YEAR OF THE VAMPIRE 8

Chapter 8

and

Dec 14, 2024

Ivy didn't see Dred on her way to the stage area, but she did keep an eye out for him. She couldn't quite decide if she was disappointed or not. At the stage, two figures in traditional gypsy attire were playing an accordion and violin, a familiar melody coming from the instruments.

Ivy stood at the back of the gathered crowd beneath the mature oak trees in a semi-circle before the stage, watching. No one around her seemed to care that the song was 300 years old, Old World European, or even very basic. The man and woman onstage wore matching tasseled, embroidered vests, keeping perfect time as they played and sang. When the song ended, a third man, this one heavier and older, came out of the back carrying a brass tuba. They played another tune, more upbeat with an oompah rhythm. The crowd was soon clapping in time. When it finished, the woman stepped forward and began a doleful Those Were the Days, My Friend in Russian.

Ivy glanced around for the artwork Lornie had mentioned. A few lines of chairs away, near the picnic tables at one side of the stage, thin wooden easels were set up, each holding a single painting. She sifted through the crowd until she was face to face with the first painting.

It was a woman standing on a narrow wooden bridge or pier over misty water with swirling fog wrapping around her. She was in a wispy cobwebby dress that hung from her like a moody cape, her black hair draping her shoulders and bosom like tendrils of a spider. A haunting look was on her face, her eyes large and dark, skin pale in the opal-white moonlight from above. The colors were all black and gray, save for a necklace of red beads the woman held in her lowered hand. She faced the viewer, a forlorn feeling of chill and departure in her posture.

As Ivy looked closer at the painting, she saw the hazy outline of a wooden bridge or pier dissolving behind the woman to the vanishing point amid delicately outlined, leaf-bare trees. To her, it looked like the woman was leaving someone—the viewer—and was setting off on a reluctant trip. Maybe a voyage, Ivy thought, seeing the wooden walkway. She frowned; but with the trees behind the woman, maybe it was the viewer who was leaving from the bridge or pier.

"Wow," she breathed, caught in the woman's pale beauty.

The dress, woman's hair, and fog all swirled in the same direction, as if she was caught in a small, slow moving eddy of fog over the water. Maybe the viewer wasn't leaving at all: maybe the woman was disappearing into a vortex of mist.

Ivy stepped back, seemingly rooted to the ground. She took a deep breath as the crowd around her was suddenly too loud. She glanced to the stage, surprised to see a puppet show now in progress. She wondered where the musicians had gone. She didn't recall hearing their music end, or even any applause. The puppet show was Jack and the Beanstalk, just as the cow was being sold.

She looked back at the painting. It wasn't wood-framed like the other paintings. Its marcasite style frame glinted in the afternoon sun, but the fog seemed just as chilly as before.

"There you are! Geez, Ivy, take my money and run," Lornie said as she wove in between the crowd to where Ivy stood.

Ivy frowned. "Sorry. Your uncle let you go early?"

Lornie blinked twice. "No. It's seven minutes after two. Did you drink my freeze?"

Ivy looked down to the five-dollar bill still in her hand. "No. N-no . . . I mean, I didn't get it yet."

Lornie refastened her ponytail band. "Well, let's go get something to eat. I'm starved."

Ivy's eyes went back to the painting.

The woman in mist seemed to stare back, her eyes dark and longing.

"You like that?" Lornie nodded at the painting. "Creepy, huh?"

Ivy shook her head, feeling as if the painting's fog had invaded her mind and taken three hours of her day. "I can't believe it's so late. Yeah," she said slowly, tearing her eyes from the painting. "Let's . . . Let's get something to eat."

"How long have you been looking at these pictures?" Lornie carefully watched Ivy's face.

Ivy's gaze went back to the woman in the mist. "It's intriguing. The others," she said, glancing for the first time at the other more colorful paintings, "didn't have the same . . . appeal."

Lornie gave the rest of the paintings in the line of easels a nod. "Guess not. Ready?"

Ivy went through the rest of the day eating and taking in the festival's weirdness, barely aware of her father collecting her at six o'clock, pie in hand. She and Lornie made plans to stack the odds in their favor of being partnered up for the upcoming climate study assignment at school, and then she walked her dad to the festival's west entrance.

"Are you sure? I can wiggle my way out if you'd rather me stay for the weekend," her dad said, earnestness replacing his pie smile. "I can tell Woodbridge they'll have to wait until Monday for a new design."

Ivy worked her father's excuse of the last half an hour of explanation back through her head. Occasionally he had to make sudden onsite changes to city designs, usually after an impromptu meeting at some town he was working with had another planner come in. She was fine with it, usually staying a night with Lornie or Camille or having them stay with her, and sometimes, stay on her own overnight. "I'm fine. I'll go home soon and have mac and cheese tonight."

He was digging in his pants pocket, nodding. "All right. If you're sure." He held out two bills. "Take something home from the Fest if you'd rather. Pierogi and Pagoda has your favorite dumplings, I noticed. Grab some. I'll leave now, swing by the house and get my bag together, and text you when I leave. Okay?"

She nodded. "Sure, Dad. Sounds okay."

For a moment the reluctant smile stayed on his face. "Okay. Call me if you need anything, and before you go to bed, and if—"

"Okay, Dad. I've done it before." She stuffed the twenty dollar bills into her shorts. "I'll be fine."

"All right." He kissed her cheek quickly. "See you later, Ivybelle. Don't stay too late."

"I won't." She watched him leave, waving halfway to the parking lot across the street. She returned the wave, feeling a twinge of isolation. She shrugged it off.

The festival music turned to a pop tune Ivy hated—but knew all the words to. "I will not sing," she breathed adamantly. Instead, she hummed a tune she couldn't place the name from in her memory bank.

She set off back into the fray of people and vendors, the lights now sparkling brighter in the dimming late afternoon light. She found herself meandering back to the rows of paintings at the stage. A country-western group was now singing onstage, a mournful ballad for four guys dominated by belt buckles and cowboy hats. Nearby, a row of line dancers waited.

The woman in the mist painting was gone.

Ivy frowned, searching among the colorful artwork still on easels and leaning against the vendor's table. She only found clowns, carousels, animals, a few people, and landscapes. The styles were completely different than the woman in the mist painting. A heavy woman behind the table was doing a crossword puzzle, smiling quickly at Ivy when their eyes met.

Ivy turned away, wondering why she cared to see the image again. According to Lornie, she'd already spent the afternoon studying the painting.