We don't dream often. Actually. It’s more accurate to say we don’t think much of the future. We know that a hunter like us will eventually grow old and weak. We must cherish our food until the next generation rises and picks our bones. 

I see in a twilight of dreams, my son Sasha forming lines of chalk into a fluffy mane lion over the rough driveway. I sit at a little metal filigree table, cutting raw slices of bloody steak. My small silver fork lifts a tender piece into my mouth. A perfume of blood reaches my nose before Sasha runs over to show off his skinned hand where chalk and tender skin dug too deep into the stony ground. 

“Mother, can you clean it?”

I patiently tie his small hand with a flower stitched handkerchief. And hold his hand a little longer when blood seeps through the cloth.

“Mother…”

“Hmmm.”

“What does blood taste like?” he asked me. 

"Like sunshine and salt."

My Sasha turned his head to spot a young girl staring from outside the barred fence of the estate. 

“Is that girl like you?” my boy asked. 

"Do I look like I would eat you? Your mother is special.”

"But mother, you must know friends like you." 

"Do you want different friends? My child, you need to remember to play safe. Other humans are like dogs, their ability depends on how they were fed and trained. They bully more than bite. Vampires are like foxes, they won't let go of prey easily. And you are a kind of prey.”

“But which ones won’t eat me?”

“I don’t know. Maybe they all would. That's why mother found someone with a tall fence and a kind family so you can get bigger without worrying.”

“Don’t worry mother. I will share our money and food so they will want me around.”

*

I was hugging the blankets closer in waking. I was hungry. The meat in the fridge had started to spoil. The little orphans I grew up with couldn’t always appease me. They had work of their own even if I did pay them and I suppose they didn’t need to bother with me at this point. My deceased husband had placed them in fine jobs. 

Birds hopped around on my carpet pecking fallen seeds. A covered vase held their comrades' dead bodies. I took a bird that was pecking and ripped out the side of its neck, swallowing feathers and all, and held it above to let the trickle of blood slide down my throat. When the edge of my hunger subsided, I dropped it down the vase. 

Blood stained my night dress and covers. I took everything off and bundled the ruined clothes and sheets for disposal. 

I slipped into a dark green and white piece, adjusted the long sleeves around my wrist. Then sat at my small bow-legged dressing table. I picked up an already powdered brush, dabbing color to my pale cheeks. I observed my reflection in the oval mirror carved with Sparrows. Then absently picked up a handkerchief and rubbed it away, subsequently dropping the silken square into the trash. 

I uncorked an amber pill bottle and shook out an iron pill. I swirled it in my mouth as my thin hands ran through my woodland colored hair, untangling some of the curled locks. My gaze drifted to the books on a nearby shelf. A million worlds of villains, heroes, best friends, and betrayal. 

My fingers paused. Sunlight played across the back of my hands. I blinked. Stood. Stepped. And ran fingers down the spine of a volume before tugging is loose. It fell open in my hand. 

Gretel understood what the witch wanted to do and pretended not to understand. “Stupid child,” cried the witch, “look, you have to put your head in the oven like this. At that moment Gretel pushed the witch and closed the oven door.

-Hansel and Gretel, The Brothers Grim. 

The witch should not have become so complacent and fat.

I move downstairs intending to work on creating a colored portrait from a sketch as an agreed upon birthday gift for an old friend.

But what about Rita? 

I had called her to the house on a whim, partly in the hope that if I showed her my art it would turn into a fantasy not my own. I tire of the hopeless expression on the faces of people I meet, joyous at the experience of meeting me, disappointed when I hold my hand over their mouth and slit their throat, let the blood condense in a multitude of bowls. Is that what I wanted for her?

Little Rita. Will you let me be the wolf? Will you come play in my painted forest? And that annoying man beside her... Shall I love him as he wishes, chewing down to the last bite. We'll…a promise was a promise. 

I pause by a slightly open door. Then fully push it open. My uncle's former study. I see a month old letter sitting on the desk. I approach only to push it into the trash bin sitting to the side, sit, and dip a quill. 

Uncle, the only person who writes, sends me words like chocolate, pages laced with toffee and melting edges. They are the kind of words that you bite off and hold in your mouth, waiting to see if your reactions have met approval. Uncle is in Poland now, if the stamps speak true.

I still remember two weeks after my uncle brought me to London. He gave me a proper bath in the small copper tub and dressed me in clean leggings and a simple black dress. It was on that Sunday that he brought me to the home of a middle-aged lady. He had stood behind me with his hands on my shoulders as though I was facing into the flames and said something about orphans. I saw children moving inside the house of this lady vampire and knew that I was supposed to be one of them. A wolf among hens.

I helped lady Rowena tend the orphanage children until I lost my appetite. And when I went to gather what surely I was due from her office I saw the other letters that my uncle had addressed to me and that they were replied to in kind by Miss Rowena who spoke for me when she said I wanted to stay. Uncle had apparently  given me his house and left none the wiser that she had stolen it. Lady Rowena had a lot of little enemies at this point. The children were rather happy when I served rat poison in her drink.

I test the nib of the quill against an already ruined page, leaving behind a multiple of dots like little starring eyes. Finally I apply letters to parchment. 

Dear Rita,

As our associate had informed you, The Red Society has accepted your request to dispose of your husband Charles Munt. For a smooth disposal please cooperate with….

Your friends, 

The Red Society 

The finished page is set aside. 

Dear Charles,

Your wife has told me much of your achievements. I would enjoy the company of you both for a lunch.

Signed,

Evalyn

The little bell at my mailbox rings. I blow over the ink and rise. 

There on my doorstep is a small jar wrapped in paper. Now that was a treat.

I move to the kitchen as I peel the brown paper away to reveal a label that read 'rabbit' on what was a marron colored jelly. I rip the label off the mix of honey and congealed blood and fetch a spoon. The flavors melt against my tongue, like a spoonful of ice cream on a hot summer day.