I left so much behind. She thought of her backpack, left at the old house, her wallet in it along with her lap-top and consequently the majority of the work she was expected to hand in once the weekend was over… tomorrow. She expected that under the circumstances - whatever explanation she came up with – she could probably get an extension.
Around seven thirty she heard the door bell ring and her Father answer the door. There was a brief muffled discussion before the door closed again and she heard footsteps on the stair.
Here we go. The police want answers, and I don’t really have any.
“Come in.” She responded to the knock on the door, and Father entered…
Carrying a take-out pizza box to her relief.
“Sun-dried tomato and artichoke. Just how you like it.” He said as he sat down on the bed and opened the box.
“Thank you Daddy.”
They ate in silence long enough for him to start his second piece.
“Do you want to tell me what happened?” He asked gently.
“Not really.” Sarah dodged.
“You know you don’t get to avoid this for long.”
“Yeah.”
“Was it…” Clearly he found the thought of saying his next words distasteful. “Some sort of… satanic cult?”
“No. Not really. But…”
“Kind of.”
“Yeah.”
“Sarah… how did this…”
“It was supposed to be fun. Just a joke.”
“And then…?”
Shit. Can’t back out now. Have to make it up from whole cloth. Though she did have a few ideas to fall back on that had come to her over the course of the day.
“There was this boy.”
“So there was a boy.”
“Dad!”
“Sorry. There was a boy. Named…”
“Kevin - Ruthven.”
“Kevin Ruthven.”
“Uh… yeah. Kevin.”
“Is he one of the…”
“Yes, he’s dead.” She took a big breath and dove into the deep end of the lie. “I really thought we were just playing around. Trying to scare one another, but then Kevin, he wasn’t really playing around. You see, they were all supposed to be the priests and I was the virgin…”
“Christ, Sarah.”
“Do you want to hear this?”
“Are you okay?”
“Nothing happened.”
“Sarah.”
“I mean, like that. We were in the middle of this phony ceremony when Ruthven – Kevin – pulled out a knife. I thought it was just a part of the game, but he started attacking the people. He killed them all Dad, and when I tried to run he came after me. I don’t know what happened – how it happened, but when he came at me, the knife ended up in him. Not me.”
Sarah’s Father watched her face through the whole confession and as she reached the end she looked back at him, into his eyes as a grave look fell across his face.
“Daddy?”
“Sarah…”
“Yes?”
“Why are you doing this?”
“Doing what?”
“You never lie to me. Ever. Why are you lying to me now?”
He was right. She was lying. And she had done a terrible job of it, no matter how much she had tried to make the rudiments of the story match the reality. She had avoided his gaze through the entire story, only looking for acknowledgement once her tale was complete. He had read her like a book.
“Why would you lie to me?”
Sarah had nothing. She could only lie again, evade him or tell him the truth.
“Because” She began haltingly. “I… don’t think you’d believe me.”
“Try me, Kiddo.”
“Daddy… I think there was a vampire.”
Installment ii
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