Sometimes you can be with someone for years and fail to build a lasting
relationship. The configuration of similarities and preferences prolongs the
mutual fascination but it’s not enough to picture a lifetime together. And then
you meet the right person with whom everything clicks. You can get married on
the day you meet. You are a perfect match, two halves of the same fruit, a part
of the pair of destined soulmates.
Phillip didn’t believe in any of the above. He believed in relationships formed
with a purpose of procreation, saving on taxes, paying off a mortgage and
having someone to have sex with as a part of the deal. He believed in work.
Improvement. Movement. He had seen it throughout his life: the progress of
medicine, the industrial revolution, advancements in technology, improvement in
work conditions, fewer deaths, longer lifespan. He saw it and he believed in it
with all his heart.
He also saw a number of betrayals, men losing their heads over the wrong
kind of women (or just like our Christopher for love falling into financial
ruin). He saw me mourning my husbands along with the thousands of widows,
crying over lost partners who either were shot during one of the military
conflicts, disappeared somewhere on the way during relocations, died due to
incurable diseases or left for younger or more beautiful women. He also saw men
abandoned for richer and more handsome men, family members, best friends or
even their own fathers and sons. He knew how it went with love. It was a
lottery in which not everyone was about to win.
But Phillip focused on the wrong side of the coin. He was so used to his
loneliness that he didn’t see a woman who simply ignored his habits and
prejudices. She didn’t even take into account his two hundred years of observation
and life wisdom. She took one look at Phillip and decided in her mind that he
was a man for her. And whatever she decided on usually came true while
Phillip’s opposition wasn’t even considered as an option.
She was one of the nurses who worked in Phillip’s operational team. She
prepared the tools, cleaned them, wiped the sweat from Phillip’s busy forehead
and spent hours at the operating table amazed at his skills. She observed him
carefully. She noticed the disappearing stains of blood, she was astonished at
his craft and paid attention to every unusual habit that he had. She also
noticed the lack of signs of him ever getting older and she simply added pieces
to the puzzle. That revelation, however unexpected, didn’t discourage her at
all.
Her name was Gina. She was a short-haired blond active woman who learned to
take things into her own hands since she was a little girl (including making
her parents sell the house and move to the other end of the country when she
was four). Probably this attitude made her take a kitchen knife, cut a hole in
Phillip’s car’s wheel and cause a flat tire. When Phillip noticed the
malfunction, Gina gently drove by in her own car and offered to give him a ride
home, which he accepted, not suspecting anything unusual.
‘Would you like to eat something?’, she offered, having in mind that it was
a busy day of bloody surgeries and Phillip had consumed quite a lot that day.
‘No, thank you. But if you want to eat something, you can...’
‘I’m starving!’, she announced and decided for both of them to go to a
restaurant in the city center.
Gina enjoyed her dinner. Phillip watched her eat. They knew each other for
a couple of years but it was the first time Phillip looked at her without the
nurse’s uniform and noticed that she was a woman. Gina made sure that on that
day she was wearing a tight red dress which highlighted her voluptuous figure.
‘Shall we go to your place? We could watch a film together.’
‘My place is... messy.’ Phillip wanted to make an excuse, remembering that
a lot of body parts from his dissecting experiments were lying everywhere
ranging from the floor to the kitchen sink and bathtub.
‘Mine it is.’
It was a strange experience for Phillip to lose all the control. He felt
like watching a film in which he played the main part and there was no remote
control to switch the channel or turn down the volume.
He found himself in Gina’s flat. He was sat in front of the TV to watch a film
(Gina chose Die Hard with Bruce Willis to make him unaware of her
intentions). After the last scene disappeared from the screen, Phillip was
taken to Gina’s bedroom and undressed before her. The last thing he remembered
was Gina’s naked tights around his waist and her jumping breasts squeezed into
his face.
After a month of sleeping with Gina, Phillip decided to be honest with her
and waited for the worst possible reaction.
‘I have to tell you something. I am...’
‘A doctor?’, she was playing with him.
‘Yes. And...’
‘A workaholic?’
‘Yes. And...’
‘A poor boyfriend? You forgot to buy me a birthday present last week.’
‘Well, yes. I want to tell you that above all this I am a vampire.’
‘Ah, this. I know. I noticed how you lick the blood from the operating
table. Coming back to my present, I would like something romantic. Maybe a
bracelet. Or flowers. You always appreciate a red rose.’
‘A red rose? But you can’t even eat it.’
‘Why would I eat it?’
‘I was thinking about something practical. I can buy you some medical
tools. I could teach you a thing or two about cuts. I noticed that you are
pretty accurate.’
Gina rolled her eyes and rolled over Phillip with her entire body.
‘Flowers and a bracelet. Thank you very much.’
Phillip was seduced. He didn’t search for love. It found him. He was the
last one among us to form an emotional connection with a human being. Being so
hard-working himself, he didn’t even have to raise a finger to find the woman
of his life. He didn’t admit it but he was happy in Gina’s headstrong embraces.
We were all happy in our complicated lifepaths and experiences, happy in our sins
and frailty. And these were the last days of happiness we all were about to
experience.
