Back | Next
Contents

CHAPTER 10

Chaim looked up from his Tanakh as Rabbi Mendel and Mordechai Zalman entered the conference room. Mordechai closed the door behind him and took a seat across the table from Chaim while the rabbi sat at the end of the table.

“Catching up on your parsha?” The rabbi’s round face had a gentle smile as he mentioned the regular Torah readings.

“Meditating on Judges, actually,” Chaim said, closing the book and setting it to one side.

Mendel’s eyebrows rose. “Indeed? And which passage has caught your attention?”

“The third chapter.”

“Ah.” Mendel’s eyebrows lowered, and his smile returned. “Let me guess: Ehud ben-Gera?” His smile broadened at Chaim’s nod. “A worthy subject of meditation. Let me ask you why you consider him?”

Chaim grinned a little. “The first time I read this, years ago, I thought he was kind of like James Bond.” Both Mendel’s and Zalman’s eyebrows went up. “I mean, look at the story—he comes in with the tribute party to meet the king, he presents the tribute, and does reconnaissance on the palace. He has an assassin’s dagger strapped to his right side under his cloak where no one would expect it, because he’s left-handed. He comes back to the palace alone, tells the king he has a secret message for the king’s ears alone, gets the king alone, stabs him, escapes, and then leads the Israelite army to victory over the Moabites. Like I said, kind of like James Bond—but it also reminds me of what Mordechai has done.” He sobered for a moment, then grinned again. “And I thought it was cool that he was left-handed. I tried for the longest time to make myself left-handed. I can do a lot

left-handed now. I’m not ambidextrous, but I can do a lot.”

“Hmm,” Mendel said. “A worthy subject of meditation, indeed—and a worthy protector. I commend you for your studies. But”—he opened the folder that lay before him on the table—“we have things both practical and personal that need to be discussed now.”

Chaim said nothing, simply waited as the rabbi sorted through the pages in the folder.

“Here we are.” Mendel selected a page, and held it before him. “So, Dr. Hurwitz and his team are confident that they have a better understanding of what vampirism does in a human body as a result of being able to study you these last three months. They have decided that it does not fit the classical model of a disease. Their current analogical model is that of a computer virus that invades a system and reprograms it.”

“Great,” Chaim muttered. “My life is a bad science-fiction movie.”

“Perhaps not so bad as that,” Mendel said gently. He looked at the paper again. “In addition to the metabolic and functional changes we talked about in our last discussion, they have determined that significant changes happened in the hormones and enzymes of your body.

“First, the easy stuff. Your hair color and eye color appear to be unchanged. Your fingerprints and footprints still match your records. On the other hand, your testosterone levels are significantly higher. This is apparently connected with your body’s rebuilding itself to be harder and tougher. This may or may not be connected with the anger issues that I understand Mordechai spoke to you about. Dr. Hurwitz and his team say that the consistently higher testosterone levels would be expected to have a consistent emotional effect in all areas of a personality, not just in sporadic anger spikes. What you demonstrated and what Mordechai has told them about does not seem to be the emotional effect that high testosterone levels produce in norm—that is, regular men.”

“You can say ‘normal,’ sir. I’ve accepted that I’m now abnormal in just about every way.” Chaim’s voice was level. He was actually a little proud of how calm he felt.

“As you say. So there may be a connection there, but they can’t define it or prove it if there is. At least, not yet.

“In comparison, however, your production of estradiol—estrogen, in other words—has reduced somewhat in actual amount and a lot in comparison to the rise in testosterone. They’re not sure yet what effect this will have, either, other than affecting your body fat levels.”

Mendel put that page down and picked up another. “They’ve determined that much of the reason for the shift in diet requirement…”

“Drinking of blood, you mean?”

“Yes…much of the reason for the shift to consuming blood is because your body’s generation of dietary enzymes has significantly changed. The enzymes that break down fats and proteins have almost disappeared from your system. This is probably related to the fact that your body fat has dropped below measurable levels.” Mendel looked at him. “Long term, they’re not sure of the implications of that, but looking at Mordechai, you can see it’s not necessarily going to be an issue.” After a moment, he resumed. “And the enzymes that break down carbohydrates are much, much lower than normal. Your body now needs your nutrition to basically be predigested into very simple forms: glucose and hemoglobin and associated minerals. It’s very efficient in using those once it takes them in, but it can’t take much of anything else.”

“Except the magen bars.”

“Except those, and don’t ask the good doctor about them,” Mendel said with a small smile, “because he does not have an explanation for them, and that irritates him.”

“Heh.” Chaim returned the smile.

“This means that your liver has changed what it does, because it now produces no bile.”

Chaim sat up. “So my gall bladder…”

“Has shrunk to the size of a single peanut, and may well atrophy altogether. And as a side note, your appendix seems to have disappeared.

“Related to that,” Mendel said, picking up a third page, “the sunlight sensitivity is now suspected to be at least related to—if not caused by—changes in liver function. The liver normally breaks down excessive amounts of hemoglobin, and when it doesn’t, normal people develop jaundice, which usually expresses as yellowish skin and light sensitivity.”

Chaim raised his hand and looked at it, then at Mendel. “No jaundice.”

“It’s a theory at the moment, Chaim. They’ll need more time and more samples to verify it. But it does fit with the fact that you’re taking in a lot more iron, which is probably going to your bones, cartilage, muscle, and skin. But it’s not all going to your structure. Hence, your urine.”

“Yeah. I look like I’m pissing liquid rust.”

“Not far off,” Mendel acknowledged. “And your feces will no longer float.”

“No kidding,” Chaim said. “I swear the last bowel movement I had went thunk when it hit the bottom of the toilet.”

Mendel smiled at that. “Remind me to tell you some time of the nurse who had to administer barium enemas.”

“Heh. But it’s weird only doing a dump every three days or so. Is that going to be normal?”

“Two samples doesn’t give us much of a baseline, Chaim, but from what Mordechai says, probably. Remember, you’re not taking in the mass quantities of fiber that you used to ingest.”

“True. And it still stinks, but it stinks differently.”

“They noted that at the bottom of the page,” Mendel said with a mischievous grin.

Chaim snorted. “So what else?

Another page. “Your pancreas is still functioning, at least partially. Production of pancreatic lipase, one of the fat breakers, has pretty much ceased, but production of deoxyribonuclease and ribonuclease, the DNA and RNA breakers, is still up. And it’s still producing at least trace amounts of insulin, although you metabolize the glucose from the blood so quickly they’re really not sure it comes into play.”

Page five. “The thymus gland appears to actually be functioning a little above the normal human level, but they’re not sure if that’s a new normal or if it’s an effect of all the other changes and it will settle back down after all the changes are done. If it remains elevated, you may well not have to worry about cancers in your new existence.”

A glance back down at the page. “The thyroid gland appears to be functioning normally. They’re not sure why.” Mendel smiled a bit. “Another topic to avoid with Dr. Hurwitz. As I mentioned, he dislikes not having answers.”

“Got it.”

“And adrenaline appears to be a bit higher than normal but otherwise unchanged.” Mendel nodded at that, and laid the page down.

“Could that be connected to the anger?” Chaim asked.

Mendel looked at the page. “No comments about that one way or the other. We’ll ask.” He jotted a note down.

Sixth page. “Last but not least, the prostate.”

Chaim sat up straight. Any male would be concerned about this information. He waited, but Mendel took his time to address the subject. Finally, he sighed, which caused a knot to form in the pit of Chaim’s stomach.

“Major changes have been and perhaps still are taking place in the prostate.”

Mendel paused again.

After a moment, Chaim said, “What? Is it still there? Does it still work?” He was sure that it did. He had produced sperm for them, after all. But Mendel’s manner was beginning to frighten him.

“It…is still there,” Mendel said, staring at the paper, “if somewhat smaller than before. And it does seem to still produce testosterone, semen, and sperm. But the last two…”

More silence.

“Am I sterile?”

Mendel shook his head. “They don’t know. They do know that your spermata now appear to uniformly feature the Y chromosome. No X chromosomes have appeared in their tests. And they do know that the sperm, while reduced in number, are very active—very active—to the point that they fear that any one of the sperm will rupture any egg cell it penetrates.”

Chaim swallowed. He opened his mouth to ask another question, but Mendel held up his hand to forestall him.

“In addition,” Mendel said in a low tone, “your spermatic fluid had changed markedly. It…has changed composition to the point where it appears it will create an allergic reaction in any woman whose vagina it comes in contact with. The odds are strong that it will produce a severe allergic reaction in many—if not most—women. Dr. Hurwitz uses the word…toxic…in his report.” Mendel cleared his throat, still looking down. “This all together means that while you could, with proper precautions, make love to a woman—a wife—without harm, you will almost certainly…never have children.”

Mendel at last looked up. Chaim, grappling with his own shock, saw a tear tracing its way down the old man’s seamed cheek, to lose itself in his beard where others glistened in the light. “I am so sorry, Chaim.” The whisper carried a world of sorrow.

Grief almost crushed Chaim. To become a vampire—to suffer through that “conversion”—to realize that his relationship to his parents was forever irrevocably changed—and to now fully realize that he would never know the blessing that God gave husbands and fathers—a loving wife, and children to follow after him—that was almost more than he could bear.

He pulled the medallion from under his shirt, touched it to his lips, and whispered, “Sh’ma, Israel, Adonai elohenu, Adonai echod.” He clung to that thought, letting it echo in his mind over and over again.

At length his mind slowed. He kissed the medallion again, and returned it to its place inside his shirt, and looked up at the other men, dry-eyed. “So,” he said in a rough voice, “something else that the modern myths didn’t get right. There won’t be any sex-maniac half-breed vampires running around.” Both men shook their heads, Mendel still sorrowful, but Mordechai with a slight upturn of his lips to acknowledge the strength it took Chaim to make that pathetic joke.

Chaim heaved his shoulder in a deep sigh. “It is what it is. Anything else in the report?”

Mendel shook his head as he gathered the papers together in a neat stack and returned them to the folder. “No. I suspect that the good doctor has some further ideas, but he seldom talks about anything if there is not at least some physical evidence to support it.”

“I can appreciate that.” Chaim clasped his hands in front of him on the table and stared at his thumbs. “I have finally accepted that normal will never be part of my life again. The reports, especially this most recent one, make that clear. I cannot continue floating along expecting that things will somehow work out and I’ll be able to resume the life I had before the conversion.” His last word was loaded with vitriol. “So we—or rather, I—need to make some decisions.”

“What do you have in mind?” the rabbi said, clasping his own hands in mirror image of Chaim.

“You and I have talked about how I can break this to my parents.” Chaim’s voice was low. He was still gazing at his hands. “I…don’t see how I can do that.” He raised his head, and his eyes looked haunted—widened, pupils large and black, and seemingly sunken in his face. “This would crush them. And there’s no way to hide it. Look at the obvious external physical changes. My mother would be all Jewish-mother-on-steroids as soon as I walked in the door, wanting to know what happened and insisting I go to the doctor to be checked for AIDS or something worse. My father would know something was wrong, and would grill me like a detective. I’d have no peace.

“There’s no lie that would satisfy them, and the truth…they’d never accept it. Not being able to eat with them? They would never buy that. It’s part of who we are, we Jews, that we eat together. That would almost certainly be the last straw. They’d probably end up trying to have me committed for psychiatric observation.

“And if they did, somehow, accept it? That would be even worse. The no-grandchildren thing would crush them both, and even if they started out trying to understand and trying to be supportive, they would never understand the reality, and would eventually start to blame me for it.”

“I doubt that,” Rabbi Mendel murmured.

“You don’t know my mother.” Chaim’s tone contained more than a hint of bitterness. “I love her dearly, but when she gets disappointed big time, she could teach graduate level seminars in passive aggression and smile while she was doing it. No, this would poison them, and the end result would be it would poison me as well. I don’t think you want to deal with what I would be like at the end.”

“But…” Mendel began, only to pause when Mordechai lifted a hand.

“He’s right, Rav Avram.”

Mendel sat back. “Explain, please.”

“From my own experience, and the few I have met along the way who would talk about their pasts, families never understand, never accept what has happened. And the more religious the family, the more they are torn apart by the taint of demonism with which such as we must so often deal.”

“But…” Mendel tried again.

“Trust me, Avram. He’s right. There are no good solutions.”

There was a moment of breathless silence, then the rabbi sighed.

“All right. I don’t like it, but all right.” He looked at Chaim. “Then what do you intend?”

“I’m not sure,” he said, looking back down at his hands. “I’m still working this out in my own head. But just thinking out loud, if there aren’t any good solutions, as Mordechai says—I certainly can’t see any—then the only thing I know to do is make a clean, sharp break as quickly as possible so I can quit living a lie for them.

“So”—Chaim looked up at the others—“I still want to take you up on the study program. With that in mind, I need to be in Israel as soon as possible. I’m not even going to call them. I’ll send them a letter telling them that because of my work this summer I’ve been offered a work-study position in Israel, but I have to take it right now to get it. That’s even got a little bit of truth to it.”

Mendel nodded. “I sorrow for the position you are in, but I understand why you feel you need to do this.” He looked at Mordechai, who nodded. “We can make this happen, and quickly. You may need to sign some power of attorney forms, but we can make it happen.”

“I’ll sign anything,” Chaim said. “Second”—he swallowed hard—“once I’m in Israel, I’ll need to disappear.”

“Disappear?”

“Chaim Caan will need to vanish. I’ll need to become someone else.” He stared at Mendel. “You’ve hinted at the strings that you can pull to get me into the country and into school. Do you have access to the strings that can get me a new identity?”

Mordechai spoke up. “If they do not, I do.”

“Good. Once I am provided with that, I need to drop off the face of the earth as far as they’re concerned. Cut off all contact, so they’re not connected to me and won’t be touched by…” He brought his hands up to his chest. “…this.”

Mendel was shaking his head. “No, Chaim. No. You would simply be replacing the pain and torment and nightmares of your metamorphosis with the pain and torment and nightmares where they imagine that you died, or were kidnapped, or became a drug addict, or had become a Muslim, or any other nightmare your ‘Jewish mother on steroids,’ as you put it, could dream up. No. You would simply trade one heartbreak for another equally as bad. Find another way.”

“And to make it worse, they would most likely continue to search for you,” Mordechai said. “They would certainly petition the government to find you, and there are private investigators in Israel, you know, that they could hire to search for you. If they are as you say, they would persist, would they not?”

“Crap.” Chaim’s voice was bitter. “Yes, that’s exactly what they would do. They would never give up. They would never rest. Damn.”

There was a long moment of silence. Chaim looked up when Mordechai cleared his throat. “There might be a way…” the older vampire began.

“How?”

“You’ve obviously thought about this. Let it begin as you lined out. Once you are in Israel, however, send your parents some emails over the course of a few weeks. Then, the next time there is a terrorist event, your name gets added to the casualty list, and your parents are shipped a tin of ashes. It will still be a lie. But it will be a lie that permits the clean, sharp break you asked for. It will still be a grief to them, but it will be a lie and a grief that permits them closure, permits them a healing of sorts, which neither of the other alternatives would allow.”

Chaim tried to think, although the clamor in his head was not conducive to clear thought. “What…what happens if there isn’t a terrorist attack?”

“Although things have been more peaceful since the various Arab peace accords, there are still attacks. One will most likely happen soon enough. If not…” Mordechai shrugged. “Then one gets manufactured.” Chaim looked at him aghast. Another shrug. “These things happen from time to time, sometimes to make a point. But you wouldn’t be the first who came to us who needed to disappear.”

Chaim looked at Mendel, who was nodding slowly despite the moue of his mouth indicating he wasn’t happy with the idea. He turned back to Mordechai, who simply stared back at him. He looked down at his hands where they clasped each other in white-knuckled ardency. A moment later, two tears trickling from his own eyes, he nodded.

“Do it.”


Back | Next
Framed