By Kimberly Thalia
One of my earliest memories is a nightmare I had when I was four. I was in an empty cave lit by torches. A section of the wall looked a Scooby Doo kind of different and when it slid open, your classic vampire entered. He said, “I vant to suck your blood!” and bit my neck. I awoke screaming and spent the rest of the night in my parents’ bed.
Red Eyes…White Face..
This was the taunt of the older kids from my parents’ friend group ever since we watched the 1979 version of Dracula. While the grown-up party raged in the kitchen we huddled around the huge wooden console cable TV in the dark. When newly turned vampire Mina emerged from the darkness a pasty faced, eye-blacked horror, 7-year-old me absolutely lost it. Shrieking crying, I ran from the room begging my parents to take me home. (They didn’t.)
Growing up Catholic during the Satanic panic had me all kinds of anxious. I honestly believed that the Judas Priest and Dio that my next-door neighbor blasted from his bedroom window into our cul-de-sac would make me into a Satanist against my will. Gene Simmons was one of the scariest things in the world. When I was five, Kiss was the Halloween costume. I didn’t go trick or treating that year, nor did I answer the door.
Oddly, I did still enjoy horror movies and books. I wrecked myself reading The Exorcist in 8th grade. Poltergeist kept me out of my closet for a month and away from static on the TV for years. I read every Stephen King book I could get my hands on and I still have an irrational fear of cemeteries from the final scene of Carrie. A hand is for sure going to shoot up out of the ground and drag me into their grave.
High school me was a preppy band/theatre kid. Good grades, stayed out of trouble, and member of a zillion extracurricular clubs. I was also a D.A.R.E. role model. Twice a month, a squad car would come to the high school, pick Jeff and me up, and bring us to a middle school. We’d earnestly tell the kids how much cooler and more fun life could be without drugs, then the cops would take us out to lunch and back to the high school.
When the Veil Lifts
The summer after my senior year I read Anne Rice’s Interview with the Vampire. I was dating a guy a few years older than me who had all the appeal of a loaf of stale bread or a raw potato. Bill was nice enough though and his friends were really fun.
In fact, I was quite smitten with one of them. Dave was a theatre major at the University of Illinois who had been a senior when I was a freshman. He was darkly handsome, funny, smart, adventurous, and on this day, leaving for Japan in the morning where he would perform Kabuki.
He explained that he had this bag of weed and he couldn’t bring it on the plane with him, so we’d better finish it off tonight. After I made a few strident refusals, he told me that, “as actors, we need to experience everything we can because you never know when you might need to draw upon that for a role”. My genuine respect along with the mad crush I had for him melted my resolve. He was right, of course. I would give it a try.
The two of us went into Bill’s backyard that warm, clear, suburban summer night and after the second inhale from his wooden pipe, a veil lifted. Suddenly I could see every leaf on every tree for blocks. Everything looked crystalline and the stars twinkled and spun. All at once I realized that this was exactly how Anne Rice had described Louis’s transformation into vampirism. I was spellbound and completely in awe.
We went back inside to find the rest of the group watching Monty Python and the Holy Grail which, by now, I could recite verbatim. Friends looked strange. One seemed to be made of wood, one claymation, another clearly a Muppet.
Retreating to the kitchen we found Bill dressed in a red and black plaid shirt sitting at the table. I didn’t even know he wore contacts but there he was in a pair of those wire rimmed progressive glasses like serial killers wear. The three of us sat and chatted a bit and then I realized that Bill looked exactly like John Denver. I found this hysterical but Bill was not amused. Dave thought it was really funny too and as he threw back his head in laughter, I swear I saw his canine teeth grow long and sharp.
Wide-eyed, I gasped and told Dave he looked like a vampire. With a twinkle in his eye and a smirk on his lips he raised an eyebrow and slowly leaned in to bite my neck. Frozen and breathless, I found I wanted nothing more.
“DAVE!!!” Bill was on his feet and fuming. “Stop!”
The spell was broken. Bill was a real wet blanket and within the week I broke up with him. The choice between John Denver and The Vampire Louis was obvious. I had discovered another side of myself; one who craved mystery and adventure. And vampires.
Embracing the Darkness
I often think about what I’d like to do with my time if I became immortal. Certainly travel the world. I’d love to learn to play every instrument and speak every language. Plant food forests. I wonder which version of the lore is most accurate and what sort of powers one might actually receive.
Though I would never claim to be a Goth, I do love to dress in costume and go dancing. In 1990s Chicago, Neo was the place. At the dead end of a long, dark alley the glow from inside found you the entrance. The tables and the bar were candlelit. The only electric lights were those on the fog-soaked dance floor. Ethereal creatures dressed in blacks and reds and purples swirled and wafted around each other in hypnotic shadows. If there was anywhere in the city that real vampires hung out, it was here.
Every once in a while, I would put on my thick black eyeliner, pale makeup, long purple crushed velvet dress, black lace shawl, and Doc Martins. I would walk the long dark alley to that glowing door – just in case.
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About Kimberly!
Kimberly Thalia is a fire-spinning, singing, dancing, divorced witch mom and budtender currently living in the West suburbs of Chicago. After studying theatre at Illinois State University and improv at Second City, Kimberly performed in numerous Chicago blackbox theatres and nightclubs. Favorite roles include Vampira in Plan 9 from Outer Space, Donna Dasher in Female Trouble, and most fun of all, five years as Kimbriolet, co-host of Daisy Mae’s Disco Bingo. More recently, she’s lead large group rituals for Sacred Harvest Festival, Pagan Spirit Gathering, Hoof & Horn, and Iowa Lammas Fest. Her latest passion is live storytelling, appearing in Tellin’ Tales Theatre’s “Misunderstood Minds” and “I Am Who I Am”.
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