Ardeur

“Your breath smells like blood.” [Nikolaos] jerked back, a hand going to her lips. It was such a human gesture that I laughed. . . . One small, slippered foot kicked me in the chest. The force tumbled m backwards, sharp pain, no air.”

—Guilty Pleasures

Like few authors before, Laurell K. Hamilton turned the burning light of reality on vampires and other denizens of the deepest recesses of our nightmares and showed us that even though they’re born of darkness, powerful and vicious creatures could retain the humanity life gives: love, angst, sorrow, and even laughter. They aren’t just terrifying; they can also be funny.

Much of the humor in the Anita Blake books comes from Anita’s observations. She makes us think about the logic of vampires, and werewolves, and vampire executioners like nobody before. Why? Because as Anita so blithely tells us, “I could not stare down at the remains and not make jokes. I couldn’t. I’d go crazy. Cops have the weirdest sense of humor because they have to” (Laughing Corpse). But while she uses her wry wit and sarcastic view of the world to cope, she does something for us, too—something more than just make us laugh. To accuse a centuries-old vampire of bad breath and have that vampire react to the insult brings Anita’s alternate reality closer to our own. It makes her world seem more real.

Let’s start with bad breath. You have to admit, a vampire’s life must have quite literally sucked before toothpaste and breath mints. Shortly after Anita encounters Jean-Claude for the first time in Guilty Pleasures , he whispers a question to the audience at the club. He asks whether we’ve ever wished to feel his breath upon our skin. Skin, yes. But nose? Even Jean-Claude’s looks could only get him so far in today’s hyper-hygienic world.

Thank goodness for the ability to bespell your victims. Do you suppose new vampires have to practice bespelling? Willie McCoy tries and fails to bespell Anita in Guilty Pleasures: “You’re the new dead, Willie. Vampire or not, you’ve got a lot to learn.” I’d imagine learning to bespell would be like practicing an important speech. But who would volunteer to be the “audience” while you practiced? You desire me. I’m beautiful. Your greatest wish is to have me bite you. No, wait. She flinched. Maybe not bite. Hmm . . . how about kiss? Yeah, that sounds better. Aw, man! She’s shivering when I touch her. That’s not my fault. That stupid coffin was freezing! Oh, and forget how cold and clammy my hands are. No, that sounds lame. You’re warm . . . so hot, burning up. You want my hands to cool you off. You need it . . . need me. So desperate for cold. Good. Totally Dracula-like. She’s smiling again and I’m close enough to smell the blood under her skin. Open mouth, bare fangs. Geez, now she’s wrinkling her nose and pulling away! I knew I should have stolen the Certs out of that last guy’s pocket. Ignore your nose. It’s just the scent of your own desire.

Humans are so picky today it’s amazing we ever managed to procreate before bathing and dental hygiene became common. And it’s not just vampires who likely have the problem. There are other creatures in Anita’s world that subsist on blood and meat: werewolves and wererats, plus lions, tigers, and bears—oh my! It can’t be any easier for them to keep kissable-fresh. Protein has an annoying habit of breaking down, whether or not it’s located in an enzyme-producing mouth. Those of you who own outdoor cats will especially understand. When you spot a scattering of feather fluff on the ground, or the unrecognizable remains of what used to be something small and furry on the porch, kitty should not be encouraged to breathe near your face for a few days. Death leaves a certain lingering ... fragrance that doesn’t invite close contact.

Speaking of hunting for food, I have to admit to a certain level of sympathy for vampires. Imagine waking for the evening with all the speed and grace of a turtle on tranquilizers. I fully understand why Jean-Claude made Jason his pomme de sang. Jason’s casual comment, “Sometimes he likes a snack when he first wakes up,” in Bloody Bones belies a hard truth of being undead; the living can outrun you before you warm up. I’d imagine the waking ritual is somewhat different for a vampire who’s not master of a city and doesn’t have a handy werewolf to snack on. When the sun dips below the horizon and the sky turns a rich indigo, the Regular-Joe vampire wakes. He’s hungry and cranky and wants nothing more than to warm his flesh . . . presently the same temperature as his quiet, secure, unheated underground crypt. Oh, sure—he probably took off the bloodstained shirt before bed, flossed the stubborn stains from between his fangs, and snuck in a shower before he died at dawn, so at least he was clean when he woke up. But unless he’s as fortunate as Jean-Claude and has a willing snack coffin-side, he’s got to go hunting. Personally, making coffee before I’ve had my coffee is hard enough, without having to go chase down the machine in the front yard and wrestle it to the ground.

It’s difficult to even conceive how it might have been to be a vampire before the landmark decision of Addison v. Clark in Anita’s reality that “gave us a revised version of what life was, and what death wasn’t” (Guilty Pleasures). Moving like a lizard in December, dragging my bloodless body out into the darkness to wait for someone to show up or going into public to bespell someone would make me want to go back to my coffin and hit the snooze alarm. I wouldn’t be a very good vampire.

I’d do better as a shapeshifter. They can just order a hamburger at a fast food joint, or a rare sirloin at a steakhouse . . . all without raising suspicion. Even a shifter the size of a pony could get away with murder and explain it away easily to nosy neighbors—no tell-tale weapons to hide: “Raina sliced through the bloody apron. Two quick, hard slices. The clothes underneath were untouched” (The Lunatic Café). As a bonus, you can use your pets as scapegoats. Dig up your own back yard to bury your kill? Bad Fido! Track blood across the carpeting? Oh, that cat’s always dragging something inside. Then it’s just a quick trip to the all-night grocery across town for a rental steam cleaner. No fuss, no muss. There are no coffins to hide, you can mow at midday like the rest of the block, and you don’t have to avoid wooden furnishings that could become stake-fodder. It’s a snap to convince your friends that stainless steel is trendy—a less toxic substitute for silver tableware at Christmas.

Even small private dinners tend to put odd behavior in the spotlight, but I think public gatherings would be the hardest part. For a vampire, being squarely under the suspicious gaze of the common citizen would be frustrating. People stare at pale people—either you’re a computer geek who has spent way too much time in front of a monitor, or you’re a vampire. Both are high on the avoidance list for the nightclub crowd . . . which is where I’d imagine most victims come from, judging by the scene in Jean-Claude’s place, described in Guilty Pleasures: “The room was full of liquor and laughter, and a few faked screams as the vampire waiters moved around the tables. There was an undercurrent of fear. That peculiar terror that you get on roller coasters and at horror movies. Safe terror.” Beer-goggles could easily take the place of bespelling before that crucial first meal, and drunk people aren’t terribly careful about who they leave bars with. Even when their partners for the night are oddly pale people with a tendency toward lace.

Let’s talk about clothes for a minute. Lace seems to be a mainstay for Jean-Claude, and you have to wonder why. I have a lovely lace tablecloth, hand-crafted a hundred years ago. It takes constant maintenance to keep it nice. It yellows even in a darkened drawer and can gather stains from food eaten in a different zip code. As clothing, lace scratches and gets caught on nearly everything. But at least with white lace, skin pallor isn’t so noticeable, so that’s something. Either vampires are the ultimate clotheshorses with a lot of money to update their wardrobes, or they use a lot of vampire illusion magic to keep people from noticing the untidy dark dots that stubbornly remain after washing.

Of course, in the early days, before Addison v. Clark, I’m sure vampires simply took what they needed or wanted to make life comfortable. But after legality, life must have become more difficult. I found it interesting, as an admittedly amateur student of economics, how many of the undead in Anita’s world are employed, and what that might mean for the economy in that alternate reality. Jean-Claude owns a string of businesses. He even has a corporate jet. But I suppose if undead isn’t really dead in the eyes of the law, lots of things vampires thought they’d escaped probably came back to haunt them. The owner of the abandoned house at the edge of town where you’d hidden your coffin is not only no longer afraid, he’s now charging rent. Even the grave can’t get you away from that blasted alimony ruling, and no doubt the credit card companies had a field day in court!

Anita herself fights for the rights of zombies, to keep them from being abused by unscrupulous business owners looking to save a buck on payroll. But surely zombies in the kitchen and vampires working the night shift must have lowered the employment possibilities for new graduates. And are people who die at age fifty-nine and come back as vampires exempt from mandatory retirement? Does the Americans with Disabilities Act apply? Are the living the new disabled in Anita’s world? Is showing up for a job interview with a rosy complexion now a detriment? Stock up on that pale make-up, kids! You’ll need it to get any use out of that diploma.

In Anita’s world, make-up to look like a vampire is probably more easily found through L’Oreal or M.A.C. than the local Halloween provider, thanks to Belle Morte’s line of vampires and how they turned the whole concept of what vampires were supposed to look like on its ear. The vampires in Anita’s life, at least, have had “drop-dead gorgeous” applied at a new level.

Vampires were really the world’s first plastic surgeons. Want to keep your youthful good looks? We have the answer! All nip, no tuck. Never mind the small side effects: the pale, pasty skin, the glowing eyes, the teeth that ruin the thousands spent on braces. You can still show off those perfect abs and chiseled jaw to the girls . . . and the beaches aren’t as crowded at night.

Not all vampires are pretty, of course. In Anita’s world, even the average Regular-Joe human can get bumped up to vamp by getting bumped off. Take Willie McCoy, for example. He’s no prize in the looks department. He’s also not tough, nor particularly bright.

That’s another thing. While getting turned into a vampire by one of Belle Morte’s line can do wonders for you in the looks department, there’s no help for being dumb. Despite their many years on earth as the undead, vampires are surprisingly dim. Maybe it’s the simultaneous death of all those brain cells when they’re turned. Because if a smart vampire bared his teeth at a woman and she continued to walk toward him, looking confident, he should be pulling the ranged arsenal out from under his cloak before she gets one step closer. Anita would have been dead a dozen times over if the vamps she faced had just been smart enough to carry a gun. The world has changed from a thousand, or even a hundred, years ago. It’s perfectly okay for a male vampire, or a shapeshifter, to shoot at the woman intent on ending his existence. A stun grenade will take the starch out of a species-discriminating killer’s smile, and let’s see a lowly human, no matter how well-armed, drive a stake through a vampire’s heart after a clip from an UZI takes off that arm below the elbow. I’m always surprised there aren’t more fanged Edwards in Anita’s world.

If I were a vampire in Anita’s world, I’d buy a few Kevlar vests with ceramic breastplates. It wouldn’t stop a determined vampire killer forever, but the longer they have to fumble around getting it off, the better the chance the sun will set before they do. I’d also order a special coffin, lined with asbestos shingles—no lungs (well, no working lungs), no lung cancer. Heck, while we’re at it, the lid should be made of solid lead. Vampires are strong, but it would be too heavy for one mere human to lift, and even if that human brought friends, a lead lid might crush their little skulls before they could get their implements of destruction prepared. Kevlar is a good idea for the shifters out there, too—they’ve already proven their effectiveness on police dogs. Buy a Christmas gift from the heart this year: a silver-deflecting vest for the werewolf in your life will guarantee he or she will be around to slaver affection on you next full moon.

Those microchip implants probably wouldn’t be a bad idea either. Instead of the owner’s name, they could list the shifters’ daytime identity and address. And as a bonus, it’d make it a lot easier to keep track of the less than law-abiding. The chicken ranch owner who wakes up to a pile of feathers could use high-tech readers attached to their security systems to identify the werewolf who jumped the fence. Then it’s a simple matter of sending a bill. Maybe a similar system would work for vampires. Bespelling a woman into opening her window so you can suck her dry would lead the police straight to your crypt the next morning. If only humans smartened up!

Then again, if the vamps and werewolves and humans got smarter, what would we need Anita for? And not having Anita around anymore would be a shame. Looking at Hamilton’s alternate St. Louis through Anita’s eyes uncovers a thousand brilliant bits of comedy gold, from the occasional absurdities of the ardeur to imagining the great and terrible Jean-Claude rolling on the floor savoring the flavor of blackberries through Anita’s tongue. I look forward to a hundred more stories from Ms. Hamilton about Anita’s world—all colored by that special brand of sarcasm that’s made Anita as infamous in her world as she is in our own.