked.
“Where?” Ricky asked.
“Good point.”
The driveway was plowed up to the garage, but there were no other paths cut through the snow. Ricky walked over to the snowbank and the stepped over into the virgin snow to slog through it towards the front door. Alan held his ground. A few seconds later, the garage door begin to go up. Alan faced it, took his hands out of his pockets and tried to look like he had nothing to hide.
Ricky turned around and started to trudge back to the driveway.
From the dark interior of the garage, a man studied them.
“Hi, are you Mr. Libby?”
From the car, Alan heard the muffled sound of the dog barking.
“Tucker, hush,” Ricky said, climbing back out of the snow.
“Mr. Libby?” Ricky asked. “We were hoping to ask you about what happened here forty years go?”
The question was answered by the garage door beginning to descend.
“Our friends were killed by vampires,” Ricky shouted, leaning down as the door dropped.
The door stopped for a moment and a voice said, “Then I’m sorry for them.”
When it started to lower again, Ricky shouted, “We want to know how to survive when they come back.”
Alan heard the reply as the door shut.
“They won’t.”
# # #
“They won’t?” Alan asked Ricky. “How can he know that?”
Ricky shrugged. He walked up and rapped his knuckles on the garage door. There was no answer.
“Now what?” Alan asked.
Tucker was barking again, so Ricky went over and opened the rear door of the vehicle so the dog could jump out. After a moment’s deliberation, he started working his way around the driveway, hiking his leg up to pee on different spots.
Ricky returned to the garage door and knocked harder. Leaning around the corner, Alan could see that the garage was connected to the house via a narrow shed. There was a window on the shed and he didn’t see anyone pass by. It seemed that Romeo was still in the garage even though he wasn’t answering.
“We need your help,” Alan yelled. “Our families are at risk. If you’re really certain that those monsters won’t come back, we would love to know why so we can sleep at night. Right now, we’re terrified what will happen when they come out of hibernation.”
Ricky picked up from there and shouted, “They seemed intent on hunting us down. What makes you think they won’t still be after us in the spring?”
They waited in silence for a moment.
Alan heard the man cough behind the door. Then, it started to rise again.
“You mind?” Romeo asked, pointing at the dog.
“Sorry?” Ricky asked.
“You mind taking him out back instead of him sullying my driveway.”
“Oh. Sorry.”
Romeo gestured towards the rear door of the garage and Ricky whistled to Tucker. He led the dog out through the back door. Alan approached cautiously with his hand extended.
“Hi, I’m Alan. We’re from Kingston.”
“I know who you are,” Romeo said.
“Sorry?”
“Bert told me that Ricky was asking around about me. I figured he would bring you here sooner or later.”
“Me? Ricky just asked me to come a week ago. How could you…”
“I guessed,” Romeo said, tapping a finger to his temple. “Come on inside, I suppose.”
He started moving towards the side door of the garage—the one that led to the shed.
“Nice floor,” Alan said, pointing down to the cement. It was coated with a blue epoxy.
“Easier to clean,” Romeo said.
Alan noticed that the truck’s sideview mirror was covered in a cloth bag. Alan’s own sideview mirrors were heated to keep away the frost. He figured that Romeo’s bag must be for the same reason.
“Let me just tell Ricky that…”
“He’ll find his way,” Romeo said. He opened the door and put a hand out, indicating that Alan should lead the way. Beyond the window, the shed was dark. Alan had the feeling he was headed towards a trap of some sort. Taking a deep breath, he moved forward anyway. His eyes finally focused on the door in the darkness just before he reached it.
“I save the lights for night,” Romeo said. “That’s when you need them. Handle is on the right.”
Alan saw the door knob just before Romeo instructed him. He clenched his teeth and turned the handle. The door opened towards him. When Alan pulled it open enough to see around it, he was blasted in the face with brilliant purplish-white light that drilled into his eyes and felt hot on his skin.
He stumbled back, still holding onto the door handle and crashed into the wall behind him.
Romeo laughed and said, “You get used to it,” as he moved by Alan.
Alan blinked as he tried to see past the bright smear across his vision from the lights. He heard Ricky come down the shed hall from the garage.
“You okay?”
“Yeah,” Alan said. He could see enough to follow Ricky through the door, but ran into Ricky just after.
“This is quite a setup,” Ricky said. “Are these lights ultraviolet?”
“Yup. They’re all LED lights. Very low power,” Romeo said.
“You could have fooled me,” Alan muttered. He followed Ricky into the kitchen.
“It’s against my better judgement to talk to you two,” Romeo said. “I couldn’t care less what happens to you and your families, but your dog is a different topic. What they do to dogs is unconscionable.”
“I saw tracks out back. Where’s your dog?” Ricky asked.
“Waiting,” Romeo said. “Have a seat and I’ll fill you in.”
The bright spot in the middle of Alan’s vision was almost gone. He took a chair next to Ricky’s at the table in the corner. Romeo sat down too.
“The key is to get somewhere that they’ve been dispatched,” Romeo said. “It’s some kind of superstition with them. They hate to
