Dracula (A Modern Telling) Read Online Free PDF Page A

other night when the Count had taken me to a restaurant. On the way back, I’d asked the driver to stop at a pharmacy. I was staring into the mirror when I felt a hand on my shoulder. It startled me so badly I cut myself and I turned and saw the Count standing behind me. He said “Good Morning,” and I nodded hello. The cut was starting to bleed and the blood trickled down over my chin.
    The Count saw the blood and there was an instant change. His eyes filled with a demonic fury and he tried to grab my throat. I pulled back and instead he grabbed the crucifix that was around my neck. He held it in his hand and the change I had seen was gone just as quickly and he said, “Careful how you shave. Cuts are more dangerous than many people think.”
    But I couldn’t completely understand what he was saying because I was staring into the mirror. In it, I could see the whole room around me. Everything but the Count. I thought that perhaps it was an optical illusion but as I stepped closer I knew it wasn’t. He just wasn’t there.
    “And this thing,” the Count said, angrily taking up the mirror, “is a testament to men’s vanity.” He threw it out the open window and it shattered onto the courtyard below.
    The Count left my room without a word and I sat wondering how it was he expected me to shave.
    I tried to repress the general uneasiness I felt by reminding myself that rock stars are weirdos. Every single one, even the ones I thought would be normal. So I went out to breakfast hoping to talk to the Count a little more, but I didn’t see him. Down the stairs into the main area I found a dining room and a breakfast spread out unlike any I had seen. Everything looked imported and fancy and had been arranged so well I hated to ruin it.
    There was no one around so I waited a few minutes and then just dug in. As I ate, I pondered how odd it was that I had never seen the Count eat or drink anything. Even when he mixed a drink for me in the limo he never took one himself.
    After I ate, I decided to explore a little. I climbed to the lower floors and the upper floors and all I found were doors and doors and more doors. There must’ve been a hundred of them. All locked except one that looked out over the valley. I sat at the windowsill in the room and looked down. There were no screens on any of the windows and I could sit right outside. The view was magnificent. I peered down and saw that I was at least five hundred feet straight up. The mansion had been built on a cliff and the backside was right up to the edge, preventing anyone from getting out.
    The layout of the mansion suddenly made sense: it was a prison.

 
    May 8 th , Continued
     
    When I realized I was being held in a prison, a wildness came over me. I ran up and down the stairs and checked every door. I was shouting for help and I even flipped over the table I had breakfast at. I shouted for Charlene. How much I would have appreciated her icy embrace just then. But there was no one.
    I collapsed against the wall and sat quietly a long time. Looking back on it, I must’ve gone temporarily crazy. I m ust’ve looked like a wild chimpanzee running around in this place. But once I calmed down, I thought it through and realized that the thing I definitely shouldn’t do is tell the Count how I felt. He was the one holding me prisoner and if I told him how I felt he’d just lie to me. And then make sure there was no way to escape. No, I had to keep this to myself.
    I heard a door upstairs and knew that the Count was up. I walked quietly up the stairs and stood in the hallway and watched as he made the bed and straightened up. It just confirmed what I already knew: there wasn’t any hired help in the house. No maids or butlers. It was just him. And I think he was the driver that brought me up here too. Charlene and the other girl were the only other people I had seen.
    The one thing I keep thinking about is how grateful I am for that old woman who tried to convince me