Vampire Dragons & Unicorn Thugs

Part 2

Brandon was still shaken by the encounter in Houston, and needed to settle his nerves before the Tuesday night beginning of his musical work-week the next day. He wandered towards the Congress bridge just before sunset, and staked out a rock next to the running path that ran along the water’s edge. He was there to watch the bats. Over one-and-a-half million bats would fly out from beneath the bridge, and even though he’d seen it from the top of First Street two-and-a-half blocks over, he’d never experienced them from ground level looking up.

The sun set as an orange glow reflected off the dark-blue water of Town Lake, and from the stillness, columns of leathery wings rustled in the humid air in long spirals. The colony’s undulation into the sky  mesmerized and calmed him, so Brandon was not too startled when a stunning Asian woman suddenly spoke, silently appearing a foot from his elbow.

“They are beautiful, are they not? They always remind me of home.”

Her voice was soft but high pitched, almost like a young girl’s. Her face was not particularly attractive, at least to Western sensibilities, but her round, somewhat flat face was flawless, and exhibited an attractive strength and competency. She could be a mature thirty, or a well-preserved fifty, and her skin was a porcelain white that he assumed must come from a jar. Her eyes held ageless wisdom but crackled at the edges with hints of cruelty. Brandon wasn’t sure whether he was more enthralled or intimidated. She was clothed in red and green flowing silk, in a style he was unfamiliar enough with that he couldn’t tell whether it was a dress or some kind of wrap, but it was ravishing.

“Beautiful? In their own way, I suppose, but I’m more fascinated by their other-worldliness. It’s almost as if they aren’t native to this world at all.”

One side of her tiny, painted lips curled into a smile, which Brandon thought an odd reaction. The colony didn’t take long before they were all away to their feeding grounds, and full night fell just as quickly. A few tall buildings pinpricked light along the horizon, and the streetlights dotted puddles of soft light along wide sidewalks above, constructed with revelers and tourists in mind. The woman seemed to come more into focus as the night darkened as if her surroundings retreated into two dimensions, and Brandon felt an attraction he couldn’t explain. He really wanted to find out something about her, but couldn’t come up with a line that wasn’t cheesy or idiotic.

“My name is Suzi. Would you care to join me for a drink?”

“Oh, I’m so sorry. I’m Brandon. Pleased to make your acquaintance. And sure, I’d love to. Just down the path there’s a hotel restaurant with a great outdoor patio that looks back onto the bridges.”

“That sounds perfect. Please, lead the way.”

Brandon tried not to walk as fast as his nerves prompted, especially as Suzi’s tightly wrapped legs allowed little room to stride. He needn’t have worried as her legs tripled-stepped beneath the sway of the rustling fabric for every one of his strides. She almost seemed to run while her upper body floated along with nearly no movement at all.  Brandon had no idea how she did it, other than, he supposed, unending practice.

They found a small table in the outer corner, and Brandon wasn’t sure, in this day and age of pervasive feminism, whether it was proper or expected of him to hold her chair. Thankfully, the Maitre D' led them himself and performed the function for him. Any sense of a high-class establishment, however, was destroyed when a brass teeny-bopper waitress in pigtails bounced over and commenced to chatter boisterously. He just tuned her out, while Suzie waited patiently for her to finish her life story.

“I’d like a glass of Beaujolais Nouveau if available.”

“I don’t normally drink alcohol, but they have my favorite chocolate dessert if you don’t mind, Suzi.”