220. Cruz

Warning: coarse language, nudity

Bridgeport, present day

After a month of giving him the runaround, Eloise finally agreed to meet with Cruz. He’d called her office every single day since he'd sent her flowers, and she'd done a remarkable job of ignoring him. Until today, that is, when her resolve had seemed to be at its lowest.

As she slowly cruised to the rendezvous point, a seedy motel in the shady part of town, Eloise wondered if maybe she was making a mistake.

“No, it’s not a mistake because you’re going to tell him to leave you alone once and for all,” she tried to convince herself. Her argument though, sounded weak and thin even to herself. She could have simply sent him a text, or told him over the phone to stop calling.

She stayed in her car for a while, thinking about whether she should go in. It wasn’t too late to turn around and send him a text message telling him to back off.

But driven by curiosity, her legs carried her out of the car and into the motel’s dimly lit reception area.

The clerk at the front desk barely looked up from her magazine, and Eloise was relieved as she raced towards the elevators. She didn’t consider herself a celebrity, but she’d been photographed with Leigh and Krisis numerous times, people recognized her instantly. The last thing she wanted was a nosy clerk speaking to the likes of Dirt magazine and twisting her simple meeting with Cruz into something it wasn’t.

She rang the elevator to the 2nd floor, and as she waited for it to come down her mind wandered to Devon. She knew they were in trouble, and it wasn’t just the stuff she was keeping from him. It was more than that. She’d tried to talk to him, but all she got was a half-hearted excuse about work being stressful. Despite all their problems though, she was glad to see Devon’s relationship with Blake was still intact, their son is one person he hadn’t withdrawn from.

The elevator doors squeezed open with a tired 'ding' and for a second Eloise just stared, unable to move, her gut clenched tightly, and a trickle of perspiration ran down her spine, all signs of her mounting anxiety. But just as the doors were about to close she stuck out her hand, forcing them to withdraw again. With a shaky sigh she stepped inside.

The 2nd floor was eerily quiet. It reminded her of the ground floor of her work that night when she forced Leigh into compelling the security guard. 

“Oh Leigh,” she sighed wistfully. She really missed her best friend and wished things could go back to the way they were before Cruz showed up.

Outside room 201, she paused for a few minutes before she struck up the courage to knock on the door. Cruz answered promptly. In the dim light in the hallway he looked older than her initial impressions of him, more threatening too.

“You showed up,” he offered in place of a greeting, a faint smile tugged at the corners of his mouth.

“It’s not like I had a choice, you would have kept hounding me if I didn’t!” Eloise snapped as she stepped inside his room. She caught a whiff of aftershave mingled with sweat and petrol fumes, or maybe it was car engine oils or some similar lubricant, she wasn't so sure, but whatever it was, it reminded her of  a petrol station. 

“And here I was thinking I was wooing you,” he retorted as he closed the door. It clicked into place with a finality that scared her.

He must have seen the petrified look in her eyes because he held up his hands in a non-threatening manner.

“Where I come from, people don’t woo married women.” Eloise turned away from him.

The window seemed to be the safest place to settle down, she pranced toward it.

“Can I get you anything?” 

Before she could reply she heard him rummage through the small cooler box on the dining table in the corner.

“No, I’m not staying long,” she shrugged as she turned away from the window to look at him.

“Suit yourself.” He popped open a beer and took a long gulp from the bottle.

“Why did you summon me here?” Eloise demanded. She’d taken just about all she could take of the pleasantries. She wanted answers and she wanted them fast.

Cruz crossed the room and lowered his frame on the bed, it creaked loudly  under his weight. He patted the empty spot beside him, inviting her to take a seat. Eloise shook her head; she was fine where she was, thank you very much!

“My name is Cruz Desai." He began when it became obvious she didn't plan on joining him on the bed.  "I just turned twenty two a few weeks ago; I work at Hank’s Auto shop as a mechanic because it’s the only place desperate enough to hire me.”

“I have a fifteen year old sister, Jupiter.” Cruz carried on and Eloise frowned at him, silently wondering where the hell he was going with this.

“My parents died from the plague eight months ago.”

At that moment, when she heard the pain in his voice,  Eloise forgot all the rage she harbored against him. She wanted to comfort him, and tell him how sorry she was for his loss. But she couldn't, she didn't know him that well, didn't know how he'd react to her sympathy and platitudes.

For a long time he didn’t say anything, and Eloise found herself trying to come up with something to fill the silence. But her mind drew a blank.

Maybe he saw how uneasy she felt, or maybe he just wanted to get everything off his chest, whatever his reasons, Cruz suddenly spoke again, showing her glimpses of his life.

“Moonlight Falls is a big town, pretty much like Bridgeport. The humans own the suburbs and the metropolis."

"And the gypsies normally set up camps in the surrounding hills, away from everyone. Its better this way, you know, it's safer for the town too, no one gets hurt and we get to be what we are without fear of getting caught."

"Being so isolated from everyone though has its negatives. Normal folk don't understand our traditions and practices, and anything they don't understand scares them. So there's always tension just simmering between us and them, ready to ignite at the slightest hint of suspicion or provocation.” Cruz paused then and took a long, ragged breath. 

Eloise held her own breath, waiting for more; she was still confused about her place in all of this, and from the look in his eyes, she knew his story didn't have a happy ending, but still she wanted to know him, understand his motivations, and maybe if she did she could start thinking about forgiving him. So she nodded her head, silently asking him to carry on.

“About a month before the outbreak, I was home from college when a small group of botanists showed up; they had a letter from the government requesting permission to conduct research on the rare flora in our site. We didn’t want them around, but refusing them access would have raised unnecessary hostility between us and the government.

So for a week they did their business, poked around the soil and took plant and water samples, and we all did our best to accommodate them. 

Three days after they left scores of fish were found floating lifelessly on the water's surface in the pond, and one clan whose camp runs along the pond fell ill. Two days later they were all dead, and a few others from my clan were infected.  

A meeting was called and we were warned not use the water from the pond. Someone managed to place a call through to the authorities. But by the time help arrived almost the entire camp was infected, and at least fifty people were dead.”

Cruz paused, giving her time to process everything he’d said. At some point during his narrative, she’d left her place by the window and joined him on the bed. She took his hand now and squeezed it comfortingly.

“What happened then?” She asked when she was sure the tight lump in her throat was gone. 

“We were moved to the Science facility in Bridgeport for treatment, it had better infrastructure. A week later I felt better and I was discharged, but Jupiter and a few others were still sick.  I didn’t want to leave her, but someone had to arrange our parents' funeral. So I went back home, buried mom and dad, and closed up our caravan.When I returned to Bridgeport two days later Jupiter was gone.”

“What do you mean ‘gone’?” Eloise sounded bewildered.

“I mean just that. She’s gone. The doctors told me they’d discharged her. But I know my sister, she wouldn’t go off on her own; she’d call me to pick her up or at least tell me she’d been discharged.” Cruz got up from the bed and paced the room. 

“So what? You think they’re lying to you?” She asked in a small voice.

“I know they are! They have my sister and the others, those sons of bitches.”

“But why? Why would they do that? Why would MorcuCorp hold them against their will and lie to you about Jupiter?” Eloise shook her head in disbelief. 

“I don’t know. My guess is they must have found out from our test results what we are, and they’re experimenting on Jupiter and the others.”

Eloise fell silent then, processing his revelation. It sounded bizarre, crazy even, but her life had lost all normalcy the moment Cruz turned her.

Cruz carried on with his pacing, his raw anger came off of him in sickening waves, and Eloise desperately wanted to tune him out and get as far away from him as her feet would allow, but her body refused to cooperate, so she remained on the bed and stared at the worn bedspread, wishing she was a thousand miles away. 

She didn’t like where this was headed, didn’t like that Cruz was making his problems hers, but she could see how torn up he was over his sister and she understood his fears. When Tamsyn kidnapped Blake, she could barely function, so she knew all too well what he was going through. She just wished he wouldn’t lay down his burdens at her door; she’d taken enough shit from him to last her three life times. She didn’t want or need any more complications. She was about to tell him that when he finally rested against the table and carried on talking, drawing her deeper into his mess.

“Before I ran into you that night, I went back to the facility to demand Jupiter’s release records, and things didn’t go as well as I’d hoped. Let’s just say, you were luckier than Jupiter’s doctor-”

Eloise didn’t give him a chance to finish his piece; she sprung from the bed and rounded on him, gnashing her canines. “You son of a bitch! I’m supposed to be grateful that you didn’t kill me?”

“That’s not what I meant. I’m sorry okay. I’m sorry. But I was furious with everyone at the facility. And no one knows better than you what anger does to us-”Cruz tried to explain, but Eloise was having none of it.

“I have a family you bastard, didn’t you care about that. Didn't you care that I might be somebody’s daughter, somebody’s mother, someone’s wife?” Even if she’d wanted to, she could not have hung on to the last bit of self-control she had. Like the last time they met, her transformation took her by surprise, and once again she found herself trapped between forms.  

In a minute the room was utterly devastated, and if it wasn’t for the sudden knock on the door, the receptionist checking if everything was okay, Eloise knew she would have shredded him to pieces, or died trying.

Panting for breath she watched Cruz shift back and throw on a towel around his waist before he went to get the door.

He assured the clerk they were great, just a session of steamy sex gone very loud that’s all.

“Keep it down you two; we do have other guests you know.” Eloise heard the receptionist say before Cruz slammed the door in her face.

He headed straight to the bathroom, giving her time to change back.

Five minutes later, having worn the carpet thin with her rabid pacing, she struck up the courage to knock on the bathroom door and borrow a t-shirt from Cruz; she couldn’t exactly leave the motel naked...

Cruz was dressed in a pair of oil-stained jeans and a surprisingly clean t-shirt when he came out of the bathroom. He looked through the dresser and pulled out a clean t-shirt and a pair of boxer’s shorts. He held them out to her, Eloise hesitated for just a fraction of a second before she took them and headed for the bathroom. She didn’t like the idea of wearing his clothes, but calling Leigh again wasn’t an option and neither was walking out of the motel naked.

He was in front of the window, smoking, when she joined him in the bedroom again. She crossed the room and sat on the bed.

“If it’s any consolation, it wasn’t personal!” He spoke, with his back turned to her.

“Fuck you!” Eloise cussed under her breath. “You made it personal when you attacked me!” 

He turned slightly then to look at her. “Will you help me?”

Eloise shook her head, an incredulous look in her eyes. “You turn my life upside down and you still want my help?”

“Yes, please help me,” he pleaded. “You know people. The head of the Vampire Council.”

“Thornton? Are you out of your mind?” Eloise was almost shouting now.

“If you can just get word to him, tell him what’s going on, about the science facility and the experiments they are doing on my sister and the others, I think he can help. He seems like a decent man, I mean he let you go didn’t he?” Cruz took a long drag from the cigarette and returned his attention to the window.

“You know about that?”

“I know everything about you.”

“Really, like what?” The words were out of her mouth before she could stop them.

Still gazing outside the window, Cruz replied. “I know you hate roses; I asked one of the girls at your office. But I still got them for you anyway just to rile you up.I know you are compassionate, and you have a generous heart, you were there for your best friend when her parents died, and I’m pretty sure you had everything to do with your family taking her in and helping her through her matric year. I know how much you love your son and how you almost died when that crazy woman kidnapped him. I know you’re fiercely independent and you don’t like to ask for help even when you clearly need it, it’s probably one of the reasons you took as long as you did to tell your husband about the change, and probably why he won’t know about our meeting today, you think you can handle me on your own, sort of out your little complication without involving him.I know how…” He would have carried on, if Eloise hadn’t cut him off.

“That’s enough!” She yelled, raising her hand to silence him. And in much gentler voice she added, “How do you know all that? All that stuff with Leigh and my son?”

Cruz gave her a sad smile. “That night when I bit you, I just wanted to scare you off. And it wasn’t until those bodies outside Waylon’s Haunt made it on the news I realized I’d changed you. Since I’m responsible for you now, I had to know you; I had you know everything about you, so I did my research, did a bit of digging around. You might not like it, but you are important to me as much as I’m important to you, we share a lifelong connection now.”

“Is that supposed to comfort me somehow?” Eloise frowned, her eyes flashing angrily.

“No. But I’ll always be around if you need me.”

“Where the fuck were you when I completed the change, when I killed that man at Waylon’s Haunt, when I went through my first full moon transformation? I needed you then! I needed you to help me!” Eloise could feel tears sting the corners of her eyes, but she quickly blinked them back. She wouldn’t cry. Not here. Not right now. Not in front of him.

“I’m sorry. It was never my intention to abandon you, but since I’d already killed Jupiter’s doctor, and the medical personnel at the facility had seen me transform, I had to lay low for a while.”

“So you were protecting yourself?” She spat at him.

“I was protecting both of us.”

Eloise snorted bitterly. “If it makes you sleep easy at night, keep telling yourself that.”

Cruz didn’t say anything after this. Instead, he turned back to the window and took a long drag from his cigarette. 

Eloise played with her hair, trying to drive away the hurt feelings clogging up her throat. “If you know so much about me, then you’ll know Thornton and I are not friends. In fact right after you attacked me, I had to stand trial and the only reason they let me go is because I promised I’d personally bring them your head on a silver platter!” She spoke after a long, uncomfortable pause. 

“Are you?”

“‘Am I what?” Eloise glowered at him.

“Are you going to bring them my head on a silver platter?” He matched her angry stare.

Eloise was the first to look away. She was never good at handling conflict. “It depends.”

“On what?” He looked intrigued suddenly.

“On whether you help me or not. Teach me everything I need to know about being a werewolf.”

“Of course, but you’re not a werewolf. You’re a Rakshasa.” Cruz told her. 

“A what?” Eloise stammered.

“A shape shifter,” Cruz ashed his cigarette and drew the curtains before he joined her on the bed. He took her hand and held it. Surprisingly Eloise didn’t yank it away. She felt drained; her emotional outburst had really taken its toll on her. She leaned on his shoulder and closed her eyes as she listened to another one of his narratives…

“A long time ago, in a sleepy town of Al Simhara, a kindly Brahmin had a very good mother who was loved by all.

But his wife, Rakshasa, was jealous and mean; she mistreated his mother.

The poor woman was too elderly and feeble to defend herself.

One night, heartsick from all the abuse she’d endured at the hands of her daughter-in-law she fled to the shrine of the village goddess and prayed to her.

Her prayers were answered and she was given an enchanted pomegranate.

Returning to her home she ate the fruit, and immediately felt her skin grow firm and youthful once more.

She rose from her elderly stoop as her body grew strong and young again.

Now she could defend herself and no longer had to endure the humiliation at the hands of her son's wife.

The Brahmin's wife was furious. The next evening, on a full moon, she went to the same shrine with a fabricated tale of woe. 

The gods, of course, weren’t fooled. But they gave her a fruit all the same.

Returning to the house, Rakshasa eagerly bit into the fruit.

At first, as strength flowed into her body, she was delighted and thought all was well.

But then grey-brown fur began to sprout from her body, and her hands and feet transformed into paws.

Falling to all fours she tried to complain, but only a howl emerged as she was wholly changed into a wolf.

When the moon waned, Rakshasa became human again, and she went back the temple and prayed to the gods to remove the curse, but sadly it was irreversible and she passed it on to all her children, and their bloodlines. And that’s how a race of Rakshas or shape shifters was born.”

Eloise didn’t know what to say for some time, it was a lot to absorb, a lot to think through.

She tried to get on her feet but Cruz stopped her when he shifted on the bed and carried on with his narrative. 

“Whenever there was a full moon, without fail, Rakshasa would transform into a wolf. Throughout the month though she could transform at will and take on any form she desired, but when she got highly emotional or aggravated, her transformations were often not seamless, and she’d become part human and part beast.”

“Like us, right now?” Eloise asked, referring to their half human-half wolf form when they transformed earlier. 

“Yes, a female Rakshasa is known as Rakshasi, and when you’re part human, and part wolf, that form is known as Manushya-Rakshasi.”

“Manushya-Rakshasi,” Eloise tried to say the word,  it sounded very strange and it rolled off her tongue awkwardly.

“So I’m a shape shifter,” she murmured, more to herself.

But Cruz nodded and smiled at her. “You sound disappointed.”

“I’m stunned. In all the research I did, I never came across anything on Rakshas.” 

“You were looking in all the wrong places,” Cruz got up from the bed and stretched before he raided  the cooler box again.

He grabbed another beer for himself and a can of soda for her. Eloise absently took the cool drink from him and flicked it open with a twist of her fingers, but she didn’t drink it, she was still too stunned to do anything.

“I can’t remember what I do when I’m in my other form, I can remember the moments just before the transformation, and the moments after I change back , but nothing in between. Why? Why can’t I remember?”

“It’s a problem most shifters have soon after they’re changed. The more you grow into your abilities the more control you’ll have over your mind when you shift. I wouldn’t worry so much about it.” Cruz assured her. 

But Eloise wasn’t convinced; it’s something she always worried about.

Reading the worry in her eyes, he knelt in front of her. “Look, if you did something bad while you were in your other form I’m sure we would have heard about it by now, I imagine it’s very hard to keep a body hidden.”

Eloise frowned darkly at him, completely missing the humor in his words. She pushed him away and got up from the bed; it had grown very dark outside.

“I have to go.”

“Will you be back?” He sounded eager, hopeful even. 

Eloise shrugged her shoulders.  She didn’t want to make any promises…

Credits: In case you were wondering, Rakshas really do exist in Hindu Mythology.

The story of Rakshasa can be found here, under Folklore and Mythology. You'll have to read through the passage titled 'Indian'; I just changed the lore quite a bit to to fit Krisis. 

Special thanks to Karima, for staying close to me while I banged my head against my keyboard, trying to make this chapter work.