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Jackson closed his eyes and prayed he had the strength to carry out his plan. He lay in a hospital bed surrounded by devices that monitored and maintained his vital signs. He had stopped thinking of this as living a long time ago.

Olivia entered the decontamination suite and began the procedure that had become routine: multiple showers, a vacuum room, an ultraviolet room, autonomous detection system, multiple airlocks. All that just to see Jackson through a plate glass window and talk to him on an intercom. Next week a closed-circuit video system was due to be installed and she wouldn’t even be allowed in the building any more. Since this was to be her last visit in person, she had permission to don a haz-mat suit with an oxygen tank and enter the room. “The things we do for love” echoed through her head as she wrestled her way into the cumbersome suit.

Jackson saw Olivia enter the anteroom. Usually he would sit up right away. Today he had to time his movements carefully. Lying down would bring her closer. He would sit up at the last second to reach her head and get the leverage he needed.

Olivia entered Jackson’s room. She leaned over his bed and stroked his cheek. He brought his hand to hers and tried to interlace their fingers, but her bulky glove made the gesture impossible.

“I can’t feel you,” he said.

“It’s okay, honey.”

“You know, I’ll never make it out of here.”

“Don’t say that. I’ll never give up until I can take you back home.”

“I want….”

“What, honey? What do you want?”

Jackson raised the bed to a sitting position bringing his face closer to hers. He placed his hand on her shoulder.

“I want…” he said again softly knowing she would lean closer.

With superhuman strength he grabbed her and ripped the hood off her haz-mat suit. Then he held her face between his hands and rose up to meet her mouth in a long, deep kiss.

“I want a kiss before dying,” he said as he released her.

“Oh my god, Jackson.” Olivia futilely tried to replace her hood. “You know that any human contact will kill you. Why did you do that?”

Jackson settled back on the bed as the monitors around him blinked and beeped into a frenzy. “Because, my love, I would rather die than to live without being able to touch you.”

.

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Five years ago today I woke up craving chicken and dumplings. An hour later I got a call from my Uncle John. Momma had passed away that morning. I didn’t go home for the funeral. There was nothing in that town for me when I left, even less now. But I did go in search of chicken and dumplings.

I quickly learned that there are damn few restaurants that have chicken and dumplings on the menu. And without exception, the ones that do are absolutely awful. So I decided to try cooking it myself. Yeah. Me. I never cook. Unless you count reheating leftover pizza in the microwave as cooking.

Momma would get up early on Sundays and put a chicken in a pot to boil. She sliced in onion, celery, and carrots. Chopped tomato. Salt and pepper and what else I don’t know. I never thought to ask. Then she’d cover it and leave it to simmer all morning while we were at services. There was never any question that we would all go to church together every week. When I was old enough and bold enough to ask, “Why do I have to go?” the closest I ever got to an answer was, “It’s what we do.” It was simply expected and accepted. And so it was that I left home and the church at the same time.

We all had chores to do after church. Momma would put Tennessee Ernie Ford on the Victrola and sing along as she finished preparing the meal. She’d take the chicken out of the pot and remove all the bones. She’d shred the meat and put it back in the pot. Then she would drop biscuit dough on top, cover it, and let it simmer another 15 minutes or so. Or whenever we finished our chores.

All this makes it sound like cooking chicken and dumplings is an easy thing. I suppose it is, but I have tried 167 times at last count to make it turn out just like Momma’s. I tried every day and night of the week before settling on Sunday mornings. I tried singing along with brother Ford to no avail. I even tried going to a church while it simmered. Twice. Apparently, comfort food is another thing that god and I don’t see eye-to-eye on ’cause when I got home I was too pissed off to eat. You’d think he’d at least let me enjoy a meal after I went and met him half way.

Last week I invited Katie from work to come over and bring her two daughters. Katie lost her husband to a car wreck a while back. We had always got along good even before she was widowed and she’s the easiest woman to talk to I ever met. She’s just a friend, of course — getting “involved” with a coworker is a bad idea. But those little girls were cute as puppies and they let me talk about what it was like to grow up out in the sticks. I haven’t laughed so much in I don’t know when.

All three of them gave me hugs when they left. And while I cleaned up I reckoned that it was the best batch of chicken and dumplings I have ever made. Still not quite as good as Momma’s but I think I finally figured out the ingredient I was missing all these years.

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My eyes glazed over (if you’ll pardon the pun) as I gazed through the window at the myriad confections in the Sweet Shoppe. I don’t understand how it was that I never noticed the place before. I’d been walking these streets for weeks, looking for work. No one had “Help Wanted” signs up, but I would go in and ask anyway. And so it was that even though I know nothing about making candies, I entered the Sweet Shoppe with hope in my heart. After all, they must need help with cleaning up I reasoned, and I can do that.

The proprietor was an older gentleman with a healthy mane of hair and bushy moustache, all shockingly white. I introduced myself and he greeted me kindly, but he ignored my inquiry as to the possibility of employment. Instead he began wandering around the shoppe pointing to his creations and muttering the most extraordinary things.

He straightened a box of taffy. “Bobby pulled his sister’s hair,” he said softly. “Jimmy pulled a puppy’s tail. And Sally loosed the ribbon from Betsy’s braids on the way to school.” At least I think that’s what he said.

He tapped the side of a jar of gumballs. (I would almost swear they turned to follow his finger tip.) “Jacob took a dollar from his mother’s purse. Mary read Lucy’s diary to Michelle and Cindy and Ben.” Could I possibly have heard that right?

He turned his attention to whips of licorice hanging freely over the counter. “My dog ate my homework. You look great! Of course I’ll respect you in the morning.” Now he just seemed to be babbling.

He rearranged a tray full of bon-bons. “Stolen boyfriends. Cheating spouses. Broken marriages.” He chuckled. Then with a soft cloth he began wiping the glass front of a tall case full of cakes. “Old man Martin.” He nearly sang with delight. “Every single one of them.”

I didn’t understand. Finally, he turned to me. “The sweetness has to come from somewhere,” he sighed. “But I’m getting too old. Would you care to apprentice? I can teach you. Or shall I just….”

Horrified, I reteated quickly. Once on the street though I hesitated and looked back. I thought I saw the old man with a flask of syrup in hand. But then the storefront was vacant and my morning a fuzzy memory. I continued walking. Hopeless.

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I don’t usually play with my food, but I had to admit I was rather enjoying the look of terror on his face. Soon he would be begging for his life, but I would not spare it.

I had come to terms with my existence (I never call what I have a “life” any more). The bitterness. The loneliness. The insatiable thirst for blood. I learned to survive on the blood of animals. Livestock makes for easy meals and as long as I don’t kill them I can feed indefinitely. It had been decades since I had harmed a human. Until tonight.

I can smell people long before I’m close enough to see them. Sometimes I wander close to their houses just to take in the bouquet. The laborers are salty, the old are bitter, and the young are sweet. So I was shocked tonight when I saw the little girl playing in the barn — not just because a child that young shouldn’t be out so late. She smelled… ruined… defiled.

Even back when I fed on humans regularly, I never attacked one so young. Who could harm a child like this? She couldn’t be more than ten. And then I smelled him. His stink nearly made me retch. He entered the barn and from the way the little girl went silent I knew he was responsible. She stared at his feet when he reached down to run his fingers through her hair. She closed her eyes when he pulled her into an embrace.

I could watch no more. I flew from the shadows and grabbed the reprobate by the throat. “Daddy!” the girl cried. In soothing tones I bade the child return to the house and go to sleep. She won’t remember me at all. I wish it were in my power to keep her from remembering her father as well.

“So,” I dug my fingers deep into his skin, “you abuse your own daughter?” I stopped his denial with an even tighter grip. He clutched at my hand trying to pry my fingers loose. His eyes bulged as he choked for air. I relaxed my grip to let him breathe just a little. He sought to claw at my face and I threw him to the ground. “Oh, this is going to be fun,” I whispered.

For two hours I thrashed him mightily, taking him just to the brink of death and making him linger there. Eventually, he confessed his sins easily and repeatedly. He begged forgiveness, as if that were mine to give. And, as I anticipated, he begged for his life. But there was no way I was going to allow the possibility that he would return to his abusive ways.

Finally, I tired of toying with him. I opened a vein in his wrist and took a small drink from the fountain it produced, but his blood was rancid. I ripped his throat open and left him twitching on the floor. Thirsty then and with that horrible taste in my mouth, I killed one of his cows and drank my fill. I’d have killed all his cattle, but that would have just harmed his family.

I left quickly and quietly. When his body and that of his cow were discovered the alarm would be raised. His neighbors would be looking for the creature that did the killing. It wouldn’t do for a stranger like me to be in the area. I knew they’d probably find a wolf or bear to blame for the carnage. And if not, well they all had a scary story to tell around the fire on cold nights. All of them except the little girl. She would never tell her story. But at least she had one less real monster in her life.

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