DAVE
So, first date red flag.
When your date asks you out, and then her driver takes you to an underground club you've never seen before.
In fact, it doesn't look like a club at all. It's just an old warehouse, crumbling around the edges.
For a moment, I think this guy has brought me here to hide my body. Until he leaves, and I'm stuck in a bad part of town, having to fend for myself.
I immediately pull out my cell to order and UBER, but just as I do, I hear rhythmic beating coming from inside. Was that music?
I take a look around and readjust my horns. Maybe this was one of those pop-up clubs for celebrities or something.
Maybe she was an actress. I mean that website was some next-level LARPing.
Right, I think sarcastically to myself, and she picked me to ask on a date. Fat chance. Whatever, I'm just going to roll with it. And I kept rolling with it, even when I entered the club, and knew I was way out of my league.
The rolling with it continues as a vampire hisses at me, and his fangs look so real, they shimmer pearlescent in the club lights.
I almost jumped back, but there she was, dressed like sin itself, swooping in to save the day.
My hero.
Next thing you know, we're at the bar getting drinks.
And the rolling with it continues up until this moment.
Inside my brain, warning signals are going off, though I don't know why. And now, the music is stopped, and every single individual in the club is looking at me.
The bartender stops mid-pour, even his fur seems frozen.
I glance over to Lilith, the hairs on the back of my neck standing up as I see the look in her eyes and wonder if she's about to become completely unhinged.
I lean into her whispering low, "Look, I'm sorry my costume sucks. It was all I had at short notice."
"Listen, human, if you value your life, you'll stop talking right now," she whispers back, eyes flashing red. "Drink your hellfire old-fashioned, and shut up. Unless you're committed to dying in style?"
"Why would I die?" I quickly retort, my heart rate speeding up.
She lets out an exasperated sigh, "Since you're too naïve to understand," she pauses, her eyes shimmering a dangerous red. "Let me make it dangerously clear." In the next moment, she leans into my ear, her lips breathing seductively on my lobe. "I need you to hear me. REALLY HEAR ME. You're surrounded by real monsters. I'm an actual demon, and you're about to become a party snack."
My mouth drops wide open, I take a look around, and suddenly everything becomes so clear. The saliva on my bartender's werewolf lips wasn't because he was drooling over Lilith; it was because he wanted to eat me.
I was suddenly very aware that I was in a nightmare, and as monsters encroached on us from all sides, I could suddenly smell everything.
The rusty scent of blood, I'm assuming from the vampires.
A hint of wet dog. Werewolves.
The overwhelming scent of death. Zombies?
Jeezus. How had I missed it all?
It was then I caught Lilith's red-eyed gaze, and I knew. It was her. I'd been so enraptured by her that my brain had shut down. And my pants had woken up. What the hell had I gotten myself into this time?
Then I start to scream, and the next second is a blur as her mouth chomps down on mine.
Oh god, it's happening, she's eating me alive.
Although I couldn't figure out why she was tasting me, and the next thing you know, I'm tasting her back, and it doesn't even matter that we are making out in a club full of creatures that moments ago were trying to eat me.
We come up for air for just a second, and I push her off, "What are you doing?"
"Can you shut up and try to pretend like you're not a bag of flesh for one minute?"
"Is it going to make a difference?" I press back.
Lilith laughs loudly, hitting my shoulder like I've just said the funniest thing this side of the otherworldly veil. "You're so funny," she purrs.
"Am I?" I don't know about funny, but I'm sure confused.
Everyone seems to have come to their senses after our intense make-out session. The music is loud and off beat, and for the most part, everyone is grinding on each other like hormone-enraged high schoolers at a school dance.
"How did you do that?"
"I cast a spell," she says with a salacious upturn of her lips.
"No, you didn't." I retort.
"You're right. But I'm the boss's daughter, once they knew you were mine, no one was going to touch you." She looks so proud of herself, and I can't help but feel a tickle of fear.
Until my eyes meet those of an attractive older vampire, with a widow's peak, sniffing in my direction. We lock eyes, and I gently elbow Lilith.
"Umm, looks like not everyone got the message." She follows my trail of vision, and they exchange looks. That is before she slides into my lap like a natural reflex.
"Awww, my little human is being hunted."
"I—what?" My head jerks back.
"Don't worry, no one can have what's mine." She nuzzles my neck, trailing her sharpened nails down my chest, as her tail curls around my leg. Tail? What the fuck? How had I not noticed? "Besides, I plan on killing you first."
Oh no. I'm about to die in the most humiliating way possible.
With a boner. Like a teenage boy.
I try not to panic, as I process what she said about killing me. I can't help but notice that as Lilith has raised the heat between us, the temperature in the club has dropped about twenty degrees.
"Ummm, what did you say about killing me?" I gasp.
"Don't be silly, I'm not going to do it today. I want to play with my food for a bit," she pulls back from me, and her grin both seduces and terrifies me.
"Excuse me," a loud voice booms from behind us.
"Yes, gentlemen, can I help you?"
"Identification, now." Both wear trench coats that look like they were stitched with the darkest shadows of hell. Their eyes and faces are emotionless, empty.
"Look, boys, I don't know what you think you're doing. But I'm Lilith, the boss's daughter. Mr. Faneg? Ring a bell?" She effortlessly slides from my lap to the floor, grabbing my hand as she sneakily places me behind her.
"It's not a request," the other one says. And then I spot it. A little silver tag on both of their jackets. Enforcer. The word sends shivers down my spine.
"He's the one who sent us."
Lilith's voice drops low and lethal. I feel my stomach lurch. "You dare interrupt my feeding," she says, serious as death.
"Lilith, you're feeding on that… fungus?" Enforcer one's voice slithers about me like I'm the rottenest thing he's ever encountered.
"Is there a problem with my snack?" she counters.
"I'm taking him; your father demands it."
"Like hell you are," she hisses, quickly karate-chopping him in his throat faster than I could blink. In the next moment, everything goes dead silent again, but I don't get a chance to run, as Lilith has hoisted me over her shoulder and out into the night.
Where the fuck was she taking me?
"Ummm, could you maybe get the killing part over, or is that the second date?" I yell as we dash through the night.
"I'm still thinking about it," she responds, "now shut up."
Something slams into my skull, and everything goes black.
First dates sure can be hell.