Red Sunset.

Wrote this short story yuesturday.

Red Sunset.

Hanoi is a terrible place to be a vampyre.
The days are too hot  and humid to sleep comfortably, and the nights are so crowded and the sky is never quite dark enough. And one simply cannot dress decently.
The white lace and black leather which I favored in the Old Country is impractical here, so I am reduced to a black silk shirt, black chinos and light weight boots, which have the inconvenience of making it clear that one is wealthy, which means that the locals are always after ones capital. I tire of the taste of con artists and taxi drivers.
There are so few places were one can have the necessary privacy to hunt, or even to plot clearly. Imagine it, one is sat brooding at the feet of a vast statue of Lenin, contemplating the next kill, and some fellow in a cone hat starts trying to sell one tourist maps and guild books.
And the size of the city and the almost constant cloud means that one simply cannot see the stars.
I do so miss the stars.


But the ladies, let me tell you about the ladies…


Vietnamese ladies do not look like Asian girls; they look like the white man’s fantasy of Asian girls. All curves and long hair on a petit build, and such lovely necks. In terms of personality, they resemble an unusually assertive cat. And like us, they age so slowly; a lady of some thirty years could pass for a college student in the Old County.
There is one particular lady.
I could never pronounce her real name, but when she was in the company of the white man she called herself Violet.
Do please allow me to tell you about Violent.


We meet by Ho Hoan Kiem (the Sword Lake) at midnight. The air was thick with humidity, the chatter of drunken tourists and the buzz of racing motor bikes.
I had broken my fast with a charming Scandinavian girl, and was contented as I smoked a cigar and gazed into the lake where neon lights danced on the water.
She sat beside me, and asked for a light.
I was astonished, for it is most rare of a Vietnamese lady to smoke. My astonishment was increased by her beauty. Her raven feather black hair reached to her microscopic waist. Her sleek face was of the pale shade which the Vietnamese ladies cultivate through a life time of sheltering from the sun. Her eyes were as vast round pools of water on a moonless night, and her lips… Her full lips called out to me. But not quite so much as her neck.
After lighting her cigarette, I introduced myself, and Violet introduced herself.
‘A beautiful night,’ she said in heavy accented English.
‘Quite,’ I replied.
She kept talking, I do not recall what she said, but I remember her voice. If cats could speak in a human tongue, they would sound like Violet.
‘Would you care to go for a coffee?’ I asked her.
‘Yes.’
‘I know of a splendid coffee shop close by.’
‘My home is closer,’ she replied, ‘we could go there.’
Normally the Vietnamese are conservative fellows when it comes to matters of the heart (or indeed other more intimate parts of the anatomy) but there are exceptions. One must deal with what is put in ones path.
‘It would be a pleasure,’ said I.
She took me by the hand and led me down a crowded street, then a less crowded street, then up the staircase to her home.
It was a pleasant room, with a high ceiling, a four poster bed (with the obligatory mosquito net), and French window leading to a French balcony.
Things ran their natural course, then they began to ran an unnatural course.
She began to bite my neck.
Not in the usual, human, affectionate manner. But in the manner which I am more accustomed to giving than receiving.
Outraged, I pulled her fine mouth from my finer neck and gazed intently at her face. My icy eyes glared into her deep, dark eyes. My fangs met her fangs.
She glared back, her mind hidden behind a mask of polite indifference.
‘There has been a mistake,’ she said.
‘You are quite right,’ I replied.
‘You are as I am,’ she said.
‘Rather,’ my outrage faded. ‘Was my deathly pallor not somewhat of a give away?’
‘No. You are from London, all men from London are white.’
‘I am not from London,’ this is a common mistake amongst the local fellows,’ not all Europeans are from London. And I am quite literally white, not tourist pink or backpacker brown.’
‘I see. Am what about me? Did you not know?’
‘You are indeed some what pale. But you are a beautiful, refined Vietnamese lady, it is fashionable.’
‘I understand, but what are we to do?’
‘You may bite me, if you like,’ I have some thing of a weakness for the fairer sex,’ but you must not draw blood, and I must bite you too. Then we will hunt together’


So it was agreed.

There was probably a lesson in this about racial prejudice and equality, but it was lost on me.

Now I have a beautiful native girl, and she has her white man.

Sometimes I miss being single, and hunting alone and freely.

But not as much as I miss the stars.