Somewhere in the deep forests of the Carpathian Mountains, lived a very old, very large and very vicious wolf. It was so old that it was said that legends about him had inspired Charles Perrault for his tale: "the little red riding hood". It was so large that even the bears would flee through the forest when they smelled his terrible stench. It was so vicious that when he had decided to have a bear for supper, said majestic animal could run all he wanted because in the end the wolf would always catch him.
If this wasn't enough, this big bad wolf hadn't always been a wolf, long before the time this story begins, this particular wolf had been a man, a nobleman actually, a noble nobleman, not the kind that steals from his subjects, a hero that had stopped the Ottoman invasion of Europe, a fair and just ruler loved by his people and loved by his lords. But this man, in his crusade for his land, for his kingdom, for the whole Christianity, had been forced to give up many, many things. Among those things were the woman he loved and his eternal soul. The sacrifices he had done, had made him a tyrant, a despotic monster, preying on the weak and the innocent. So, after being cursed by God, he had been cursed again forced to live in the pelt of an animal, this dire wolf.
Radu Vladislav didn't know all this when this very old, very large and very vicious wolf appeared in the sight of his hunting rifle. Radu Vladislav was a poacher, he wasn't evil or greedy but he had a family to feed and he knew a man in Brasov, who knew a man in Bucharest who knew a rich American who was ready to pay a lot of money for a wolf pelt as beautiful as this one. So Radu Vladislav shot the wolf and thus ended the life of this creature of legend.
***
"Fur You Coats and accessories Banks and son Established 1934"
The sign over the small Pasadena shop says it all. Putting aside its potential vulgar twist, the name of the shop is terrible. A Fur shop is supposed to inspire opulence, luxury, warmth, superficiality... I don't know, anything but "a gift". A Fur coat is an investment not a God damn souvenir. But well what can I say, we, the Banks, are not really good at business and when we make it work it's usually more due to luck rather than talent. My great grandfather, Samuel Banks Senior, for instance, came to the west coast after losing everything in the 1929 crack and opened a fur shop in a region where the average temperature oscillates between fifty and eighty degree. It should have been an epic failure worthy of the building of the town of Pompeii on the skirts of that funny smoking mountain if it hadn't been for the movie industry. The movie industry and the fur business have a very profitable relationship. Every movie star has to have a fur coat; every year or so the pool of movie stars is renewed; so every year or so there's a new batch of potential clients for my uncle, Samuel Banks the third.
My name is Erin Banks; I'm a nineteen years old redhead. I fucked up my final exams last month and I've been working here, with my uncle for the last two weeks. The idea is to raise some money to do something with my life... maybe. I'm a bit lost at the moment.
I push the door and enter in the excessively air-conditioned realm of my uncle. I'm in charge of the shop until eleven, not that my uncle trusts me to meet the high standards of his select clientele but honestly who buys a fur coat at eight thirty on a Tuesday morning?
The shop is cozy, precious wood on the walls, thick furry carpet, luxurious dressing rooms with big leather couches for rich old man to admire the twenty or thirty grand they will spend to decorate a trophy wife bought the week before.
I flip the sign, put on my most commercial smile and get ready for a long morning of boredom and nothingness, alone in the freezing palace. At first working here excited me, first proper job, the opportunity to meet the rich and the famous, luxury, glamour and all that. But well what can I say, standing behind a counter for hours waiting for someone to come in and when eventually someone does come in, staying behind the same damn counter because, it's either my uncle, his wife Sandy or their daughter Mindy who gets to drive the client through the selection of magnificent pelts, coats and other accessories, is clearly not how I had pictured this job. What about the glamorous rich and the luxurious celebrities you will ask. Well, Tom Cruise is a dwarf, Megan Fox a pretentious ass, Channing Tatum a retarded poser and Mel Gibson a misogynistic pig... Enough said... It's always better not to meet the artist when you love the art.
Lost in my thoughts I nearly miss the tall man who enters the shop carrying a large bag with our logo on it.
"Good morning sir," I say despite the fact that, judging by the general aspect of the man, his morning must have been anything but good. "How can I help you on this beautiful day?"
The man is in his mid forties, athletic, wearing a three pieces suit and tanned to a crisp like your average Angelino. That's pretty much all the positive you can say about his aspect. The rest is, as a matter of fact, a wreck, the shadows under his eyes are the size of a weather balloon, the look he gives me must have originated somewhere in a graveyard, the trembling lip, the three day beard... A wreck I tell you.
"Yes..." he says, "yes, there's something you can do! You have to take this back!"
He takes a beautiful fur coat out of the bag. I recognize it because we received it last week. It's a large woman's coat made from a very rare Carpathian Wolf pelt. I remember it clearly because the piece is magnificent and also because I have something with wolves and the Carpathians, but if need be I'll tell you all about it later.
"I'm terribly sorry sir but it's against house policy to take back merchandise that has been worn, if you want I can direct you towards a reseller that will most certainly give you a fair price for it," I say.
"I don't care about the money all I want is to get rid of it. If you don't want it I'll throw it."
"I'm sorry sir but I really can't take it back." I say, "I can't pay you back."
"Oh fuck it," he says storming out of the shop leaving me with the pelt.
I'm breathless. Not that I haven't had complicated customers before. In this kind of trade half of the customers can be considered complicated and the other half is plain pain in the ass. No what left me with my jaw halfway through the floor is a thing I saw on the man's neck. A thing you usually get to see in movies, not in real life: a bite mark, a small half circle of normal sized upper jaw teeth marks finishing on each side with two deep wounds, small and round, covered with encrusted blood, a peculiar bite mark, the bite mark of a vampire...
Do you remember that I told you that Carpathians and wolves were a thing for me, right? Well, maybe it's time we talk about it. It's always hard to say this, even to myself... but I have this vampire fetish, I've had it all my life, or at least since I was old enough to have fetishes. I dig them... My ex, Mike, had this pair of a bit oversized incisors- nothing supernatural mind you, but, damn, they did made me hot. I loved to kiss him just to touch them with my tongue. When I kissed him, I always hoped that he would tilt my head and sink them in my neck. He never did... What do you want, this is real life, there aren't vampires running around. Or are there?
No that's bullshit; this is California, Lala land; Hollywood is just a few miles away; that man must have been an actor or something...
Suddenly I realize that I've been caressing the fur for the last minute or so. I stuff it back in the bag, I leave the bag in the back and, planning on talking about it to my uncle as soon as he gets in, I go back behind the counter waiting for the next customer to arrive.
But when he gets in, around twelve, I'm taking care of a customer, when I get rid of the pompous bitch that was "just browsing", it's his turn to be taking care of someone else, and so forth until I completely forget about the bag.
I leave work around four. As I walk back to the car my uncle lent me, I realize that the bag with the pelt is in my hand. I don't even remember picking it up. For a moment I want to turn around and give it back, but something stops me. After all, there's no reason why I shouldn't keep it, the man wanted to throw it away, in a sense it's as if I had found it, in a sense this pelt is mine. All the way back to my uncle's home the coat on my back seat occupies my every thought. Each time I stop at a traffic light I have to put my hand in the bag to feel the supremely soft hair of the dead Carpathian wolf. The coat is quite amazing; when I touch it, a warm electric feeling runs through my fingers. It's highly erotic. My mind is so clouded with it that I nearly run an old man over. When finally I arrive home all I can think of is locking myself in my room with the pelt.
