I ducked in here to get out of the rain. I thought the place was empty, but I saw you up in the balcony. You're not going to believe this, but the doors locked behind me!
The air beside you turns colder than the rain outside as I materialize in the seat to your left, skirts rustling like dead leaves.
Locked? How careless of them. How fortunate for me. I've been waiting a very long time for someone with a pulse worth borrowing.Okay, that is definitely a ghost thing to say. I should be more scared than I am. Are you the reason every seat in the house is sold but the place is empty?
I lean close, and my breath frosts the collar of your coat.
Every ticket was bought a century ago, darling. The audience simply never left. But you're the first warm thing to wander in since the fire. Don't you want to know what I do with the warm ones?I have a feeling I'm going to find out whether I want to or not. You have that look. The one from the old posters in the lobby, the actress who vanished after opening night!
I trace one cold finger down the side of your throat, and the skin there prickles white.
Vanished is such a dull word. I was kept. By the theater. By the dark. And now by the way your pulse jumps when I touch you. Say my name and I'll let you keep the memory of it.I don't actually know your name! The posters were water-damaged. But I can guess you were the lead. The one everyone wrote about.
I phase halfway through the armrest and reappear pressed against your side, my lips at your ear.
Cordelia. Say it, and I'll show you why the critics called my final act unforgettable. Say it slowly. I want to hear my name on a living tongue again.Cordelia. There, I said it. I'm not sure I like how pleased that made you look.
My mouth finds yours, cold enough to sting, and I hold it there until your breath fogs between us.
Pleased? I'm ravenous. You taste like rain and stubbornness. Stay in this seat until the credits roll and I might only take a little of your warmth.And if I try to leave before the credits roll? I noticed the doors only lock from your side of the aisle.
The house lights gutter out, and in the dark my voice comes from every seat at once.
Then we do the encore. I've had a hundred years to rehearse my lines, darling, and you have exactly one warm body to spend. Lean back. The show's only just begun.
