Bad Blood

16

Retired. He tried the word in his mouth a few times on his way down to the boathouse. He still hadn’t really gotten used to it.

A life full of activity. Always in a tight spot. The conference rooms. The meetings. The trips. That suppressed jubilation when the contract was signed.

He missed it all. It was a fact that was impossible to run away from.

Now there was only the boat. His wife had been dead for many years; he hardly remembered her, a vague fluttering somewhere on the edges of the landscape of his past.

Everything was fixated on the boat now. His pride and joy. A fine old two-masted wooden yacht of the classic and tragically forgotten brand Hummelbo. From 1947, in superb condition.

But only because it was so well cared for.

Twice a day he went down to the boathouse. He had turned into the boat club’s unpaid guard.

Not even the worst autumn storm could stop him. It didn’t usually look like this in September, did it? Had the greenhouse effect started to show its ugly mug? He rejected the thought-he didn’t believe in it. An infantile fantasy of the green movement. They were always blaming industry and cars. Didn’t they understand what industry and cars had done for the Western world? Did they want to live without them? By the way, how much shit did Greenpeace’s old ships release?

But the autumn storm was irrefutable. He fought his way down toward the Lidingö coast and entered the boat club’s grounds with the help of a robust set of keys. Another couple of keys got him out on the pier.

He could hardly see his own hand in front of him. He was standing right next to his Hummelbo yacht before he could see it at all. Every time the same little jolt of happiness and pride coursed through him. His life in a nutshell.

He checked the locks. The chain was in place; the trap-which resembled a bear trap-was in its place. He got down on his knees, hunched forward, and let his hand slide across the well-polished stem.

Such a pleasure.

He bent a bit farther forward, and his hand slid along the stem until it reached the waterline. He caught something in his hand. The incredibly stubborn rain meant that he couldn’t really see what it was. Sticky. Like seaweed.

Seaweed? But he had cleaned the stem of seaweed as recently as this morning.

He got a good grip on the bunch of seaweed and lifted it upward.

And stared into a pair of open eyes.

He immediately let go of the body and screamed.

As the body splashed back down into the water, he noticed two small red holes in the pale white neck.

Vampires in Lidingö?