A Cautionary Tale for Social Media Users

[Swaefheard]

This piece was inspired by LTROI, rather than based on LTROI. I think Carmilla played a tenuous role somewhere in it as well and I often imagined as I wrote it that the narrator may have been female although I never really decided and it doesn't matter.
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I had been spending far too many evenings online at home since the business I worked for relocated to this town. I had no friends or family living anywhere near me and I was usually too tired to go out after work. One night in late October I opened my Facebook page and saw a 'friend' request from someone called Martha. I wondered who she was and why she had sent it. I decided to accept the request and the next evening something started that was going to change my life forever.

Martha only seemed to be online during the night and always used internet cafés or other places with public access. She said she didn't have access to the internet where she lived. We were in the same town and she knew a lot about its past and the landmarks, even many that had long been replaced with soulless modern buildings. Her posts intrigued me, frequently using words and phrases you wouldn't expect to see outside the novels of Jane Austen and other writers of that period, as though she was acting out a role. The photos on her Facebook page showed a pale young woman with long hair, wearing old fashioned clothing. I suppose it was the contrast between her youthful appearance and the impression she gave of being so much older that made me decide I wanted to see her one day soon.

A few weeks went by and we arranged to meet one evening after I finished work. It was early winter now, the sun had set late in the afternoon and it was dark by the time she quietly appeared beside me. We got on well, as though we had known each other for many years. She didn't want to go for a drink or have anything to eat and was happy just to sit outside and talk, although it was a cold evening with a few snowflakes falling from time to time. Martha looked even more pale and vulnerable than she did in her photos and there was a slight air of decay surrounding her which she laughed off, saying it was just the old clothes she liked to wear. We talked about anything and everything until she said it was time for her to go. She was insistent that she didn't want me to accompany her but I followed at a discreet distance anyway until I lost sight of her when she reached the shadows near what looked like a long disused church or chapel. I turned and walked back, thinking about our evening together and how much I had enjoyed her company.

We kept in touch online every night after that night and met several times during the next few weeks, always late in the evening and always somewhere without too many people around. She asked me a lot of questions about myself but was reluctant to tell me much about her life. I never saw Martha post again on her Facebook account after our last evening together and I began to fear that I'd said or done something to upset her. I would probably never see her again.

Days came and went without any word from her and I started to realise how much she had come to mean to me.

One evening I was sitting with my laptop on the table beside me. I had been reading the messages we had exchanged in those happy times. It had been a hectic day at work and I was feeling much more than half asleep when the door bell rang. Martha was standing there wearing the same clothes she had worn on our first date. I was so pleased to see her that I didn't have the presence of mind to ask her how she had discovered my home address. Maybe she had followed me home one night? I had always taken care to keep my personal details hidden from people on the internet. She stood on the landing outside the door and said she wouldn't come in unless I invited her.

I asked her in at once without stopping to think that events were taking a rather strange turn. She looked healthier than she had on the previous occasions I had seen her and there was more colour in her cheeks. I suggested that I should ring for a takeaway for us to share but she smiled and said she had eaten earlier in the evening. Time flew by as it always did when we were together and it was well past midnight when she said it was time for her to go home. I was extremely tired and had a strange feeling of being in a dream-like state, detached from my surroundings. I hardly felt Martha's lips and teeth nuzzle my neck and gently nip the skin before she left.

The insistent beeping of my alarm clock woke me and I realised I was still sitting fully dressed in my armchair. The laptop on the table beside me had a blank screen and a flat battery. I must have drifted off to sleep reading our e-mails and posts to each other and the previous evening had been a dream, yet it had all seemed so real to me. Martha hadn't returned after all and was gone for ever.

I was troubled by my vivid dream all day at work and Martha's face kept drifting into my consciousness. I couldn't concentrate on the heap of papers in front of me or on anything else. As if that wasn't enough there was a bug going round the office which added to my discomfort. I thought I must have caught it because my lunchtime sandwiches wouldn't stay down.
The sun broke through the wintry gloom briefly and lit up my office for a moment as dusk fell. A brief uncomfortable tingling swept across my face and was gone as the sun vanished behind the clouds again.
I had never felt so pleased as I did when it was time to clear my desk that day, check my e-mails one last time and head for home. Snow was beginning to fall as I walked to the station. The train was punctual for the first time since New Year and the journey home was thankfully uneventful.

I had to walk a short distance in the snow from the station to the block where I lived. I trudged up the stairs. My stomach was churning as the bug took hold. I made up my mind I'd call in sick tomorrow if I felt like this in the morning. I turned my key in the lock, went in and switched on the lights. As I hung up my coat I glanced in the mirror and noticed a faint red mark on my neck. I raised my hand and ran my finger along an almost healed scratch. Before I had time to wonder how that had happened I felt a sudden need to rush to the bathroom. After I had cleaned up, cursing whoever had given me that bug, I went into the living room and flopped into my armchair to recover. I hadn't been seated for more than fifteen minutes when I became aware of something, a moving reflection in the mirror above the fireplace. The air beside me was shimmering and becoming opaque as it took on a familiar human form.

She had come back but not the way I had expected.

Martha told me that last night hadn't been a dream and that everything really had happened as I remembered it.
She quietly explained that she was able to come and go as she pleased now because I had invited her in the previous evening.
That she had once been as human as I was but many lonely decades had passed since then. How happy she had been after our first date and that she had made up her mind then that I would always be with her.
She told me that my body has been changing inside since that playful nip before she departed last night and I would soon become what she was.

We secured my home against the sun's hateful rays later that night so we would be able to spend the daylight hours resting safely in darkness.
It took a while for me to fully accept and forgive her for what she had done to me and acknowledge that I would never see the sun rise again. I know now that there are far worse fates than being undead with Martha beside me for ever and I have become accustomed to living on human blood.

It is exactly three years since the fateful night I accepted that 'friend' request from her.

It will be dark soon and we will be going out tonight for our anniversary dinner.....

[dongregg]

It could happen that way, couldn't it?

The vampiric elements are introduced with a deft touch.

I lost sight of her when she reached the shadows near what looked like a long disused church or chapel.

The photos on her Facebook page showed a pale young woman with long hair, wearing old fashioned clothing.

And especially:

I hardly felt Martha's lips and teeth nuzzle my neck and gently nip the skin before she left.

Well done, sir.

[Jameron]

Nice story.

.

[PeteMork]

... I hardly felt Martha's lips and teeth nuzzle my neck and gently nip the skin before she left.

I agree. Nice touch! And great little tale.

[lombano]

Nice.

[gkmoberg1]

Bravo Swaefheard!! Just read this. Sorry. I have been away and am catching up.

Your protagonist's journey is well told. Yes, he/she could be either sex as this doesn't seem to matter one bit.

I really like how the tension builds up as things move along. The points where he/she is still naive about Martha but we've long caught on are the best. The details play into this so well, such as that sense of decay, the Jane Austen phrases or the old clothes.

I agree about the Carmilla inspiration. I can see how social media can lead to this languid development - I do so like the the title.

The only part that feels rushed is "We kept in touch online every night after that night and met several times during the next few weeks, always late in the evening and always somewhere without too many people around. She asked me a lot of questions about myself but was reluctant to tell me much about her life. I never saw Martha post again on her Facebook account after our last evening together and I began to fear that I'd said or done something to upset her. I would probably never see her again." The transition is stumbled into, almost as if you edited something out.

The ending "It is exactly three years since the fateful night I accepted that 'friend' request from her. / It will be dark soon and we will be going out tonight for our anniversary dinner....." leaves a nice chill. Way to go! *applause* Do write more. Pleeeease

[Swaefheard]

Thank you for your critiques. I've already gone through three drafts of this story and the paragraph you mention, GK, does seem to have lost something along the way. I will have to think about it.

I don't find writing easy. Sometimes a story drifts into my head from who knows where. I have to write it down straight away and then work on it. I think my muse is someone who has been 12 years old for a very long time - vampires often feature in my stories. I have written a Christmas story which was too late to post before the big day. I was going to write it as a story for children but I don't think they would appreciate it all. And they would have to be rather strange children if they did